The report was prepared for Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, who has made pension reform a top issue his last year in office… The report’s proposed changes echo the governor’s, many of which are politically difficult: reducing benefits for new employees, raising annual contributions to ward off shortfalls and shifting workers to a partial 401k system.
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by Denis C. Theriault, The San Jose Mercury News.
Posted: April 5th, 2010, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
While California universities have faced round after round of crippling budget cuts and protests against increased fees have flared on campuses, administrators have tapped funds meant for classrooms and students to cover some extraordinary costs: losses on ill-timed real estate deals, loans to high-ranking officials and an ambitious construction project. Experts say the moves, made without wide student knowledge or public oversight, show that administrators have put aggressive business plans ahead of the teaching mission. When things go wrong, they’re dipping into student fees, scholarship funds and money meant for classes to pick up the tab.
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by Jack Dolan, The Los Angeles Times.
Posted: April 4th, 2010, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
California’s public universities are using waiting lists this year for the first time, telling some top-notch students to wait two more months before they find out if they’re in. The practice – long common at selective private colleges – is yet another fallout from the state’s budget crisis, as the University of California and California State University look for ways to trim enrollment in response to last year’s historic funding cuts.
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by Laurel Rosenhall, The Sacramento Bee.
Posted: April 3rd, 2010, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
The nation’s 10 largest public pension funds have paid private equity firms more than $17 billion in fees since 2000, according to a new analysis conducted for The New York Times, as the funds flocked to these so-called alternative investments in hopes of reaping market-beating returns. But few big public funds ended up collecting the 20 to 30 percent returns that private equity managers often held out to attract pension money, a review of the funds’ performance shows.
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by Jenny Anderson, The New York Times.
Posted: April 2nd, 2010, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
Dr. Stobo said the university’s interests are twofold: First, the university is a public trust whose duty is to help the state solve its problems as well as serve medically underserved populations. Second, finding ways to reduce prison medical costs would ultimately free up money that could be spent on higher education. In a letter to The New York Times in January, Dr. Stobo said Texas spends $8 a day on health care for each inmate; California spends $22. If all parties agree to the proposal, the California governor’s office is hoping that the plan is well on the way to being up and running before Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger leaves office at the end of the year. "He wants it on a pathway so that when the next governor comes in, it’s almost on autopilot," Dr. Stobo said.
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by Michelle Quinn, The New York Times.
Posted: March 25th, 2010, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
Yudof proposed changing admissions policy across the UC system to adopt a holistic approach–which would take into account a student’s personal history in his or her UC application rather than only using a points-based system currently employed by many campuses–to increase the presence of underrepresented minorities at UC campuses… "The large number of people who are admitted decide not to come," he said. "I think that is a bigger problem than admissions." The campus’s yield rate for black students–the percentage of students who accept their admissions offer–is about 12 percent…
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by Javier Panzar, The Daily Californian.
Posted: March 24th, 2010, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
The UC regents are expected later this spring to remove the word "public" from the schools it examines when setting the price for attending professional school, opening the door to even faster tuition increases. This one-word change will move another step toward fully implementing Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s vision, articulated in the 2004 "Compact on Higher Education," to privatize UC and CSU. The governor has cut state support and overseen huge fee increases, shifting more of the cost of college onto students and their families. The UC regents would be using tuition and fees charged by private universities, which serve far fewer students and were never designed to create opportunities for the people of California, as the basis for setting fees for UC professional schools.
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by Stanton Glantz, The San Francisco Chronicle.
Posted: March 24th, 2010, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
Demonstrations for increased education funding continued Monday as roughly 5,000 students and employees from community colleges and California State University descended on the state Capitol for a noisy but peaceful rally… Monday’s demonstration was the latest in a string of protests that began in early March with students up and down the state speaking out against rising fees and reduced courses at California’s colleges and universities. Community college Chancellor Jack Scott said the state could make money by spending more on education. For every dollar the state spends on education, it gets $3 back in increased tax revenue, Scott said, because educated workers earn bigger salaries.
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by Laurel Rosenhall, The Sacramento Bee.
Posted: March 23rd, 2010, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
Breaking ranks with several other federal judges who have recently considered the question, a U.S. magistrate judge held last week that the First Amendment protects job-related statements made by faculty members of public colleges… U.S. Magistrate Judge Michael R. Mertz rejected the idea that the Garcetti ruling, which upheld the disciplining of a deputy district attorney for job-related statements, should be applied to speech in an academic setting. The judge’s ruling said universities "should be the active trading floors in the marketplace of ideas."
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by Staff, The Chronicle of Higher Education.
Posted: March 22nd, 2010, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
The plan, still being refined, could include the purchase or construction of a central hospital near several prison infirmaries for housing and treatment of the chronically sick. That would reduce the state’s current — and expensive — practice of paying correctional officers overtime to transport and guard inmates at community hospitals around the state. Eventually, the program would mean a sharp reduction in the number of employees providing care. The proposal would require approval from lawmakers and from federal judges presiding over inmate lawsuits on inadequate healthcare. It could meet with opposition from unions for state workers whose jobs might change or be eliminated.
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by Michael Rothfeld, The Los Angeles Times.
Posted: March 19th, 2010, by: admin. Categories: . Awaiting Comments.
