Robert Samuels: Giving Up on Education at UCLA?

Giving Up On Education at UCLA?
By Robert Samuels, President of UC-AFT

The UCLA undergraduate College has sent layoff notices to almost all of its continuing appointment lecturers. In the layoff notice, it explicitly states that the university is considering suspending all of its undergraduate requirements. This is a drastic move that needs to be resisted, and this type of change could hurt the reputation of the UC system for years to come. The UCLA take on this story is posted on their website

UCLA has already suspended its undergraduate general education seminar requirement, and this move was done by an executive committee and not the full senate. In other words, UCLA and other UCs, could suspend undergraduate requirements without going through their faculty senates. Moreover, a special budgetary task force recommends moving writing, language, and math courses to either summer, extension, or online. In this structure, students would have to pay extra to take required classes.

All faculty should be concerned about defending the quality of undergraduate education, and if the 4,000 lecturers in the UC system are eliminated, the entire structure of the UC system would change. Go here for more on these changes.