Pushing a New Measure of UC Budgets in Sacramento

Pushing a New Measure of UC Budgets in Sacramento

UCOP's budget request for 2010-11 was good (see the summary).  It goes looking for a big bounce - from down over $800 million this year, to in principle...

A Modest Proposal

A Modest Proposal

To Enable the Young, Poor, and Sick to Contribute to Fixing the BudgetBy Jonathan LemuelEveryone knows that California is facing a crisis. But the increases in fees for UC, CSU, and Community College students, the recent proposals of the Parsky Commission to shift the tax burden more onto the poor and the middle class, the legislature’s limited changes to California’s criminal...

Where Should We Go After the Fee Hikes?

Where Should We Go After the Fee Hikes?

legitimacy and the great public absence by Kris Peterson, UC Irvine I just finished watching a YouTube video of Regents Bonnie Reiss and Eddie Island make a quick get-a-way to their vehicle at UCLA - just after they voted to increase student fees by an unprecedented 32%. They were surrounded and followed by students chanting, “Shame on you!” Reiss represents the banking and finance...

Doomsday Medicine

Doomsday Medicine

The only good news coming out of UCLA has been the student protests. They attracted lots of media coverage of the financial hardships caused by the...

UCOP Says Fee Hikes Don't Hurt Students; Students Disagree

UCOP Says Fee Hikes Don't Hurt Students; Students Disagree

From SAVE UCLA: Subject: TOMOR- ROW: PART II, Statewide Mobili-zation Against the Fee Hikes at Covel Commons! Today was hard and unexpected, but tomorrow...

What the Regents should do instead of increasing fees

What the Regents should do instead of increasing fees

If you are going to inflict pain on students, the least you can do is feel their pain.  The second thing you can do is broadcast their pain to the Governor and the legislature that caused it.    Maybe then they’d think twice about forcing more fee hikes with more cuts. Maybe even the fanatical governor would think twice, since he is promising still deeper cuts,...

The Public and Higher Education

The Public and Higher Education

by Michael MeranzeAs we head into this week’s Regents meeting and the imminent increase of student fees, Andrew Dickson is right to draw attention to the political and funding implications of the recent PPI poll on higher education. The results, as he makes clear, are sobering. The public, at least as represented in the poll, thinks well of the Community Colleges, CSU, and UC,...

The Politics of Solidarity

The Politics of Solidarity

The Department of English at Riverside has issued a letter of solidarity in response to the Budget Crisis. President Yudof has responded her...

NOtes on UCOF Meeting November 12

NOtes on UCOF Meeting November 12

Thanks to Bob Samuels for these notes on the UC Commission on the Future meeting this past wee...

Rose colored glasses -- do we need a new prescription?

Rose colored glasses -- do we need a new prescription?

Yesterday there was a Town Hall meeting at UCSD to discuss campus budget recommendations:"This open forum will provide an opportunity for faculty, staff and students to communicate directly with members of the Joint Senate-Administration Task Force on Budget. The Task Force is charged with providing recommendations for sustaining UC San Diego’s academic excellence during budget...

Regents Meeting Events, Petition to Delay Fee Hikes

Regents Meeting Events, Petition to Delay Fee Hikes

Please note links featured in the blog's other columns: SAVE's petition to postpone fee hikes, and a survey and further information on travel to the Regents' meeting at UCLA Nov 17-1...

UCSB Student Coalition Demands for UCSB Chancellor

UCSB Student Coalition Demands for UCSB Chancellor

The UCSB student coalition demands are here. See also the first issue of UC Solidarity Notes, a student-worker joint productio...

A View from a Science Department

A View from a Science Department

By Anonymous Part 1: Response to previous and current cuts I am a faculty member in a research unit receiving a large amount of extramural and especially federal funding. We are primarily a graduate department, and only about a third of our teaching is currently at the undergraduate level. Since we offer few service courses, we have few TA positions available to provide a...

News from UC Riverside

News from UC Riverside

From Pat Morton, Professor of Art History, UCR There are a number of activist groups working at UCR right now, including UCR Mobilize, Social Justice Alliance, and Concerned Faculty of UCR.  They emerged out of the September 24 Walkout and Teach-In, which attracted about 1000 people over the course of the 5 hour program.  (Chancellor White even came to the Teach-In...

Professional Degree Fees Jumping: Is this Happening at Your School?

Professional Degree Fees Jumping: Is this Happening at Your School?

We received a query from Jessica Luk, and would appreciate receiving more news about new professional degree fees.  Similiar increases have been proposed for Berkeley's School of Social Welfare. I'm a graduate student in the Masters of City Planning program, and our department is looking to levy a professional degree fee (PDF) on incoming students in the amount of $6,000/student/year....

UCOF at UCSD

UCOF at UCSD

On Friday, November 6, the traveling medicine show called UCOF arrived in La Jolla to "listen" to the UC San Diego community. Commission members included UCSC Chancellor Blumenthal, Cynthia Brown, Mary Croughan, Keith Williams, CFO Peter Taylor of UCOP, and student regent Jesse Bernal. The audience peaked at about 125 but was down to less than 100 by the time public comments...

UC Berkeley's Senate Endorses Cut in Athletics Aid

UC Berkeley's Senate Endorses Cut in Athletics Aid

Having learned that Berkeley's Department of Intercollegiate Athletics is running losses that the campus administration was covering, the Division Senate voted 91-68 for an immediate end to loans and subsidies.  The Resolution starts on page 5 of the Notice of the meeting, and the Division had posted background materials.  ASUC also passed a resolution calling for an...

Twilight in Riverside

Twilight in Riverside

by Toby Miller, Professor of Media and Cultural Studies The phones are being turned off. The garbage is no longer being removed from offices. Student fees are rumored to be going up by 35%. Faculty salaries have been slashed by 4-10%. The entire place will be closed from mid-December for weeks. Dozens of chairs at the University of California, San Diego have signed a document...

Advocacy and the Done Deal

Advocacy and the Done Deal

by Kristin Peterson, Anthropology Department, UC Irvine On Monday, November 2, UCOF stopped off at UCI -  a very good post to this blog on the same day summarized this dire event.  At one point, the panel moderator asked the audience for ideas on how to lobby the California Legislature - ideas were needed to advocate on behalf of the UC. My colleague next to me was...

Post-Employment Benefits and Senate Vice-Chair at UCSB

Post-Employment Benefits and Senate Vice-Chair at UCSB

I've posted reports on the most recent appearance of UCOP people and issues at UCSB.  They are worth reading. For a few years, UCOP was saying that employees needed to restart contributions to the pension fund in order to secure UC's great "defined benefit" pension.  Now, the Task Force is considering whether to get rid of DB pensions, with various permutations, even...

To the Gould Commission, from Michael Montoya

To the Gould Commission, from Michael Montoya

Sent October 2009Dear Commissioners,Thanks for agreeing to serve and for allowing the opportunity to comment. I have one overriding comment that stems from my research and teaching across disciplines.Students increasingly approach their degrees as means to a prescribed end. I see this in social and natural sciences, medicine, law, engineering and less so in humanities. The pressures...

Gould Commission at UCI

Gould Commission at UCI

The Gould Commission came to UCI, with our own Chancellor Drake, Cynthia Brown, Mary Croughan and Chris Edley presenting the Commission's structure, its mission and its willingness to listen to a sparse audience, perhaps sixty profs at most with a smattering of students and staff. The Commission asserted that the policy recommendations that they were going to draw up were not...

Higher Education As A Public Good

Higher Education As A Public Good

By Michael MeranzeNovember promises to be a tumultuous month in the UC system. The beginnings of the Gould Commission’s flyovers of campuses, the upcoming Regents Meeting and the vote on increasing fees, the planned protests by staff, students, and faculty, all indicate that the month will be crucial moment in the re-definition of the University. Nothing will be solved in November,...