|

Cautionary Tales for the Regents

Byuclafaculty


The New York Times today runs cautionary tales today about universities that go on building booms, build up debt, and get into trouble.  The opening lines give you the flavor:
 
Some call it the Edifice Complex. Others have named it the Law of More, or the Taj Mahal syndrome. A decade-long spending binge to build academic buildings, dormitories and recreational facilities — some of them inordinately lavish to attract students — has left colleges and universities saddled with large amounts of debt. Oftentimes, students are stuck picking up the bill.
Overall debt levels more than doubled from 2000 to 2011 at the more than 500 institutions rated by Moody’s, according to inflation-adjusted data compiled for The New York Times by the credit rating agency. In the same time, the amount of cash, pledged gifts and investments that colleges maintain declined more than 40 percent relative to the amount they owe. With revenue pinched at institutions big and small, financial experts and college officials are sounding alarms about the consequences of the spending and borrowing…
Full article at http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/14/business/colleges-debt-falls-on-students-after-construction-binges.html
 
Do the Regents read the NY Times?  Let’s listen carefully to the January Regents meeting to see if there is any sign that they do?  Or do they just continue approving expensive projects (without getting independent reviews) on the basis of nice Excel sheets that always show all is well accompanied by pretty architectural plans?

Similar Posts

| | | |

UCLA-FA files Unfair Labor Practices charge against UC

Byadmin

LOS ANGELES, CA (June 5, 2024) – On June 3rd, the UCLA Faculty Association (UCLAFA) filed unfair labor practice (ULP) charges against the University of California (UC) to vindicate faculty rights to protest, organize, and exercise academic freedom. The ULP charges the UC for UCLA’s failure to uphold, and their choice to interfere with, faculty’s legally protected rights during and after the recent UCLA Palestine Solidarity Encampment. This is the fourth organization to file a ULP against the UC in the wake of its actions at UCLA in late April and early May, following charges by UAW, UC-AFT and AFSCME….

Faculty call for pause on budget & network security changes at UCLA

Byhigbie

Over 250 UCLA faculty, including a large number of department chairs and center directors, have written Chancellor Block with a detailed critique of plans for administrative centralization. The letter follows earlier exchanges between department chairs and Executive Vice Chancellor/Provost Emily Carter and other top administrators. “Although we appreciated the fora that EVC/P Carter recently organized in response to an earlier letter requesting more time to evaluate the re-organization plans she is proposing, we continue to feel that there has been insufficient time or detail to evaluate their consequences and that we have not been adequately involved in the consultation process,”…

| | |

Jerry Brown Looks for an Online Course that Requires No Human Interaction

Byuclafaculty

At the Regents meeting of January 22, 2014, Gov. Brown seems to be searching for an online course that requires no human interaction.  Such a course, he reasons, could have unlimited enrollment because it is completely self-contained.  He gets some pushback from UC Provost Dorr, who thinks courses should have such interaction.  You can hear this excerpt at the link below.  The entire meeting of the Committee on Educational Policy of the Regents was posted yesterday.[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3tYFLJvrE3g?feature=player_detailpage]

| | | | | | |

Listen to Part of the Regents Afternoon Session of 1-22-2014

Byuclafaculty

As we have noted in numerous prior posts, the Regents refuse to archive their meetings beyond one year.  So we dutifully record the sessions in real time.  Below is a link to part of the afternoon session of Jan. 22.  This segment is mainly the Committee on Educational Policy.  Gov. Brown was in attendance.  We will separately (later) provide links just to certain Brown segments.  But for now, we provide a continuous recording. There was discussion of designating certain areas of UC-Merced as nature reserves, followed by discussion of a new telescope.  The discussion then turned to online ed and…

| | | | | | | | |

Tradition!

Byuclafaculty

The Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) has issued a report on UC and CSU funding.  LAO is usually viewed as a neutral agency.  But it is a component of the legislature.  So it tends to favor approaches that add to legislative control as opposed to, say, gubernatorial control.  This report is no exception. LAO seems to want to return to what it terms the “traditional” approach to funding, but with bells and whistles added to monitor legislative goals.  The traditional approach seems to be one focused on undergraduate enrollment.  But in fact the tradition – such as it is – has…