Year: 2013

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    Fossils

    Byuclafaculty

    If you have listened to the public comment sessions at Regents meetings posted on this blog, you will have heard statements from a student group pushing the Regents to divest its pension and other portfolios from “fossil fuels.”  By this demand, the group – which is part of a national movement – appears to mean not just oil-coal-gas producers but also at least some major utilities.  We have noted that there are problems with using other peoples’ money to favor or disfavor particular political/social causes, partly involving the esoteric elements of finance and returns to the portfolio, but also the…

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    What do you know? Another view of the UCLA Grand Hotel court decision is out there!

    Byuclafaculty

    Yesterday, we provided a link to UCLA’s “shame media release” on the recent court decision regarding the Grand Hotel project.  You might not be totally surprised to know that there is an alternative view of what occurred.  You might not be totally surprised to know that the alternative view projects a more favorable view regarding the plaintiff’s position. But in case you ARE surprised, we provide a link below for reading the alternative:

  • Cooperation?

    Byuclafaculty

    As previous posts noted, for now the Congressional impasse and government shutdown is having only limited effects on higher ed so far.  The effects will increase as time passes without a resolution. Right now, the prospects of such a resolution are difficult to see.  From the website of the San Francisco Chronicle: Indiana GOP Rep. Marlin Stutzman said he wanted respect in the budget standoff. Instead, he got ridicule from President Barack Obama and Senate Democrats. Stutzman is being mocked for saying Republicans should get something from the budget standoff — but he doesn’t know what that is. The tea…

  • Cartoon wisdom that continues to dog us online

    Byuclafaculty

    The cartoon above appeared twenty years ago.  According to Inside Higher Ed today, it still has much merit: …Ocorrafoo Cobange, a biologist at the Wassee Institute of Medicine in Asmara, recently had an article about the medical properties of a chemical extracted from a lichen accepted for publication — by more than half of the 304 open-access journals he submitted it to. Of course, Cobange is not real, and neither is the Wassee Institute. They are both inventions of John Bohannon, the Harvard University biologist and writer who documented the study in this week’s edition of Science. “Acceptance was the…

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    Will common sense prevail?

    Byuclafaculty

    The LA County DA continues to pursue a case against a UCLA faculty member that sure seems like a matter for civil, not criminal, litigation.  Will common sense prevail in the DA’s office?  So far, no sign of it happening. From the Daily Bruin: At a pretrial hearing Thursday, a Los Angeles County judge ordered UCLA chemistry professor Patrick Harran to return to court next month regarding a lawsuit that involves the death of a UCLA lab assistant in a 2008 laboratory fire.Harran is expected back in court on Nov. 20, said Daniel Prince, a lawyer representing Harran. His trial…

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    Don’t twist their arms

    Byuclafaculty

    Our previous post noted that donors do not inherently insist on capital projects.  In fact, UCLA just got $20 million, it was announced yesterday, for environmental teaching and research: http://centurycity.patch.com/groups/schools/p/hyatt-hotel-heirs-donate-20m-to-ucla   Some dutiful blog readers will recall that over a year ago we posted an interview with Mark Yudof in which he insisted that UC puts donor money into buildings only when the donors absolutely insist on it – which is not at all the history of the UCLA Grand Hotel.  You can find the audio of the interview at: http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2012/07/ucla-hotel-did-not-happen-that-way.html The fact is that donors have interests beyond bricks…

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    Aint that a shame?

    Byuclafaculty

    It was another slow day at the worksite of the UCLA Grand Hotel yesterday.  The photo above was taken around 10:30 am.  Apparently, there was more action in the courtroom.  According to a media release put out by UCLA, a court decision removed the donors from one of the two lawsuits against the Grand Hotel.  (One lawsuit says the environmental review wasn’t done properly; the other says the hotel will have to pay taxes.)  You can find the media release at: http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/donors-ucla-foundation-removed-248713.aspx The Daily Bruin version, based on the release, is at:http://dailybruin.com/2013/10/02/luskins-ucla-foundation-dismissed-as-defendants-in-case/ According to the media release, it was “shameful”…

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    On Demand

    Byuclafaculty

    We noted yesterday in a posting on former UC president Mark Yudof’s ruminations upon leaving office that his successor, Janet Napolitano, was possibly going to experience a vote of no-confidence from a student group at UCLA on her second day in office.  As it turned out, that didn’t quite happen.  Instead, various “demands” were enacted.  From the Daily Bruin: The undergraduate student government unanimously passed a resolution calling for University of California President Janet Napolitano to comply with a list of demands compiled by students from multiple UC campuses. The resolution passed after members of the Undergraduate Students Association Council…

  • Not the Only Way

    Byuclafaculty

    Not the only blog & not the only way The simple way to read this blog is to do what you are doing now and click on it.  If you do it daily, you won’t miss anything.  (Or, if you do miss, you can always go back in time in it.)  But at the end of each quarter, we have been offering an alternative mode of reading.  If you click on the link below, you can read it like a book for the period July through September 2013.  However, you will find differences in the format and – most important…

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    Garden Therapy

    Byuclafaculty

    Blog readers will know that UCLA tried to sell the Hannah Carter Japanese Garden and has been blocked so far by litigation since the original agreement specified the university would maintain the garden “in perpetuity.” This blog has urged UCLA to sit down with the family and others who have an interest and work out a deal that would conserve the garden even if it is sold.  Basically, the reason the sale has been blocked to this point is that the university’s attempt to sell it failed the sniff test.  If you haven’t followed the issue, type in “Japanese garden”…