Year: 2013

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    A Modest Proposal from Joe Mathews

    Byuclafaculty

    …The University of California badly needs a president who knows how to fight. For 25 years, the UC has been playing nice and doing the right thing. And that’s gotten the system nowhere. The UC opted to be responsible and not buy the kind of Prop 98-style protection that the K-14 system bought. The result: UC made itself easy to cut. The UC made a series of compacts with governors on cuts and spending – only to see those cuts exceed what was agreed to. And more recently, the UC has stood back, meekly, as the governor and legislators have…

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    Rampaging 405 Construction

    Byuclafaculty

    Despite the picture, the ramp will be down, not up. Which ramp?On Friday, March 8, the I-405 Sepulveda Pass Improvements Project will begin demolishing the third of eight ramps joining Wilshire Bl and the I-405 freeway. This time the southbound I-405 ramp to westbound Wilshire will be rebuilt. The ramp will be closed beginning March 8 at 8pm. The contractor anticipates reopening the new ramp by 6am, Friday March 22. Reconstruction of all eight Wilshire ramps is expected to be complete by the end of 2013… Source:http://www.metro.net/projects/I-405/wilshire-ramps-reconstruction/

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    Bad Law?

    Byuclafaculty

    Inside Higher Ed  today carries a brief report that faculty from many law schools (including some from UCs and Hastings) have signed a letter saying the current tuition, debt, and job market for law students are incompatible.  Excerpt from the letter:  …Over the last three decades, the price of a legal education has increased approximately three times faster than the average household income. With the help of the federal student loan fund, some ninety percent of law students borrow to finance their legal education and the average law school debt now exceeds $100,000. Overall, law students in 2011-2012 borrowed more…

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    Tobacco Tax Initiative for UC/CSU Student Aid Advances

    Byuclafaculty

    As prior posts have noted, an initiative was filed featuring a tobacco tax to be used mainly for student aid at UC and CSU.  Unlike many initiatives that are filed, there seems to be serious money behind it since it is being handled by a professional law firm that deals with electoral matters. The Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) has now come up with an analysis of the initiative, a step towards petition circulation. According to the LAO, about $730 million, net, would be raised by this initiative annually. Once the initiative is approved for circulation, we will see whether someone…

  • MOOC problem

    Byuclafaculty

    Inside Higher Ed has an article today on the problem of hate speech and suicide threats that appear among the many student comments in online MOOCs.  Excerpt:…Troubled MOOC users are an elephant in the room, said Gary Pavela, the author of a book on college student suicide and an instructor at Syracuse University and the University of Maryland’s College Park campus…Different analogies could be applied.  Since such courses are MOOcs, we prefer seeing the problem as a bull in a china shop. The article is at:http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/03/06/professors-wonder-how-deal-suicidal-or-homicidal-students-online

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    Regents to “Review” UCLA Teaching & Learning Center for Health Sciences

    Byuclafaculty

    The Regents will again be presented with a major UCLA capital project they have already discussed: The Teaching & Learning Center for the Health Sciences.  Regardless of the merits of this particular capital project or any other that comes before them from the campuses, in the end – as this blog has noted many times – the Regents have no independent review capability to evaluate capital proposals or to follow up on actual outcomes.  This particular project has a budget (see below) of $104.7 million, not chump change, plus another $6 million for furniture and equipment.  Past discussions at the…

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    Audit Results to be Presented at Regents

    Byuclafaculty

    Page 10 of audit report [click on image for clearer view] At the upcoming Regents meeting, there will be a presentation of the annual audit report through fiscal year 2011-12 (the year ending June 30, 2012).  Among other things, it reports a $26 billion budget for what the auditor calls core activities, as can be seen above.  This audit definition of “core” should not be confused with the similar term used in the state budget for UC which refers only to basic teaching activities and is essentially the state appropriation plus tuition (roughly one out of five dollars in the…

  • Uh Oh! The UC Elephant Lives!

    Byuclafaculty

    Who could forget the brouhaha when there was an attempt to replace the old UC seal with something that looked like an elephant’s behind, upside-down.  If you have nonetheless forgotten, you can be reminded at: http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2012/12/hindsight-on-yesterdays-post-on-new-uc.html The new seal seemingly was withdrawn.  But it lives on!  If you click on the UC newsroom webpage, you can still see it as shown above. This may require drastic action![youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aD9wL0ffxqY?feature=player_detailpage]

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    Traffic Nightmare Reported This Afternoon/Evening

    Byuclafaculty

    EMERGENCY OUTAGE NOTIFICATION! *****DESCRIPTION: What: Sepulveda Closure at Mulholland When: Currently Ongoing until midnight Impacts:  Sepulveda Blvd is closed in both directions at Mulholland due to police activity in that area. Mitigation: Please use either the 405 (joke, right?), Beverly Glen, or canyons further east. Thank God it’s not Friday.  Or maybe it is:*  *If you are too young to get the pun, ask an elder. UPDATE: Apparently Friday caught the culprits because Sepulveda is now reported as reopened.