Author: admin

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    Issue of UC Health Cap for Students Heats Up

    Byadmin

    We noted in a prior post this past weekend that there is a cap on the dollar payouts for student health insurance at UC.  Major illnesses can cause students to hit the cap. Below is an excerpt from a San Francisco Chronicle article that seems to imply – but doesn’t quite say – that UC chose self-funding of the student health plan to avoid a ban on such caps in the Obama health plan:  Health care limits like the one imposed by UC are already illegal under the sweeping federal health-care law – dubbed Obamacare – that takes full effect…

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    No Rush Online at Yale

    Byadmin

    Inside Higher Ed today carries a report that Yale is taking a gradual approach to online education and not rushing into MOOC delivery.  Excerpt: News of universities partnering with massive open online course providers has become commonplace, which is why Yale University stands out for what it’s not doing: rushing. While many top universities — including Harvard and Stanford Universities, along with many others — were announcing partnerships and launching their first MOOCs, Yale sat back, watched, and evaluated… Watching and waiting — and strategizing — can be a difficult choice to make given the “herd mentality” that has developed around MOOCS,…

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    Return of the Local Deli

    Byadmin

    Several weeks ago, we noted that Junior’s Deli on Westwood (north of Pico) was closing what was probably the closest deli to UCLA.  It appears that another deli, Lenny’s, will open in that location, according to the Westwood-Century City Patch:http://centurycity.patch.com/articles/lenny-s-deli-to-replace-junior-s-deli-in-westwood Lenny’s operated in Pacific Palisades but closed recently.  It isn’t yet open in the new location but it has a website with pictures of healthy foods as above:http://www.lensdeli.com/ But don’t overeat:[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rXH_12QWWg8?feature=player_detailpage]

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    Will Help Be On the Way?

    Byadmin

    From today’s LA Times: After he retires as chancellor of UC Berkeley in June, Robert J. Birgeneau will head up a national effort to study and help public universities in an era of reduced tax support, new technology and changing student demographics. Birgeneau, a physicist, is to lead the American Academy of Arts and Sciences’ new initiative that will propose ways for the federal government, private industry and foundations to better aid state institutions, along with developing reforms the schools could undertake. It is being called “The Lincoln Project: Excellence and Access in Public Higher Education” — named for President…

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    Burning Sofas: A Lesson for the Governor on UC

    Byadmin

    A column in today’s Sacramento Bee tells a tale about sofas with lessons for the governor.   Here is an excerpt: Gov. Jerry Brown is about to repent for a sin he didn’t know he committed in 1975. Ten months after Brown took office the first time, his administration produced a little-noticed regulation requiring that furniture sold in California comply with the strictest fire safety standard in the nation. Befitting its turgid language, the regulation came to be known as Technical Bulletin 117. Although it was supposed to save lives, another story has emerged in the intervening decades. Technical Bulletin…

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    UC Student Medical Insurance Limits

    Byadmin

    From the Contra Costa Times: UC Santa Cruz graduate student Micha Rahder suffers from a rare disorder that requires her to be hooked up to an IV over two days, five to eight hours at a time, every four weeks… In November, she got a letter from the university saying she had used $378,000 of the $400,000 lifetime limit for students on the University of California student health insurance plan (also known as UC SHIP), Radner said. In early January, a little more three years after her first treatment, she received another letter. “It comes from the Office of the…

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    Peter Schrag on Yudof Retirement

    Byadmin

    Peter Schrag, a former columnist for the Sacramento Bee, wrote an op ed about President Yudof’s retirement.  Excerpt: …All told, the UC is in far better shape now than when he came. But it’s unlikely that it can ever again exercise the kind of influence, both in this country and abroad, that it did in its glory days under Clark Kerr in the 1950s and 1960s. It was an era when new UC campuses and new programs were created one after another, when students paid low “fees” and not tuition, and when California adopted a master plan that promised every…

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    Do as the governor says online; but not as he does

    Byadmin

    Gov. Brown has been pushing online education as the key to closing the gap between what he proposes to give UC in his budget and what UC requests.  Various prior posts on this blog have dealt with that issue.  He also wants to foreclose tuition increases as a way to close the gap.  So let’s take a look at the governor’s use of online communications: Above is a screenshot of the governor’s multimedia element of his website: http://gov.ca.gov/home.php [click on multimedia].  It was taken at around 6 AM this morning. [Click on the image to enlarge it.]  If you are…

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    Student Regent Asks Why Students Weren’t Consulted About Online Education (and no one quite answers)

    Byadmin

    At the Jan. 16 session of the UC Regents dealing with online education, student regent Jonathan Stein asked why UC students were not consulted.  Various regents spoke in response.  Notably, Gov. Brown responded with the admonition to “get real” about the budget, but he did not address why students were not consulted.  In addition, UC-Berkeley Law Dean Christopher Edley – who has been active in UC online efforts – was asked to respond.  His response dealt with potential access by non-UC students.  But he also did not address the question of why UC students were not consulted. Stein’s remarks refer…

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    Jerry Brown on Higher Ed Funding in the State of the State

    Byadmin

    In case you missed it, Gov. Brown’s State of the State message yesterday contained only a brief paragraph on public higher education.  Most of his education remarks were directed at K-12.  Below is what he said about higher ed: “With respect to higher education, cost pressures are relentless and many students cannot get the classes they need. A half million fewer students this year enrolled in the community colleges than in 2008. Graduation in four years is the exception and transition from one segment to the other is difficult. The University of California, the Cal State system and the community…