Author: uclafaculty

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Davis and Merced Get Drones, But We Have Snodgrass

Byuclafaculty

The website California’s Capitol reports that UC-Davis and UC-Merced have applied to the FAA to have drones. http://www.californiascapitol.com/2013/10/californias-drone-applicants/ and https://www.eff.org/files/filenode/faa_coa_list-2012.pdf. Obviously, the rest of us will be falling behind in this technology.  But at least we have Prof. Snodgrass who drones on and on, as former UC president Yudof once reminded us in his soliloquy on online higher ed:

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More late night 405 troubles near UCLA

Byuclafaculty

The on- and off-ramps between southbound I-405 and Sunset Boulevard will be closed to all traffic from 9 pm until 5 am nightly from tonight (October 29) until the morning of Saturday, November 2nd. Wilshire and Santa Monica Boulevards should be open as alternatives. Good luck getting home:[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SC4NmZSlDeY?feature=player_detailpage]

Just saying no

Byuclafaculty

Dirks agrees From the Washington Post: …What brought [UC-Berkeley chancellor Nicholas Dirks] to Washington, among other business, was a meeting with top U.S. Education Department officials to discuss President Obama’s plan for the federal government to rate colleges on value by the start of the 2015-16 school year. Obama announced the plan in August, part of what was billed as an effort to increase college affordability. The rating system is still under design. Obama proposed that ratings should be based on measures such as the percentage of students receiving Pell grants; the average tuition, scholarships, and loan debt at a…

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Looks like the Regents Will Have to Continue to Grin and Bear It

Byuclafaculty

…The Democratic governor said of his own time in office, “I’m working pretty darn hard, and yet I can’t spend a lot of time on getting into the intricacies of government. So that, over the next year, that’s something that interests me, to try to understand … to get a real world feel of what’s under my responsibility, and I don’t think many governors have ever done that.” Brown said doing so will allow him to “think and imagine and come up with things.” Full article at http://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2013/10/jerry-brown-seeking-real-world-feel-of-government.html

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LA Conservancy Picks Up Story of UCLA Japanese Garden

Byuclafaculty

The Los Angeles Conservancy includes a story in its November-December 2013 newsletter on the Hannah Carter Japanese Garden UCLA has been blocked from selling through litigation.  We continue to suggest that UCLA work with conservation groups and the family to find a solution that will preserve the garden.  Litigation is costly for the university and its purpose should not be simply to gratify someone’s ego in Murphy Hall.  How about a focus that is less on “winning” and more on achieving the dual goals of garden preservation and revenue for UCLA? You can read the LA Conservancy’s story at:

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UCLA History: Where’s the bridge?

Byuclafaculty

The roadway that connects the plaza between Dodd and Murphy to the one between Royce and Powell carries the sign above referring to a bridge.  Many in the UCLA community know the history but for those who don’t, the seeming roadway is in fact a bridge over a ravine that was long ago filled with dirt.  When the Westwood campus was being constructed, however, the ravine was a prominent feature and the bridge was one of the early structures built as the photo below shows. When the campus opened in 1929, crossing the bridge was a common occurrence as show…

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Brown Joins Harvard in Rejecting Fossil Fuel Divestment

Byuclafaculty

We have noted in previous posts that there is a student group that has been using the public comment period at the Regents to push for pension and other fund divestment of fossil fuels. (The demand involves both extraction industries and some utilities.)  It is part of a national student movement.  If you scroll back to our links to Regents meetings, you will be able to hear those demands. Recently, as we have noted, Harvard rejected the demand.  See http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2013/10/04/harvard-rejects-call-divest-fossil-fuels.  Today, Inside Higher Ed is reporting that Brown University has also rejected it.  See http://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2013/10/28/brown-u-rejects-call-sell-holdings-coal-companies. Given the current anti-pension initiative…

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A “Hole” Lot of Money

Byuclafaculty

We have noted in previous posts that progress on the UCLA Grand Hotel seemed leisurely whenever yours truly dropped by with his trusty cell phone camera.  However, there is now a big hole at the work site for the Grand Hotel where once Parking Structure #6 stood as you can see from the photos taken last Thursday.  Many parking spaces were removed by the demolition.  A small number will be built under the Grand Hotel for use only by the Grand Hotel’s guests, not by general campus parkers.  (The Hotel will have fewer spaces relative to the number of rooms…

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The Whitaker-Baxter style campaign for the anti-pension initiative continues

Byuclafaculty

An earlier post on this blog provided a bit of California political history regarding Clem Whitaker and Leone Baxter, the couple in the photo, who developed an approach to campaigning in the 1930s.  As we noted, they developed a network that provided editorial content to newspapers around the state, pushing whatever cause they were paid to promote. The proponents of the anti-pension/anti-retiree health care initiative that was recently filed and which sweeps in UC, seem to be following the Whitaker-Baxter playbook, as we have previously noted.  Yet another example can be found below in which one newspaper reprints a pro-initiative…

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Hints While You Puzzle Through Your Health Insurance Options from a Blog Reader

Byuclafaculty

As we are coming up to the open enrollment period for the various health insurance options, Prof. Bill Zame of Economics sent me an email with a cautionary note readers may want to consider.  (Edited excerpt): When insurance plans use the term “out of pocket maximums,” they do not mean what an ordinary lay person would mean by the term. As used by the insurance industry and the [open enrollment] plans, only healthcare expenses that are “ordinary and necessary” (by [industry] standards) are included toward  “out of pocket maximums” and only charges that are deemed to be in the range normally…