News

Pepper Report Seems to Temper Response to Berkeley Broccoli Occupation

Byuclafaculty

An earlier post reported on this occupation.  Here is an update.  === Farm occupiers fail to respond to UC proposal Peter Fimrite, May 7, 2012,  San Francisco Chronicle (excerpts) Protesters occupying land in Albany used by UC Berkeley for agricultural research missed a weekend deadline to agree to a negotiated departure, but representatives said they would respond Monday.  University officials said they would consider more forceful measures after the group Occupy the Farm failed to respond to their proposal to end the encampment in exchange for discussions about using part of the 10-acre plot for urban farming. …On April 22,…

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Leaving California

Byuclafaculty

The Sacramento Bee today carries the graphic on the left accompanying a story about an increase in California high school grads who are leaving the state for college elsewhere due to rising tuition here in public higher ed and restricted admissions slots. Even though out-of-state privates have higher sticker prices for tuition than California public universities, aid of various types brings down the gap.Click on the graphic for a sharper view or go the article at the link below. The article is at http://www.sacbee.com/2012/05/06/4469074/more-college-bound-californians.html Whatever happened to: Things seem to have reversed:

Mild Penalty for Berkeley Administrator Trumped by Faculty Protests

Byuclafaculty

Secret sex partner’s pay gets former UC Berkeley vice chancellor fired (excerpt)Matt Krupnick, 5-4-12, Pasadena Star-NewsUC Berkeley on Friday fired administrator Diane Leite, who over a period of five years helped triple her secret sex partner’s pay.  Leite had been demoted from her $188,000-a-year assistant vice chancellor position after the affair with a subordinate was discovered but still made $175,000 a year as an adviser to Vice Chancellor Graham Fleming… “Ms. Leite’s employment with the university has been terminated,” UC Berkeley spokesman Dan Mogulof said Friday. The firing is effective Tuesday. …Professors and other employees had urged the university to…

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Systemwide Pepper-Spray Report Released

Byuclafaculty

After the pepper-spray incident at UC-Davis, various reports were prepared.  Among them is one recently released for comment by UC General Counsel Charles Robinson and UC-Berkeley Law School dean Christopher Edley.  Below are some excerpts from the Robinson-Edley Report followed by a link to the full report.  Note that unlike other reports, this one is meant to be advisory to the entire UC system rather than just UC-Davis.  News accounts have noted the report’s idea of musing “mediation” to defuse conflicts.  See, for example, http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2012/05/05/MN3P1ODI4S.DTL Excerpts from “Robinson-Edley Report” …We have divided our recommendations into the following nine thematic categories:…

Cinco de Mayo Background: UCLA-Related Insights

Byuclafaculty

Sometimes this blog posts items relevant to holidays of the day and today is Cinco de Mayo.  On May 3, 2012, UCLA Professor David Hayes-Bautista was interviewed by Warren Olney on KCRW radio’s Which Way LA? about the history of Cinco de Mayo.  He was also interviewed on the UCLA Newsroom blog on the same topic and recorded a YouTube video for that blog on the subject of Cinco de Mayo (link to that video and text at http://newsroom.ucla.edu/portal/ucla/uncovering-the-origins-of-the-232941.aspx). Prof. Hayes-Bautista notes that the celebration of the holiday has much to do with the American Civil War.  On the radio…

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Time Out for More Seat Time?

Byuclafaculty

As readers of this blog will know, at the March Regents meeting, UCLA attempted – and failed – to get Regental endorsement of its proposed hotel/conference center project.  After an embarrassing session of a Regental committee at which the proposal was presented, UCLA pulled the item from the agenda due to the strong doubts expressed by members of the committee.  It was said that the item would be brought back to the Regents in May. The May 16 agenda for that meeting has just been posted and no such item is to be found. At a recent meeting for staff…

Escape the Mundane Tomorrow

Byuclafaculty

If you wish to escape the mundane (Earthly) problems that usually are reported in this blog, consider the following tomorrow night: The full Moon has a reputation for trouble. It raises high tides, it makes dogs howl, it wakes you up in the middle of the night with beams of moonlight stealing through drapes. If a moonbeam wakes you up on the night of May 5th, 2012, you might want to get out of bed and take a look.  This May’s full Moon is a “super Moon,” as much as 14% bigger and 30% brighter than other full Moons of…

Letter of Non-Intent

Byuclafaculty

The Beverly Hills Courier published an interesting history of the Japanese Garden and its proposed sale by UCLA in its May 4 issue.  Links to just that article and to the paper as a whole are below.  It contains an interesting statement by former Dean Fred Eiserling on p. 10: Using a letter written by Dean of Life Sciences Fred Eiserling in June 1993 to Vice Chancellor Alan Charles, UCLA partially based its argument to sell the gardens on Eiserling’s assertion that it did research purpose and would be better suited for another use within the University. In 1965, the…

We’re (in Wave) #1!! Guess We’ll Go With the Swim

Byuclafaculty

Inside Higher Ed pointed me to a UC notice dated 5-3-12 in which it was announced that certain UC human resource functions will be consolidated at UC-Riverside.  UCLA will be among the first set of campuses (“Wave #1”) to make the transition. UC RIVERSIDE SELECTED TO HOST NEW EMPLOYEE SERVICE CENTER   After a thorough review and analysis, UCPath executive sponsors Peter Taylor, chief financial officer, and Nathan Brostrom, executive vice president of business operations, have selected UC Riverside as the host location for the UCPath Center, the new systemwide shared service center.  The UCPath Center will process routine transactions related…

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Gov. Brown: “Vote for the Tax. Suck it In.”

Byuclafaculty

There probably have been more enticing campaign slogans for ballot initiatives.  But Governor Brown seems to have come up with one that is, well, quotable for the November ballot initiative campaign.  He does appear to have gathered the necessary signatures to get the tax initiative on the ballot, despite a very short timeline for doing so.  UC is likely to endorse the initiative in one way or another.  Details athttp://blogs.sacbee.com/capitolalertlatest/2012/05/jerry-brown-says-tax-signatures-in-hand.html