News

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    UCLA History: 1950s Westwood

    The third in our sequence of aerial photos of Westwood. This one probably taken in the 1950s. The Occidental building on Wilshire appears to be under construction. There is now much development at UCLA beyond Westwood. Earlier photos from the 1930s and 1920s are at http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2011/08/ucla-history-1930s-westwood.html and http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2011/08/ucla-history-1920s-westwood.html

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    Doing Good

    The Washington Monthly has a ranking of national universities by “their contribution to the public good.” It looks at such things as students on Pell Grants. UC-San Diego comes in as #1, UCLA as #2, UC-Berkeley #3, UC-Riverside #5, UC-Davis #8, UC-Santa Barbara #13, UC-Irvine #60. The full listing is at http://www.washingtonmonthly.com/college_guide/rankings_2011/national_university_rank.php

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    More on Looking at the Law School’s Gift Horse

    An earlier blog post noted the controversy over the Milken gift to the UCLA Law School to set up an institute on business law and policy. The controversy seems to have triggered a message from the Law School Dean now posted on the School’s website and a job description that is being circulated for the executive director of the new Institute. Below is 1) the message from the dean on the controversy, 2) the job description in italics, and 3) the original announcement of the gift. Our earlier post is at: http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2011/08/ucla-law-schools-gift-horse.html ——– An Important Message from Dean Rachel F….

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    Outlawing Holidays

    There is a bill pending in the legislature (passed the Assembly; now in the Senate) – applying to CalPERS, not UC – that would effectively ban pension “contribution holidays.” As is well known, UC had the mother of all contribution holidays to its pension fund, one lasting two decades. Had that holiday not occurred, we would not have the underfunding problem we have today. Of course, given the circumstances under which the UC pension holiday developed – overfunding in the face of a state budget crisis at the time – it could be argued that the holiday was unavoidable. But…

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    No More Books for Them at UC-San Diego?

    More Cheery Budget News: August 26, 2011 | Erica Perez | California Watch Driven by dramatic budget cuts that will shutter four campus libraries, staffers at UC San Diego are removing roughly 150,000 books and journals from their collections by summer’s end – selling volumes to the highest bidder or donating them. If UCSD students or researchers want to check out the selected writings of Benjamin Rush, they might have to request it through an interlibrary loan… Full story at: http://californiawatch.org/dailyreport/ucsd-library-cuts-mean-150000-books-must-go-12293 No more books for them?

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    Bad PR for UC

    Velma Montoya passed the story below to me. Not the best PR for UC at this point in the budget cycle. Are Professors Picking the Public’s Pockets? Rex Dalton, 8/25/11, Miller-McCune From his arrival in the U.S. some 25 years ago, Tatsuya Suda deftly cut a path to the upper echelons of academic computer research. Fresh from prestigious Kyoto University, he steadily rose to become a tenured professor at the University of California, Irvine, earning a reputation for dynamic theories in computer networking at the dawn of the cell-phone age. He even wed Grammy-winning singer Rita Coolidge. But along this…

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    LAO Report on Infrastructure Includes Higher Ed and UC

    UCLA’s Westwood Campus under construction in 1927 —————————————————— The Legislative Analyst’s Office (LAO) has issued a report on state spending on infrastructure. Most infrastructure spending goes for programs other than higher ed such as K-12 and transportation. However, the higher ed segment of the report is reproduced below. Some portions of the text are in bold indicating they are of special interest. Note: There are some charts in the original that are not reproduced below. Go to the link at the bottom of this item to see the whole report including the charts. Higher Education California’s public higher education system…

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    UC Compensation Data Report for 2010

    UC has released its annual compensation report for 2010. Below are some highlights: *Approximately 40% of compensation in 2010 went to academic employees, primarily to faculty and researchers. The remaining 60% went to non-academic employees, including those who support academic departments, student services, patient care and other university functions. As in previous years, the “top 10 earning” employees at UC in 2010, based on total pay, were health sciences faculty members – typically world-renowned specialists in their fields – and athletic coaches. • Market positions have eroded and are expected to worsen due to lack of salary increases, rising employee…