governor

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Lessons to be Learned

Byuclafaculty

Today’s LA Times carries the story of two neuroscientists recruited by USC from UCLA: Arthur Toga and Paul Thompson will move to the USC Keck School of Medicine campus next fall, along with scores of graduate students, postdoctoral fellows and staffers who now work at UCLA’s Laboratory of Neuro Imaging, known as LONI. In establishing a new institute at the USC campus in Boyle Heights, they will also move substantial government and private grants that fund the lab’s $12-million annual budget as well as some of the highly sophisticated equipment used to investigate the brain’s inner workings.  (The move)…raises concerns…

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Boulware at the Regents?

Byuclafaculty

Lemuel Ricketts Boulware Today is May Day – often viewed as a labor holiday.  That happenstance brings to mind the role the governor has been playing as an ex officio regent. Governor Brown likes to show his scope of knowledge through quotations, Latin phrases, and historical references.  Earlier this year, when asked about his collective bargaining policy with state unions, he referred to “Boulwarism” as something that he wouldn’t want to do. So what is Boulwarism?  Lemuel Ricketts Boulware was General Electric’s chief bargainer with its unions in the 1950s and early 1960s.  He developed a take-it-or-leave-it style of negotiating,…

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And if you are done celebrating “more” in the state budget as on the previous posting…

Byuclafaculty

The drawing board According to the LA Times, UC is not likely to like important elements of the forthcoming May revise budget to be issued by the governor: …”We’d like to go back to the drawing board,” said Patrick Lenz, a top UC budget official. The university was not consulted in advance about the details of Brown’s proposal, he said… And what are those elements? Gov. Jerry Brown wants to tie some state funding for California’s public universities to a host of new requirements, including 10% increases in the number of transfer students from community colleges and the percentage of…

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Hold the Line: Jerry Knows Best

Byuclafaculty

From today’s LA Times: Gov. Jerry Brown is pushing forward with plans to shake up California’s higher education system, including strict rules on tuition and fees, according to an administration spokesman. Under the governor’s proposal, university officials would forfeit increases in state funding if they raise student costs during the next four years.  The governor originally outlined his plans in his January budget proposal. Now, as he prepares to release a revised spending plan next month, administration personnel have been briefing legislative staff and university officials on the details… Full story at http://www.latimes.com/news/local/political/la-me-pc-jerry-brown-colleges-20130419,0,6532913.story  And we thought it was someone else…

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Looking Ahead to 2014 Politics

Byuclafaculty

“Your remarks give us great enlightenment, not only like a statesman, but also like a university professor.”* Shenzhen Party secretary Wang Rong to Governor Brown during recent China trip ==Political year 2014 may seem like a long way off but one GOP possible candidate has already semi-declared: Abel Maldonado, the former Lt. Governor.   It is widely assumed that Gov. Brown will run for re-election.  If for some reason he didn’t, there would be no shortage of Democratic candidates for governor including the current Lt. Governor, Gavin Newsom (who tried briefly in 2010).  So one question is what will be involved…

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Nobody here

Byuclafaculty

The LA Times today carries an article about the search for a new UC president to replace Mark Yudof who is resigning in August. It’s a slam on the current crop of UC campus chancellors and UCOP administrators since apparently the Regents think they have no feasible inside candidates. …The search is secretive; officials say the selection process is a confidential personnel matter. Leading the effort is a committee of 10 UC regents, including Gov. Jerry Brown and student and alumni representatives. Its members declined to comment and so did the executive search firm—Isaacson, Miller. Matthew Haney, executive director of…

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Survey Suggests It’s Time to Take a Deep Breath on MOOCs

Byuclafaculty

The Chronicle of Higher Education has a survey of 103 of 184 faculty members who have taught MOOCs.  The article that accompanies the survey is at: http://chronicle.com/article/The-Professors-Behind-the-MOOC/137905/#id=overview But the summary below should suggest anyone proposing rushing into this area on the grounds that it will save large amounts of money or even provide a route to credit at the institutions at which these faculty are based should take a deep breath before proceeding. The results are decidedly mixed and they come from a group of folks who are evidently enthused about the endeavor.  [Clicking on the images above will provide…

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Now here’s a bright idea…

Byuclafaculty

From Inside Higher Ed today: A powerful California lawmaker wants public college students who are shut out of popular courses to attend low-cost online alternatives – including those offered by for-profit companies – and he plans to encourage the state’s public institutions to grant credit for those classes. The proposal expected today from Darrell Steinberg, a Democrat and president pro tem of the state Senate, aims to create a “statewide system of faculty-approved, online college courses,” according to a written statement from Steinberg’s office. (A spokesman for Steinberg declined to discuss the bill.) Faculty would decide which courses should make the…

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Windfall Revenue Remains

Byuclafaculty

In January, the state controller reported a surprise windfall of about $4 billion arrived in personal income tax revenue.  It was unclear why but possibly it had to do with speculation by wealthy taxpayers about the fiscal cliff or prospective income tax changes at the federal level.  No one knows.  An interesting question was whether the windfall would unwind in February, i.e., come in below estimates.  It did unwind a bit.  But basically, there still is an unforeseen extra $4 billion in revenue so far this year. What the impact might be on the state budget for the coming year…

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I guess the chemistry was good

Byuclafaculty

UC-Irvine has put a chemistry course on the web.  But it doesn’t give credit for it and isn’t using the Coursera website (although UC-Irvine is affiliated with Coursera) because it wants to give the course away free.  As for labs, it says that if some other institution wants to offer the course, it will have to provide the labs, etc.  We are likely to see a bunch of such offerings from the campus. They show the campus is up-to-date, complying with the Regents/governor desires, and yet – in the end – they commit to nothing.  Actually, yours truly has put…