We posted yesterday about the news from UC-Berkeley that many earthquake-prone buildings are located in southern California – including in Westwood. The Westwood-Century City Patch, in picking up the story from the LA Times, blamed USC instead of UC-B, at least in the headline. See above. Probably just as well. Who wants to be the bearer of bad tidings?.
We have followed the LA Times‘ story of the concern about certain concrete buildings in the southern California area which might be at risk in a major earthquake. The Times identified some buildings in an earlier story but noted that UC-Berkeley had a survey list of buildings. Berkeley was reluctant to provide the list because its intent was to get an estimate of the number of such buildings based on public records rather than evaluate each building directly. It has now provided the Times with the list, along with a legal disclaimer. The Times now has an interactive map on…
We noted in a prior post there would be increased attention to earthquake risks in LA around the 20th anniversary of the Jan. 27, 1994 Northridge quake. One item that began to develop was an LA Times article indicating that various buildings were at risk in the LA area, even though they were thought safe when constructed. One of the buildings in Westwood is owned by UCLA, which asserted that it had been upgraded. It was also reported that a team of researchers at Berkeley had compiled a list of such buildings, but was not making the list available due…
Hey! Let’s rebuild the old stadium! Sorry to mix metaphors. But Inside Higher Ed today has a long story on Berkeley athletics which have recently been in the news for low graduation rates and problems in funding a stadium upgrade. A white paper from the Berkeley Center for the Study of Higher Education suggests that the program is running as an autonomous and relatively uncontrolled business operation. It is written by a former vice chancellor – who can now tell all -and a Berkeley grad student. See http://cshe.berkeley.edu/sites/default/files/shared/publications/docs/ROPS.CSHE_.12.13.Cummins%26Hextrum.CalAthletics.1.6.2014.pdf and http://www.insidehighered.com/news/2014/01/08/highlighting-berkeley-paper-explores-academic-damage-expanding-independent-athletics The issue is whether control can be retaken or whether…
Christmas day tends to be a slow news day. However, for those who didn’t see it, the LA Times carried a front page story about UC’s online offerings which allow cross-campus credits. You can find the article at: http://www.latimes.com/nation/la-me-uc-online-20131222,0,6798231.story Blog readers will be familiar with these offerings. We noted in a prior post that UCLA seems to be a taker rather than a giver in this endeavor. That is, other campuses’ online courses are available to UCLA students. But UCLA is not offering courses to the other campuses. Berkeley, Irvine, Davis, and Riverside seem to be the offerers. Now, how…
The headline for this posting is a direct quote from a headline to an article in the San Francisco Business Times which you can find at www.bizjournals.com/sanfrancisco/news/2013/12/16/uc-berkeley-finishing-school-asia-rich.html The (economics) professor in question is Brad DeLong. For your information, below is the portion of his post on the Berkeley Blog that deals with the subject of that headline: …(Partially) a Finishing School for the Superrich of Asia The first priority of the chancellor is to successfully execute a strategy to keep Berkeley great–to reinforce the reasons that it is worthwhile keeping a university like Berkeley around at all.The days of Clark Kerr…
Yours truly confesses he missed an August 1 article in the NY Times concerning the UC-Berkeley admissions process (which undoubtedly applies to UCLA as well). The article gets into the sensitive area of admissions in the post-Prop 209 era. [Prop 209 bans affirmative action in admissions.] Since you may also have missed it, here is an excerpt below with a link to the full article: A HIGHLY qualified student, with a 3.95 unweighted grade point average and 2300 on the SAT, was not among the top-ranked engineering applicants to the University of California, Berkeley. He had perfect 800s on his…
People keep noticing Berkeley’s White Elephant money-draining stadium – one of the grand capital projects that the Regents routinely approve based on pretty slides and business plans offered by the campuses. Peter Schrag in the San Francisco Chronicle today ties the low graduation rates of Berkeley athletes with the stadium: …Fueling the… issue is the chronic matter of cost – what the university kicks in to the sports program – and what someone called “its gold plated” spending. Brian Barsky, a Berkeley computer science professor and vocal critic of the athletics program, says between 2003 and 2011, athletics “drained campus…
From the San Francisco Chronicle: UC Berkeley officials, responding to recent reports of lax admissions standards and poor graduation rates among student athletes, admitted this week that the university has a serious problem that is at times exacerbated by the desire to succeed on the field. “At a point, the pressure to win caused us to put more focus on the athletic piece and, as a result, we saw less performance on the academic side,” said Cal Athletic Director Sandy Barbour… “We have an issue. No doubt,” said Barbour…. “It’s a serious one. And we have taken several measures to correct…
The request to circulate the item below was received by Prof. Meranze of the UCLA Faculty Assn. board from the UC-Berkeley Faculty Assn.: Berkeley Faculty Association Calls for Increased Support of Grad Student Employees: At the end of September, the current 3 year-contract of UAW 2865 representing UC Academic Student Employees (GSIs, readers and tutors) expired and ASEs are now working without a contract. UCOP Labor Relations and UAW 2865 have not yet reached an official “impasse.” But the Berkeley Faculty Association is concerned that UCOP’s last offer of a 2% rise doesn’t come close to eliminating the gap with…
