Above are the world rankings of universities from the British Times Higher Education magazine based on “academic reputation.” [Click on the image to make it clearer.] The full list and info on the survey methodology is at:http://www.timeshighereducation.co.uk/world-university-rankings/2013/reputation-ranking
The Regents are meeting March 13-14 – Wednesday-Thursday of next week. The agenda is only partly online. At this point it just lists topics without the supporting materials. One March 13 item is the UCLA Health Sciences Teaching and Learning Center which we are assured won’t cost the campus a penny. Of course, we know the Regents will carefully undertake a review of the business plan using outside independent expertise and will be monitoring the project after it is built to ensure it is a total success, just as they did, and surely will do, with the Grand Hotel: http://regents.universityofcalifornia.edu/regmeet/mar13/gb.pdf…
Slow seat sales have prompted UC Berkeley to launch a fresh marketing campaign and look for other revenue in an effort to keep pace with the $18 million a year in debt it will soon owe for the Memorial Stadium makeover and athletic center construction. The redone stadium opened last season, but only about 1,900 of the 2,900 premium club seats – lifetime spots that cost anywhere from $40,000 to $225,000 each – have been sold. And not everyone who bought a seat has fully paid up. That has left UC some $121 million short on the $474 million project. Now, Cal’s…
…Handwritten thank-you notes are apparently in vogue at the UC Berkeley’s Haas School of Business, and not just for recruiters who hold a student’s fate in their hands. Recently, the school set up tables and invited students, faculty and staff to pen personalized notes to Haas donors… Hundreds of Haas students and staff participated in the note-writing effort, with many sharing specifics on how donors’ money directly influenced their education or work… Some of the notes included stories about accomplishments that would not have been possible without funding, such as research projects. Others included drawings… Full story at http://www.sfgate.com/business/article/UC-Berkeley-s-Haas-school-minds-its-manners-4267136.php It’s not known how anxiously donors are awaiting these letters….
An interesting article appears today in the San Francisco Chronicle about debate at UC-Berkeley over the cause of the extinction of the dinosaurs. Was it caused by a comet striking the Earth? Or something else? A more precise estimate of the timing of the strike has been produced. But what happened to the Disney hypothesis – which Southern Californians can relate to – that it was all due to too much sunshine and not enough water? [youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JO1dtHJF5bc?feature=player_detailpage]Anyway, you can read the article at:http://www.sfgate.com/science/article/Dinosaur-extinction-battle-flares-4261978.php
From today’s LA Times: After he retires as chancellor of UC Berkeley in June, Robert J. Birgeneau will head up a national effort to study and help public universities in an era of reduced tax support, new technology and changing student demographics. Birgeneau, a physicist, is to lead the American Academy of Arts and Sciences’ new initiative that will propose ways for the federal government, private industry and foundations to better aid state institutions, along with developing reforms the schools could undertake. It is being called “The Lincoln Project: Excellence and Access in Public Higher Education” — named for President…
The Regents held a special meeting to approve the new UC-Berkeley Chancellor and the interim UC-Riverside Chancellor on Nov. 27, 2012. You can hear that meeting at the link below. Governor Brown , Lt. Governor Newsom, and one Regent (Zettel) voted against the pay package for the new Berkeley chancellor Nicholas Dirks which paid $50,000 in sslary more than the previous chancellor. (The increment was from private funds.) All three voted for the appointment but against the pay. Brown’s comments are particularly interesting and occur roughly between minute 5:50 and 10:50 on the recording. He says that the state funding…
When UC-Berkeley looks for someone to hire, it isn’t just a matter of putting up a sign, even though it is “financially secure.” From a recent email: Our client, the University of California, Berkeley, is seeking a Human Resources Leader that desires a blank slate opportunity to develop and drive the HR Policy and Practice function in a brand new direction, advancing the legacy of success on behalf of an institution that has been ranked as high as third in the world, a premier, internationally renowned, financially secure teaching and research university that is consistently rated among the best in…
In an earlier post, we noted the names of state assembly members dealing with higher ed. The state senate has a more general education committee that does all levels of education. It will be chaired by Carol Liu who represents a district that runs from the Burbank/Pasadena area all the way east to Claremont and beyond. Despite representing a southern California district, she has ties to UC Berkeley, especially the School of Education there. Poking around on the web, I find she at one time was on the UC-Berkeley Foundation Board of Trustees and that she and her husband have…
Lots of news stories are appearing at this time of the year summing up events of 2012. John Myers, who writes a Capitol Connection blog for a Bay Area TV station, including various photos of such events. From the presidential campaign, he included a picture of Ron Paul speaking at UC-Berkeley on April 5, 2012 and leading audience chants of “End the Fed.” So maybe the image of UC-Berkeley as exclusively leftist needs some qualification if Paul could have a successful rally there. Or maybe the photo and event just reflect the fact that there are those on the left…
