UC

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Free Textbooks from State Online Source?

Byuclafaculty

Darrell Steinberg wants digital library of free textbooks (Excerpt 12/13/11) Senate President Pro Tem Darrell Steinberg announced today that he will push for legislation to create an online open source library to reduce the cost of course materials for college students across the state. The Sacramento Democrat framed the proposed project as an effort to lower costs for students struggling to cope with higher fees and tuition rates at California’s public colleges and universities… Steinberg said the average student spends $1,300 a year on textbooks, a figure his staff said is based on projections the University of California, California State…

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PPIC Poll on Public Higher Ed in California

Byuclafaculty

The charts above come from a poll taken by the Public Policy Institute of California available at: http://www.ppic.org/content/pubs/survey/S_1111MBS.pdf [Click on the table above to enlarge it or go to the report itself.] You can interpret the charts as you like. As the saying goes, an optimist is someone who thinks we are in the best of all possible worlds – and a pessimist is also someone who thinks we are in the best of all possible worlds.

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Hole in the Middle of UC Admissions?

Byuclafaculty

Middle income student attendance declines at UC Samantha Schaefer, 2011-10-30 Orange County Register Over the past 10 years, the proportion of middle-income students attending the University of California has declined at nearly twice the rate of California middle-income households, while the share of lower- and upper-income UC students has risen. Some analysts suggest the trend stems from repeated hikes in UC tuition costs, coupled with limited access to many kinds of aid for middle-income students, who are increasingly incurring larger and larger loan debt. “We’ve got some significant problems here,” said William Tierney, USC Rossier School of Education professor, Wilbur-Kieffer…

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Out of the box on higher ed: Uh Oh

Byuclafaculty

From the Sacramento Bee today (excerpt): Lt. Gov. Gavin Newsom railed against tuition increases and said Wednesday that the state’s master plan for higher education is outdated, promising “a different narrative” for higher education by the end of the year. It was unclear what the plan might contain or how Newsom, a Democrat, might propose to fund it. “We’re going to come up with some out- of-the-box recommendations, is our hope and expectation,” he told The Bee’s Capitol Bureau. Fifty years after the production of the California Master Plan for Higher Education, Newsom said he and officials are preparing to…

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UC or not UC? – That is the question (to be answered in a few hours)

Byuclafaculty

Bits and pieces of Governor Brown’s public pension plan are leaking out ahead of his news conference later today. UC or not UC, that is the question, as Hamlet might say. But the leaked reports don’t provide the answer so we will have to wait a few hours more. The Capitol Alert report from last night and another from KCAL indicate that the reason Brown wants a ballot prop is to change the CalPERS board. Excerpt from Capitol Alert: Gov. Jerry Brown will propose a higher retirement age and a less generous pension system for newly-hired state workers, sources familiar…

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Do You Have an Opinion on APM 0668 – Negotiated Salary Program?

Byuclafaculty

To: UCLA Senate Faculty From: the UCLA Faculty Association Date: Oct. 26, 2011 Subject: UCLA FA Bulletin on APM 0668 – the proposed Negotiated Salary Program In times like these—budget cuts to higher education statewide and to UC year after year—it is good to know about the Faculty Association (FA) at UCLA, an independent organization of faculty on this campus since 1973. Its focus is singular: the general welfare of UCLA Senate faculty on the general campus and health sciences. Because it is state funded, the Academic Senate cannot use its resources to speak out on political issues. It is…

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Student Aid Alliance

Byuclafaculty

From Inside Higher Ed today (excerpt below) comes a note about the Student Aid Alliance, a higher education group of which both UC and CSU are members. Alliance Pushes to Save Pell From ‘Super Committee’ October 25, 2011 The Student Aid Alliance, a group of 74 higher education associations, advocacy groups and other organizations, announced a lobbying campaign Monday to fight possible cuts to federal financial aid as the Congressional committee on deficit reduction enters the final month before its Nov. 24 deadline… There are various links in the article including a petition that you may find of interest. Full…

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UC Admissions in Newspeak?

Byuclafaculty

UC’s new admissions rules confuse applicants: The SAT subject exams are no longer required. If students take them anyway, good scores can help but poor scores won’t hurt, administrators say. (except) Larry Gordon, LA Times, 10/24/11 …(T)he new rules have caused widespread confusion and anxiety among students about whether to take the supplemental tests known as SAT subject exams. {Note from yours truly: These tests are the subject exams, not the regular SAT which remains required.} To boost their chances of UC admission, thousands of high school seniors are taking the subject exams even though the university has dropped them…

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There Goes the Baby: Fewer UC Undergrads in Late 2030s?

Byuclafaculty

Given the chart above from today’s Sacramento Bee, will there be fewer UC undergrads in the late 2020s and beyond? The original chart is at http://www.sacbee.com/2011/10/20/3990370_a3990291/california-birthrate-lowest-since.html Accompanying article is at http://www.sacbee.com/2011/10/20/3990370/california-birthrate-lowest-since.html It’s an interesting question:

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Just sign us up

Byuclafaculty

From today’s Inside Higher Ed comes some interesting news about a collective bargaining contract UC recently signed: “We believe that if courses are moved online, they will most likely be the classes currently taught by lecturers,” reads a brief declaration against online education on the website of UC-AFT, the University of California chapter of the American Federation of Teachers… Now the California lecturers, who make up nearly half of the system’s undergraduate teaching teachers, believe they have used… bargaining power to score a rare coup. The University of California last week tentatively agreed to a deal with UC-AFT that included…