gsoc curriculum—winter 2010

8/14/2019 GSOC CurriculumWinter 2010

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GSOC CurriculumWinter 2010

Teach-In Notes

(A lot of detail is included here in order to give teachers the flexibility to read their audiences

and emphasize the points they think are most relevant. Key points are in bold.)

Intro: Were here to:

- provide some information on how the budget cuts and privatization are affecting

your experience at UCSC

- explain how the university is being restructured and describe the different

perspectives on privatizing the university.

- talk a little about the protests that happened last quarter and what students are

already doing to protect their education

Section I: How Budget Cuts are Affecting Students Now- Tuition Increases

o You probably already know that the Regents voted to increase your tuition

by 32% on November 19th

.

o But you might not know that this was in addition to a 9% increase passed

last May.

o You may be fortunate enough to have the resources to cover these increases.

However, even if you can afford to pay over $10,000 per year for school, you

should know that youll be getting less for your money.

More Limited Admissions

o In the 2009-2010 school year, the UC admitted 1,477 fewer freshmen

than it did the year before.[1]

o UCs Office of the President is proposing a plan to cut UC enrollments by

8-10,000 over the next few years.[2]

o The UC is also reserving more spots forout-of-state students who can

afford to pay about $30,000 per year in tuition.

Next fall UC Berkeley will increase the percentage of non-

resident freshmen from 14% to as much as 23 % of the incoming class

of 2010-11.[3]

This also means that 600 Californians eligible for admission to UC

Berkeley next year will not get in.[4]

- Declining Accessibility.

o According to a study released in early January 2010, UC Berkeley ranks

among the lowest in the nation in terms of enrollment rates of

underrepresented minorities.[5]


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o Rising Student Debt. Average student loan debt rose nearly 20% in the first

5 years of the 21st

century; for students of color, the increase has been between 80

and 100%.[6]

o As fees go up, students of color and low-income students are increasingly

unable to pay for a UC education, thus creating an elite educated class of white

upper middle-class students.[7] Optional: Short film trailer about student loan

default (http://vimeo.com/2618035).

Declines in Quality

o Increased class sizes mean less individual attention from professors and

TAs.[8]

o Fewer classes are being offered each quarter. This winter UCSC cut course

offerings by 11%, the highest drop of all the UC campuses,[9] making it

increasingly difficult to for students to get the classes they need to graduate on

time.[10]

o Fewer resources for students.

Departments and programs across campus that emphasize

community and accessibility have seen their budgets slashed.[11] Such

as:

the Community Studies department,

the Chicano and Latino Resources Center,

The Equal Opportunity Programs Office, among other

programs.

Library hours have been drastically cut by more than 20 hours

per week. (In 2007-08, the library was open 7 days a week, and weekday

hours were 8am to midnight. This year, the library is open from 10-10 on

weekdays and closed on Saturdays.)

o Fewer Choices. Many majors are in threat of disappearing.

The Humanities Division is considering major cuts to the language

program that would get rid of Portuguese, Russian, Hebrew and Hindi,

as well as replace instructors with decades of experience teaching

language with inexperienced graduate students.

o Faculty Flight. The UC will continue to lose its best faculty as it is unable

to offer competitive salaries or a supportive working environment. Others are laid

off.

o Effects at UCSC: The cuts are being distributed unevenly. The brunt of the

burden is being born by Humanities and Social Sciences Divisions. While so far

only 3 faculty positions were lost in Science and Engineering, 40 faculty

positions have been cut from Humanities and Social Sciences.

Q: But isnt this just the result of bad economy? Isnt this just a temporary situation?


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A: The changes we are seeing now are the result of decisions made in 2004 to dramatically

restructure the university through a process known as privatization.

Privatization involves the transfer of a government service or responsibility to the private

sector. In the case of the UC, this has meant a plant to force private individuals to shoulder more

of the cost of higher education and to solicit more corporate sponsorship.

Section II: The Story of Privatization

- In 2004, years before the current economic crisis, Governor Arnold

Schwarzenegger met with then UC President Bob Dynes, and his counterpart at CSU,

Charles Reed, and pressured them to sign the 2004 Higher Education Compact.[12]

- With this compact, 3 key individualswithout any public debatedecided to

fundamentally change the model for supporting higher education in California.

- The compact abandoned the view of higher education as a public good and

redefined it as a private good. The plan said that the UC would begin to shift the

financial burden onto students through higher tuition, and to begin to look for

private sources of funding, such as corporate donations and grants.- The changes that we are seeing today in the quality of education and the priorities

of the state and the UC administration are a result of this shift in thinking and

commitments that were made six years ago.

- Since you, the students, are most directly affectedby this change, its important

you understand the perspectives and the debate.

Privatization vs. Public Good: Two Perspectives.

The Argument for Privatization:- The argument for privatization comes out of neoliberal ideology, which argues

that markets are best at creating efficiencies.

- Supporters of privatization say that government bureaucracy is inefficient and

expensive, and that when government services are privatized, they are forced to

compete and thus become more efficient.

- Second, since individuals with a college degree on average are able to attain

higher incomes than high school graduates, students and their parents should

assume more of that financial burden.

- Finally, since corporations benefit from research innovations and from having

well-trained employees, they should pay directly for these services and should havea larger influence on the university.

Public Good: The Critique of Privatization

Privatization does not equal Efficiency

- Critics of privatization argue that it is the UCs undemocratic structure that

produces inefficiencies.


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- Though the UC is said to be a public university, the Board of Regents, which

oversees the UCs $18 billion-dollar budget, consists of mostly unelected and

unaccountable political appointees.

- Each appointment is supposed to be vetted by a Senate Advisory Committee

representing the interests of voters. The Governor has appointed 9 Regents since

2004 and the advisory committee has not met once in that time.[13]- According to Professor Stanton Glantz, the UC is wasting $600 million a year on

a growing management bureaucracy that is not directly involved in teaching or

research, the core functions of a university.[14]

- Between 1994 and 2009, the ratio of senior management to faculty jumped

from 2/5 to 1/1.[15]

- Finally, as in the corporate world, executive compensation seems to be a

priority for the Regents: On the same day that UC regents cut $813 million from UC

budgets (July 2009), which led to pay cuts for those earning under $40,000, they

gave pay and stipend raises to over two dozen executives. Many of these executives

earn from $250,000 to more than $500,000 a year.[16]- Even as the UC Regents have increased tuition by a total of 40% over the last three

quarters, they have continued at every meeting to approve millions of dollars in merit

bonuses for top-earning executives.[17]

Public Benefit

- Critics of privatization argue that higher education benefits the community as a

whole.

o University educational attainment is highly correlated with the income of

everyone in a state. More educated workers means faster economic growth andmore high-paying, knowledge-based job.

o When fewer people have access to higher education, the whole

community suffers.

- They point to Californias history of affordable higher education and economic

growth:

o In 1960, the Master Plan for Higher Education in California set public

education as a public priority, a central role of the government.

o It promised every California student an affordable (initially free) seat at

an appropriate institution of higher education.[18]

o Under this plan, California built one of the finest institutions of higher

learning in the world.

o In the years since then, the UC system has contributed to making

California the 8th

largest economy in the world and the largest in America; to

helping establish Silicon Valley and the entertainment industry; and to making

California the leading agriculture state.[19]


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o Higher education in California created one of the most skilled and highly

productive populations in history, the inventors of new technologies, popular

arts, and entire industries that make California one of the most prosperous and

equitable economies in the world. (NOTE: Choose from the following facts

according to your audience.):

UC faculty and alumni have founded 1 out of every 4 biotech

companies in California.

Nearly 60% of the states IT and communications firms have UC

alumni as executives.

For the past 12 years, UC has developed more patents than any

other university in the nationand its researchers produce on average

three new inventions a day.

UC is working with K-12 schools across the state to improve student

achievement and is spearheading Cal Teach, which will train 1,000 new

math and science teachers annually for public schools statewide.

- They note that privatization reduces the quality and scope of research.o Under privatization, research and teaching would be shaped by special

interests looking for a direct return on their investments.

o This would mean devaluation of basic research in favor of applied research,

increasing inequality in resources between different departments,

o This may also mean different tuition cost for different majors and cutting or

closing of departments deemed to not have sufficient market value, such as

ethnic studies, history of consciousness, and even large cuts in departments we

think of as central to the university, such as literature, history, and

languages.

o Privatization means that business and corporations that sponsor departments

influence what is researched and studied in the university. For example, Harvard

Medical school is supported by big pharmaceutical companies and now has 3

professors researching sleep disorders. At the same time, no Harvard Medical

school professor is researching the effects of Malaria and HIV in the 3rd

world.

o

POINT: Even those who do not go to college benefit from having a large college-

educated population, which generates innovation, propels economic growth, and

creates jobs.

Section III: What Privatization Means for the Future of the UC

[Optional: Play Wendy Browns description of privatization at http://www.youtube.com/

watch?v=aR4xYBGdQgw (fast forward to 15:24)]

More of the Same: Privatization means a continuation and acceleration ofthe changes we

are seeing:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aR4xYBGdQgwhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aR4xYBGdQgwhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aR4xYBGdQgwhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aR4xYBGdQgwhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aR4xYBGdQgwhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aR4xYBGdQgw


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- increases in tuition and class sizes. The Academic Senate estimated that a

public funding freeze would require tuition to increase to $15-17,000 a year.

- reductions in class offerings and diversity,

- declining accessibility,

- and overall declines in the quality of education.

Increasing inequality- As tuitions increase, fewer Californians will be able to afford to attend college,

meaning less opportunity for social mobility and less diversity within the

university and the middle class.

A Case Study: The University of Michigan

- The University of Michigan has chosen a semi-privatized model. The results

may be instructive on what California can expect:

- Admission standards were relaxed to increase out-of-state enrolment.

- By 2003, over half of Michigans freshman class came from families with

six-figure incomes in a state where only 13% of families earn that much .

- The University of Michigan has also fallen in national rankings, according toU.S. News and World Report.[20]

Q: So what can we do about it?

A: The protests of last quarter made some important impacts, but the state is still moving

towards privatizing the university.

Section IV: Effects of Last Quarters Protests

- On November 19th

, students on every UC campus across the state protested the

Regents vote to increase tuition by 32%. The protests got the attention of both theGovernor and UC President Mark Yudof.

Schwarzenegger:

o Noted that the state spends 10% of its general fund on prisons and only

7% on higher education. He proposed to reverse that ratio, guaranteeing that

10% of the states general fund would go to funding higher education.[21]

o One of Schwarzeneggers spokespeople stated, Those protests on the U.C.

campuses were the tipping point[22].

Yudof:

o At the last Regents meeting on January 20th

, President Mark Yudof and

some of the Regents said they would support a student march on

Sacramento.[23]

o Up until the protests of last quarter, Yudof and the UC Regents had done

nothing to advocate for the universitys core mission of education or to

influence the states budget plans.[24]

A Reason for Hope, but still much to be done:


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- While these reactions show that student protest has had some effect, the actions

proposed by Schwarzenegger and Yudofdo not address the underlying problems that

have led to the current situation of the UCs and higher education in California.

No Guarantee

o First, Schwarzeneggers plan does not guarantee that funding for higher

education will not continue to shrink. Californias general fund has been

steadily shrinking for the last decade or more. Even if California higher education

gets 10% of the state budget, this might turn out to be a tiny piece of a shrinking

pie.

Californias prisons have been under federal receivership since

2004 because prisoner healthcare was so bad there that it killed

several inmates and was deemed unconstitutional.[25]

The proposal to save money by pulling yet more money out of

this already broken system is not an acceptable way forward.

Bigger Problems:o The problems facing the UC are not just about state funding, but about the

UC administrations shifting priorities and lack of transparency and

accountability.

o Finally, the governor and the UC administration continue to frame this as a

temporary budget crisis, when it is in fact part of a larger plan to privatize

the University of California.

Section V: Action

- The process of privatization is happening in all sectors of public education

across California. Students, faculty, and workers across the UCs, the CSUs, the

community colleges, and K-12 schools are organizing against the privatization of public

education in California.

March 4th

- Over 800 representatives of these groups came together on October 24, 2009 at

a conference in Berkeley and chose March 4th

as a state-day of action.

- At UCSC, students are planning a campus-wide student strike. The UAW, the

TA union, is supporting this effort and all campus unions have expressed solidarity

with these actions.

- We invite all students, workers, and faculty to observe this important show of

opposition to the current direction of public education in California.

Support the Strike

- SIGN THE STRIKE PLEDGE


8/9

o Observe this important show of student opposition to the current

direction of public education in California.

- SPREAD THE WORD: Let your student reps, professors, and TAs know you

support the strike!

o Tell your reps in student government to support the strike!

o Let your professors and TAs know that you will not be in class that day and

ask them not to hold class!

o Ask your professors and TAs to teach this important lesson to their other

classes and sections.

- JOIN the Movement!

o If you are interested in helping organize this important day, please attend

the General Assembly, a large meeting of all student groups organizing to

fight the budget cuts. Location: Kresge Town Hall. Time: 6pm. Dates: 2/10,

2/24

March 1st March on Sacramento

- After the display of strength of the student movement in November, the UC

Administration has decided to call for a march on Sacramento on March 1st

to ask the

legislature for more money for the UC Administration.

- The UC Student Association has called for a Lobby Conference from Feb. 26 to

March 1st. Talk to the Student Government to get involved.

[1] UC Releases Fall 2009 Admissions Data, http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/article/20902

[2] Approval of the 2010-2011 UC Budget, University of California Office of the President, available at

www.ucop.edu

[3] Philip Matier and Andrew Ross, UC Berkeley to admit more out-of-state students, San Francisco

Chronicle, October 21, 2009

[4] Ibid.

[5]Nanette Asimov, UC minority enrollment among lowest in the nation, San Francisco Chronicle, Jan. 14,

2010,

[6] http://www.gradstudentstoppage.com/a-note-to-students-of-color-completing-the-work-of-prop-209/.

[7] http://www.gradstudentstoppage.com/a-note-to-students-of-color-completing-the-work-of-prop-209/

[8] Approval of the 2010-2011 UC Budget, University of California Office of the President, available at

www.ucop.edu

[9] http://www.latimes.com/news/local/la-me-classes20-2010jan20,0,4770272.story

[10] Chris Newfield, UC Budget Questions and Answers, available at www.teachthebudgetucsc.org
http://www.ucop.edu/http://www.ucop.edu/http://www.ucop.edu/http://www.ucop.edu/


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[11] Tamar Lewin, University of California Makes Cuts After Reduction in State Financing,New York Times,

July 10, 2009

[12] This section is based on a lecture by UC Professor Stanton Glantz. A recording of that lecture can be found

at http://www.youtube.com/user/caltvinfo#p/u/48/vgDmft3DtMQ

[13] Thomas Jue and Jerold Theis, Money isnt the only problem facing the UC system, San Jose Mercury

News, Jan. 21, 2001

[14] Ibid

[15] Thomas Jue and Jerold Theis, Money isnt the only problem facing the UC system, San Jose Mercury

News, Jan. 21, 2001

[16] Asimov, Nanette. "Execs Still Get Raises as UC cuts Staffing, Pay." 7 August, 2009. San

Fransisco Chronicle. http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2009/08/06/BASG194N2P.DTL

[17] See reports of the Regents Committee on Compensation at http://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/regents

[18] A Master Plan for Higher Education in California, 1960-1975, available at http://www.ucop.edu/acadinit/

mastplan/mp.htm

[19] www.keepcaliforniaspromise.org

[20] Chris Newfield, Understanding the Crisis at UC, Available at www.keepcaliforniaspromise.org[21] Schwarzeneggers Higher Ed Constitutional Amendment: All PR. http://keepcaliforniaspromise.org/628/

governor-schwarzeneggers-constitutional-amendment-on-higher-ed-lots-less-than-meets-the-eye

[22] Steinhauer, Jennifer. Schwarzenegger Seeks Shift from Prisons to Schools. The New York Times.

6 January 2010: Web.

[23]Nanette Asimov, Regents to back student protests at capitol, San Francisco Chronicle, 1/21/2001

[24] Glantz, Stan. Moving Forward From the 2009 Budget http://keepcaliforniaspromise.org/1

[25] Solomon Moore, Paring Plans for Healthcare in California Prisons,NYT, May 31, 2009
http://www.youtube.com/user/caltvinfo#p/u/48/vgDmft3DtMQhttp://www.youtube.com/user/caltvinfo#p/u/48/vgDmft3DtMQhttp://www.youtube.com/user/caltvinfo#p/u/48/vgDmft3DtMQ

gsoc curriculum—winter 2010

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