Thursday, July 18, 2013

good one, UC

Many I really hope the UC governing board votes down Janet Napolitano as the new UC president. It really sends a bad message. Head of homeland security during a time of ever increasing surveillance?  Governor of Arizona, a super fucked up state?  Not involved in academia in any way ever?  The UC is pretty fucked in countless ways and this is just the icing on the cake.  It strays further and further from its original mission every day and it's very sad to be on the inside of it.  My job is fine I just feel bad for the students, especially the poorer students who live in California who can't afford tuition or who are close to the grade and test cutoff but are being pushed out by out-of-state or foreign students.  There is nothing wrong with the latter type of students except that it's a pure money grab that pushes aside CA high school students.  Meanwhile the number of bureaucrats (vice chancellors, etc.) has doubled in the last 20 years, all highly paid positions, while key staff has been cut and buildings are crumbling around us.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

If you thought smoking weed in the dorms was risky now ...

NM

beckler said...

on a lighter note: I think some of my tweets have been pretty funny lately, see link on right

Snufkin said...

it's a pure money grab that pushes aside CA high school students.

No kidding. One of my sisters works for Berkeley and has mentioned this, along with how getting funding via tuition instead of the legislation means that the system can pretty much spend money as it sees fit, instead of having to follow guidelines and requirements attached to earmarks. And the whole thing pushes down the system as people who can't afford UC look to CSU or community colleges instead, which are also getting slammed with cost cuts.

And in terms of cost inflation, when I did my undergrad at UC, my tuition was about $2000 a year. I probably couldn't afford it if I were an undergrad now.

Anonymous said...

condi rice and henry kissinger are on the board of the org where i work, if that's any consolation.

--chaffrica

The Armeniac said...

This seems like a bad idea. Have other UC Presidents been non-academics?

beckler said...

I could be wrong but I think it's unprecedented. I don't know if Mark Yudof was any good, but he at least was a law professor. Wiki said recognized expert in the fields of constitutional law, etc. He was a former chancellor and president at other universities. So yeah, just *slightly* more qualified

Wow two war criminals on your board!

Anonymous said...

Fucking UC... I feel really lucky to have gotten in/out of there during affordable times.

Enjoy your Heinekin with Walt Gray!!

Jed