Richard Scalettar: Faculty walkout would spotlight harm state's done
Another View
Last Modified: Sunday, Sep. 13, 2009 - 10:03 am
I write in response to The Bee's Sept. 5 editorial "Ticked-off profs punish students" about teaching and furloughs at California universities.
Why are faculty considering a walkout? This year's 40 percent reduction in state support for the University of California and California State University systems caps years of cuts. In 2001, California spent $22,300 per student in today's dollars; today, we spend half as much. Many faculty see a walkout as the only way to be heard, to focus attention on the harm the state – not the faculty – is doing to students.
Washington Monthly recently rated three UC campuses in the top five nationally in service to the nation. California's educated work force, our high-tech industry, our advanced agriculture and medicine all spring from research and teaching at UC and CSU. As top students and faculty look elsewhere, will our cutting-edge industries remain? While the budget crisis has accelerated the process, we are also victims of a fundamental shift in vision by UC leaders.
In a 2002 article in Change magazine, before becoming UC president, Mark Yudof wrote, "Public research universities will look to students to pay more of their educational costs. These students will be part of what I have dubbed the hybrid university, an institution with many traditions and functions still within the public realm, but with other characteristics that are more in line with those of private colleges and universities."
Do your readers want their public universities privatized? Do parents want their children excluded as fees rise to the level of private universities? Do they want an elitist university system where admission is based on wealth? Or do they want a system where every California student has equal opportunity? As a former undergraduate at UC Irvine, graduate student at UC Santa Barbara, and UC Davis professor, I also respond to The Bee's challenge to my commitment to education.
I received the 2009 UCD Chancellor's Award for Excellence in Undergraduate Mentoring, teach each summer in a high school science program and lead a UCD effort partnering faculty with undergraduate research students. I undertake these duties in addition to my "normal" teaching and maintain a research group bringing $300,000 a year in federal funding to California.
But I am far from unique. My colleagues at UC, CSU and community colleges have an enduring commitment to California's undergraduates. All we ask is that the Legislature and UC leadership share the same.
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