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The Lombardo Trophy: Are students Memorial Stadium’s eventual saviors?

Memorial Stadium’s renovation — a $321 million, multiyear endeavor that yielded a gleaming, earthquake-proof temple of football — has long been short on cash. In the beginning, campus officials contended that, recession and common sense be damned, donors would pay for almost the entire cost by purchasing expensive season tickets. Read More…

Reinvesting, strings attached

UNIVERSITY ISSUES: Gov. Jerry Brown’s proposed budget rightfully gives more money to the UC system, but seeks too many restrictions.

Sacramento is finally starting to seriously reverse its divestment from higher education. With the state beginning to emerge from a deep slump of deficits and spending cuts, Gov. Jerry Brown earlier this month announced a budget plan for the next fiscal year that proposes sorely needed increased funding to the Read More…

Yudof’s complicated legacy

UNIVERSITY ISSUES: UC President Mark Yudof, who will step down at the end of August, led the university through a tough financial climate.

Mark Yudof became president of the University of California at an incredibly difficult time. Just a few months after he took office in June 2008, the nation suffered its worst financial catastrophe since the Great Depression, and, in the years that followed, state funds for higher education were slashed significantly, Read More…

Improving online education

UNIVERSITY ISSUES: If UC leaders expand the university’s online education program, they must figure out how to make it drastically better for students.

Online education is an attractive venue for universities to explore, and for good reason. It offers many advantages to higher education institutions, from the prospect of saving costs to expediting students’ time in the classroom and expanding a university’s reach. But if UC officials are going to invest heavily in Read More…

Raising concerns for Dirks

CAMPUS ISSUES: UC Berkeley chancellor-designate Nicholas Dirks should not have been given a pay increase above his predecessor’s salary.

The UC Board of Regents has forced UC Berkeley’s next chancellor into an awkward position. Earlier this week, the regents inappropriately awarded Nicholas Dirks, who will replace Robert Birgeneau as chancellor in June, a $50,000 pay increase above his predecessor’s salary. While the extra funding for Dirks’ pay will not Read More…

A new campus activism

CAMPUS ISSUES: A year after Occupy Cal took UC Berkeley by storm, activism on campus needs to adapt to new political and social realities.

Occupy Cal is dead, but that doesn’t mean student activism should disappear. One year ago, protesters at UC Berkeley used the momentum of Occupy Wall Street to establish a movement that, at least for a short period of time, consumed the campus. However, since Nov. 15 of last year, turnout Read More…

Necessary nonresidents

UNIVERSITY ISSUES: Faced with few other short-term options, UC officials should enroll more nonresident students, but larger changes are needed.

For years, the University of California has struggled to ensure that it maintains access for as many state residents as possible while also preserving its academic excellence. And while the university is clearly in need of dramatic structural changes to adapt to the recurring problems it faces, tough short-term decisions Read More…