UC San Diego in the 21st Century:

Cathedral or Corporation on the Hill?

Jorge Mariscal
If you know your history,

Then you would know where you coming from,

Then you wouldn't have to ask me,

Who the ’heck do I think I am.

Bob Marley, “Buffalo Soldier”

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 Initial Assumptions
• Many of the people who began the process
of privatizing the UC system had good
intentions.
• We are now living with the unintended
negative consequences of their actions.
• Almost no one thought about the impact of
privatization on historically excluded
communities. This is still true in 2010.

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 What was special about UC?
Dating from the time of the Master Plan (1960), UC was a
one-of-a-kind offering of affordable, quality education at
multiple top-ranked research campuses.

Of the 13 universities in the top 50 with tuition less

than $10,000 per year, 6 were University of California
campuses.

Thousand of students of California, many from working

class backgrounds, received a superior education that
elsewhere was available only to the rich.

In 1965, the state paid 94.4% of a UC student’s

education; in 2008, it paid 58.5%. The percentage
continues to decline.
 The Master Plan was
created by UC President
Clark Kerr

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 Ronald Reagan became governor in
1967 and one year later fired Clark Kerr
 Late 1960s- early 1970s: Minority
students fight for access to the UC

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Reagan collaborated with the FBI to destroy
student groups and began the defunding of
the UC system

 Unable to fire all

UC chancellors

 Goes after students

 Governor Ronald Reagan, 1967-1975
• Called for end to free tuition for UC
and Cal State

• Demanded 20% cuts in higher

education funding

• Declared that taxpayers should not

“subsidize intellectual curiosity.”

• Asked why he should fund colleges

that produced students who
protested his policies

• On campus protests: "If it takes

a bloodbath, let's get it over with.
No more appeasement!"
 Two important CA Supreme Court rulings--
Serrano v. Priest, 1971 and 1976

• The Court ruled that the amount of funding

going to different school districts was
disproportionately favoring wealthy families

• The Court ruled that the state had to make the

distribution of revenue for education more equitable

• Businessman Howard Jarvis led what he called a

“taxpayers’ revolt”
 In 1978, Jarvis became the public face
of Proposition 13. Voters approved it by
65% to 35%.

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 What was Prop. 13?
• Imposed a cap on individual and
commercial property tax rates, reducing
them by an average of 57%.

• Required a two-thirds majority in both

legislative houses for future increases in
state tax rates.
 Higher Education Funding
• In 1970, UC received about 7% of the state’s general fund budget. Today,
it has fallen to roughly 3%.

• State per-student funding for educating UC students has fallen from

approx. $16,000 in 1990 to less than $8,000 in 2010.

• From 1984 to 2004, California's population increased 35%, while state

funding for higher education decreased by 9%. Higher education is the
only major part of California’s budget that grew more slowly than
population.

http://www.ucthewayforward.org/budgetfactsheet.pdf 13
 California shifted its priorities
• From 1982-2000, CA prison
population grew by 500%

• Three strikes law, 1994

• From 1983-2003, the Dept.

of Corrections workforce
increased by 350% (UC
system: 26%)

• During Arnold’s term as

governor, corrections
spending increased by 82%;
higher ed spending declined
by 9%
More information, see Michelle
Alexander, The New Jim Crow:
Mass Incarceration in the Age of
Colorblindness, The New Press,
2010, and Ruth Gilmore, Golden
Gulag, University of California
Press, 2006
In the late 1970s, public universities began
to privatize due to cuts in state funding

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 1978: National Science Foundation head,
Richard Atkinson, creates University-Industry
Cooperative Research Projects Program

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1974: Former UCSD Med School Dean, Clifford Grobstein, had

proposed the UCSD Research and Development Clearinghouse.
1980: Congress passes University-
Small Business Patent Procedures
Act or Bayh-Dole Act

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 Bayh-Dole removed obstacles to patenting
academic research. Taxpayer funded knowledge
made individual professors wealthy
(“Entrepreneurship” and “Technology Transfer”).

Bayh-Dole Amendment, 1984

Federal Technology Transfer Act, 1986
Reagan Executive Orders, 1983 & 1987
 First Biotech Company (1976)

San Diego Biotech, Biomedical and Pharma Companies (2006)

Hybritech

Lilly
Pfizer

Novartis
Johnson & Johnson

What about production?

“Universities in the 1980s made the
judgment that the inducements to
commercial activities outweighed
the possible risks to their core
academic roles.”

Roger Geiger, Knowledge and Money: Research

Universities and the Paradox of the Marketplace (2004)
 UCSD at the cutting edge of
technology transfer

• UCSD-CONNECT was founded in 1985 with the mission

of contributing to increased commercialization of
university research.

• Global CONNECT was founded in 2003 as a sister

program of the regionally focused CONNECT program.

• CONNECT, an independent entity since 2005, has

a number of high-ranking UCSD administrators
on its board.
• Left to right: Irwin Jacobs - Chairman, QUALCOMM; Richard Atkinson -
President Emeritus, University of California (and former Chancellor, UCSD);
Lea Rudee - Founding Dean UCSD School of Engineering; Mary Walshok -
Associate Vice Chancellor, Public Programs and Dean, UCSD Extension;
Buzz Woolley - President, Girard Capital/Girard Foundation; David Hale -
Chairman, Hale BioPharma Ventures LLC (Chair, CONNECT Board); Dan
Pegg - Former President & CEO, San Diego Regional Economic
Development Corporation
“To the extent that universities view themselves
first as drivers of economic development, and
only second as educational institutions, their
priorities will be skewed, and they will neglect
their commitment to the life of the mind.”

Jennifer Washburn, University, Inc. (2005)

Number of administrators
outnumber faculty
 You decide
UCSD awarded $13 million for Defense Department studies
S.D. UNION TRIBUNE, TUESDAY, JANUARY 27, 2009 AT 2:48 P.M.

SAN DIEGO – The federal government has awarded UCSD $13 million to conduct separate

studies on the roots of terrorism and defense technology in China.

Susan Shirk, director of the university's Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation, and Senior

Research Fellow Tai Ming Cheung will examine the evolving relationship between national security

in China and the use of technology.

Eli Berman, institute research director, will help spearhead research into terrorism, including what

reforms might be needed to reduce politically motivated violence.

The awards were given by the U.S. Department of Defense.

“The root malaise of China lies within the authoritarian system.”

-- Huang Hua, general secretary of the Chinese Democratic Party
Roger Revelle on UCSD (1991)
“From its small…
beginnings it has
become a big,
impersonal, rather
fragmented place; a
place we are all
proud of, but which
is rather hard to
love.”

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 Words acquire new
meanings
BEFORE
“community” = local working
and middle-class families
“diversity” = women and
historically excluded ethnic
and racial groups
“social justice” = transformation
of institutional structures that
reproduce inequality
AFTER
“community” = local corporate
and business entities
“diversity” = regional,
national, and other
“differences”
“social justice” = ensuring
everyone is ‘comfortable’
and not feeling “tense” or
‘threatened’
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Definitions we can believe
in
• MLK on the struggle
for social justice:

“I am not afraid of the words

'crisis' and 'tension' I
deeply oppose violence,
but to cure injustices you
must expose them before
the light of human
conscience and the bar of
public opinion, regardless
of whatever tensions that
exposure generates.”

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 In 2004, the UC and Cal State
presidents signed a “Compact” with
Governor Schwarzenegger

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The “Compact” was crafted by Arnold’s
finance director, Donna Arduin, who had
been Florida Governor Jeb Bush’s
budget director and a strong advocate of
privatization.

The “Compact” permanently reduced

state funding for UC, was signed behind
closed doors without public debate, and
locked in large student fee hikes.
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UC funding as % of state
coffers

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 Consequences

2009-2010 mid-year fee hike

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 Consequences
Student fees will increase dramatically by 44% by 2010
(making UC fees comparable to those of semi-private schools
like University of Michigan)

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 What is the so-called Michigan
solution to budget shortfalls?
• When the University of Michigan moved to a semi-
privatized model, it relaxed admissions standards to
recruit more out of state students who pay much more in
tuition.

• >50% of Michigan’s 2003 freshman class came from

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

• The result has been significantly diminished access for

the residents of Michigan, especially the most
disadvantaged, and a reduction in the quality of the
University as seen in its drop in rankings by U.S. News
and World Report.
http://keepcaliforniaspromise.org/wp-
content/uploads/2009/09/Understanding-the-Crisis.pdf 35
 Where do the fees go?
• According to UC President Yudof, higher
educational fees will pay for faculty
salaries

• Seven campuses sacrifice revenue to

maintain med schools and expensive labs
at UC Davis, UCLA, and UCSF

• UCSF ends up with a 459% return

“City on the Hill,” UC Santa Cruz student newspaper (12/09)
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 But what about financial aid?
• In 1980, Pell grants covered 77% of total student
costs at a four-year public college.

• In 2010, Pell grants cover only about 25%. Average

debt for UCSD students is about $15,000.

• Due to financial pressures, Pell grant recipients have

lower graduation rates.

• Many college graduates are deferring graduate

school due to debt responsibilities.
 “As colleges and universities shift
toward revenue generation through
academic capitalism, they invest less
in historic democratic missions of
providing increased access and
upward mobility for less advantaged
populations of students.”

Sheila Slaughter and Gary Rhoades, Academic Capitalism and the New Economy (2009)
2008: Pressure grows at UC
campuses to admit more
non-residents

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Impact of increase in non-
resident students
• Decline in number of first-generation and
HURM students

• Justifiable anger on the part of CaliforniaÕs

families; decreased public support

• Likelihood that the State will continue to

defund the UC system

• Increased costs associated with

recruitment and yield of non-resident
students and potential decline in
standards

• Long-term change in public character of

UC system 40
“The disastrous changes in fee and enrollment policies
will sharply limit opportunities for California residents
and severely damage the already meager
enrollment levels of African American, Latino, and
Native American students, and the enrollment of low-
income students in general.”

Bob Laird, former UC Berkeley director of admissions

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 Students take action

A woman is arrested by UC police after protesting at the Mission Bay

campus in San Francisco. Faculty, staff and students are urging a
systemwide walkout Sept. 24, the first day of classes for the fall quarter at
many UC campuses. (Paul Chinn / Associated Press / September 16)
Rally against fee hikes,
UCSD 9/24/09

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UC San Diego

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UCLA MEChA at Regents’
Meeting, 11/19/09

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UC police taser students

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UC Berkeley

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 Bottom line for you
• UC is becoming more private and less public, which
is bad for ACCESS (it will become a school for the
wealthy with a few token Latino/a and AfAm
students)
• Fewer first-generation and HURM students will be
able to attend
• Educational opportunities will be reduced, and this
will have an profound impact on future generations
of California youth

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Voices from the past

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Plan de Sánta Bárbara 1969

“The colleges and universities in the

past have existed in an aura of
omnipotence and infallibility. It is time
that they be made responsible and
responsive to the communities in
which they are located.”

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 Time for a change

“The structures and functions of the

American university system have escaped
intensive and honest scrutiny.

Black people know this and so do the

Mexicans--and so do the disillusioned
sons and daughters of the white working
class.”

-- Dr. Ralph Guzmán (UCSC, 1969)

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 Possible Solutions

• Eliminate Prop. 13’s 2/3 majority by

supporting the “California Democracy
Act” calling for a simple majority to
raise taxes

• Create an oil and gas extraction tax

dedicated for higher education
(proposed AB 656)

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 What you can do
• Be informed. Learn about privatization and how it impacts higher
education
• Defend public education by spreading the word
• Demand a new Master Plan for the 21st century
• Reject superficial definitions of “diversity”; insist on equitable
outcomes for women and historically excluded groups
• Vote when the time comes! Lots of students don’t vote; your vote
counts
• Speak out for the public good over private gain
• Organize!

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