TAXATION, CITIZENSHIP, PROTEST
AND OUR CURRENT CRISIS IN HIGHER EDUCATION
Wheeler Auditorium – 06 December 2011 – 12 pm to 2 pm
Free tickets available at the Wheeler Auditorium Box Office beginning at 11am
Doors open at 11:30amÂ
Henry E. Brady – Dean of the Goldman School of Public Policy and co-author of the forthcoming book The Unheavenly Chorus: Unequal Political Voice and the Broken Promise of American Democracy
Catherine M. Cole – Professor of Performance Studies at UC Berkeley and scholar of South Africa’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission
Donald Kennedy – President Emeritus of Stanford University; Bing Professor of Environmental Science and Policy, Emeritus, Stanford University
Alfredo Mireles, Jr. – Student Regent for the UC System, UC Berkeley alum, Graduate Student in Health Policy at UCSF and Registered Nurse
Jonathan Stein – UC Student Regent-Designate, former UC Student Association (UCSA) board member, and UC Berkeley MPP/JD candidate
FORMAT:
Talks -Â Each speaker will give a brief presentation to set the stage for group discussions and sharing of ideas and concerns
 Group discussion - The speakers will ask the audience to discuss topics brought up during the presentations in groups
Get your questions answered: Blank cards will be handed out as you arrive in Wheeler Auditorium. Write your questions down and give them to one of the volunteers. A volunteer will also come by to collect them after each talk. A student moderator will select questions to pose to the forum. You can also submit questions for Forum #2 here.
We look forward to hearing from you.
If you were unable to attend on Tuesday:
THIS FORUM WILL BE RECORDED AND POSTED ON THIS SITE AFTER THE EVENT.
This event is endorsed by The Offices of the Chancellor and Executive Vice Chancellor & Provost, The Academic Senate, The Associated Students of the University of California,The Berkeley Staff Assembly and The Graduate Assembly.
Much talk has been around making higher education more affordable for students. I think we should also look at accessibility to public higher education. More specifically, we should consider accessibility within minority communities. How will we move towards increasing accessibility among minority communities? Should there be a vision of a more equitable admissions process? Do the speakers openly support the Repeal of Prop 209? Is there any linkage between Prop 13 and Prop 209 in regards to public higher education?
It seems clear that Proposition 13 is a huge problem in our state for funding public education. How can we unite as a university and use our powerful say in removing this piece of legislature?
My 9-year old daughter’s dream is to go to Cal. But i worry that, though she is a top student, she has no chance because you are starting to increase enrollment of out of CA students (when it’s already competitive to get in) and she is not a minority (when so much of the emphasis is placed on this). What about CA residents who are just smart — will soon the option for these kind of students be Cal State schools. It seems so unfair given UC was meant for top CA students, not out of state students. Please don’t forget about this population.
I would be interested in hearing commentary on the alleged conflicts of interest that exist on the board of Regents. I would also be interested in a response to the conflict presented by using student fees as bond collateral. If raising student fees means we can obtain a better bond rating, it would seem there is an incentive to raise fees.
An address of the devaluation of humanities majors would also be intriguing.
There is a trend in college education – rationalized as helping reduce cost & maximize access – to promote remote learning, on line lectures and to gradually eliminate costly overhead of maintaining a faculty and a campus where students interact. For-profit free-standing investor-driven professional schools are in the works, turning higher education into a commodity governed by marketing and margins. Getting professors to provide their instruction on DVDs for administration to ‘sell’ could be tempting- with TV-style residuals generating income to faculty and lower overhead for the virtual University.
How will UC and untenured faculty resist this siren song ?
The proposed transition of our email services from internally provided to private contractor provided represents a privatization of the public university with a significant risk to our livelihood. What happens when google or microsoft go ‘out of business’ and our information assets are lost? What happens when there is contract dispute with these service providers? Loss of control of our own information services is a grave concern.