We finish our reformatting of UC health insurance premiums for the group of Medicare-eligible retirees who have non-eligible family members. Not being in Medicare is bad news.
Wednesday, November 4, 2026
Medicare-Eligible - One or More Family Members Not Eligible - Percent
Straws in the Wind - Part 515
From the Yale Daily News: The Yale Divinity School has decreased enrollment in the two most recent admissions cycles to maintain its commitment to full-tuition scholarships after a federal endowment tax hike prompted University-wide cuts. The endowment tax increase, which is costing the University $247 million this fiscal year, has had varied impacts across Yale’s schools. The Divinity School, whose income relies heavily on endowment returns, enrolled fewer students to maintain its guarantee of providing need-based full-tuition scholarships in the face of budgetary pressure, the school announced in August.
...Divinity School students interviewed by the News said they appreciated the school’s commitment to financial aid but expressed disappointment about the decrease in enrollment...
Full story at https://yaledailynews.com/articles/divinity-school-has-lowered-enrollment-to-keep-aid-under-trump-tax-hike.
DOJ Berkeley Law Journal Probe
From the Daily Californian: The U.S. Department of Justice is investigating the California Law Review, the UC Berkeley School of Law’s student-run journal, after an outside source alleged the publication was considering a plan to delete all internal application records. The investigation comes weeks after the DOJ found Berkeley Law had discriminated against white and Asian applicants, extending federal scrutiny of the law school from its admissions office to its student journal...
...The California Law Review fully complies with the law in choosing members and does not give preference based on race or gender,” said Berkeley Law Dean Erwin Chemerinsky... The Washington Free Beacon, a conservative online newspaper, reported in August that members of the review’s committee had made pledges to “uplift Native voices,” consider “diverse life experience” alongside “technical editing abilities,” and “integrate anti-racist sentiment” into the selection process.
Nearly two months later, the Free Beacon is alleging the student journal was set to vote on a proposed document retention policy that would require members to delete all documents kept outside the review’s Google Drive within two months of the conclusion of their membership at the journal. The Free Beacon alleges the policy “is attempting to destroy evidence that could be used against it in the event of a discrimination probe.” ...
...The Free Beacon alleged an editor of the student journal told the paper that the policy would raise legal concerns about the destruction of evidence and could expose students to criminal liability. Following the Free Beacon’s claims, the DOJ wrote a legal hold letter Oct. 21 demanding that UC Berkeley, Berkeley Law and the California Law Review preserve all of the journal’s records, including those stored outside student email accounts. It warned that destroying them could be treated as “willful destruction of evidence of civil rights violations.”
...[Assistant Attorney General for the Civil Rights Division Harmeet] Dhillon, who signed the department’s Sept. 9 findings against Berkeley Law, wrote on X that after the Civil Rights Division found UC Berkeley had “an illegal race-based admission system,” the review “thought it would be a bright idea to destroy evidence of possible race discrimination in how it selects its members.” ...“CLR complies with the law and will continue to do so,” said Editor in Chief Deksyos Damtew and Managing Editor Cait Meyer in a joint email statement.
Will Harvard Continue to Lead the Charge? - Part 210
From Inside Higher Ed: A federal judge on Monday dismissed the Trump administration’s legal attempt to force Harvard University to provide certain admissions information, though the court said the government could refile the lawsuit. The Justice Department filed the litigation against Harvard in February, accusing it of unlawfully withholding “information necessary to determine whether Harvard, which has a recent history of racial discrimination, is continuing to discriminate in its admissions.” In an amended complaint in May, it added allegations that the university was also withholding this info from the Education Department. But on Monday, Judge Myong J. Joun of the U.S. District Court for Massachusetts concluded the administration hadn’t made its case sufficiently at this point to survive Harvard’s motion to dismiss it.
“I decide a limited question: whether the Government has adequately established, at this stage and on the materials properly considered, that it satisfied the prerequisites to judicial enforcement,” Joun wrote. He added that his “ruling does not determine whether Harvard has discriminated, whether the agencies may lawfully seek appropriately defined applicant-level data, or whether Harvard may ultimately be required to provide such data.” Joun, a Biden appointee, said he dismissed the suit without prejudice... The DOJ said it plans to refile the lawsuit...
Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2026/11/03/doj-ed-demand-harvard-admissions-info-dismissed-now.
Tuesday, November 3, 2026
We're still looking for numbers and definitions - Part 3
Yesterday, we posted the table below from the Oct. 29th Zoom meeting in which the UCLA budget was discussed:
Here are some line-item questions from the table on the left.
Line 5 shows "indirect cost recovery." Presumably, this refers to the tax on grants that helps pay for general expenses. The amount is projected to fall this year compared to last year. Is that a reflection of the current conflict with the feds?
Line 6 shows "other sources" that are also falling. The amount of other sources is around 16% of total revenues so they are not negligible.
Line 9: What are "all orgs"?
Line 10: Can we have a list of "core teaching and research units"? (See also the question about line 14 below.)
Line 11 and Line 12: What is the difference between "Central Administration" and "Operational Central Administration"?
Line 13: How does "operational student administration" differ from "operational central administration"?
Line 14 refers to "other research and mission-related units." Presumably, these are somehow not the "core" units of line 10. What are non-core units?
Line 15: Athletics is projected to lose more money this year relative to last year. A new AD has been brought in to fix things. Is the target for this year now zero? What is the new target?
Line 16: We noted that the business side of UCLA Health appears to be carved out of this version of the budget. So what are the expenses for UCLA Health on this line?
Lines 21 and 22: Why are expenses for DTS for this year, but not last year, shown outside the usual lines for such expenses?
As noted yesterday, there seems to be confusion about deficit vs. debt in the table on the right.
On line 23: It appears that someone is moving debts around to the center. But it is unclear why this would raise net debt unless the units involved are somehow off the books. What units are we talking about?
Line 24 contains mysterious language we noted yesterday that seems to imply that UCLA has overdrawn accounts held by UC. Or maybe it doesn't mean that. So an explanation is needed since this line accounts for over half the debt shown on the right-hand table.
Line 25 on athletics is past debt which is bigger than the athletics deficit of line 15. Presumably, when debt was forgiven, not all of it was - which accounts for the difference. ??? In any event, there needs to be more said about athletics than can be discerned from the two lines.
As noted yesterday, there was apparently discussion of a $250 million bond for athletics in which much was made of the fact that the entire principal was due when the bond matured. If that is correct, why is that depicted as unusual? A standard US Treasury bond, for example, is issued in just that way: The bond pays the lender just interest on a regular basis and when it matures the entire principal is returned. Of course, loans can be structured in various ways, e.g., mortgages typically involve repayment of interest and principal during the life of the loan. And the issuers of mortgages have claims on real property if the borrower defaults. So what exactly is the story of the athletics bond?
Two afterthoughts:
The chancellor has repeatedly talked about a $58 million deficit. But you won't find the number 58 on the tables. There is a $59 million number on line 20. As we have noted, that number is really not a deficit (flow concept). But putting aside the sloppy word usage, is that what the chancellor has been referencing?
We again urge that the recording of the Zoom event be made available. And we continue to wonder why the 2025-26 budget of last year is not on the UCLA website at:
https://www.finance.ucla.edu/corporate-accounting/ucla-annual-financial-reports.
All in Medicare - Percent
Note: Click on table to clarify.
We have been reformatting our earlier postings of Oct. 26 on UC health insurance premium changes, 2026-2027. It appears that having everyone in Medicare was a kind of insulation against premium increases. The only retirees disadvantaged were those in UC's Medicare Advantage Plan (Medicare Choice).
Straws in the Wind - Part 514
From Inside Higher Ed: The Department of Defense last week said the 30 institutions it ordered to audit their partnerships with foreign entities of concern have “fully mitigated” those partnerships... The Pentagon said the audits resulted in more than 80 “termination-related” actions across the 30 universities with institutions on the Section 1286 list of foreign entities of concern, “as well as precautionary terminations involving entities not specifically identified on the list.”
The department also called out seven institutions—Oklahoma State University, Pennsylvania State University, the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, the University of South Carolina, the University of Southern California, the University of Texas at Austin and Virginia Tech—for going “above and beyond by quickly terminating problematic relationships” with blacklisted institutions...
Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/global/us-colleges-world/2026/10/26/dod-declares-foreign-partnerships-audit-success.
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