Only NFL?

From the NY Times: Since the degenerative brain disease known as C.T.E. was first scientifically linked to football about 20 years ago, and as hundreds of former professional football players have been diagnosed with the disease after their deaths, a haunting question has lingered: Just how many N.F.L. players will end up with C.T.E.? New data provides a sobering indication: At least one in four of all the people who have played in the N.F.L. might expect to end up with chronic traumatic encephalopathy, according to a study of hundreds of cases over a recent six-year period.

Researchers considered every former N.F.L. player who died from 2016 to 2021. There were 878. Some died in their 20s, some in their 80s, most in between. The study’s main finding was simple math: At least 215 of those 878 former players — 24.5 percent — had C.T.E. ... C.T.E. is a progressive neurological disease caused by repeated impacts to the head. It can be definitively diagnosed only by examining the brain after death. Studies have shown that the rate of C.T.E. in people who have not sustained repeated impacts to the head is nearly zero...

Experts say that the rate of brain disease represents an occupational safety hazard with little comparison in the American workplace...

Full story at https://www.nytimes.com/2026/08/25/us/nfl-cte-brain-disease.html.

As the distinction between professional football and college football becomes murkier, with NIL, etc., is there anyone who seriously believes CTE is somehow a risk only to players in the former?

Straws in the Wind - Part 452

Ronald Daniels, President of Johns Hopkins in an interview with the Chronicle of Higher Education: We developed the partnership with the American Enterprise Institute. We recognized it was going to take time to see a shift in the recruitment of faculty, but we wanted to move with some dispatch to make sure that our students and faculty were exposed to these ideas. 

The fact that conservative scholarship is underrepresented in our institutions ultimately means that the left gets flabbier because it’s not being tested and challenged in the way it ought to be. At the same time, the right, to the extent that it moves outside the university and finds itself in think tanks and is not subject to challenges or critiques from the center and the left, becomes more radicalized. This is not just a problem for our institutions. It’s a problem for America. So I do feel urgency in trying to remedy this issue. It was my colleague Steve Teles, who wrote in The Chronicle about this, who said he was hard pressed to identify a single tenured conservative scholar in the social sciences and humanities at Hopkins. I took that as a very serious critique.

Interviewer: A recent article about various political-diversity initiatives at Hopkins describes the university under your leadership as being on “an ambitious and uncharted journey to transform itself into a citadel of ideological pluralism.”

Daniels: I take it as a compliment. That’s something that I proudly embrace...

Full story at https://www.chronicle.com/article/conservative-scholars-are-rare-johns-hopkins-wants-more-of-them.

Will Harvard Continue to Lead the Charge? - Part 194

From the Harvard Crimson: The Department of Justice appealed the dismissal of its antisemitism lawsuit against Harvard... seeking to revive a sweeping case accusing the University of violating federal civil rights law in its treatment of Jewish and Israeli students. The government filed a notice Thursday afternoon asking the First Circuit to review U.S. District Court Judge Richard G. Stearns’ August 13 decision granting Harvard’s motion to dismiss the case. The appeal comes two weeks after Stearns dealt a major blow to one of the Trump administration’s most aggressive legal efforts against Harvard, finding that the incidents cited by the government were “too isolated and episodic” to prove an ongoing violation of Title VI...

Stearns left open the possibility that should the government be able to present compelling instances of ongoing noncompliance, their case might be seen in a different light. And he did not quarrel with the government’s assumption that it could recuperate previously awarded funds under the Title VI or breach of contract arguments outlined in the original complaint...

Full story at https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2026/8/28/doj-harvard-antisemitism-appeal/.

The SAT Goes Political

We live in a world in which there is no issue that can't be politicized. If Trump says the sky is blue, Republicans see it that way and Democrats don't. If he says the sky is green, the same occurs. And no one bothers to look up. There was even a movie five years ago titled "Don't Look Up" about this tendency. The thing is, the color of the sky is a matter of observation.

Apparently, the SAT issue at UC is becoming politicized. From the LA Times:

Three Republican state senators are pressing the University of California to reinstate SAT and ACT scores in undergraduate admissions, urging the Board of Regents to act “as soon as possible” and warning that six years without the tests has left students underprepared. “Please re-instate the SAT or ACT ASAP,” wrote the three legislators — Sens. Roger Niello (R-Fair Oaks), Rosilicie Ochoa Bogh (R-Yucaipa) and Steven S. Choi (R-Irvine). Ochoa Bogh is vice chair of the Senate Education Committee and Choi is a member. Injecting legislative politics into what has so far been a largely academic debate about UC admissions policies, Ochoa Bogh also said in a statement that she plans to introduce a bill next session on testing...

https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2026-08-26/gop-senators-uc-sat-testing-legislation.

A related letter was sent to UC President Milliken and others to the same effect by Ochoa Bogh and Niello:

https://sr19.senate.ca.gov/sites/sr19.senate.ca.gov/files/OCHOA%20BOGH%20AND%20NIELLO%20Letter%20to%20the%20UC%208.20.26.pdf.

So he's not Co-CFO? He's the AD.

Blog readers may remember the image above from our Aug. 21st post concerning Tim Harris and whether he was being brought to UCLA as a kind of co-CFO, as suggested by an item in the California Post. Turns out he was brought in as the new (replacement) Athletics Director. From the Daily Bruin:

Martin Jarmond is out of Westwood. Chancellor Julio Frenk said in a campuswide email and written statement that Jarmond, who has served as UCLA’s athletic director since 2020, was dismissed from his position Monday. Jarmond will be replaced by former Los Angeles Lakers executive Tim Harris, who will serve as both director and CEO of UCLA Athletics on a pro bono basis, Frenk added. Jarmond has $6.5 million remaining on his contract...

In the 2024-25 fiscal year, the program ran a $21.6 million deficit – down from $51.8 million in the previous cycle. Most of that reduction came from media rights revenue upon joining the Big Ten, which provided more than three times what UCLA procured in the Pac-12. The university itself also provided $30 million in direct institutional support to pay for the remaining deficit and balance it out to zero...

Full story at https://dailybruin.com/2026/08/31/ucla-athletics-director-martin-jarmond-dismissed-from-position-after-6-years.

By the way, if the last paragraph makes no sense to you, you are not alone. As yours truly reads it, we had a deficit of $21.6, added $30, and got zero. (Maybe this is yet another argument for at least the math part of the SAT to be restored!) The problem, however, isn't arithmetic. It is the absence of budgetary numbers (once again) beyond June 30, 2025 - more than a year ago. We need a 2025-26 income statement, a balance sheet, and a breakdown by unit - including athletics as a unit. And we need projections for 2026-27. If Tim Harris is being brought in to deal with the financial side of athletics, he, too, will need up-to-date numbers.

So far, all we have is a promise that all will be disclosed in an upcoming "retreat" this month.

===

Note: Chancellor's message at https://chancellor.ucla.edu/messages/building-the-next-chapter-of-ucla-athletics or https://archive.org/details/ucla-budget-book-v-final-feb-2026/UCLA%20Building%20the%20Next%20Chapter%20of%20UCLA%20Athletics%20-%20Office%20of%20the%20Chancellor%208-31-2026.pdf.

Picking Dates

The Regents pick tentative dates for their regular meetings a year or so in advance. But the dates tend to shift for unknown reasons as the original selections grow nearer. For example, the upcoming September meetings at UCLA were originally set for Sept. 15-17. Then the last day was lopped off and the schedule became Sept. 15-16. Why? Not enough business to do? Your guess is as good as mine. But recently, a day was added back, but this time it is earlier. So now the schedule reads Sept. 14-16. Why the addition after the subtraction and the time shift? Who knows?

The schedule is at https://regents.universityofcalifornia.edu/meetings/. The Wayback Machine from the Internet Archive was used to track the changes: https://web.archive.org/.

Union News: Police Contract

From UC News: The University of California and the Federated University Police Officers’ Association (FUPOA) have reached a tentative agreement on a new systemwide contract covering approximately 273 sworn, non-supervisory police officers across the University.

The four-year tentative agreement, which will run July 1, 2026, through June 30, 2030, provides significant wage increases and includes enhancements to longevity pay, additional compensation and allowances. The agreement follows six months of bargaining and reflects the parties’ shared effort to address priorities on both sides...

Full news release at https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/press-room/university-california-and-federated-university-police-officers-association-fupoa-reach.