UCPD Policy Review - Public Comment

Currently reported as under review by the systemwide Academic Senate (and others) is policy related to the UCPD. Comments are due in mid-July.*

The proposed policy comes in two segments in Box: a clean copy of the proposal** and a tracked change version.*** Although there are cover letters regarding the review, there really is no overall summary of highlights as to what was changed, what is new, etc. And there is a lot of material.

I am guessing that those concerned will be mainly interested in the following items:

• Arrests
• Use of Force
• Personnel, Duties and Responsibilities
• Crowd and Demonstration Management
• Military Equipment
• Unmanned Aircraft Systems
• Mutual Aid
• Systemwide Response Teams

Note: In some cases, you may get a message that the item is not available and can't be downloaded. But in fact it can be downloaded and then read. Not all items appear in both Box collections. Be persistent.

Additional note: Given the complexity and length of the documentation, it would have been nice if the systemwide Senate had distributed a guide to the significant changes, rather than just make the entire set of files available.

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*https://senate.universityofcalifornia.edu/_files/underreview/systemwide-senate-review-ucpd-policies-gold-book.pdf.

**https://ucop.app.box.com/s/qldatg08j5ifk9zar6yvq0vfbymxmakn.

***https://ucop.app.box.com/s/ouweu9b5xn9ciepangdeunk2ljvgxrxq.

Straws in the Wind - Part 363

From Centre Daily Times: As Penn State prepares for seven of its commonwealth campuses to close, the university’s technical service union is demanding protections for employees. After the university announced it would close seven campuses by the end of the spring 2027 semester, the Teamsters Local 8 union that represents more than 2,000 technical workers across the commonwealth began negotiating with the university in July 2025 over job placement protections. A proposal was presented to the union in November, according to local union President Jon Light, but the 59 members at the affected campuses overwhelmingly voted to reject it. The proposal, Light said, would allow the university to lay off union members at any time, replace them with part-time or contract labor and keep the affected campuses open without union workers.

After months of negotiations, Light said the university is backtracking on promises they made at the beginning of their discussions with the union. “I sat in on one of the meetings and heard executives say they wanted to find placements for workers — whether they wanted to continue working or retire,” he said. “They said they planned to keep these campuses open through May 2027, and even longer if they couldn’t sell them. Now, they essentially want the ability to lay workers off at any time, remove job placement protections and offer severance packages that require employees to immediately separate from Penn State with little to no opportunity for rehiring.” ...

Full story at https://amp.centredaily.com/news/local/education/penn-state/article315845132.html.

Shifting Gears

As blog readers will know, the higher ed model that developed after World War II is breaking down as the federal government pulls away from supporting research. There are two primary sources of funding for basic and applied research: the feds and the private sector. The likely scenario for research universities is to shift from the former to the latter with maybe some public funding from the state.

From the Daily Bruin: The Henry Samueli School of Engineering’s new $125 million Semiconductor Hub will push technological boundaries, faculty and administrators said at a conference May 21. The hub will accelerate research on semiconductors, which are materials used in computer chips to regulate electrical current, faculty speakers said. The project will advance autonomous vehicles, robotics, environmental engineering and space systems, the School of Engineering said in a statement.

Alissa Park, the Ronald and Valerie Sugar Dean of the School of Engineering, announced the hub and its corporate partners – Applied Materials, GlobalFoundries, Meta, Synopsys and Broadcom – at the Mong Auditorium. Engineering faculty, students and more than 250 industry executives attended the half-day event...

The Trump administration withheld $584 million in scientific research funding from UCLA in late July, alleging that the university allowed antisemitism, affirmative action and “men to participate in women’s sports.” While a series of court orders restored the vast majority of the frozen grants, the UC has pushed for alternative funding, including state funding and a bill that would allow California voters to decide on a $12 billion bond for scientific research...

Full story at https://dailybruin.com/2026/06/02/ucla-announces-125-million-semiconductor-hub-with-industry-partners.

The Forecast

The UCLA Anderson Forecast met yesterday and, not expectedly, took note of an uncertain environment. From the news release:

The June 2026 UCLA Anderson Forecast for the U.S. and California finds the economy confronting another inflationary shock, this time driven by the war in Iran and the closing of the Strait of Hormuz. After tariff-driven inflation appeared to peak and the labor market began to stabilize, rising energy prices have created a new source of pressure on households, businesses and the Federal Reserve.

The national economy remains relatively resilient, but the Iran-related oil shock has replaced tariffs as the major inflation threat. GDP growth is now expected to hold at roughly 2.1% in 2026 rather than accelerate; inflation is forecast to peak at 4.5%; and unemployment is expected to rise only modestly to 4.5%. The key forces offsetting the oil shock and tariffs are investment in artificial intelligence, tax cuts and earlier fiscal support.

In California, the same energy shock creates additional pressures because of the state’s specific low-emissions gasoline requirements and the importance of ports and logistics to the state economy. California continues to outpace the U.S. in output and income growth, but its labor market remains weak, and the employment recession described in prior Forecast reports is expected to continue through the third quarter of 2026...

California Forecast Numbers

Unemployment Rates (Annual Averages)

2026: 5.5%

2027: 5.1%

2028: 4.2%

Total Employment Growth

2026: 0.2%

2027: 0.7%

2028: 2.5% ...

Full release at https://www.anderson.ucla.edu/news-and-events/ucla-anderson-forecast-says-oil-shock-has-replaced-tariffs-leading-risk-us-economy.

The forecasters looked at alternative scenarios concerning when the Strait of Hormuz would be reopened and the impact on oil prices and general inflation. At present, the world is drawing down reserves of oil, i.e., more oil is being consumed than is being newly supplied. If the war situation is not settled in a couple of months, prices will rise from current levels since pricing expectations are based on a relatively quick settlement.

Although no one said so, it struck yours truly that paradoxically we may end up with an inadvertent Trump Green New Deal, even though the idea would be anathema to the current administration. The economists' solution has always been to raise the price of oil substantially through taxes, cap-and-trade programs, and the like. Even if some kind of settlement allows oil to flow again through the Strait and prices come down, the world has learned that reliance on oil from that part of the world is unwise. We live in interesting times.

Apart from the general forecast, the remainder of the Forecast dealt with real estate: residential, commercial, and industrial. A video will eventually be available.

Union News

From the Daily Bruin: About 12,000 employees joined a union representing UC academic student employees, postdoctoral students and academic researchers May 19, making it the largest union in the UC. The expansion brings United Auto Workers Local 4811 to 60,000 workers across the UC. UAW Local 4811’s new union members include Student Services and Advising Professionals and Research and Public Service Professionals. SSAPs provide a variety of services to students and faculty, including curriculum planning, financial aid assistance and career service specialization. RPSPs engage in data collection, research and grant management...

Heather Hansen, a spokesperson for the UC Office of the President, said in an emailed statement that the Public Employment Relations Board is still reviewing the expansion. The board is addressing questions concerning which bargaining unit these workers will be placed in and potential overlap between multiple unions, Hansen added in the statement...

Full story at https://dailybruin.com/2026/05/28/12000-employees-to-bring-ucs-largest-union-to-60000-workers.

Straws in the Wind - Part 362

From the Chronicle of Higher Education: In his first interview since being named the sole finalist for the University of Florida’s presidency, Stuart Bell on Friday defended his past diversity initiatives at the University of Alabama as an effort to boost in-state enrollment and described colleges’ explicit goals of recruiting more minority students as a form of “segregation.”

“When we talk about DEI and the criticisms we all hear and agree with, we think of segregation, in terms of keeping students away from certain areas,” Bell said in an interview with Salem News Channel, a conservative news network. “Those are certainly what DEI became at some places in the country. That certainly was not our focus at the University of Alabama.” Conservative activists, prominent Republican lawmakers, and Education Secretary Linda McMahon have called for Bell’s candidacy to be rejected because of his diversity efforts as president of the University of Alabama, which they say led to pervasive discrimination against white students and faculty...

Bell plans to visit the University of Florida’s campus next week to speak with students, faculty, and administrators ahead of his interview with the Board of Trustees on June 10. If Bell is confirmed by the trustees, he will go before the Florida Board of Governors for final confirmation later this summer.

Full story at https://www.chronicle.com/article/vying-for-the-u-of-florida-presidency-stuart-bell-compares-colleges-diversity-efforts-to-segregation.

Sliding into a problem

From the Daily Cal: The percentage of failing grades in multiple UC Berkeley computer science classes in spring 2026 is significantly higher than past semesters and marks a departure from the department’s grading guidelines. Instructors point to students’ increased reliance on AI, lack of mathematical preparedness and understaffing as potential contributing factors.

According to Berkeleytime, 35.3% of CS 10 students and 10.6% of CS 61A students received F’s in spring 2026. In spring 2025 and spring 2024, the percentage of F’s did not exceed 10% for either class. The electrical engineering and computer sciences department’s grading guidelines state that 7% of students in lower division courses, including CS 10 and CS 61A, should receive D’s and F’s...

UC Berkeley teaching professor Dan Garcia taught both CS 10, “The Beauty and Joy of Computing,” and CS 61A, “The Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs,” in spring 2026. Garcia believes the “primary driver” of these abnormally high failing rates is due to a “vast increase in academic dishonesty” due to students’ usage of large language models, such as Claude, ChatGPT and Google Gemini.

“Some of the numbers that you saw from the number of students who receive failing grades were because we caught them (cheating) and prosecuted them and are sending their cases to the center for student conduct,” Garcia said. “But in other cases, it’s students who are leaning a little too hard on LLMs to do their work for them, and then at exam time just really aren’t ready.” ...

Full story at https://www.dailycal.org/news/campus/academics/failing-grades-soar-as-professors-see-greater-ai-usage-dwindling-math-skills-in-uc-berkeley/article_16fad0bf-02cb-4b8c-8d88-888ffd9f8608.html.