Does this make you nervous?

As blog readers will know, we have been following UC's bailout of the Blackstone Real Estate Trust (BREIT). From the Financial Times: 

Blackstone owes the University of California twice as much as it did last quarter as part of a complex transaction to shore up its flagship real estate fund. The world’s largest alternative asset manager promised UC an 11.25 per cent annual return from the property fund, called Blackstone Real Estate Income Trust, or Breit, as part of a deal to draw $4.5bn in new investment. But as the fund lost value last year, Blackstone’s liability to UC has grown to $560mn.

It underscores the financial risk Blackstone assumed to draw UC’s investment by promising high returns on property investments hit by rising interest rates. In late December 2022 and January 2023, Blackstone received a $4.5bn investment from UC that helped Breit meet a spate of redemption requests from other investors and shore up its liquidity. The new cash helped Breit avert a fire sale to meet the requests. To entice UC, Blackstone made a promise that Breit would achieve 11.25 per cent annualised returns over six years. The US private capital group pledged $1.1bn in Breit shares it owned to guarantee some of those returns. Since the UC investment, Breit’s redemption requests have dropped by about 80 per cent.

But Blackstone has had to record a liability to UC based on how far Breit has fallen below its return promises. In the fourth quarter, Blackstone more than doubled its liability to UC, raising it from $260mn at the end of the third quarter to $560mn by the end of 2023, according to a securities filing. Breit recorded a 0.5 per cent loss in 2023, its first annual loss since its launch in 2017, putting Blackstone significantly behind on its promised return. Breit’s value fell as Blackstone marked down some property investments. In addition, some interest rate hedges that had gained substantially in value lost ground amid rising expectations of interest rate cuts from the US Federal Reserve.

The annual losses in turn caused Blackstone’s liability to UC to increase. Though it is an accounting entry and no cash or assets are changing hands, the liability reflects the increased risk Blackstone may eventually have to forfeit some Breit shares it owns to the California-based endowment. If Breit’s performance soars in coming years, the liability could reverse or even turn into an asset...

Full story at https://www.ft.com/content/c057a8ff-0a9b-418b-80b3-0e66055af95c.

The Missing Link in Admissions

Given all the noisy politics around what should be taught in K-12 about California's diverse population, or around the use of admissions tests such as the SAT, you might think that these issues are the key to making college more available to disadvantaged students.

However, in California, to apply to UC or CSU, students in high school need to complete the so-called A-G courses. A majority of students do not, either because the courses aren't offered or because they are unaware of the importance of taking the courses. 

EdSource has a chart showing A-G completion rates in 2023:

Source: https://edsource.org/2024/most-california-high-school-seniors-shut-out-of-even-applying-to-the-states-universities/705635.

It appears, therefore, that the key to wider access is to get more high school students interested in taking A-G and being capable of completing A-G when they do. And, of course, A-G have to be offered and promoted by school districts.

Regents vs. Senate

As blog readers will know, the Regents are in conflict with the Academic Senate regarding online degrees, after a vote on Feb. 14th.* This conflict is part of a longer trend involving other issues such as dropping use of the SAT. From Inside Higher Ed:

The University of California is ending a ban on allowing students to study for their degrees entirely through online courses. The UC Board of Regents voted 10 to 1 on Feb. 14 to repeal a year-old decision by the Academic Senate. That 2023 decision essentially banned online degrees from the university system, requiring anyone seeking an online degree to get an exception to that “campus experience” requirement.

The vote has raised issues about the balance of power between the regents and the Academic Senate. “It’s within the board’s authority to make a decision in the area of degree requirements, but the way it was carried out was damaging to shared governance,” said James Steintrager, chair of the Academic Senate.

Steintrager said there are no immediate plans to respond to the regents’ reversal, adding that the Senate does not have the power to override the decision. But, he said, there will be a response about the regents’ decision-making process. “I was taken aback in the way they did it, because they listened to the argument but had no meaningful Q&A,” he said, referring to the lack of questioning during his presentation at the meeting. “They seemed to have a willingness to act without being informed.” ...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/tech-innovation/teaching-learning/2024/02/27/university-california-lifts-ban-online-degree.

===

*https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2024/02/watch-regents-full-board-meeting-of-feb.html.

Remember "Medical" Marijuana?

You may recall that the approval by voters of "medical" marijuana led quickly to a de facto legalization of recreational marijuana. The original selling point was that a few cancer patients and others could benefit from doctor-prescribed marijuana, so why shouldn't it be allowed? But once it was allowed, it wasn't hard to obtain a prescription for any ailment, real, imagined, or totally made up. 

What the US Supreme Court opened the door to NIL (name-image-likeness) payments to college athletes, the justices probably imagined that only a few star athletes would benefit. But once NIL was allowed, supposedly for stars, it became a general recruitment and retention tool, i.e., general pay-for-play. Now lower courts are recognizing - and apparently endorsing - general pay-for-play. From Inside Higher Ed:

A federal judge issued a preliminary injunction siding with the states of Tennessee and Virginia in their lawsuit challenging the National Collegiate Athletic Association’s enforcement of its rules restricting the use of name, image and likeness payments to recruit athletes... Judge Clifton L. Corker of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Tennessee issued a preliminary injunction barring the NCAA from enforcing its name, image and likeness policy, citing not its impact on institutions like the University of Tennessee but on athletes themselves.

“It is pure speculation to assume that student-athletes would receive more lucrative NIL deals in an open market. Fair-market value may be equal to or less than the NIL deals student-athletes can currently receive after selecting a school,” Corker wrote. “But without the give and take of a free market, student-athletes simply have no knowledge of their true NIL value. It is this suppression of negotiating leverage and the consequential lack of knowledge that harms student-athletes.”

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2024/02/26/judge-bars-ncaa-enforcing-its-rules-name-likeness.

State Budget Gimmicks

As blog readers will know, the governor - as the state constitution requires - presented his budget proposal for 2024-25 in January. As always, he sounded very authoritative in his presentation. But there were a lot of loose ends that weren't apparent.

One of these loose ends is the budget treatment of K-14 under Prop 98 which is based on various formulas approved by voters. K-14 absorbs over 40% of the general fund budget so how it is handled affects other elements of the budget, especially the discretionary portion that includes UC. 

Because of the delay in income tax receipts for 2022 taxes caused by federal and state temporary policies related to wildfires, it was difficult to estimate what revenues would be when the current budget was approved. As it turned out, revenues were significantly overestimated, leading to an overpayment to K-14. The governor was reluctant to take back funding that had already been allocated. But allowing K-14 do keep the overage would create greater K-14 liabilities going forward, so the governor proposed a gimmicky way around the Prop 98 rules. The Legislative Analyst's Office (LAO) has raised questions about this approach.*

How the legislature will eventually deal with the problem is unknown at this point. But indirectly, these Prop 98 pressures put an additional squeeze on UC, which is already slated for a "deferral" of payments that would be due this coming fiscal year under the "compact" with the governor.

===

*https://lao.ca.gov/reports/2024/4840/Governors-Prop-98-Funding-Maneuver-021524.pdf; https://lao.ca.gov/reports/2024/4839/Prop98-K12-Budget-021524.pdf.

Wooden Stamp

From the LA Daily News: One of Los Angeles’ most beloved figures of the past century, and a giant of college sports, was honored Saturday with a stamp approval. A first-day-of-issue ceremony for a commemorative U.S. Postal Service Forever stamp depicting the late UCLA basketball coach John Wooden was held [last] Saturday outside Pauley Pavilion, where the legendary coach, mentor and leader enjoyed record-setting success. 

UCLA Chancellor Gene Block, NCAA and NBA legend Kareem Abdul-Jabbar —who played for Wooden’s Bruins during three consecutive championship seasons — former Bruins’ women’s gymnastics coach Valorie Kondos Field, Christy Impelman, a granddaughter of Wooden, and Derek Kan, a member of the U.S. Postal Service Board of Governors, spoke at the early afternoon ceremony...

Full story at https://www.dailynews.com/2024/02/24/coach-mentor-leader-stamp-celebrates-ucla-legend-john-wooden/.

Is there a buried lede here?

The Daily Bruin carries a story about two students who had EMT training and were able to save another student having a seizure in the middle of a midterm exam. You can find it at:

https://dailybruin.com/2024/02/24/from-chemical-formulas-to-911-two-student-emts-save-seizing-student-mid-exam

But when you read the full story, you find within it this segment:

...Despite calling 911 immediately, the paramedics took a while to arrive, he said, adding that he attributed this to them being unfamiliar with campus and therefore being unable to locate the building in a timely manner. “I thought this was (the paramedics were) going to come right away, but … (they took) 10 to 15 minutes to arrive,” [the course instructor] said. “I was shocked.” ...

Seems like we have a problem.

Watch the Regents' Health Services Committee Session of Feb. 14

As blog readers will know, the Regents originally had a Health Services Committee session scheduled for February 14th, an off-cycle meeting. Because there was leftover business related to online education from the January meetings, a full Board session to deal with that topic was later added to the agenda for that day. We have already covered the Board segment.*

We now (belatedly) turn to the Health Services segment. That segment began with public comment. Topics covered were several anti-Israel statements, antisemitism and departmental statements, online courses, FAFSA problems for undocumented students, Teamsters issues, recovery programs for addiction, divestment from Blackstone and hotels, funding for CARE (sexual assault) programs, anti-abortion, Blackrock, UC jobs for undocuments students, arrest of students at the prior meeting, and an alleged "extortion" at UC-Santa Barbara. A demonstration followed and a request to clear the room was made. It was unclear what happened at that point; the protesters may have left voluntarily.

There were then two items on the agenda: A strategic framework for UC Health and Student health services. It was noted that the latter was run separately from the former, even on campuses that have med centers. While there was no unhappiness with the strategic plan, there were comments from some Regents that it should be more detailed. The problem of overloaded ERs was noted. Acquisitions and affiliations were included in the strategy. Yours truly would have expected more questions about acquisitions and how management control and quality would be handled in a growing system.

With regard to student health, it was noted that the insurance system was in deficit. Students post-pandemic have substantially increased use of costly ERs and decreased routine non-ER visits. There was a suggestion that perhaps the deductible for ER visits needed to be raised. It was suggested that some kind of survey be undertaken to determine if students who have non-UC insurance are exhibiting similar behavior to those with UC students insurance.

As always we preserve recordings of the Regents since the Regents have no policy on how long they will retain their recordings. You can see the Health Services Committee meeting at:

https://ia801308.us.archive.org/9/items/health-services-committee_202402/Health%20Services%20Committee.mp4.

The general link for the webside containing both the Health Services and the full board meetings is:

https://archive.org/details/health-services-committee_202402.

===

*https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2024/02/watch-regents-full-board-meeting-of-feb.html.

Scam Warning

Yours truly has received lots of these messages recently at his UCLA email account. I don't know exactly what the scam is but if you get such messages, delete them. [Gmail, it might be noted, classifies them as "spam," so there must be a lot of them being sent.]

Neutral

As blog readers will know, in response to campus tensions arising from the Israel-Gaza War, UC president Drake allocated $7 million to the campuses for some kind of "neutral" programming. He didn't define exactly what that was and - apparently - the money has been distributed. Yours truly has yet to see the programming at UCLA.

One interpretation was to have dialogues with different views expressed. As far as yours truly knows, the only such program occurred at the med school before Drake's dollars had been distributed:

https://archive.org/details/ucla-med-school-dialogue-12-20-2023

Even that program was not made widely available. Yours truly, however, did preserve the audio at the link above.

Meanwhile, the notion of neutrality seems to have taken hold at Harvard which - with some other institutions - was the target of ongoing congressional investigations. Apparently, Harvard is setting up a committee to look into a policy of neutrality.* At Yale, there is a group of faculty pushing for a separation of "activism" from teaching.**

And at UC, there is the discussion at the Regents of departmental political statements - which presumably will be resuscitated at the March meetings.

All of these issues appear to be interrelated. Somewhat related were recent anti-Israel divestment resolutions at some UC student associations including UCLA.*** Exactly what that means in practice and whether such resolutions conflict with Regents' policy or raise other legal issues remains to be seen.

===

*https://www.thecrimson.com/article/2024/2/23/institutional-neutrality-feature/.

**https://yaledailynews.com/blog/2024/02/19/faculty-group-calls-on-yale-to-make-teaching-distinct-from-activism/.

***https://dailybruin.com/2024/02/21/usac-passes-resolution-endorsing-boycott-divest-and-sanctions-movement.

The SAT Again - Part 2

From the NY Times: Yale University will require standardized test scores for admission for students applying to enter for the class entering in the fall of 2025, becoming the second Ivy League university to abandon test-optional policies that had been widely embraced during the Covid pandemic. Yale officials said in an announcement on Thursday that the shift to test-optional policies might have unwittingly harmed students from lower-income families whose test scores could have helped their chances. While it will require standardized tests, Yale said its policy would be “test flexible,” permitting students to submit scores from subject-based Advanced Placement or International Baccalaureate tests in lieu of SAT or ACT scores.

Yale’s decision, which will not affect students who applied during the current admissions cycle, followed a similar decision in February from Dartmouth College. Dartmouth, in Hanover, N.H., said an analysis had found that hundreds of students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds who had solid scores — in the 1,400 range on the SAT — had declined to submit them, fearing that they fell too far below the perfect 1,600. In 2022, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology announced that it had reinstated its testing requirement...

The anti-testing movement has long said that standardized tests help fuel inequality, because many students from affluent families use tutors and coaches to bolster their scores. But recent research has questioned whether test-optional policies may actually hurt the very students they were meant to help.

In January, Opportunity Insights, a group of economists based at Harvard, published a study that found that test scores could help identify lower-income students and students from underrepresented populations who would thrive in college. High scores from less privileged students can signal high potential. Yale, in New Haven, Conn., said that test scores were particularly valuable in evaluating students who attend high schools with fewer academic resources or college preparatory courses...

Full story at https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/22/us/yale-standardized-testing-sat-act.html.

Childcare Issues

From the Bruin: An Early Care and Education caregiver was arrested Wednesday on five misdemeanor charges, including sexual battery, false imprisonment and willful cruelty to a child. Christopher Rodriguez worked for the University Village ECE Center from 2001 to 2020, as well as the Krieger Center from 1999 to 2001 and from 2020 to his leave. The UCLA Early Child Care and Education Centers, which include Krieger and University Village, provide care for children ages two months to six years for UCLA-affiliated families.

Although he was only charged by UCPD yesterday, he has been on academic leave since Dec. 18 following the beginning of a Title IX investigation. According to an email sent to ECE families, the reports of inappropriate behavior that led to Rodriguez’s arrests involved mandated reports to the Child Abuse Hotline, the Department of Social Services/Community Care Licensing Division and UCPD.

In the email, Krieger staff said they have taken precautionary measures in response to the allegations, including changing the gate code, reminding teachers to be diligent in their observations and requesting additional UCPD patrol on the campus...

Full story at https://dailybruin.com/2024/02/22/ucla-ece-caregiver-arrested-for-sexual-battery-willful-cruelty-to-a-child.

Yours truly senses a lawsuit coming.

Fox for Sale - Part 3 (sold)

We have been tracking the fate of the Fox Theater in Westwood which has been up for sale.* It now has been sold. From the NY Times: 

With the moviegoing experience under threat from streaming services and ever-improving home entertainment options, a group with a passionate interest in its preservation — three dozen filmmakers who create their works for the big screen, to be enjoyed in the company of large audiences — has decided to do something about it.

The group of directors, led by Jason Reitman — whose films include “Juno,” “Up in the Air” and “Ghostbusters: Afterlife” — announced Wednesday that it had bought the Village Theater in the Westwood neighborhood of Los Angeles, which was put up for sale last summer to the concern of film buffs. The group, which also includes Christopher Nolan, Steven Spielberg, Lulu Wang and Alfonso Cuarón, among others, plans to restore the 93-year-old movie palace, which features one of the largest screens in Los Angeles...

Once renovated, the Village Theater will showcase a mixture of first-run films and repertory programming curated by the group. The collective also intends to keep the theater open while plans for a restaurant, bar and gallery are finalized. Reitman said that the group was in talks with existing exhibitors about management of the day-to-day operations of the theater, but did not reveal who.

The Village Theater was put up for sale last summer for $12 million, and the filmmakers — many of whom are alumni of nearby U.C.L.A. — were fearful it would be torn down and turned into condominiums or a space for retail. The existential threat about the future of theatrical moviegoing also loomed over this endeavor...

Full story at https://www.nytimes.com/2024/02/21/movies/jason-reitman-buys-village-theater.html.

===

*https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2024/02/fox-for-sale-part-2.html; https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2023/07/fox-for-sale.html.

Are there lectures after death?

Of course, it has long been possible to video-record lectures - particularly those on Zoom or similar platforms, and play them back in the future. However, such recordings are 2D. 

But word comes from Inside Higher Ed of use of holograms - 3D images - for teaching purposes.* So you don't have to be there. Your image could give lectures, even after you expired. Maybe it's time for Name-Image-Likeness concerns to be extended to faculty. Just a thought...

===

*https://www.insidehighered.com/news/tech-innovation/teaching-learning/2024/02/23/holograms-begin-beaming-classrooms.

Faculty Club Positions

Received from the Faculty Club:

The Faculty Club Board has several openings to begin in September 2024 for President, President Elect, Treasurer (all are Members of the Executive Committee), and four Board Members-at-Large (for 1, 2, or 3-year terms). We are soliciting candidates now for elections that will be held in April 2024.

The Faculty Club Bylaws state that the members of the Board are expected to be in good standing with respect to membership accounts and be active supporters of the FC. All are expected to attend Board meetings held a minimum of eight times a year. The President Elect, Secretary, and Treasurer are Officers of the Association and serve on the Executive Committee which also meets the week before the Board meetings. Members-at-Large attend Board meetings monthly and serve on at least one Committee. Further details of the roles of President Elect, Secretary and Treasurer are available in the bylaws on the FC website https://facultyclub.ucla.edu/about-us where current Board members are also listed.

Any individual interested in running for the open seats on the FC Board may contact the Nominating Committee at this email nominations@fc.ucla.edu.

Readers may know that there has been some turmoil in Club leadership. There have also been concerns about Club finances. See: https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2024/02/faculty-club-concerns.html.

Insurance Issue

Received by email:

Dear Colleagues:

Re:  Farmers Insurance – Benefit Changes that require immediate action by policy holders     

As you know, the University of California offers Homeowner/Auto Insurance as a benefit.  Please note that this plan is managed by the UC Partnership Programs (UCPP) and not by the UCOP Health & Welfare Benefits team.  At UCPP’s request we are sharing the following information: 

Significant changes in the California insurance landscape have made Farmers unable to renew current Farmers GroupSelect home and auto policies upon expiration. Members already may have received or will soon receive a non-renewal notice for those policies. 

If participants have a current home or auto insurance policy through UC with Farmers GroupSelect and want to ensure new coverage upon expiration of that policy, they must contact Farmers now at 1-855-246-0285.

Attached is a memo from Farmers Insurance and UC Partnership Programs posted in UCnet at:

https://ucnet.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/2024/02/farmers-insurance-changes-require-your-action-now.html

Please help us by sharing this update.

Arn Olano

Benefits Analyst, UCLA Campus Human Resources

Take backs

As we have noted from the most recent controller's statement, the revenue forecasts that were the foundation of the governor's budget proposal of last month now seem to be overoptimistic.*

The Legislative Analyst's Office has come to the same conclusion and is looking for more ways to cut the budget.** Only a few touch on UC. LAO in particular wants to take back from this year's budget (2023-24):

UC Cancer Research Relating to Firefighters $7 million

UC Berkeley School of Journalism Police Records Access Project $7 million

UC Los Angeles Ralph J. Bunche Center $5 million

UC Davis Equine Performance and Rehabilitation Center $5 million

Whether this money has already been spent is unclear. 

====

*https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2024/02/missing-forecast.html.

**https://lao.ca.gov/Publications/Report/4850.

Mystery Bill

The full text of Senate Bill 1160 (Dodd) reads as follows:

THE PEOPLE OF THE STATE OF CALIFORNIA DO ENACT AS FOLLOWS:

SECTION 1. It is the intent of the Legislature to enact subsequent legislation that would establish reporting requirements on public postsecondary educational institutions relating to the prevention of discrimination.

Source: https://legiscan.com/CA/text/SB1166/2023#:~:text=This%20bill%20would%20declare%20the,to%20the%20prevention%20of%20discrimination.

An item in the Fresno Bee* suggests the bill has something to do with concerns over sexual harassment. These placeholder bills are filed when the author intends to come up with something eventually. 

===

*https://www.fresnobee.com/news/politics-government/article285535582.html.

New UCOP Office of Civil Rights

President Drake announces new Systemwide Office of Civil Rights

Tuesday, February 20, 2024

A message to the UC community from President Michael V. Drake, M.D.

Dear UC colleagues:

Over the past several years, we have worked collectively as a university community to create a safer, more welcoming learning, working, and living environment for all. These efforts have translated into a number of significant systemwide initiatives that are helping us improve our ability to prevent, detect, and respond to all forms of harassment and discrimination. I want to thank the UC community for your ongoing engagement and thoughtful feedback in these endeavors.

Today, I’m pleased to share another important milestone in this work: the launch of the University of California’s first Systemwide Office of Civil Rights. This new umbrella office will provide systemwide leadership, guidance and support on issues related to protecting civil rights at our 10 campuses, medical centers, national labs, and the UC Office of the President. It will encompass the existing Systemwide Title IX Office, a new Systemwide Anti-Discrimination Office, and a new Systemwide Disability Rights Office. The executive director of this new office will report directly to me, and we are in the final stages of a national search for this important position. I expect we will be able to announce their appointment in the coming weeks.

We are creating the Systemwide Office of Civil Rights proactively — not in response to any particular incident, but rather in response to feedback from the UC community and based on the recommendation of a systemwide working group charged with developing the University’s Anti-Discrimination Policy. The working group’s process was informed by the University’s Systemwide Sexual Violence and Sexual Harassment Policy, UC campuses’ current non-discrimination policies, and policies at UC comparator institutions of higher education. The working group found that UC students, staff, and faculty would greatly benefit from centralized oversight of these functions and a more consistent approach to how the University responds to allegations of discrimination and harassment. Recent events on campuses across the country have only reaffirmed the need for such a function. The new office will ensure uniform interpretation and implementation of related UC policies across our locations and provide comprehensive and consistent policies, guidance, training, education, and investigative support to UC offices responsible for preventing and responding to harassment or discrimination on the basis of protected categories such as race, religion, and disability.

We want the University of California to be a fair and just learning, working, and living environment free of discrimination, and we must be responsive when issues arise that hinder us from achieving that goal. The Systemwide Office of Civil Rights will help us do that by supporting and enhancing the critical services that existing campus offices already provide. You can learn more about this new office, including how to get help if you are experiencing harassment or discrimination, here: https://ucop.edu/civil-rights/. 

Sincerely,

Michael V. Drake, MD

President

Source: https://ucnet.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/2024/02/president-drake-announces-new-systemwide-office-of-civil-rights.html.

====================

Dear Bruin Community:

We write today with important news. As President Drake announced in a letter to the UC community issued this morning, the University of California has launched a new Systemwide Office of Civil Rights (SOCR), an umbrella office that will “provide systemwide leadership, guidance and support on issues related to protecting civil rights at our 10 campuses, medical centers, national labs and the UC Office of the President”.

In form and function, the SOCR is very similar to the UCLA Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Civil Rights Office (EDI-CRO), which was established in 2020, and which supports all of UCLA’s campus and UCLA Health. EDI-CRO ensures that UCLA remains in compliance with applicable federal law, state law and UC policy concerning protections under Title VI and Title VII of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, Title IX of the Education Amendments Act of 1972, the Americans with Disabilities Act, Section 504 of the Rehabilitation Act of 1973 and equal employment opportunity and affirmative action obligations.

In addition to the launch of the SOCR, today is also significant because it marks the issuance of the new UC Anti-Discrimination Policy, which will further strengthen UCLA’s ability to advance equality for all members of our community. The new policy applies to all UC employees as well as undergraduate, graduate and professional students, and third parties (which includes patients at UCLA Health). Pursuant to the policy, Assistant Vice Chancellor for Civil Rights Chandra Bhatnagar has been designated UCLA’s Local Implementation Officer to oversee implementation of the policy. As a reminder, if you have experienced discrimination or harassment at UCLA or if you are aware of another member of the Bruin community who has experienced discrimination or harassment, please contact us via the EDI-CRO Report an Incident page to share your experience.

Sincerely,

Mitchell Chang

Interim Vice Provost for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion

Chandra Bhatnagar

Assistant Vice Chancellor for Civil Rights

Another Possible Biden Jam Today

From the Santa Monica Daily Press today:

President Joe Biden heads to California today looking to soak up more cash for his reelection bid during a three-day swing through the state.

Biden will arrive at LAX mid afternoon before taking his usual helicopter ride to the Santa Monica Airport (SMO). His official schedule has him landing at SMO at about 3:30 p.m. although there’s been a wide margin of error on the precise time for past trips...

Full story at https://smdp.com/2024/02/20/biden-to-pass-through-santa-monica-gain-to-rev-up-his-fundraising-in-anticipation-of-a-costly-rematch-with-trump/.

The impact could be nil

Exciting as the item below may seem, if NIL is to be used as a recruitment tool, selling items related to high school recruits who have yet to make a name for themselves is at best a limited incentive:

UCLA Has Now Launched An NIL Store for Bruins Players: Dress like your favorite Bruin.

MAREN ANGUS-COOMBS  FEB 16, 2024  Sports Illustrated

The NIL Store powered by Campus Ink announced the launch of its NIL Store featuring officially licensed UCLA merchandise on Friday.* The store will provide opportunities to every UCLA athlete. The Campus Ink NIL Store website featuring UCLA will continuously be onboarding new athletes and developing custom merchandise drops for individual athletes. All merchandise on the NIL Store is officially licensed by UCLA. Each student-athlete’s digital locker room includes a collection of core products which feature personalized names and numbers for applicable athletes...

Full story at https://www.si.com/college/ucla/news/ucla-has-now-launched-a-nil-store-for-bruins-players-mac4.

===

*Note: Backed by Mark Cuban, Campus Ink expanded into the Name, Image, Likeness (NIL) space in 2021 and launched the NIL Store, which serves as a merchandising solution for student-athletes and schools across the country. The NIL Store operates with the firm belief that every student-athlete has an opportunity to capitalize on their NIL and should earn industry-leading payouts. Campus Ink was founded in 1947 on the campus of the University of Illinois and was reimagined in 2015 with an office in downtown Chicago and a production facility in Urbana, Ill., where the company handles all of its own production and fulfillment.

Source: https://ucla.nil.store/blogs/news/campus-ink-officially-launches-ucla-nil-store-featuring-officially-licensed-ucla-merchandise.

Missing the Forecast

The latest controller's monthly report indicates that state general fund revenues are $29.5 billion below the levels forecast back when the current state budget was enacted in June. They are also $6.4 billion below what was forecast in January when the governor made his proposal for the 2024-25 budget. Much of the gap comes from personal income taxes - probably in the capital gains category. 

The latest figures are at https://sco.ca.gov/Files-ARD/CASH/January2024StatementofGeneralFundCashReceiptsandDisbursements.pdf.

Watch the Regents Full Board Meeting of Feb. 14

Initially, a meeting of the Health Services Committee was scheduled for Feb. 14. But that meeting split into two: Health Services in the morning and a full board meeting in the afternoon, the latter to deal with an issue left over from January, a ban on fully-online undergraduate degree programs that had been proposed by the Academic Senate. Here we deal with the Board meeting. We will take up Health Services in a later post.

Essentially, with the push to create online courses, it became - or might become - possible for an undergraduate to enroll only in online courses and get a degree. The Senate viewed this development as a kind of accidental online program that hadn't been reviewed as such. It thus tried to implement a ban (with some wriggle room for deliberate creation of online programs.) The Regents - who had a more favorable view of potential online degree programs - intervened and put the item on its agenda.

The position of the Senate - expressed by faculty rep Steintrager - was that purely online education had drawbacks such as lower completion rates and accreditation issues. Students fully online would not benefit from such on-campus athletics, research opportunities, etc.

But sitting in the background is a task force of the UC president which is exploring the matter further. So, that opened the door to the argument for waiting for the task force report instead of an immediate ban.

Regent Pérez moved to approve the Senate's position but no Regent would second the motion so it died. Pérez's fear, expressed later, was that online ed would become the poor students' track, since not living on campus would likely reduce cost and debt. Lieutenant Governor Kounalakis tended to echo the concerns about a poor students' track. Provost Newman, in contrast, pushed the let's-wait-for-the-task-force approach. UC president Drake did not make detailed remarks but he clearly opposed the ban. Irvine chancellor Gillman said his business school faculty wanted to develop an online program but the proposed Senate ban halted the effort. Regent Park said a total ban was extreme and would limit innovation. In the end, the ban was rejected.

In addition, the Regents approved tuition increases for several professional programs.

As always, we preserve recording of Regents meetings since the Regents have no policy on duration of preservation. You can see the board session at:

https://ia601308.us.archive.org/9/items/health-services-committee_202402/Board.mp4.

Rising from the Dead

The issue of UC hiring undocumented students has potentially been revived by the legislature. As blog readers will know, the Regents - after considering the issue in a special committee over several months - ultimately effectively killed the proposal on grounds of legal risk. From the Sacramento Bee:

The push to allow California universities and colleges to employ undocumented students without legal work permits is moving forward with the support of some California lawmakers. Assemblyman David Alvarez, D-San Diego, introduced historic legislation this week that would direct the University of California, California State University and California Community Colleges systems to employ these students who often struggle to secure paid, on-campus jobs, internships and research opportunities.* “They’re unable to use their talents to work, so this bill is just focused on giving those young people that opportunity,” Alvarez said in an interview with The Sacramento Bee...

Full story at https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article285577557.html.

===

*The bill is at https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billTextClient.xhtml?bill_id=202320240AB2586. 

New Coach - Part 3

We noted in our last post (Part 2) that with NIL (name-image-likeness) payments now on the table, the college athletics field - at least those sports which are the money-makers - is becoming a commercial labor market.* Just to make that point clear, consider this from the Bruin:

...[UCLA Athletic Director Martin] Jarmond dispelled the notion that the program isn’t in tune with the evolving NIL scene but said there’s room for growth under Foster. “Everybody doesn’t know what everybody has. Every school says that they need more, but there’s a lot of numbers out there that don’t mean anything, so I don’t buy stock in, ‘We’re so behind,’” Jarmond said. “The fact is, we have guys that have NIL on the roster this year – we have plenty of them. Now, we’ve got to do that more.”

The fourth-year athletic director said UCLA has, at times, been slow to respond to changing NIL regulations, but added that he’s had appointments with around 16 donors in the past three weeks. He and Foster plan to meet with more in the coming days. 

At the crux of a turning point in UCLA football history, Foster wasted little time in connecting with fans. Just four hours after he was formally introduced, Men of Westwood – UCLA Athletics’ official NIL collective – posted a video on X, the platform formerly known as Twitter, in which Foster asked Bruin fans for financial support...

Full story at https://dailybruin.com/2024/02/14/our-brand-is-nationally-foster-jarmond-discuss-boosting-nil-in-coming-years.

===

*https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2024/02/new-coach-part-2.html.

Maybe There Needs to Be More Direction as We Shovel Out $7 Million

A news report indicates that UC-Santa Cruz has its share of the $7 million that UC president Drake set aside ostensibly for some kind of "neutral" education in history related to the current Middle East conflict. 

With an increase in hate speech and anti-Semitism on campuses, UC Santa Cruz has received a grant to eliminate discrimination on their campus. The university confirmed that they will be receiving a $500,000 grant from the University of California Chancellor's office as they are looking to eliminate discrimination throughout UC campuses. 

UC Santa Cruz reported multiple incidents on and off campuses where students allegedly celebrated Adolf Hitler's birthday cake and hate symbols along with anti-Semitic and anti-LGBTQIA+ filer on their windsheld. Anju Reejhsingshani who is the vice chancellor for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion for the University says the funding is not just about safety and security but building a stronger community.

"The goal is to bring in specialists who can talk to our community members around antisemitism, Islamophobia, forms of hate that affect, different religious and ethnic and racial minority groups," Reejhsinghani said.

As a system wide imitative, $7 million will be going to various UC campuses in total. The funding will be directed towards mental health and trauma support plus leadership training for students and staff.

Source: https://kion546.com/top-stories/2024/02/13/uc-santa-cruz-receives-grant-to-tackle-anti-semitism-and-hate-speech-on-campus/.

This is all very nice but doesn't sound like what the money was supposed to fund. As we have noted in earlier posts, Dartmouth seems to have pioneered programs in which there are dialogues directed specifically toward the Israel-Gaza situation by experts with different perspectives but who can hold a civil discussion and can engage rather than make statements.

UCLA, before any UCOP money arrived, had such a dialogue for the med school:

https://archive.org/details/ucla-med-school-dialogue-12-20-2023.

Hopefully, there will be more, with or without the money.

Student-Worker Strike Repercussions - Part 28

The student-worker strike seems to have stimulated similar demands for child care provisions among faculty at UC-Santa Cruz. From the Santa Cruz Lookout:

...UC Santa Cruz is the only University of California school among the nine residential campuses without a child care program that serves faculty and/or staff – the UCSC program currently serves only undergraduate and graduate students and has about 62 slots. Faculty mothers at UCSC say they face unique challenges compared to some other UC campuses, driven by the region’s high cost of living, expensive child care and limited day care spots. And they say it’s affecting their career prospects as many female academics feel pressured to choose between caring for their children and furthering their careers. And while graduate students saw a nearly 27% increase in child care reimbursements — to $1,400 a quarter — this past October after a 2022 strike, UCSC faculty don’t receive any child care subsidy. 

The result is that many of the school’s faculty mothers, particularly with children under 2½ years, simply can’t afford to pay for child care and end up scaling back their work hours when their children are young, hampering their efforts to progress in their careers, said Lindsey Dillon, an assistant professor of sociology at UCSC. “They’re working 15 to 20, maybe 25 hours a week, and they’re doing a job that is an over-40-hour-a-week job,” she said. “So what that means is that it might take longer to get tenure, people aren’t getting promoted at the same rate as other peers.” 

The challenges of accessing affordable local child care in Santa Cruz have inspired more than 60 faculty members, known as the UCSC Academic Mothers, to push for a child care subsidy for tenured and tenure-eligible faculty. The group originally formed in 2016 to advocate for better policies for faculty parents — specifically mothers. 

After finalizing their proposal during a group meeting Monday, Dillon, who chairs the group, says they plan to make a proposal similar to what graduate students recently won through their strike at the end of 2022. Until the campus provides staff and faculty child care – through the center that will be built at Student Housing West – faculty are requesting a $1,350 child care subsidy to offset costs of finding care for children under 5 years old. 

Dillon said the faculty union will present the proposal at the union’s next labor relations meeting with campus administration in about a month...

Full story at https://lookout.co/uc-santa-cruz-faculty-mothers-say-lack-of-child-care-hurting-their-academic-careers/.

One Could Ask How This Was Even Possible...

Seems like there should be systems in place for preventing someone from diverting tuition checks to a personal account without someone immediately noticing. But apparently not. From the Mercury News:

A former academic program officer for the University of California, San Francisco will serve 20 months in federal prison for diverting $1.53 million in tuition payments into her personal bank accounts, according to authorities. Sandra Le, 55, of San Francisco, received the sentence from U.S. District Court Judge William H. Orrick on Thursday, the U.S. Attorney’s Office said in a news release.

Le directed students enrolled in UCSF School of Nursing post-masters and special studies certificate programs to have their tuition checks made out to her, a merchandiser she purchased from, or to leave the payee line blank so she could make the checks out to herself or her associates, prosecutors said, citing Le’s plea agreement. Prosecutors said Le deposited the checks into her bank accounts, including ones she shared with associates, and used the funds to pay for luxury items from the merchandiser, as well as for gambling, home improvement and other personal expenses.

Le concealed her conduct by creating false records of payments and enrollment for her supervisors, prosecutors said. An investigation kicked off in May 2019, when Le took a leave of absence amid increased scrutiny from UCSF’s audit and advisory services unit. Prosecutors said the school could not reconcile tuition revenues with enrollment in the programs Le managed...

Full story at https://www.mercurynews.com/2024/02/16/ucsf-administrator-sentenced-for-diverting-1-5-million-in-tuition-payments/.

Transfer Planning

Not mentioned in the story below was that UC and UCLA were not happy about this legislative and gubernatorial intervention concerning transfers to UCLA, although in the end they couldn't prevent it. Blog readers, however, will know that history.* In any event, it is happening. 

From the Bruin: UCLA will pilot an Associate Degree for Transfer Program in the 2026-2027 academic year. Established by Assembly Bill 1291, which was signed into law by Gov. Gavin Newsom in October and went into effect Jan. 1, the program will prioritize the admission of students who have completed an associate degree for transfer at a California Community Colleges’ campus and meet the requirements of the UC transfer curricula for a participating campus...

UCLA must incorporate eight majors into the CCCs’ transfer model curricula by the 2026-2027 academic year and expand that number to at least 12 by the 2028-2029 academic year, according to the bill. [Academic Senate chair Andrea] Kasko said in an emailed statement that the task force will consult with transfer student representatives, campus units and departments to recommend the first series of majors, as well as goals and evaluation metrics to guide the program’s future. Student representatives will be invited to task force meetings as the agendas are developed, she added...

Full story at https://dailybruin.com/2024/02/11/ucla-to-pilot-program-guaranteeing-admission-for-associate-degree-holders.

====

*https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2023/09/ab-1291-passed.html.

More on the FAFSA Screw Up

Last week, we blogged about the FAFSA screw up, the federal website/application for student financial aid.* The tale continues. From Inside Higher Ed:

The U.S. Education Department is relaxing a number of requirements so that colleges and universities dealing with delayed student financial aid information can better focus on processing aid applications and delivering aid packages to students. The department announced today that it will reduce the proportion of financial aid forms it reviews for potential inaccuracy, suspend all new reviews of colleges’ compliance with financial aid rules and offer institutions flexibility in their applications to renew their eligibility to access federal financial aid programs. Those changes build on the department’s strategy, announced last week, to support colleges with the update to the Free Application for Federal Student Aid, which has been plagued by delays and technical glitches...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/student-aid-policy/2024/02/13/us-reduce-requirements-colleges-due-fafsa-delays.

====

*As we noted before, heads should roll in DC for this snafu. But none have or likely will.

https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2024/02/delayed-deadline.html.

UCLA Chancellor Search

There was a meeting yesterdat at UCLA of the Regents' search committee for a new UCLA chancellor to replace Gene Block.

As usual, the committee met behind closed doors so what was said or done remains unknown to outsiders.

All we can tell you is who the committee members are: 

Regents Elliott, Matosantos, Reilly, Sherman, and Sures; ex officio members Chair Leib, and President Drake. 

Looking in to the Matter

Remember the Shooting at Berkeley on Feb. 10? The local police are being pretty closed-mouthed about what led to the shooting by someone without an affiliation to UC-Berkeley. But beyond that issue, there have been repercussions about how students were, and weren't, notified when it occurred. Basically, students learned more from the Daily Cal than from official sources. The San Francisco Chronicle has a timeline:

Friday night was the second time UC Berkeley junior Riley Cooke planned to hang out with friends and instead ended up covering a shooting. Cooke, the university news editor for the Daily Californian student paper, was on her way to get frozen yogurt with former managing editor Anna Armstrong when their phones started buzzing with texts and Slack messages about students hearing gunshots on the south edge of campus.

Later, the university would announce that a 59-year-old man had fired several shots into the air above Lower Sproul Plaza, hitting no one, and was quickly arrested by University of California police. But the first news that a shooting had happened at all came from student journalists reporting on it, even as they themselves took shelter.

As soon as the shooting happened, information began to pour into the Daily Cal’s Slack from students across campus, according to Matt Brown, the newspaper’s managing editor and a former Chronicle intern. Some reporters had walked past the shooting as it happened, another had a friend who recorded a video of the incident, and yet another heard informally that police officers had already arrested the suspect, Brown said. But students didn’t receive a notification about the incident or the arrest until about 40 minutes after the shots were fired.

University of California police use a system called WarnMe to communicate with students about emergencies. The first WarnMe notice about the 8:40 p.m. incident went out around 9:20 p.m. Asked about the timing of the alerts, Janet Gilmore, a spokesperson for UC Berkeley, said the university was “looking into the matter.” ...

Full story at https://www.sfchronicle.com/bayarea/article/uc-berkeley-shots-journalism-18660486.php.

Our Traditional Valentine's Day Posting

This works much better if you don't ask if they are still married:*

Or direct to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c0dGRDvmO54 or https://ia601509.us.archive.org/28/items/sacramento-city-at-risk/Trang%20and%20Nam%20Proposal%20Flash%20Mob%20at%20UCLA%209-24-11.mp4. 

===

*https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2023/02/the-morning-after-post-valentines-day.html. For those seeking truly eternal love, consider this:

Or direct to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4i96M0YDfGE.

New Coach - Part 2

From the Daily Bruin: ...[Athletic Director Martin] Jarmond said [new football coach DeShaun] Foster will be provided whatever he needs in order to transform the program. “Make no mistake – and I want to be clear with this – DeShaun Foster and this football program will get all the resources they need to be successful,” Jarmond said. “We are all in on him and this program and going to the Big Ten.”

On the precipice of the move to the Big Ten, Foster’s hiring launches UCLA into a new era. Jarmond and Foster also laid out their plans in the evolving college football landscape as NIL and the transfer portal continue to impact recruiting. NCAA rules stipulate that players have 30 days to enter the portal after a head coach departs. The portal opens Wednesday for UCLA players following former coach Chip Kelly’s departure, but Jarmond said as of Tuesday morning no players have transferred nor expressed an intent to transfer...

Full story at https://dailybruin.com/2024/02/13/deshaun-foster-martin-jarmond-discuss-future-of-ucla-football-in-press-conference.

What you should take away from this item is that with NIL we have de facto pay-for-play. And with a transfer portal, we have a de facto labor market. Presumably, one factor in the departure of current coach Chip Kelly to the NFL is that he preferred an open commercial market rather than one that pretends to be something else.

I dissent again (in part)

Blog readers will know that yours truly has recently dissented from statements that appear (if you use a PC to read this blog) up in the right hand corner. Today's personal commentary deals with two statements. One objects to the the Regents' attempt to limit departmental political statements. Another wants charges to be dropped against demonstrators at the recent Regents meeting who disrupted the proceedings.* The language accompanying the latter is unhelpful and inflammatory. But if folks think protests at the Regents that become intemporate are helpful to their cause, my sense is that wide latitude should be given. In my view, however, such behavior tends to be performative and often turns off many more people than it attracts. It tends, in short, to be counter-productive to whatever cause is being fostered. But, if folks want to do it, wide latitude should be given.

Barnard recently banned departmental statements. The Barnard ban had nothing to do with defining "landing pages" of departmental websites, an issue that - among others - bogged down the Regents. It just says departments don't make political statements in any forum, whether websites or others.**

Here's the problem. Departments are groups of people carrying out some common function. They have views only in the sense that corporations sometimes claim to have views. But really it is individuals that have views. When departments - particularly at public universities - issue political statements, such views are potentially coercive to students, non-ladder faculty, junior ladder faculty, staff, and applicants for positions at such departments (staff or faculty) who may disagree. The Academic Senate came up with guidelines that attempted to deal with such issues - but those guidelines (presenting dissenting views, etc.) have been ignored. That ignoring of the guidelines is what invited the Regents into the debate. Normally, the Regents prefer to leave such matters to the Senate.

In the view of yours truly, individuals should be the beneficiary of the notion of academic freedom. Individuals can express views on political matters in various forums and formats. They can write op eds, they can tweet, they can talk at events, etc. As individuals, they can co-express such opinions. Departments, as departments, and particularly at public universities, should not. 

===

*https://cucfa.org/2024/02/drop-the-charges-against-january-regents-meeting-protestors/; https://cucfa.org/2024/02/objection-to-proposed-new-website-policy/.

**...Barnard has added a policy that was shared with faculty via email on Nov. 6 that requires departments to run by administrators any changes they want to post to their websites. In a statement emailed to Inside Higher Ed, a Barnard spokesperson explained that under the new approval process, “the provost reviews proposed departmental website edits for editorial integrity and academic relevance.”

The college also expanded its definition of political statements—which are barred from both barnard.edu websites and signs on campus—to include “all written communications that comment on specific actions, statements, or positions taken by public officials or governmental bodies at local, state, federal, and international levels; attempt to influence legislation; or otherwise advocate for an outcome related to actions by legislative, executive, judicial, or administrative bodies at local, state, federal, and international levels.” ...

Source: https://www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty-issues/academic-freedom/2024/01/26/uc-system-barnard-debate-departmental-political. Note that Barnard is a private institution so its potential latitude for political speech is wider than that of public institutions.

Need for a New Master Plan - Once Again

Gov. Pat Brown receives Master Plan
from UC President Clark Kerr

From time to time, we point to the fact that the old Master Plan of 1960, which provided for a division of labor between UC, CSU, and the community colleges is indeed old. In fact, it expired in 1975, although people keep referring to it. The impetus behind the old plan was that the three segments were operating independently and overlapping their functions.

As the plan has decayed, community colleges keep coming up with BAs and CSU with PhDs. Now maybe that's all fine. But no one has looked at public higher ed recently in California to see if some revision of the old Master Plan is needed.

Inside Higher Ed recently noted yet another community college bachelor's degree may be in the works:

California community colleges could begin offering bachelor’s degree programs in nursing under a new pilot program proposed in a recent state Senate bill. Community college leaders are celebrating the bill as a way to expand access to more affordable bachelor of science in nursing (B.S.N.) programs and fill critical nursing shortages in the state. California State University officials, however, have expressed concerns that new programs will cause undue competition.

Senate Bill 895, authored by state senator Richard D. Roth, would allow the chancellor of the community college system to choose up to 15 community college districts that already provide nursing associate degrees to offer B.S.N. programs.* These new programs would be limited in size at up to a quarter of colleges’ nursing associate degree enrollments or 35 students, whichever is greater...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/institutions/community-colleges/2024/02/09/bill-raises-hopes-bsn-programs-two-year-colleges.

So, again, we point to the need for a new Master Plan.

===

*The bill is at:

https://legiscan.com/CA/text/SB895/id/2868455.

UC Retirement Savings Webinars

There's even one today:

13 Feb: Mindful Investing

Learn how your personality influences money and investing decisions, and the impact emotions can have when it comes to money. Available times: 1:00 PM PST

14 Feb: Guide to Investing in the UC Retirement Savings Program

How to build an investment strategy based on risk tolerance, investing horizon and involvement level, and the investment options available through UC's 403(b), 457(b) and DC plans. Available times: noon PST

15 Feb: Ways to Save with Roth

The Ways to Save with Roth webinar is designed to help you understand the new Roth option in the UC Retirement Savings Plan. Available times: noon PST

20 Feb: Women & Investing: Organize, Plan, Own Your Future

Learn simple steps you can take to build healthy financial habits, save for multiple goals and invest wisely. Available times: noon PST

21 Feb: Understanding the Basics of Social Security

Social Security may be an important income source for retirement. Learn about key Social Security claiming ages and how your benefit is calculated, so you can better understand the choices. Available times: 9:00 AM PST

22 Feb: Guide to Investing in the UC Retirement Savings Program

How to build an investment strategy based on risk tolerance, investing horizon and involvement level, and the investment options available through UC's 403(b), 457(b) and DC plans. Available times: 1:00 PM PST

27 Feb: Understanding the Basics of Social Security (Spanish)

Si considera que el Seguro Social será su principal fuente de ingresos durante su jubilación, entérese de cuándo y cómo reclamar su beneficio. Available times: noon PST

28 Feb: Mindful Investing

Learn how your personality influences money and investing decisions, and the impact emotions can have when it comes to money. Available times: 9:00 AM PST

29 Feb: Ways to Save with Roth

The Ways to Save with Roth webinar is designed to help you understand the new Roth option in the UC Retirement Savings Plan. Available times: 1:00 PM PST

Registration for the online classes above at https://myucretirement.com/Classes/ClassSchedule/19.

Sink Hole Problem on the 405 at Sepulveda Pass

Loyd Sigmon after
whom SigAlerts are
named*

This bulletin from the Santa Monica Patch suggests there could be a problem for those leaving UCLA today who drive through the Sepulveda Pass:

A SigAlert has been issued for the northbound San Diego (405) Freeway in the Sepulveda Pass where a sinkhole opened up on an offramp Monday morning, according to Caltrans. 

Caltrans is reporting a SigAlert and indefinite closure of the northbound Skirball Center Drive /Mulholland Drive offramp as of 11:30 a.m. Monday to repair a large dip or sinkhole. 

Drivers are advised to avoid the area or seek alternate routes until the repair work is completed. Caltrans has not released an estimate for when the work will be done.

Full story at https://patch.com/california/santamonica/s/iureo/405-sigalert-sinkhole-shuts-down-sepulveda-pass-offramp.

====

*https://www.snopes.com/fact-check/the-sig-files/.