Reporting

Reporting Options

If you have witnessed, experienced, or been informed of sexual harassment, sexual violence, or other discrimination or harassment based on any protected category at UCLA or within the UCLA Health system, please report it to CRO [Civil Rights Office] as soon as possible.

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In Person: Murphy Hall, Suite 2255

Office Hours: Monday-Friday (except campus closure days) 9 a.m. – 5 p.m.

On The Web: Report an Incident form: https://ucla-ocr.caseiq.app/portal/reportonline

By Email: civilrights@ucla.edu

By Phone: (310) 825-7102

Monday-Friday (except campus closure days) 9 a.m. – 5 p.m.

After Hours Reporting: CALL 800-403-4744 (toll-free) This number is staffed by live operators at the UC Whistleblower Hotline 24 hours a day, 7 days a week. Your report will be forwarded to CRO on the next business day. Reports may be made anonymously (unless made by a Responsible Employee who must use the Report an Incident Form: https://ucla-ocr.caseiq.app/portal/reportonline).

Making a report is not the same as making a formal complaint and does not necessarily lead to an investigation. Anyone who makes a report may choose to only access supportive measures and not participate in a Resolution Process (such as a formal investigation). CRO strives to honor a person’s preferred course of action whenever possible.

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Timely Reporting

Reports should be made as soon as possible. Making a timely report ensures that all impacted individuals have equal access to supportive measures and information about reporting options. It also allows the University to take prompt action to stop discriminatory or harassing conduct, prevent it from recurring, and address its effects. Timely reporting also helps ensure that the University fulfills its obligations under federal and state civil rights and campus safety laws and reinforces our institutional mission and values.

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Whistleblower Reporting Form: https://secure.ethicspoint.com/domain/media/en/gui/23531/index.html

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Source: https://civilrights.ucla.edu/report-concern. 

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See also Reporting Requirements at:

https://civilrights.ucla.edu/report-concern/faculty-staff-reporting-responsibilities.

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In the event of an emergency or crisis call 911 or contact UCLAPD at (310) 825-1491.

Straws in the Wind - Part 409

From the State News: Michigan State University faculty overwhelmingly voted that they lack confidence in the Board of Trustees, while a separate vote showed a majority support President Kevin Guskiewicz. Of the 1,394 who voted, 86%, or 1,199, indicated that they didn't have confidence in the board. Just 8.6%, or 120 faculty members, voted that they have trust or confidence in the board, with 5.4%, or 132, abstaining.

Faculty Senate Chair John Aerni-Flessner said that the purely advisory action organized by the Faculty Senate Steering Committee was "not a campaign against anyone" but "to have the president and the board see where faculty stand, so that they can take that into consideration." More than 53% of voters said they have confidence and trust in the president. Of those, 37% said they don’t have that trust in him, and 9.5% abstained...

All 4,103 faculty members were eligible to cast a ballot. The participation rate for the vote was 34%... In a statement sent to The State News, Board Chair Brianna Scott wrote that she didn't believe the "hard work, dedication and reliable support of the majority of the Board is reflected in the results of the vote by the Academic Congress...

In Guskiewicz’s initial departure announcement for Clemson University,* he said working with the MSU board was an "unsustainable situation." Nearly six weeks later when Guskiewicz decided to stay at MSU, he wrote in another community letter that he was "sincerely sorry" for any uncertainty that he caused. He also acknowledged a need to rebuild trust...

Full story at https://statenews.com/article/2026/07/the-board-needs-to-see-where-faculty-stand-msu-faculty-overwhelmingly-back-no-confidence-vote.

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 *President Guskiewicz had said he was going to Clemson, but changed his mind.

Don't Respond

It looks innocent enough: an electronic invitation to an event, seemingly sent by someone you know. But when you start to respond, it begins to ask you for things such as the password to your email account. That's a big no-no. Do not supply such information. It likely means that your contact has been hacked. And you will be, too, if you supply information.

What you can do is to contact the person supposedly sending the invitation, indicate you think a hacking has occurred, and advise them to let all their contacts know.  

Yale Deal - Part 8

From the Yale Daily News: A group of Connecticut lawmakers sent a letter to University President Maurie McInnis and trustees threatening to revisit Yale’s tax-exempt status and reform the process of selecting the Yale Corporation if the University settles with the federal government. The state legislators, most of whom are Yale alumni, urged the University to bring the Trump administration to court over Department of Justice investigations into its admissions practices. That probe, which began at the Yale School of Medicine and expanded to the Law School and Yale College, represents the University’s first major confrontation with the second Trump administration... 

In their letter, the lawmakers threatened to review Yale’s special exemption from state property taxes and reassess the composition of the Yale Corporation if the University cuts a deal with the Trump administration. They cited the favorable ruling Harvard received after it sued the government over $2 billion in federal grant freezes, promising to support Yale — which has not received targeted cuts — if it chose to go to court.

...The lawmakers wrote that a settlement of the kind “reportedly under discussion” could “fundamentally unsettle” the centuries-old bargain between Connecticut and Yale. Since the Connecticut Colony granted Yale’s original trustees license in 1701 to start a college, the school’s founding charter has been amended to include various agreements between the University and the state. These have concerned the composition of the Yale board of trustees and, under an 1834 provision of the charter, the tax-exempt status of University property that serves some commercial use, provided it does not bring in an income of over $6,000. Due to the University’s nonprofit status, none of the educational buildings on its campus are taxed... The feasibility of the letter’s threats regarding Yale’s taxation status and the Corporation’s composition is unclear...

While the lawmakers’ tactics in some ways mirror policy changes under the Trump administration — including an endowment tax increase that took effect this month and is expected to cost Yale around $300 million per year — the signatories who spoke to the News differentiated their letter from federal attacks on higher education...

Full story at https://yaledailynews.com/articles/objecting-to-trump-talks-ct-lawmakers-threaten-yale-s-tax-exempt-status.

Lost Track

Sad to say, this blog lost track of a case from a California community college involving such issues as free speech, academic freedom, etc. It involved a faculty member at Bakersfield College who objected to DEI statements and related matters. We had previously covered it at an earlier stage.*

The case was initially dismissed, appealed, largely won by the plaintiff through a temporary injunction, and finally and recently made permanent. From Inside Higher Ed:

...In a 2023 lawsuit, [history professor Daymon] Johnson accused administrators of penalizing him and other professors for expressing conservative political and social views based on the system’s DEIA principles, including that faculty “employ teaching, learning, and professional practices that reflect DEIA and anti-racist principles” and demonstrate “proficiency in DEIA-related performance to teach, work, or lead within California community colleges.” He claimed the mandate would force him to express views he didn’t believe...

The settlement turns a preliminary injunction granted by a federal court in February into a five-year permanent injunction that prevents administrators from investigating, disciplining or terminating Johnson for political speech.** But he’s still required to attend mandatory DEIA training to serve on a faculty screening committee. Johnson also won $150,000 toward his attorneys’ fees, according to the Institute for Free Speech, which represented him in the lawsuit...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2026/07/13/bakersfield-settles-professor-suing-over-dei-principles.

Note that although the case involved DEI issues at a community college, a similar case arising from UC would likely produce the same effect, regardless of the particular topic. Forced speech in an academic setting maintained by a state entity would likely be found illegal,

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*https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2025/02/more-on-community-college-dei-statements.html. 

**The court decision is at:

https://ecf.caed.uscourts.gov/cgi-bin/show_temp.pl?file=14621022-0--95548.pdf&type=application/pdf.

Straws in the Wind - Part 408

From Inside Higher Ed: Democrats’ confidence in higher education has hit a record low, with just 50 percent expressing confidence, according to the latest Lumina Foundation–Gallup Confidence in Higher Education survey... That’s down from 61 percent last year who said they had “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in higher ed, and 68 percent who said the same in 2015, when Gallup first began collecting such data. For Courtney Brown, Lumina’s vice president of impact and planning, Democrats’ declining confidence in higher ed is driven by their concern over college affordability and outcomes. Democrats are asking themselves, “Is somebody going to get a good job?” she said. “If they’re going to invest this amount of money and time, we want to make sure there’s a good job on the other side.”

Still, Republicans have expressed a steeper long-term decline in confidence in higher education, down 33 percentage points since 2015, from 56 percent then to 23 percent in the latest survey. The data was collected during phone interviews with 1,001 adults in the first 15 days of June. All told, 38 percent of American adults said they have “a great deal” or “quite a lot” of confidence in higher ed, down from 42 percent last year. The survey also revealed that 37 percent of Americans have “some” confidence in higher ed, while 25 percent expressed “very little” or “none.” Last year, 23 percent had very little or no confidence...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/institutions/2026/07/14/democrats-confidence-higher-ed-hits-record-low.

When is it over? - Part 2

Remember the Canvas hacking that brought instruction at various universities including UCLA to a halt?

From Inside Higher Ed: Two months after Instructure made a deal with hackers to salvage troves of stolen user data, the company—which owns the popular learning management system Canvas—may have another breach on its hands. And this time, the incident is delaying Instructure’s efforts to be transparent with its customers about their compromised data. 

In May, a criminal extortion group known as ShinyHunters twice hacked Canvas and claimed that it gained access to the personal identifying information of 275 million people across 9,000 institutions. At the time, the company said the leaked information included names, email addresses, student ID numbers and user messages, but it “found no evidence that passwords, dates of birth, government identifiers, or financial information were involved.” 

In the aftermath, Instructure CEO Steve Daly vowed to be “transparent about what happened” and provide K–12 schools and higher education institutions “with information as quickly as we responsibly could.” Over the past two months, Instructure has worked “to conduct a detailed forensic review of the data involved in this incident,” Daly said in a memo last week. On Tuesday, the company was set to deliver to institutions the first wave of data related to the breach. Instead, Daly said Tuesday that the company is “pausing data delivery out of an abundance of caution” after learning that “the third-party platform we’ve selected to deliver your data may have been subject to a security threat.” ...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/quick-takes/2026/07/16/another-security-threat-canvas.

Yale Deal - Part 7 (background)

From the Yale Daily News: After the 2023 Supreme Court ruling that banned race-conscious college admissions, Yale administrators quickly assured the community that the University would comply with federal law while attempting to maintain diversity. Now, the University is under federal investigation for allegedly failing to comply with the ruling. In May, the Department of Justice announced an investigation into the Yale School of Medicine’s admissions practices, alleging the school had discriminated against Asian and white applicants. The investigation’s scope has since expanded to admissions at Yale College and Yale Law School, and University President Maurie McInnis confirmed... that Yale is in the process of seeking a voluntary resolution with the federal government over the probe.

At the center of the investigation is the Civil Rights Act of 1964 — which bars racial discrimination for programs that receive federal funding — and a 2023 Supreme Court decision, Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard, which outlawed race-based affirmative action. A May letter of findings issued by the Justice Department alleged the School of Medicine’s admissions process violated that law, as interpreted by the Supreme Court decision. Experts told the News that Yale’s alleged violation may depend on whether the University found ways to circumvent the Supreme Court decision — like using a proxy for race — and whether those methods are considered illegal...

[DOJ] pointed to materials and presentations distributed to admissions officers that included guidance on admissions after the Supreme Court decision — including a slide in an internal presentation with the words, “Admissions post-SCOTUS.” “This suggests that admissions personnel are given verbal instructions during this presentation encouraging the use of race/ethnicity in admissions, and such instructions are not put in writing,” the letter reads. “The Department also has evidence that Yale attempted to circumvent the Harvard decision by using racial proxies to indirectly discriminate against applicants based on race.”

The Justice Department has not publicly released letters of findings for its investigations into Yale College or the Law School, nor has it publicly commented on those investigations. The department did not respond to a request for comment...

Full story at https://yaledailynews.com/articles/yale-admissions-is-under-investigation-could-it-have-broken-the-law.

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Note: If you have been following this Yale sequence and have been wondering about the Hebrew writing on the Yale seal (shown above), see:

https://archives.yalealumnimagazine.com/issues/01_03/seal.html.

Union News: Deal with Docs

From the news section of the UC website:

UC and CIR-SEIU Reach Tentative Contract Agreement

July 16, 2026

The University of California and the Committee of Interns and Residents, a local affiliate of the Service Employees International Union, reached a tentative agreement [last] Wednesday night on a new systemwide contract covering approximately 6,400 interns, residents and fellows. 

The agreement follows negotiations that began in August 2025 to replace eight separate location-based contracts with one systemwide agreement. 

“We appreciate the work of both bargaining teams to reach this tentative agreement,” said Missy Matella, associate vice president for Systemwide Employee and Labor Relations at the University of California. “It supports UC’s continued commitment to these valuable employees and to medical education, clinical training and high-quality patient care.” 

Interns, residents and fellows provide critical care across UC hospitals, medical centers and affiliated clinical sites while completing advanced medical training. 

The tentative agreement is subject to ratification by CIR-SEIU members. More information will be available after the ratification process is complete.

Source: https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/index%2ephp/press-room/uc-and-cir-seiu-reach-tentative-contract-agreement.

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From the union website:

UC Resident Doctors Win Historic Statewide Contract after Year-Long Fight

July 17, 2026

Over 6,400 UC Resident and Fellow Physicians Secure Crucial Support for Fair Wages, Benefit Protections, and Workplace Safety with a Focus on Improved Patient Care 

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California — After a year of tough negotiations, coordinated collective actions, and increasing political support, the resident physicians and fellows at the University of California (UC) reached a tentative agreement on their first statewide contract with UC Health this past Wednesday. Represented by the Committee of Interns and Residents (CIR/SEIU), the doctors say that the deal – which includes 18% salary increase, preservation of fertility benefits, improved access to radiation exposure equipment, immigrant protections for patients, and critical improvements to address emergency room capacity, among others – will directly impact their wellbeing and their ability to provide the best patient care for the 2.5 million Californians they serve across the state in the largest public healthcare system in the country.     

“We are very happy with what we were able to negotiate for our futures, including the wage increases, better access to properly fitting lead, and enshrining our fertility benefits in this contract. However, we’re also really proud that we were able to win language for our patients, especially for the immigrant communities we serve so that they can receive care with less fear, and for all our patients who have had to contend with issues related to emergency room capacity. This is a great starting point and we look forward to ratifying this contract and to continuing to advocate for all of our patients at the UC’s from San Diego up to Sacramento,” said Dr. Diana Dayal, UCLA Emergency Medicine Resident. 

This victory for UC residents and fellows comes after a 12 month long contract fight, marked by UC executive representatives’ attempts to claw back existing benefits and protections while also submitting to pressures from the Trump administration around DEI and ICE. However, over the course of negotiations, the UC residents and fellows participated in a series of escalating collective actions that culminated most publicly in June in a series of eighteen unity breaks at multiple UC sites in Sacramento, San Francisco, Fresno, Riverside, Los Angeles, Irvine, and San Diego, and neighboring hospitals where the UC residents and fellows work. In these actions, the UC physicians called for a fair contract that addressed rising cost of living, keeping their fertility benefits intact, and demanding that UC administration address emergency room capacity so that patients can receive timely care with diginity when they are at their most vulnerable. 

Now that the UC resident bargaining team has reached a deal with UC executives, they look forward to providing the best healthcare possible while also continuing to transform residency for future generations of doctors, all with an eye on patient care. “Resident working conditions are patient care conditions,” said Dr. Gloria Tavera, UCSF Gastroenterology Fellow. She continued, “With a contract that covers all residents and fellows at the UC’s, we are more united than ever in ensuring that we keep the pressure on administration to ensure that the contract language is enforced – for our futures, for the futures of those coming up behind us, and for our patients’ futures.” 

The CIR UC bargaining team will be presenting the tentative agreement (TA) to the full membership with a ratification vote to occur in the coming weeks across California. Once the TA is approved by the CIR UC resident and fellow doctors, then the contract will take effect.

Source: https://www.cirseiu.org/uc-resident-doctors-win-historic-statewide-contract-after-year-long-fight/.

More on the need for a new Master Plan

As blog readers will know, the old Master Plan for Higher Education put together by UC President Clark Kerr and others, is rapidly eroding. We have argued that a new plan is needed so we have a roadmap of who should be doing what among the three segments of state higher ed: UC, CSU, and the community colleges. What we have now is ad hoc adjustments overseen by the legislature. There is no plan. We noted in a prior post that Regent Chair Anguiano seems to want to create one within the Regents. But it's hard to see how that could happen without some kind of participation of the community colleges, CSU, and the legislature.

One of the developments, given the absence of a plan, is pressure from community colleges to offer BA degrees, typically narrowly occupationally focused. A recent National Bureau of Economic Research study suggests that employers do value such degrees. Summary:

Community colleges are more financially, academically, and geographically accessible than four-year institutions. Yet despite most community college students intending to earn a bachelor’s degree, few successfully transfer and complete one. Community College Baccalaureate (CCB) programs have emerged as an alternative pathway, allowing community colleges to confer bachelor’s degrees directly. However, little is known about how employers value these credentials in the labor market. To address this question, we conduct the first resume audit study of CCB degrees, submitting fictitious applications to real job vacancies while experimentally varying applicants’ educational credentials, degree-granting institutions, and demographic signals. In this pilot study, we focus on the early childhood education (ECE) labor market, a rapidly growing CCB field characterized by labor shortages and increasing educational requirements. We find that employers view CCB degrees similarly to both traditional bachelor’s and associate degrees, with statistically indistinguishable interview-request rates across degree types. A text analysis of employer callback messages reveals little evidence that employers communicate differently with CCB applicants, while a net-price simulation suggests that sticker-price comparisons substantially overstate the affordability advantage of CCB programs. Together, these findings provide new evidence on the labor market value and affordability of CCB degrees and inform an ongoing large-scale audit study across additional fields and labor markets.

Full study at https://www.nber.org/papers/w35404.

A new Master Plan process would look at studies such as the one above and possibly commission others. And it would bring together interest groups, academics, and political leaders to hammer out a coherent approach. In other words, it would be formulated much as the old plan was.

Straws in the Wind - Part 407

From the Wall St Journal: A select group of colleges is making it easier to apply—but probably harder to get in. Top schools including Tulane University, Washington University in St. Louis and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill are reducing the number of essays applicants have to submit. Colleges say that they are trying to ease students’ stress, and that artificial intelligence has made it harder to tell whether students are actually doing the writing. The moves will likely increase applications, potentially making admissions more cutthroat, college counselors say. Texas Christian University experienced a roughly 14% jump in applications after removing two of its supplemental essays last year.

Schools are “trying to become more competitive,” said Caroline Koppelman, founder of an admissions firm. For students deciding where to apply, an extra essay “can be the straw that breaks the camel’s back a little bit, or at least the straw that makes you not apply to that school.” A lower admissions rate improves schools’ rankings and “protects their prestige,” said Christopher Rim, chief executive of admissions firm Command Education. “A lot of that is really artificial.”

With the population of college-goers shrinking in coming years, higher-education institutions are fighting over a smaller pie—and supplemental essays can deter applicants...

Full story at https://www.wsj.com/us-news/education/colleges-essays-supplemental-applications-admissions-9e7f8651.

Watch the Regents Meetings of July 14, 2026

We are catching up with the Regents meetings of last week. We have already noted the ambitious plan set out in the meeting of July 14th by Chair Anguiano that seems to go beyond the immediate SAT issue, so we won't repeat that material here.

There were many public comments on the SAT issue, mainly, but not exclusively, urging reinstatement of the test. Other topics included use of license plate readers, hiring of UC of undocumented students, remote work for staff at UC, Muslim student issues, the Hawaii telescope project (TMT), anti-Israel, and the maintenance of a nature reserve. 

A new student regent-delegate was appointed after public comments. Chair Anguiano made her above-mentioned statement. President Milliken noted that Provost Newman would be stepping down. The faculty representative, Senate Chair Palazoglu, indicated that the Senate review of the SAT issue would be "deliberative."

There was then a presentation of the "UC Inspires" campaign emphasizing accomplishments of UC Health and its cooperation with the VA, scientific innovation and entrepreneurship, contributions to agricultural research, and "access" to UC.

At the Health Services Committee, an executive pay matter was approved. The rest of the Committee meeting was devoted to the statistical dashboard of various quality measures. Regent Park took note of some measures that indicated quality concerns and asked about responses. One issue noted was the "boarding" problem, i.e., patients who needed to be transferred or discharged but who were stuck in hospitals for various reasons.

The Compliance and Audit Committee approved audit and compliance plans. Note was taken in the presentation about cybersecurity issues.

As always, we preserve recordings of Regents meetings since the Regents have no policy on duration of retention. The general link for recordings of the July 14th meetings is:

https://archive.org/details/regents-7-14-2026.

The opening full Board session is at:

https://ia800703.us.archive.org/14/items/regents-7-14-2026/Regents-Board%207-14-2026.mp4.

Health Services and Compliance and Audit sessions are at:

https://ia600703.us.archive.org/14/items/regents-7-14-2026/Regents-Health%20Services%20Committee%2C%20Compliance%20and%20Audit%207-14-2026.mp4.

Note that the recordings at that link can be easily downloaded. The same is true for prior Regents meetings we have preserved. Go the "Download Options" at that link.

State Cash Report

The story of fiscal 2025-26, the year that ended last June 30th, was one of underestimating state revenues, as the latest report from the state controller illustrates.*

On the other hand, disbursements were more or less accurately forecast when the state budget for 2025-26 was enacted and overestimated at the time of the May revise.

The state still has a significant reserve of cash in various accounts, so the prospect of the state handing out IOUs anytime soon, as in the Great Recession, is nil. All of this can be seen on the table below:

We don't yet have the budgetary summary numbers from the Dept. of Finance for the current year 2026-27. Xavier Becerra, the de facto incoming governor (since California no longer elects statewide Republicans) will spend his first 6 months under the Newsom-enacted budget. The budget he will present in January 2027 for 2027-28 will largely have been put together by the Newsom team, given the pressures of timing. So, if he has very different priorities from Newsom with regard to UC - and there is no indication that he has - that would be a surprise. Surprises, if they occur for UC, are more likely to occur from changes in economic activity and the stock market than from political turnover in Sacramento.

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*https://www.sco.ca.gov/Files-ARD/CASH/June2026StatementofGeneralFundCashReceiptsandDisbursements.pdf.

Straws in the Wind - Part 406

From the Philadelphia Inquirer: Temple University approved a $1.3 billion operating budget... that includes an average 3.4% tuition hike for both in-state and out-of-state students and plans for about 40 employee layoffs. Both the average tuition increase — which is for undergraduate and graduate students — and number of layoffs are smaller than those last year. The university raised tuition an average of 3.6% in 2025 and laid off 50 employees.

The layoffs constitute less than 1% of the university’s workforce. Temple officials did not elaborate on who was affected or which positions but said positions across the university from senior levels to the operational ranks were considered. An effort was made to limit the impact on “student-facing” roles, said chief strategy officer and former interim provost David Boardman.

...More than 80% of the positions cut this year came through voluntary retirements, including a faculty program that netted more than 70 takers, as well as resignations and the elimination of vacant positions. The rest were the layoffs... The university’s 27% decline in domestic enrollment since 2017 and increased financial aid costs have been the most significant factors causing the school’s budget pressures... The loss of students has amounted to an average of more than $200 million in lost revenue annually, according to an internal Temple report obtained by The Inquirer in April...

Full story at https://www.inquirer.com/education/temple-university-budget-layoffs-tuition-increase-20260708.html.

Going Up

An ASUCLA-operated digital textbook system will be more costly in the fall, although it likely will remain a money-saving option, given the cost of regular textbooks. From the Daily Bruin:

UCLA is raising the quarterly fee for its digital textbook program, which students said could deter them from using the service.

The quarterly fee for Bruin One Access will increase from $129 to $149 starting next fall, an ASUCLA spokesperson said in an emailed statement. The program provides students with a lower-cost alternative to purchasing individual textbooks and offers access to quizzes and course platforms through a flat-rate fee charged on students’ BruinBill accounts.

...Students are automatically enrolled in the program each quarter but can opt to drop the service...

Full story at https://dailybruin.com/2026/07/12/amid-student-concerns-bruin-one-access-to-increase-to-149-per-quarter.

Incomplete

There is apparently agitation within UCLA student governments - undergrad and grad - to make Incomplete grades disappear. See:

https://dailybruin.com/2026/07/08/usac-recap-june-23.

Here are the current rules on Incomplete (I) grades:

Incomplete (I) Grade Removal

An instructor may assign the I grade when work is of passing quality but is incomplete for a good cause (such as illness or other serious problem). Once an Incomplete (I) grade is assigned, it remains on the transcript until it is resolved or lapsed, after which the resulting grade is displayed on the transcript.

For Undergraduate students, if the work is not completed by the end of the next full term in residence, the I grade lapses to an F, NP, or U as appropriate. The College or school may extend the completion deadline in unusual cases. Graduate students should complete the work in accordance with the timeline established with their instructor, which may be no later than the first day of the corresponding term of the next academic year.

Active Duty Military Incomplete

Enrolled UCLA students may request an incomplete grade if they meet these three conditions

• Are members of the U.S. Armed Forces or National Guard
• Are called to active duty, state training, or state service
• Are using an education benefit administered by the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs (VA), also known as a chapter benefit

These students may also request an extension of the completion deadline until they resume attendance at UCLA.

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Source: https://registrar.ucla.edu/student-records/grades-and-academic-revisions.

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Presumably, any change in grading policy would have to be approved by the Academic Senate. It is unclear if any official request to the Senate has been made and, if so, whether the Senate is actively considering the request.

Straws in the Wind - Part 405

From the Brown Daily Herald: The Generative AI in Teaching and Learning Committee report found asymmetric patterns of generative AI use across campus... According to the report — shared with the community Provost Francis Doyle — 56% of undergraduate respondents and 67% of graduate and medical student respondents reported intentionally using generative AI tools daily or weekly. The committee noted they found a disconnect between the ways students and faculty use generative AI. They found that while a majority of students who responded to their survey use generative AI to learn new concepts, only a quarter of faculty respondents said they asked their students to use generative AI as a tool for their coursework. When they did so, it was often to have students think critically about AI or use it as a learning assistant...

An audit of roughly 3,000 syllabi from academic years 2023-24 and 2024-25 found that more than half did not include a policy on generative AI usage in teaching and learning... The report noted that over 70% of student survey respondents in the life sciences and physical sciences identified as frequent generative AI users, while only 41% of humanities and the arts students identified as frequent users. Despite differences in AI adoption, students and faculty alike share concerns that over-reliance on generative AI could “reduce long-term critical thinking, have negative cognitive consequences and undermine academic integrity,” Doyle added. 

...For the near-term phase of the roadmap, the committee recommended that the University set baseline rules for generative AI while each department develops “standards for their areas when their expectations diverge from the baseline rules.” The recommendations also call for providing “centralized, enterprise-level GenAI tools” through the Office of Information Technology. In the next phase, the committee recommends updating the College and Graduate School academic codes to “explicitly address boundaries of AI assistance” as well as providing training to develop AI literacy among University staff. 

...The final phase recommends exploring the development of a coalition of peer institutions to set national standards for AI usage in higher education...

Full story at https://www.browndailyherald.com/article/2026/07/university-report-finds-split-ai-adoption-patterns-concerns-of-risks.

Grants' Tomb - Part 3 (official)

It appears that UCLA has taken an official stance against the proposed new federal grant guidelines. From the Daily Bruin: (excerpt)

“UCLA strongly opposes the Proposed Rule,” [a UCLA] spokesperson said in [a] statement.

 “The proposed rule would make federal research funding less predictable, increase agency and recipient burden, weaken the research enterprise, and ultimately diminish the public benefits that federally supported research delivers.”

Full story at https://dailybruin.com/2026/07/11/how-the-trump-administrations-revamp-of-funding-guidelines-could-threaten-research. 

Fast vs. Slow: Maybe That's Not the Question

There seems to be confusion in news accounts - as blog readers will know from past postings - over whether the decision regarding the SAT is moving faster or slower than before. The chair of the systemwide Senate issued two statements regarding the SAT issue. 

What seems to be the bottom line is that a more detailed timeline will be released after the Academic Council meets on July 22nd. How long after the 22nd there will be a release is unclear.

Statement #1:

Statement from UC Academic Senate on admissions review

UC Office of the President, July 13, 2026

After published reports emerged today (July 13) that the University of California’s Academic Senate voted on July 10 to rescind its review of standardized testing admissions, Ahmet Palazoglu, the University of California’s Academic Senate Chair, issued the following statement:

“The Academic Senate is not rescinding its commitment to a comprehensive review of standardized testing in admissions. Recognizing the significance of this issue, the Academic Senate is revising its timeline while ensuring the forthcoming review is thorough, evidence-based and informed by faculty expertise.”

Source: https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/press-room/statement-uc-academic-senate-admissions-review.

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Statement #2:

Statement from UC Academic Senate Chair Ahmet Palazoglu on review of UC admissions

UC Office of the President, July 14, 2026

“The Academic Senate’s comprehensive review of the University’s undergraduate admissions policies will align with the Board of Regents’ timeline to deliver a policy recommendation on the use of standardized tests in admissions by the end of the 2026–27 academic year (June 2027 for our campuses based on the quarter system). The separate review of UC’s A-G framework is not tied to the same timeline. A new plan from the Academic Senate will be available after the Academic Council meeting on July 22, 2026. The goal of this A-G policy review is to consider how UC defines and evaluates college readiness in a rapidly changing educational environment.”

Source: https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/press-room/statement-ahmet-palazoglu-chair-ucs-academic-senate-review-uc-admissions.

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Perhaps more significant than the statements above is the statement of the new Regents Chair, Maria Anguiano. She essentially declared the old Master Plan dead. And then she proposed, without explicitly saying so, that the Regents spend the next year coming up with a substitute, although she did not mention the other two components of higher ed in California: CSU and the community colleges. Nor did she mention the state legislature which has been doing ad hoc tinkering with the old Master Plan, as blog readers will know. The SAT decision is to be but one element in the year-long review she announced.

Although her statement was a personal one, it's hard to imagine she didn't discuss what she was going to say with President Milliken and other Regents. An excerpt from her statement is below:

Or direct to https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3vXplgoFlCc or https://ia600703.us.archive.org/14/items/regents-7-14-2026/Anguiano%20on%20Master%20Plan%2C%20SAT%2C%20%26%20Priorities%207-14-2026.mp4.

ICYMI - Library Thief

From KTLA: A Bay Area man was sentenced to a year of home confinement and three years of supervised release for stealing rare and historical Chinese manuscripts from the UCLA library.  The U.S. Department of Justice announced Wednesday the sentence was handed down to Jeffrey Ying of Fremont after he pleaded guilty to one count of theft of major artwork, a felony, in October. 

More specifically, the DOJ said Ying’s guilty plea relates to a theft that occurred in December 2024 in which he stole a 17th century Qing dynasty manuscript. Ying, 39, who used several aliases including “Jason Wang,” “Alan Fujimori” and “Austin Chen,” admitted during his guilty plea hearing that he stole the rare manuscripts from the UCLA library between December 2024 and July 2025. Since they are so valuable, they are not in regular circulation and thus must be reserved and checked out...

Ying would rent them – bringing them home for days at a time – and then returned a “dummy manuscript” to the library instead of the authentic one. According to the Justice Department, Ying would travel to and from China “within several days of the thefts.” ... According to the DOJ, restitution in the case will be determined at a later date. Previous reports indicate that the value of the stolen items exceeded $215,000. It was unclear whether any of the manuscripts have been recovered.

Full story at https://ktla.com/news/local-news/man-gets-366-days-in-federal-prison-for-stealing-rare-chinese-manuscripts-from-ucla/.

Yale Deal - Part 6

From the Yale Daily News: Yale President Maurie McInnis is arranging to meet with graduate and undergraduate student leaders in a confidential meeting as the University pursues a settlement with the Trump administration. The proposed meeting will include McInnis, Yale College Council President Alex William Chen ’28, YCC Vice President Michelle Jimenez ’28, Graduate and Professional Student Senate President Raekwon Fuller DRA ’27 and Graduate Student Assembly chair Anushka Potdar GRD ’29. According to Fuller, the meeting date has yet to be determined. Undergraduate student leaders have been vocal opponents of any settlement with the Trump administration that would compromise Yale’s independence...

Potdar declined to comment on the future meeting, citing its confidentiality...

Full story at https://yaledailynews.com/articles/mcinnis-to-meet-with-undergraduate-graduate-student-government-leaders.

Straws in the Wind - Part 404

From Inside Higher Ed: The University of North Texas has paid for journalism professor Tracy Everbach and her colleagues to attend a certain conference every year since she started at the university in 2004. Until this year. In a June 30 memo to Everbach and at least five other journalism professors, university administrators said that funding membership or sponsorship costs for the Association for Education in Journalism and Mass Communication, the organization that hosts the conference she plans to attend and present at next month, violates a Texas law banning diversity, equity and inclusion measures at public institutions.

Scheduled for early August in New Orleans, the AEJMC conference has a Jazz & Jambalaya theme, which showcases the “rich histories” and “diverse contributions” of community members, according to the association’s website. The schedule says it will feature “thought-provoking programming, diverse voices and exciting opportunities to learn and connect.” ...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty/academic-freedom/2026/07/09/north-texas-denies-faculty-conference-funding.

Grants' Tomb - Part 2 (follow-up)

From Inside Higher Ed: The White House in late May proposed a rule that would cement its control over essentially all federal grant making, including research funding and Education Department grants. Among other changes, the proposal from the Office of Management and Budget says political appointees, not peer reviewers, would be the primary deciders of who gets grants, and says officials could yank funding even after it’s awarded and research or another project has begun. 

Opponents in and outside higher ed say the politicization could undercut research and all the societal benefits that flow from it, and the possibility of more midgrant cancellations could inject further instability into a sector the Trump administration has already destabilized.

Through social media, video calls, Substacks and petitions, scientists, universities and groups representing them have called for a flood of public comments. They’ve shared resources listing objectionable provisions they’ve identified in the more than 400-page proposal...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/government/science-research-policy/2026/07/07/comments-flood-omb-proposal-political-control.

Our earlier post on this matter is at:

https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2026/07/grants-tomb.html.

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Note: The deadline for public comments was July 13th.

Yale Deal - Part 5

Message from the president of Yale

Monday, July 13, 2026

Dear Members of the Yale Community,

Many of you have written to me in the past week regarding investigations by the Department of Justice (DOJ) into the admissions processes of Yale School of Medicine, Yale College, and Yale Law School. At Yale, our standard is to refrain from commenting on ongoing legal matters to protect the integrity of the process for Yale. I am making an exception in this instance because I am seeing speculation and misinformation spreading, and it is causing concern in our community. I recognize that this can happen when there is an absence of information, so I want you to hear the facts directly from me.

On May 14, the DOJ issued findings based on its investigation into the admissions policies and practices of the Yale School of Medicine. The DOJ also has pending investigations into the admissions processes of Yale College and Yale Law School.

These investigations concern university compliance with federal law; specifically, a federal statute, Title VI of the Civil Rights Act. The U.S. Supreme Court required colleges and universities across the country, including Yale, to adhere to new legal standards in admissions in its 2023 decision in Students for Fair Admissions v. Harvard. As a university committed to the rule of law, we take that obligation seriously.

When the DOJ issues findings of an investigation, federal law provides a process for the parties to engage in seeking a voluntary resolution. It is a standard and important practice that lawyers for the involved parties and the government participate in conversation and exchange of information to determine whether they can resolve the matter without further legal action. Yale is currently engaged in this process of talking and listening. It is a required and reasonable step, and we are participating in good faith.  

We are approaching these matters with five fundamental principles. First, we are wholeheartedly committed to safeguarding academic freedom. Our students and faculty have the intellectual freedom to study, teach, and publish according to their scholarly interests in keeping with the standards of their discipline. Second, Yale must maintain the right to decide who we admit and hire in accordance with the law. Third, we hold dear our university’s tradition of protecting free expression on our campus. Fourth, we are determined to continue advancing Yale’s mission of education, research, and scholarship. And fifth, we make all our decisions by prioritizing our responsibilities to our students, faculty, staff, and patients, as well as the university as a whole.

These are the principles that guide us in how we engage in any legal inquiry, but they are not the whole of what we ask of ourselves. We are also guided by the long-time efforts of our faculty, students, staff, and alumni who help us engage in a process of continual self-assessment. The most recent examples of such reflection relevant to admissions culminated this past spring, with the Presidential Council on Yale College Admissions and the Committee on Trust in Higher Education.

Guided by their recommendations, we began refining our admissions processes based on a high standard of candor and on an unambiguous fact: We are proud of our students, who come from across the country and around the world and bring a multitude of talents, experiences, and ideas. For example, we have further clarified on Yale College’s admissions website the magnitude of academic achievement of our current students, so applicants are aware of what they need to accomplish. We now state explicitly that academic strength has long been the predominant criterion in our holistic evaluation of applicants, and the overwhelming majority of admitted students score in the ninety-fifth percentile or higher on the SAT or ACT. Throughout the university, we have bolstered our training so that readers and decision-makers understand the law and federal guidelines for admissions, and our faculty and staff in admissions will keep studying how to continually enhance the admissions process based on our own high standards and the requirements of the law.

I know there are divergent views about admissions policy in general and these investigations in particular. I very much want to hear those views and welcome your reply to this message. And I am so grateful to everyone who has already sent me their thoughtful questions and advice.

I will update you when I have more news to share. In the meantime, I will continue to draw on my experience as a student, professor, and university leader to navigate the present moment. Amid this uncertainty, you can be certain of my promise to the entire Yale community: my decisions will be guided by what I believe is in the best interests of our university.

Sincerely,

Maurie McInnis

President

Professor of the History of Art

--

Source: https://president.yale.edu/posts/2026-07-13-message-from-the-president.

Today at Noon

What will you learn in this seminar

Actionable steps to help you make the most of your retirement income and savings by understanding how to address key challenges like inflation and market volatility.

Who should attend?

Anyone interested in a more financially secure retirement.

Go to:

https://fmr.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_iC9_nSdvTQatNxNTCBtOWw#/registration.

Straws in the Wind - Part 403

From Inside Higher Ed: For the first time since he started teaching Welfare Economics and Social Choice Theory nearly two decades ago, Brown University economics professor Roberto Serrano gave his students a take-home midterm this spring. Quite a few students had expressed anxiety about being in a classroom after a gunman killed two students and injured nine in a December mass shooting at Brown, and so “it was appropriate,” he said, to allow students to take their exams at home.

But by the end of the semester, Serrano regretted the decision. Dozens of students in the class likely used artificial intelligence to cheat and earn perfect or near-perfect scores on their midterm, he said. Serrano in turn made the final exam in-person, which led more than a dozen students to drop the course and even more to fail it. Administrators’ response to the widespread cheating event has been “meek,” he said, and the incident has raised questions about how universities can—and should—respond to AI-enabled cheating at scale.

His welfare economics class typically attracted up to 30 students, but this spring he taught 86—an increase he attributes to the promised take-home exams. When the midterm came along, the average score was 96 percent. “Historically the average grade in the midterm of this course has ranged between 65 and 80 [percent], and this exam was harder than the exams I wrote in the past, because … take-home is an opportunity to challenge the class a little bit more, given that you’re giving the students unlimited time,” Serrano said.

...In a message to students after the midterm that he shared with Inside Higher Ed, he told them he suspected many of them of using AI to cheat and, with the blessing of his dean, changed the final exam to an in-person test. Serrano heard crickets from his students, but 18 of them subsequently dropped the class. Nine students remained enrolled but did not take the final exam. And Serrano said the results proved him right; three students earned a zero, and the average score on the final was 48.6 percent—by far a historic low, he said. Previously, the average final exam score had never dropped below 65 percent. Only a few students scored similarly to how they did on the midterm. In a follow-up message to students, Serrano announced the midterm was void and the final exam would be worth 80 percent of the students’ final grade. Any student that scored a 40 percent or higher on the final earned a passing grade—previously, he set the passing line at 50 percent or higher. In total, 19 students failed the class...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty/learning-assessment/2026/07/08/brown-professor-suspects-most-his-class-used-ai-cheat.

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Not a surprise:

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

Everyone is entitled to the Regents' Opinion

Generally, the Regents do not take political positions. But as an exception, they do advocate for UC on occasion, especially when items directly affecting UC are on the ballot. 

At today's Regents meeting, the board is expected to endorse the housing bond which the legislature has put on the November ballot, and which allocates some money for UC student housing. From Item B4:

On June 25, 2026, the Governor signed Senate Bill 417 (Limón), the Veterans and Affordable Housing Bond Act of 2026. The measure placed Proposition 1 on the November 3, 2026 ballot, which asks voters to approve an $11.25 billion statewide housing bond. The bond includes $350 million for the Higher Education Student Housing Grant Program to be divided equally between the University of California and the California State University system. If the bond passes, the University would be eligible for $175 million to develop affordable student housing projects. The President recommends that the Board of Regents endorse Proposition 1, the Veterans and Affordable Housing Bond Act of 2026...

Full item at https://regents.universityofcalifornia.edu/regmeet/july26/b4.pdf.

Dubinett & Hawgood Testimony

Steve Dubinett - dean of the UCLA med school - and Sam Hawgood - chancellor of UC-San Francisco - testified yesterday at the House Committee on Education & Workforce. The topic was DEI in medical education. Both defended their institutions, but both acknowledged problems that had arisen in particular courses at their campuses. Both indicated the courses referenced had been replaced and that the new versions were in compliance with appropriate standards, would be given only by campus faculty, and would comply with university rules limiting use of courses for unrelated purposes.

You can see their opening statements to the Committee at the link below:

https://ia902809.us.archive.org/1/items/newsom-7-1-2026-savings-accounts-for-kids/Dubinett-Hawgood%20testimony%20on%20DEI%20in%20med%20schools%207-14-2026.mp4.

The full hearing is at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=m4EeaPsxa2s.

Fast Run

In contrast to our previous post on this blog, consider this item from the Sacramento Bee:

At a meeting Tuesday morning, Board of Regents Chair Maria Anguiano said she anticipates a recommendation from the Academic Senate within the 2026-2027 academic year. “The goal of this review is not to rehash old questions or data but an opportunity to take a fresh look at how we define and evaluate college readiness in a rapidly changing world,” Anguiano said. “Our responsibility is not to begin with answers but with the discipline to ask better questions, to understand the evidence, to hear diverse perspectives, to deliberate thoughtfully and to make wise, long-term decisions.” 

The Academic Senate, which represents faculty across the system, will lead the review process through the year while the board deepens its own understanding of the broad questions at hand, she said. In a statement, Academic Senate Chair Ahmet Palazoglu confirmed a policy recommendation would be provided by June 2027. A new plan for the review process, he said, would be shared after the Academic Council meeting on July 22...

Full story at: https://www.sacbee.com/news/politics-government/capitol-alert/article316506622.html.

So everything depends on whether you read the San Francisco Chronicle or the Sacramento Bee.

Slow Walk

The San Francisco Chronicle carries a "timeline" of what is supposed to happen with regards to the SAT issue:

July to September 2026: The Academic Senate’s influential Board of Admissions and Relations with Schools, known as BOARS, created the admissions roadmap and will spend the summer recruiting experts for Workgroup 1. This panel of at least 13 professors, four administrators and one K-12 representative will consider the pros and cons of restoring standardized test scores to UC’s admissions criteria. 

BOARS will also recruit experts for Workgroup 2: at least 13 UC professors, one from California State University, four administrators and three K-12 representatives. This group will study whether the combination of high school courses needed to qualify for UC admission, known as “A-G” requirements — history/social science, English, math, science, foreign language, arts and an elective — adequately prepare students for success at UC.

May 15, 2027: Final reports are due from both workgroups. (The two are A-G workgroup and the SAT workgroup.)

June 4, 2027: The workgroups will present their reports to BOARS.

Mid-June 2027: BOARS will share the groups’ findings and recommendations with “stakeholders.” These include UC admissions staff, students, and representatives of public schools, CSU, community colleges, private universities and higher education nonprofits. 

July 2, 2027: BOARS will discuss the stakeholders’ comments.

July 31, 2027: This is the deadline for BOARS to approve the workgroups’ recommendations and, if it does so, to send them to the Academic Senate’s executive committee, known as the Academic Council.

August-October 2027: The Academic Council will oversee a “systemwide review” of the recommendations.

November 2027: If the council approves the recommendations, it will share them with the Assembly of the Academic Senate, a group of about 60 leading professors who consider legislative issues affecting more than one campus.

If the Assembly approves the recommendations, it will send them to UC President James Milliken and Provost Katherine Newman.

Milliken will then decide whether to forward the recommendations to the regents.

Early 2028: If the regents receive recommendations to change how high school students apply to UC, such as requiring them to submit SAT/ACT scores, the board is likely to discuss and vote on those changes during the first half of the year. 

Fall 2028: If the regents have voted to reinstate admissions tests, high school students would have to submit their scores now to enter as freshmen in fall 2029. 

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Source of timeline: https://www.sfchronicle.com/college-admissions/article/uc-sat-act-return-explained-22339345.php.