Under the radar

After all the controversy about A-G admissions requirements and reliance on high school grades versus SATs, this item about UC-Berkeley seems to have passed under the radar. From the Daily Cal:

The [UC-Berkeley] College of Letters and Science has changed how students can fulfill foreign language requirements. For those admitted fall 2026 and beyond, L&S students now must complete two semesters of a college-level foreign language course, or meet an equivalent competency through various exam scores. Accepted exam scores that fulfill the requirement include specific AP, IB or SAT subject tests and scores. For students admitted before fall 2026, three years of high school foreign language instruction still satisfies the requirement. The requirement is also fulfilled “by completing at least three years of secondary school in which the primary language of instruction was a language other than English, starting from grade 6 or above as verified by transcripts,” said campus spokesperson Sarah Fullerton.

The change reflects the shift to California General Education Transfer Curriculum, created by Assembly Bill 928, which standardized transfer requirements needed to enroll in a UC or a CSU, according to UC Office of the President spokesperson Omar Rodriguez... The L&S Executive Committee also determined that high school language instruction is not consistent or standardized, so students could come in with the same amount of language instruction time, but varying degrees of ability...

Full story at https://www.dailycal.org/news/campus/academics/uc-berkeley-no-longer-accepts-3-years-of-high-school-foreign-language-for-l-s/article_f194e0fe-c781-42c7-a179-0e95dd6d64c2.html. 

Straws in the Wind - Part 481

From the U.S. Bureau of the Census: How are new college graduates affected by the rise of artificial intelligence, and what can this tell us about the mechanisms behind AI's overall labor market effects? ...Administrative records on college graduates [indicate] how economic outcomes among college majors with differing levels of labor market AI exposure have evolved since large language models became available.

...Post-graduation employment, earnings, and job switching patterns among the most AI-exposed college majors began to diverge immediately following the introduction of ChatGPT in late 2022. In regression-adjusted estimates, the most AI-exposed decile of college majors saw their likelihood of initial employment decline by five percentage points, while full-quarter initial earnings declined by thirteen percent. This earnings decline is comparable in magnitude to the earnings losses associated with graduating into a large recession. Roughly half of the decline in earnings is attributable to lower earnings within the industry sectors that employ these graduates, with the remainder resulting from a shift in the industry mix into lower-wage sectors such as restaurants and retail. The effects attenuate as graduates move further from labor market entry but remain substantial for the most exposed majors. 

Full working paper at https://www2.census.gov/library/working-papers/2026/adrm/ces/CES-WP-26-56.pdf.

Invitation to Trouble

 

If you get an email with an "invitation" that is supposedly from someone you know and might really be sending you an invitation, do not click on it or any link provided. Instead, directly get in touch with the purported sender by phone or email (NOT a direct reply to the "invitation"). If the purported sender knows nothing about it, tell him/her that a hacking has occurred and all contacts should be notified and warned. Then delete the invitation.

Some hints that the invitation is phony: 1) It comes from a weird email address. The one above came from a .vu address. .vu = Vanuatu. (It may show the purported sender's legitimate address as the inviter. But where did the invitation come from?) 2) The email is also addressed to a large number of people. Even if neither #1 nor #2 is involved, you should still assume the worst and get directly in touch with the purported sender.

Finally, given the large number of these scams going around, you might think twice about sending out invitations, greeting cards, etc., through commercial services. Recipients may be suspicious and just delete them. Younger folks may want to ask their grandparents about envelopes, letters, and postage stamps. They'll tell you now it is done!

Yesterday's Forecast

From an Anderson news release of 9-30-2026: The UCLA Anderson Forecast’s September 2026 outlook finds an economy that has largely weathered a series of disruptions, with economic growth remaining resilient, even as inflation and interest rates have risen and labor markets nationally and in California remain weak... Nationally, the Forecast expects growth to remain above 2% for the remainder of 2026 and near 2% in 2027 and 2028, supported in part by continued investment in AI infrastructure and the wealth effects associated with rising technology equity valuations. Inflation, meanwhile, is expected to move higher again this winter, keeping interest rates elevated and prompting the Federal Reserve to raise rates accordingly...

California continues to present an unusual combination of superior economic growth and inferior employment performance... Much of [the] growth reflects California’s concentration in technology and other high-productivity industries... Aerospace is also benefiting from increased commercial aircraft production, defense purchases, space exploration and satellite production. But that strength has not translated into broad employment gains. California’s unemployment rate has remained above 5% for 31 months and stood at 5.1% in August, one percentage point above the national rate... The Forecast assumes AI-related hiring and the end of contraction elsewhere in the technology sector will produce employment growth beginning in 2027 and accelerating in 2028. 

Housing remains another constraint. New-home construction has changed little since June, with the annual pace of permits around 110,000 units, well below the level needed to address the state’s housing shortage. Elevated mortgage rates, tariffs on imported building materials and the loss of construction workers through deportations are expected to continue limiting new construction. Overall, the September 2026 California outlook is slightly weaker than the June forecast, largely because of continued disruption in energy markets...

Full news release at https://www.anderson.ucla.edu/news-and-events/ucla-anderson-forecast-sees-resilient-growth-despite-inflation-weak-labor-markets.