Friday, January 25, 2019
The Regents' Missing Link Has Been Found!
Thursday, January 24, 2019
Veterans-UCLA Dispute - Part 2
Sleep-Inducing Follow Up on Governance and Compensation
 |
| NAP-olitano? |
Anyway, it was just about money which is inherently boring. Sample below:
The Committee recommends approval of an incentive award of $490,985 for Plan Year 2017-18, under the Office of the Chief Investment Officer Annual Incentive Plan (AIP), for Jagdeep Singh Bachher as Chief Investment Officer and Vice President – Investments, Office of the President. The recommended incentive award represents 75.252 percent of Mr. Bachher’s annual base salary of $652,454.
Recommended Compensation
Effective Date: upon Regents’ approval
Base Salary: $652,454
AIP Award: $490,985 (75.252 percent of base salary)
Base Salary Plus Recommended AIP Award: $1,143,439
Funding: non-State-funded
Waiting for Governance and Compensation and the Search for Deeper Meaning
Ahh! Perhaps there is some deeper meaning in all of this:
Wednesday, January 23, 2019
Toil and Trouble at Extension
 |
| Not exactly what Shakespeare said but... |
From the Bruin: About 75 employees left UCLA Extension amid administrative upheaval, despite UCLA cancelling an initial plan to lay off about one-quarter of UCLA Extension’s employees last year.
From the Bruin: In January 2018, UCLA Extension’s revenue was projected to be $10 million less than the previous year. The projection caused former dean Wayne Smutz to announce layoffs for about one-quarter of UCLA Extension’s employees.
This January, Tom Oser, UCLA Extension interim vice provost, said in an email statement that last year’s announced layoffs never happened.
“The announced layoffs were canceled by Executive Vice Chancellor (and Provost) Scott Waugh,” Oser said. “Approximately 75 people voluntarily left the employment of UCLA Extension for other positions.”
The mass resignation of almost one-third of UCLA Extension’s staff sent ripples through all levels of administration.
At the start of 2018, UCLA Extension had one dean and two associate deans; by the start of 2019, all three deans were gone.
On July 24, 2018, Waugh announced Smutz would retire by Oct. 31...
Less Cash; More Stuff
The fourth quarter of 2018 ransacked the University of California’s assets as the stock market tanked, but the $114 billion organization forged ahead with its plan to deploy its cash stash into alternatives.
In the first three months of the new fiscal year, which began July 1, the $11.7 billion endowment section of the institution more than halved its position in cash, from roughly 7.5% to about 2.1%, or $300 million, according to a video of the UC Regents’ January 15-17 board meeting.
“We had been talking about our desire to remain opportunistic, but also at the same time, we were concerned with the fact that this growth risk factor was so dominant in our portfolios that we actually wanted to diversify as well,” said Edmond Fong, senior managing director overseeing absolute return, at the meeting. “What we ended up doing was creating a fairly robust pipeline of private market opportunities that shared some common characteristics.”
The similarities between the changes were that several were “non-market non-auction in transactions, directly where we were having a bilateral discussion with the seller,” said Fong, adding that this allowed the UC endowment to “control pricing discipline and reduce costs of transactions.” The cash-fueled allocations brought in additional diversification to the endowment. Fong said these opportunities had a “strong cash-flow profile.”
The shift started in the third quarter, where 60% of that cash went into real estate, with projects that the investment team had identified as good targets. According to Fong, his unit is conservatively underwriting these projects.
Another 20% was invested into other real assets, where they found several co-investments that helped reduce the overall program costs. An additional 15% of the cash was moved into absolute return strategies, via hedge funds.
“We’re quite comfortable with how we’ve been able to deploy that capital,” Fong said.
The remainder of cash was further committed in the fourth quarter, with 40% to private equity, which included a number of co-investments. Another 40% was invested in absolute return strategies.
“Again, we found a number of unique investment opportunities that we felt would diversify the endowment investment portfolio,” Fong said...
Tuesday, January 22, 2019
Listen to the Regents Morning Meeting of 1-16-2019
Full Board:
During public comments Wednesday, students from
advocacy groups across the UC campuses made demands to UCOP, including that it
stop the outsourcing of UC jobs and hire full-time career workers, terminate
any ties to federal immigration agencies and divest from companies which
students said they think are violating Palestinian human rights.
Lt. Gov. Eleni Kounalakis and State
Superintendent Tony Thurmond introduced themselves to the board, adding that
they are working to increase accessibility to public education and address food
insecurity and labor issues.
UC President Janet Napolitano said California
Democratic Gov. Gavin Newsom has released a proposed budget which includes a
$240 million increase in ongoing funds to the core education budget, along with
a one-time fund of $153 million dollars for things such as maintenance. She
added the budget includes increased funding for gun violence research, legal
services for undocumented students and increased Cal Grant awards for students
who are parents.
Robert May, chair of the UC Academic Senate, said
negotiations over the UC’s contract with Elsevier, which owns more than 2,500
journals including Cell and The Lancet, have not been settled. The contract
ended Dec. 31, and the UC has been negotiating a new contract with Elsevier for
the past few months. The UC aims to lower subscription costs and make all of
its research available for free to the public. The Academic Senate is committed
to its open-access policy, May added. [Note that the recording of May's remarks
were cut off before completion.]
Compliance and Audit Committee:
Suzanne Taylor, the UCOP interim systemwide Title
IX coordinator, gave a six-month update on UCOP’s implementation of
recommendations from the California state audit of sexual harassment cases.
Taylor said the audit recommendation focused on key areas such as ensuring
timeliness of investigations and discipline, making sure that policies align
with law and promoting consistency in training Title IX. Taylor added the UC
president accepted all audit recommendations.
Taylor said the audit remediation plan does not
address sexual harassment prevention. Taylor added changes to data collection
methods based on the auditors’ recommendations will increase transparency about
the Title IX system.
Taylor said auditors found that reports filed
against faculty and staff during this audit increased compared to earlier
audits and attributed it to positive measures at the UC such as increased
outreach to students. She added Title IX informs complainants of their rights
to go to law enforcement, and the Title IX office has confidential advocates
that support complainants in their decisions.
[Note: The official recording is cut off before
the session was completed.]
===
The Bruin didn’t cover one session. Here is a
summary from yours truly:
Public Engagement and Development:
The meeting of the Public Engagement and
Development Committee included presentations on various aspects of UC-Davis
activities including assistance provided during the recent wildfires and
cooperation with local governments. There was also review of UC environmental
efforts, trends in donations, and lobbying at the state level (including
cooperation in such efforts with students).
You can hear audio of these sessions at the links
below:
Full Board:
Or direct to:
Full Board:
Compliance and Audit:
Public Engagement and Development:
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)