New Regents

More catching up. Governor Newsom announced new Regents appointments last month:

Elaine E. Batchlor, M.D., 64, of Los Angeles, has been appointed to the University of California Board of Regents. Batchlor has been Chief Executive Officer at MLK Community Healthcare since 2012. She was Chief Medical Officer at L.A. Care Health Plan from 2004 to 2012, and Vice President and Program Officer at the California Health Care Foundation from 1999 to 2003. Batchlor is a member of the National Academy of Medicine and serves on the boards of the California Hospital Association, Insure the Uninsured Project, and the Editorial Board of Health Affairs. Batchlor earned a Doctor of Medicine degree from Case Western Reserve University School of Medicine and a Master of Public Health degree from UCLA’s Fielding School of Public Health. This position requires Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Batchlor is a Democrat.

Carmen Chu, 44, of San Francisco, has been appointed to the University of California Board of Regents. Chu is City Administrator for the City and County of San Francisco. She served as the elected Assessor-Recorder from 2013 to 2021, District 4 Supervisor at the San Francisco Board of Supervisors from 2007 to 2013 and served in the Mayor’s Office of Public Policy and Finance from 2004 to 2007. Chu earned a Master of Public Policy degree from the University of California, Berkeley. This position requires Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Chu is a Democrat.

Ana Matosantos, 46, of Sacramento, has been appointed to the University of California Board of Regents. Matosantos has been Cabinet Secretary in the Office of Governor Gavin Newsom since 2019. She was President of Matosantos Consulting from 2013 to 2018 and joined the Newsom transition team in 2018. Matosantos was Director of the California Department of Finance from 2009 to 2013 and Chief Deputy Director for Budgets from 2008 to 2009. She was Deputy Legislative Secretary for Health and Human Services and Veteran Affairs in the Office of Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger from 2007 to 2008. She served in several positions at the California Health and Human Services Agency, including Assistant Secretary for Programs and Fiscal Affairs and Associate Secretary for Legislative Affairs from 2004 to 2007. Matosantos was Human Services Consultant at the Senate Committee on Budget and Fiscal Review from 2002 to 2004. She was a Consultant at the Senate Committee on Health and Human Services from 2000 to 2002. She was a California Senate Fellow from 1999 to 2000. This position requires Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Matosantos is a Democrat.*

Mark Robinson, 57, of Kentfield, has been appointed to the University of California Board of Regents. Robinson has been a Partner at Centerview Partners since 2009. Previously, he worked at Merrill Lynch & Co. from 1998 to 2009. Robinson is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, the Board of the College of Letters and Sciences at the University of California, Berkeley, the Board of Trustees of the UC Berkeley Foundation and the Board of the Thacher School.** He earned a Master of Business Administration degree from Harvard University. This position requires Senate confirmation and there is no compensation. Robinson is registered without party preference.

Full news release at https://www.gov.ca.gov/2022/07/22/governor-newsom-announces-higher-education-appointments-7-22-22/.

===

*Note: We will have two former state budget directors on the Board of Regents since Regent Cohen is also a former budget director.

**Some readers may recall that the Thacher School had a major sexual abuse scandal: 

https://www.thacher.org/explore/special-committee-report. Just when the School was recovering from that scandal, a new one came to light:

https://nypost.com/2022/03/29/elite-thacher-school-is-hit-again-with-sexual-abuse-allegations/.

Student Pandemic Erosion

Just catching up with some material from last month and noted the item below about student erosion - the degree to which first-year students don't enroll for the next year. As you might expect, this phenomenon was increased by the pandemic with its online courses, quarantining, etc. From EdSource:

Fewer first-year and transfer students returned to the University of California this past fall after enrolling the previous year, a trend that system President Michael Drake said he is watching “very carefully” but predicted will rebound. Across the university’s nine undergraduate campuses, 92% of undergraduates who enrolled as freshmen in fall 2020 returned to their UC campus in fall 2021, down from 93% the previous year. The percentages measure what are called retention rates.

The drops were steeper for first-generation students, students who receive Pell Grants and underrepresented students, which includes Black, Latino and Native American students. The retention rates dropped from 92% to 88% for first-generation students, from 91% to 88% for underrepresented students and from 93% to 89% for Pell recipients. Pell Grants are federal financial aid awards available to low-income students...

Click on image to enlarge and enhance.

Full story at https://edsource.org/2022/uc-tracking-drop-in-students-returning-after-covid-start-especially-for-low-income-and-first-generation-students/675779.

Briefs on Harvard/U of North Carolina cases

Inside Higher Ed carries a report that various universities have filed friend-of-the-court briefs with regard to the US Supreme Court case dealing with admissions at Harvard and the U of North Carolina. Included is this information:

...The president of the University of California system and chancellors of UC’s 10 campuses said their system was an example of what the court should avoid.

“For the past 25 years, UC has served as just such a laborator[y] for experimentation,” the brief said. “After Proposition 209 [which banned affirmative action] barred consideration of race in admissions decisions at public universities in California, freshmen enrollees from underrepresented minority groups dropped precipitously at UC, and dropped by 50 percent or more at UC’s most selective campuses. Since then, UC has implemented numerous and wide-ranging race-neutral measures designed to increase diversity of all sorts, including racial diversity … Those programs have enabled UC to make significant gains in its system-wide diversity. Yet despite its extensive efforts, UC struggles to enroll a student body that is sufficiently racially diverse to attain the educational benefits of diversity. The short-fall is especially apparent at UC’s most selective campuses, where African American, Native American, and Latinx students are underrepresented and widely report struggling with feelings of racial isolation.” ...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/admissions/article/2022/08/02/groups-file-briefs-supreme-court-defend-affirmative-action.

Overheated Graduation at Davis - Part 3

Blog readers may remember that heat problems overwhelmed UC-Davis' graduation ceremonies.* Indoor alternatives have been announced:

From the Sacramento Bee: 

Following [the] botched, shortened commencement ceremonies that saw at least six people taken to hospitals amid extreme heat, the University of California, Davis, has announced three makeup dates to allow students from the class of 2022 to walk. Two of the three dates are about a month away: Aug. 26 and Aug. 27, each at 10 a.m. The third is Dec. 10, at 2 p.m. All three ceremonies will be held indoors at the University Credit Union Center, UC Davis campus officials announced Tuesday. Cap and gown rentals will be provided free of charge...

Full story at https://www.sacbee.com/news/local/education/article263878652.html.

===

*https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/06/overheated-graduation-at-davis-part-2.html and

https://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/06/overheated-graduation-at-davis.html.

===

A modest proposal: Here's a song that could replace Pomp and Circumstance for the graduation:

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

Back to the Future (with COVID) - Part 2

Dutiful blog readers will recall that some of the membership was reluctant to come to the American Sociology Association's in-person convention in LA because of rising COVID cases.*

As it turns out, the case rate, hospitalizations, and deaths in LA County now seems to have plateaued and even begun to drop. (See accompanying chart.) However, an online alternative was offered to participants reluctant to come to the in-person meetings. From Inside Higher Ed:

Thousands of sociologists are expected at the annual meeting of the American Sociological Association, which starts Friday. But the location of the meeting, in Los Angeles, has upset some scholars, because the city is home to the latest variation of coronavirus, a version that is supercontagious.

So Alan Martino, a sociologist at the University of Calgary, has organized a one-day Sociological Research Jamboree** for tomorrow...

Full story at https://www.insidehighered.com/quicktakes/2022/08/01/sociologists-who-don%E2%80%99t-want-go-la.

===

*http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/07/back-to-future-with-covid.html.

===

**https://drive.google.com/file/d/1Q4Fg9VQHl5Xjoc4d9o8Ic0Ay3o_gY35I/view.

===

We also noted in a prior blog post that the American Economic Association is offering a hybrid in-person/remote format for its upcoming meetings in New Orleans:

http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/07/hybrid.html.

It's likely that there will be some permanent use of in-person/online options for other professional groups as a lasting result of the pandemic.

Heaps: Trial by Jury

From KABC: Jury selection is scheduled to begin Monday [August 1] in the trial of an obstetrician-gynecologist formerly employed by UCLA accused of sexually assaulting several of his patients. Dr. James Mason Heaps, 63, of Woodland Hills, was indicted on 21 counts accused of sexually assaulting 7 women and has since pleaded not guilty.

Earlier this year, attorneys for 312 former patients announced $374 million settlement of abuse lawsuits against the university... In total, it's considered the largest payout related to sexual abuse involving public university... At one time, Heaps was reportedly the highest paid physician in the UC system and had treated about 6,000 patients, attorneys said...

Full story at https://abc7.com/james-heaps-trial-jury-selection-ucla-gynecologist-doctor-accused-of-assaulting-patients/12090435/.

The (Endless?) People's Park Saga Continues

From the LA Times: Berkeley’s People’s Park, for half a century a symbol of Bay Area protest and counterculture and for years the home of numerous unhoused people, is one step closer to becoming student dorms and housing for low-income community members after a judge tentatively ruled Friday that construction can commence.

Alameda County Judge Judge Frank Roesch, in a decision that won’t become official until it is issued in writing, probably next week, ruled that UC Berkeley can begin clearing the historic park and starting site work because the university’s plan does not violate the California Environmental Quality Act. 

UC Berkeley and the city of Berkeley proposed redeveloping the park in 2018, calling it a first-in-the-nation plan to build long-term supportive housing for homeless people on university land. The university would also build 1,100 units of badly needed student housing and retain some of the park as open green space, while also erecting a monument to its storied history... 

UC spokesperson Dan Mogulof said university officials are “pleased with the judge’s decision and look forward to the court making it official early next week, just as we look forward to starting construction sometime this summer.” But Harvey Smith, president of the People’s Park Historic District Advisory Group, said Friday that it plans to appeal the decision and ask for a stay preventing the university from launching work until a state appeals court weighs in...

Full story at https://www.latimes.com/california/story/2022-07-29/judge-rules-uc-berkeley-can-clear-peoples-park-site-of-1960s-protests-to-build-housing.