Archival Grant

From time to time, we like to take note of donations to the university that do not involve brick-and-mortar construction. Here is one such grant:

UCLA Library has received the largest grant in its 139-year history: $13 million over eight years to digitize and make at-risk cultural heritage materials from the 20th and 21st centuries available online to the public. The grant from Arcadia, a charitable fund of Lisbet Rausing and Peter Baldwin, renews a five-year, $5.5 million commitment that launched UCLA Library’s Modern Endangered Archives Program, known as MEAP, in 2018. At a time when cultural heritage materials are targeted and destroyed around the world, this new grant ensures that UCLA will remain a leading force for preserving global knowledge, said Ginny Steel, Norman and Armena Powell University Librarian.

Through MEAP, the library grants subawards to project teams representing cultural heritage organizations and archives outside of North America and Europe. In its first four years, the program has committed $2.8 million in subawards to 88 projects in 46 countries, supporting work to document and digitize collections that reflect the experiences and cultural expressions of diverse communities. The funded projects preserve all forms of media materials, including audio recordings, political ephemera, studio and vernacular photography, film and video, financial ledgers, newspapers and cultural productions. "We are grateful to Arcadia for continuing to advance the library’s work to digitize and make openly accessible primary source materials that speak to the experiences of individuals around the world who have been largely left out of historical and national narratives," Steel said...

Full news release at https://meap.library.ucla.edu/about/news/ucla-library-to-expand-global-preservation-work-thanks-to-largest-grant-in-its-history/.

To hear the text above, go to the link below:

https://ia601402.us.archive.org/25/items/big-ten/library%20grant.mp3

Watch the Regents Meetings of Sept. 22, 2022

We conclude our coverage of the September Regents meetings with the final session on September 22. That session was the one in which the UCLA/Big Ten matter was discussed behind closed doors. We have already covered what leaked out, the letter from the Pac-12 commissioner to the Regents.* So, what happened at the open meetings? The answer is "not much." 

Public comments included fossil fuel, contracting out, labor relations, student housing guarantees, the Big Ten matter, anti-abortion, and animal research. After some speechmaking, student awards were presented.

There was some anticipation that at the open joint session of Academic and Student Affairs and Finance and Capital Strategies, the Big Ten matter would come up since the initial topic was delegation of authority by the Regents. That topic had developed as a result of the special August meeting of the Regents that had been triggered by the governor's closed session complaints about the UCLA move to the Big Ten in July. But Regent Chair Leib made it clear from the beginning that there would be no discussion in open session about the Big Ten matter and that the issue of delegation of authority was only for discussion and not decision. So, at the session, there was information from the general counsel's office about the ability of the Regents to delegate. 

General Counsel Robinson noted in August there were mixed views expressed about whether changes in delegation policy were needed and, if they were needed, what those changes might be. He noted that the Regents could reverse decisions made pursuant to delegations of authority. But he also noted that there might be "consequences" were such reversals to occur. He was alluding to the Big Ten decision, of course, a deal that had been made pursuant to an authorized delegation. Were it to be reversed, there would likely be litigation consequences. But none of this was said, at least in the open session. In the end, Leib suggested that the topic of delegation was too big and too vague to be discussed and it should be referred to future meetings of the Governance Committee. Members agreed and the discussion ended.

The session continued with approval of reports from the various committees. Then there was a report from the Berkeley chancellor about the strategic plan for that campus. She painted a dark picture of insufficient revenue and deferred maintenance leading to unsafe buildings with seismic risks.

As we always do, we have preserved the recordings of the Regents sessions since the Regents keep them for only one year. The general link address for the September 22 sessions is:

https://archive.org/details/board-9-22-22-first-session

The Board's morning session is at:

https://ia801506.us.archive.org/29/items/board-9-22-22-first-session/Board%209-22-22%20first%20session.mp4

The joint session of Academic and Student Affairs and Finance and Capital Strategies is at:

https://ia601506.us.archive.org/29/items/board-9-22-22-first-session/Joint%20Meeting_%20Academic%20and%20Student%20Affairs%20Committee%20%26%20Finance%20and%20Capital%20Strategies%20Committee.mp4

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*http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/09/the-uclabig-ten-move-what-happened.html.

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You can hear the text above at the link below:

https://ia601402.us.archive.org/25/items/big-ten/regents%20sept%2022.mp3

No News from New Claims

For all the talk of recession, there is no sign of one in our latest weekly look at new California weekly claims for unemployment benefits. We remain at pre-pandemic levels. In a recession, claims should be shooting up. 

As always, the latest new claims data are at https://www.dol.gov/ui/data.pdf.

Watch the Afternoon Regents Meeting of Sept. 21, 2022

We are catching up with the Regents meetings of September 20-22. We have already posted about the meetings of September 20 and the morning of September 21.* 

In the afternoon of September 22nd, there were meetings of Finance and Capital Strategies, Governance, and Academic and Student Affairs. The Finance and Capital Strategies Committee mainly approved various capital projects. The Governance Committee dealt with executive pay matters. 

A summary of the discussions at Academic and Student Affairs appeared in the Daily Cal:

The Academic and Student Affairs Committee discussed various programs relating to transfer students, academic opportunities for freshmen and UC involvement in state-driven efforts against climate change. During the meeting, regents accepted the CCC-UC Transfer Task Force’s final report, which aims to strengthen post-secondary transfer to a UC school specifically from a California Community College... The report includes a series of recommendations addressing increased educational access, better data usage and more robust financial aid.

“The recommendations are certainly not exhaustive of the work that might be done to improve transfer from the CCC to UC, but they do include targeted and realistic actions that both institutions can take to better facilitate and support students,” said Michael Brown, provost and executive vice president for UC academic affairs. “There’s never been a greater opportunity for California to be a national model for inclusive success of transfer students.”

The committee also discussed transfer and freshmen pilot programs, such as the UC Dual Admission pilot program, which allows freshmen who have not completed their UC admissions requirements to apply simultaneously to CCC with conditional admission to a UC campus. The LIFTED program, a collaboration with prisons and community colleges to offer a bachelor’s degree to students transferring from state prisons to UC campuses as juniors, was also highlighted.

The committee eventually pivoted to discuss the $100 million climate action research state grant program led by Theresa Maldonado, UC vice president for research and innovation.

“When you look at all of (the UC campuses) collectively, the expertise is rich. From science and engineering, economics, policy, education and so on,” Maldonado said at the meeting. “We also collectively have unique facilities and test beds that we could leverage … to look at solutions to address climate change.”

Full story at https://www.dailycal.org/2022/09/21/uc-regents-approve-229m-for-evans-hall-replacement-bechtel-center.

As always, we preserve the recordings of the Regents meetings indefinitely since the Regents - for no apparent reason - delete them after one year. You can find links to the recordings below.

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*http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/09/watch-regents-meeting-of-sept-20-2022.html and http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/09/watch-morning-early-afternoon-meetings.html.

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You can find the afternoon meetings of September 21 at the links below:

https://archive.org/details/academic-and-student-affairs-committee-9-21-22-pm

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Academic and Student Affairs:

https://ia801409.us.archive.org/1/items/academic-and-student-affairs-committee-9-21-22-pm/Academic%20and%20Student%20Affairs%20Committee%209-21-22%20PM.mp4

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Finance and Capital Strategies:

https://ia801409.us.archive.org/1/items/academic-and-student-affairs-committee-9-21-22-pm/National%20Laboratories%20Committee%2C%20Finance%20and%20Capital%20Strategies%20Committee.mp4 (starts at around minute 19)

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Governance:

https://ia601409.us.archive.org/1/items/academic-and-student-affairs-committee-9-21-22-pm/Governance%20Committee%209-21-22.mp4

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To hear the text above, go to the link below:

https://ia601402.us.archive.org/25/items/big-ten/regents%20sept%2021%20pm.mp3 

What Happened? - Part 2

We posted earlier about an evacuation of the Molecular Sciences Building and noted that after an "all clear" notice went out, no explanation of what had happened was provided.* It would have been nice if the university had provided such an explanation, but instead it is now available from outside news sources:

From MyNewsLA and City News Service: An “environmental hazard” that prompted the evacuation of University of California, Los Angeles’s Molecular Sciences Building was caused by a student who accidentally created a by-product that exploded, police said Sept. 30. Campus police and fire department units responded to the building just after noon Sept. 29 on reports of the initially unspecified hazard and evacuated the building out of an abundance of caution, according to a UCLA campus alert. Staff and students were advised by the university to avoid the building, but the rest of the campus remained open.

The Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) reported Sept. 30 that the hazard was caused by a student at the university who “inadvertently created a by-product that destabilized and became energetic, resulting in a small detonation.” LAPD bomb squad and hazmat units assessed the remaining material and disposed of it on the scene, police said. No injuries were reported in the detonation and no property was damaged, according to the LAPD.

Source: https://mynewsla.com/crime/2022/09/30/evacuation-of-ucla-science-building-caused-by-accidental-explosion-police-say/.

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*http://uclafacultyassociation.blogspot.com/2022/09/what-happened.html

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To hear the text above, click on the link below:

https://ia601402.us.archive.org/25/items/big-ten/explosion.mp3

The Alternative Route to Reading This Blog

As we do at the end of each quarter, we provide an alternative route to reading this blog. The blog for the third quarter of 2022 can be read in "book" format at:

https://issuu.com/danieljbmitchell/docs/ucla_faculty_association_blog_3rd_quarter_2022 (read only)

or

https://archive.org/details/ucla-faculty-association-blog-3rd-quarter-2022 (read or download) 

In the alternative format, all video, audio, and animated gif content is omitted.

New Worker Safety Requirements on UC Campuses

A new state law signed by Governor Newsom adds worker safety requirements for live events held on UC campuses and facilities. The law covers any "public events venue" defined as “a state-operated fairground, county fairground, state park, California State University, University of California, or auxiliary organization-run facility that hosts live events.

From Deadline: California Gov. Gavin Newsom has signed a bill that will set workplace safety training and certification standards for companies that produce live events at publicly owned and operated venues. The signing was praised by the California IATSE Council, many of whose members work behind-the-scenes on live events.

The legislation, AB 1775, requires contracting entities to require entertainment event vendors at publicly owned and operated venues “to certify for its employees, and employees of its subcontractors, that those individuals have complied with specified training, certification, and workforce requirements, including that employees involved in the setting up, operation, or tearing down of a live event at its public events venue have completed prescribed trainings of the United States Department of Labor’s Occupational Safety and Health Administration.” The new law also requires Cal/OSHA, the state’s Division of Occupational Safety and Health, to enforce its provisions and to issue citations for violations...

Full story at https://deadline.com/2022/09/gavin-newsom-landmark-workplace-safety-bill-publicly-owned-live-venues-california-1235132000/.

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The bill is at https://leginfo.legislature.ca.gov/faces/billNavClient.xhtml?bill_id=202120220AB1775.

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To hear the text above, go to the link below:

https://ia601402.us.archive.org/25/items/big-ten/safety.mp3