THE UNIVERSITY OF TEXAS will pursue a contract to manage the Los Alamos National Laboratory, which has been under UC management since its inception some 60 years ago. U.S. Energy Secretary Spencer Abraham decided to put the contract up for bid in the wake of criticism about UC's management. The current lab contract expires in 2005. UC also may try to pursue the new contract.
... UC BERKELEY was stunned last month when the U.S. Department of Education rejected applications from all 30 UC Berkeley graduate students applying for Fulbright doctoral fellowships because of a missed application deadline. An overnight courier service failed to make a scheduled pick-up of the applications, so the deadline was missed. In reviewing the case, the Fulbright board last week asked the U.S. Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs, which co-administers the Fulbright program, to consider a separate review for the Berkeley group. UC would have to find funding for scholarships that might result from the process.
UC SAN DIEGO has announced the second largest philanthropic gift in the university's history -- a $30 million gift from the Ernest Rady and the Rady Family Foundation -- to support the campus's recently established School of Management. Rady founded American Assets, a financial services company. ...
OREGON'S PUBLIC COLLEGES are planning a new round of budget cuts and tuition increases in response to state voters' rejection of a proposed temporary tax increase to finance higher education and other services.
AFTER A LONG PERIOD of decline, interest in politics among students is on the rise, according to UCLA's annual survey of the nation's students entering undergraduate classes. Conducted by the Higher Education Research Institute at UCLA, the survey said that one-third (33.9 percent) of students feel that "keeping up to date with political affairs" is a very worthy goal. Still, political engagement remains far below the level recorded in the late 1960s, when 60.3 percent of the 1966 freshmen valued keeping up with politics
… ACTOR MICHAEL DOUGLAS has contributed $1 million toward the construction of a Center for Film, Television and New Media at UC Santa Barbara. A longtime resident of Santa Barbara and graduate of UCSB, Douglas earned a bachelor's degree in dramatic art from the campus in 1968.
... SOME 21 AMERICAN UNIVERSITIES are engaged in campaigns to raise at least $1 billion each. During a recent one-month period, they collected a total of $604.1 million in gifts and pledges. The campaign with the largest gain in the last month was Duke University's, with $113-million. With a total of $2.36 billion, Duke is just completing its campaign, exceeding its goal of $2 billion
… THE CALIFORNIA PUBLIC INTEREST GROUP's recent report on textbook prices found that UC students are paying about 40 percent more for textbooks than they did seven years ago. Students surveyed said they expect to pay about $900 for textbooks this year. At UC Davis, the annual undergraduate expense for texts plus supplies is estimated at $1,214. One reason for rising textbook costs, the CALPIRG report says, is the growing practice of bundling additional instructional materials -- such as CD-ROMs and workbooks -- with texts, adding cost but not necessarily value to the purchase, since most faculty (65 percent) say they never use these extra materials. Authors and publishers are experimenting more with online textbooks, a new industry trend, CALPIRG reports. ...
A TEXAS TECH UNIVERSITY SCIENTIST who made national headlines when he was convicted in December of improperly transporting plague samples and defrauding the university out of research grants has agreed to resign his professorship in the coming weeks. The researcher, Thomas C. Butler, will also pay the university $250,000, his lawyers said.
THE NUMBER OF STUDENTS graduating from U.S. high schools will continue to rise steadily over the coming years, reaching a peak of 3.2 million in 2008-09, according to a report by the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education and the College Board. The report estimates there will be 73 percent more Hispanic students graduating from public high schools in 2014 than in 2002. During the same period, there will be 11 percent fewer white graduates and 6 percent more black graduates.
...THE NATIONAL CENTER for Public Policy and Higher Education estimates that at least 250,000 prospective students are being shut out of college because of rising tuition and cutbacks in admissions and course offerings.
-- By Clifton B. Parker