Dissent at Berkeley

BY MICHAEL MERANZE The following post by UCLA history professor Michael Meranze  is reposted by permission from the Remaking the University blog that he runs along with UC Santa Barbara professor Christopher Newfield.   I have offered my own view of the Milo controversy at Berkeley in “On Milo’s Right to Speak.” The turmoil surrounding Milo…

The Morass of Big-Time College Football

BY HANK REICHMAN Remember that widely circulated map illustrating how in 39 of 50 states the highest-paid state employee is a public university football or basketball coach?  If you don’t, here it is: According to USA Today‘s annual survey, in 2015-16 some 72 college football coaches were paid over a million dollars annually, not including…

Reich: "Public Higher Education is Dying in the U.S."

BY HANK REICHMAN Public higher education is “dying” in the US, with the pricing out of students from poorer backgrounds amounting to a “national tragedy in the making.”  So warned Robert Reich, chancellor’s professor of public policy at the University of California at Berkeley and secretary of labor in the Bill Clinton administration, in a…

Next Berkeley Chancellor Must Rebuild Trust

POSTED BY HANK REICHMAN “We need a chancellor who will not be engaged in the doublespeak of proclaiming UC Berkeley’s preeminence as a public university while simultaneously insisting on marketizing every aspect of its existence. We need a chancellor who does not believe that the negative impact on educational access and the quality of our…

Berkeley Chancellor Responds to BFA Letter

BY HANK REICHMAN Yesterday I posted to this blog the text of a letter from UC Berkeley professors Michael Burawoy and Celeste Langan, co-chairs of the UC Berkeley Faculty Association (BFA), a partner organization of the AAUP, calling for a new probe of alleged abuses in the university’s intercollegiate football program.  The request came after…