The University of California (UC) consists of nine campuses servicing over 200,000 students. In addition the California State University (CSU) maintains 23 campuses and currently enrols some 410,000 students. The University of California’s missions are designated to be teaching, research and public service, while the primary function of California State University is the provision of undergraduate instruction, applied research and community service. The legislation proclaiming the two systems also stipulates that UC is to provide space for the top 12.5 percent of graduating high school seniors wishing to attend while CSU provides space for the top one-third of graduating high school seniors wishing to attend.

    The third segment of the Californian higher education system consists of the 109 two-year California Community Colleges (overseen by the Colleges' Chancellor) which service some 2.9 million students. They are somewhat similar to Australia's TAFEs; they offer academic and vocational education at the lower division level for both recent high school graduates and those returning to school. They are required to admit any California resident with a high school diploma or the equivalent. On completing the two year course students wishing to attend either UC or CSU who are judged to be of sufficient standard will be accepted to complete a bachelor's degree.

It is noteworthy that of the 9 University of California campuses 7 are ranked in the world's top fifty research universities (Berkeley, 4; San Francisco, 13; San Diego, 14; UCLA, 15; Santa Barbara, 26; Davis, 36, and Irvine, 44) as determined in the Shanghai Jiao Tong University evaluation of the world's top 500 research universities. That alone ought to give pause to those in Australia's government, academe and media who claim that the US lead in university research is based on those private universities sporting large endowments. ANU (49) is Australia's highest placed university with The University of Melbourne coming second (92).

Over the past several years the state of California has experienced sizable budget deficits and as a result public funding for the higher education system has suffered. The University of California has had a net reduction of 16% in state support over the past four years and as a result there was alarm that the quality of UC would suffer a marked decline. The President of the University, Robert Dynes, together with the Chancellor of CSU, Charles Reed, undertook a series of discussions with the newly installed Governor of the state, Arnold Schwarzenegger, to determine ways to reverse the deterioration of California's university system. The result has been the Higher Education Compact an "agreement between Governor Schwarzenegger, the University of California, and the California State University, 2005-06 through 2010-11." Under the terms of the "Compact" the state of California will provide a 3% General Fund increase to the prior year's base for 2005-06 and 2006-07. For the following four years the increment will be raised to 4%. The provision for basic funding is to provide for "basic budget needs including salary increases, health benefits, maintenance, inflation, and other cost increases." In return the universities agree to "continue to seek additional private resources and maximize other fund sources available to the [universities] to support basic programs."

    For the final three years of the "Compact" the state will provide an additional 1% incremented increase for "other instruction and research support for core areas of the budget critical to maintaining the quality of the academic program—including instructional equipment, instructional technology and libraries—and for ongoing building maintenance." The state also undertakes to "provide funding for debt service to support general obligation bonds of US$345 million per segment [UC and CSU] per year from Proposition 55 to be used to finance high priority capital outlay projects that address seismic and other life-safety needs, enrollment growth, modernization of out-of-date facilities that no longer serve the academic programs they support, and renewal or expansion of infrastructure and other facility systems that cannot accommodate ongoing needs. The [state] Administration will support additional General Obligation bond measures to provide funding of similar magnitude in future years of this agreement."

While there are additional possibilities for funding, should the state deem it appropriate and budgetary constraints permit, the state is not obligated by the "Compact" to do so. In return for the increased public resources to be provided, UC and CSU will increase student fees. Interestingly, fees declined for the seven years from 1995-96 through 2001-02 by 10% for undergraduates and 5% for graduate students. However, the following two years, with the state's budget in marked deficit, fees once again increased. Over the period of the "Compact" fees will show a sizeable continued increase with the understanding that there will be no concomitant decrease in state support for the universities. Undergraduate fees will increase by up to 10 percent per year on average over the first three years of the "Compact". No commitment as to fees is stipulated beyond that. Fees for graduate students (UC) will rise more sharply; they will average between 20-25% for 2004-05 and be no less than 10% in "both 2005-06 and 2006-07". In the years following the universities will adjust fees for graduate students as is deemed appropriate.

Under the terms of the "Compact" universities have agreed to continue to increase as necessary available places to meet the enrollment obligations of 12.5% and 33% for UC and CSU respectively for those graduating high school seniors to enrol as well as providing places for eligible students from the Community Colleges who wish to continue higher education beyond the second year.

Finally the universities have undertaken to meet the stipulation by the state to be provided with a number of statistics to allow it to determine how well the universities are meeting their obligations.

Whether or not the terms of the "Compact" will be met and whether or not that will reinvigorate California's university system remains to be seen. And the terms of the "Compact" reached between the universities and Governor Schwarzenegger must be ratified by the State Legislature.  However, what should be apparent is the marked difference of how the governor of California regards the university sector of his state compared with the approach  of Australia's Coalition Government to the nation's higher education sector, and especially so considering the difficult budgetary situation of California in contrast to the surplus budgets Australia has accrued over the past years. And in answer to the argument that a nation has obligations and demands not required of a US state it should be remembered that the citizens of US states pay federal taxes as well as the taxes (income and otherwise) demanded of them by their state of residence.

Alex Reisner

The Funneled Web