The UC Board of Regents met today in San Diego to address issues that arose from the $1 billion budget gap faced by the UC. The meeting, which began on Tuesday, will conclude today at UC San Diego. UC President Mark Yudof told regents that several cuts to the UC are expected.
Half of the shortfall in the budget can be attributed to projected reduced state funding, salaries, higher energy costs and pensions.
Discussion included cost-saving measure, including fewer offered courses at UC, more layoffs and cuts to financial aid. Yudof said the university plans to enroll more out-of-state students who pay higher tuition, reducing admission for in-state students. This would be a significant break from the state’s Master Plan for Higher Education.
“The moment is fast approaching when the university will no longer be able to guarantee admission to all California applicants who meet the eligibility criteria,” Yudof said to the board, as reported by the San Francisco Chronicle.
About 20,000 to 30,000 qualified students would be turned away under the new “holistic review” policy that was endorsed on Wednesday by the UC Regents’ committee on educational policy. Admissions at UC Los Angeles, UC Berkeley and other top-tier colleges and universities currently practice this holistic review, in which a reviewer examines a range of academic and nonacademic achievements and then assigns a score to each applicant. This move from the current point-based formula would require extensive training for application readers, and it would reportedly be more costly than the system already in place.
“I have no doubt that this expansion of holistic review puts in place an admissions method that fully comprehends the complex challenges many of our applicants face and evaluates these students equitably,” Yudof said, as reported by the UC Office of the President UC Newsroom.
Yudof will make specific budgetary recommendations in March.
