I am a hornet, and proud of it. However, with California in financial hell, Professor William Tierney of USC has suggested in a recent article that California sell off its California State University and University of California systems to a private organization, specifically the University of Phoenix. It's definitely a good idea.
The CSUs have had to bear much of the pain inflicted by California's budget shortfall, with students paying over 30% more in fees this year, with fees almost certain to rise next year. Instructors are also required to take a 10% pay cut, resulting in students paying more and receiving less.
The state is in a bind, and as Professor Tierney suggests, selling off the CSUs would have a positive fiscal impact on the state, as the state would no longer be responsible for running 23 campuses and helping to fund 400,000 students' educations. For the CSU, it would mean that instead of relying on the unreliable state every year, the CSU system would find its backing from The Apollo Group, the parent company of the University of Phoenix, which has billions in private funding and is not susceptible to the public to determine its spending.
This would almost surely result in stabilized education fees and instructor salaries. For teachers, they would no longer have to waste their days furloughing away. And for students, there would be no random campus email letting you know you have two weeks to pay a new $300 fine before you're dropped from all your classes.
The UoP could also lower operating costs throughout the CSU system, because as a for-profit, they wouldn't want any money wasted. It would be very possible that under the UoP, Chancellor Reed wouldn't need to exist. Campus presidents probably wouldn't be making $400,000. Excessive workers and staff would be fired to keep costs down. UoP could turn the CSU system into something the state could never achieve: an efficient organization. All of this would help with fee stabilization and longterm financial issues.
The quality and variety of the education at the CSU could increase as well, given the UoP's experience with online coursework.
In fact, currently the UoP is in the process of trying to create a nationwide online public high school, called Insight Schools. Insight Schools already has a school in eight states, with two in California. Each one of these schools uses public education money to give out laptops to students for a year, and the majority of the high school is done online (students usually meet once a week in person). However, it's publically funded and it's a public school, but because there aren't as many costs for a physical campus, the extra funds can go to hire part-time teachers to teach classes that most high schools can't offer, such as Mandarin Chinese or Video Game Development. It's able to fill out these classes by pulling from students across the entire state.
It's not too hard to see how the vision for something like Insight Schools could be applied to the CSU system to make education more diverse and give it a higher quality. The CSU system, when owned by UoP, could be given access to a network of online classes that could be taught throughout the whole system.
This would greatly benefit students! If there was a class a student needed for their major, but couldn't take it at the time offered because of other commitments or other required classes, an online version could be offered. If there's not enough students at Sac State interested, that would be ok. A Sac State professor could teach the online class to not just Sac State students, but students from Cal Poly, Sonoma State, and CSU Long Beach at the same time.
Cancelled classes could be a thing of the past, and more odd and obscure topics could be covered without fear of budgetary concerns forcing departments to drop popular, but unnecessary classes. Students would no longer have to worry about classes not being available or watch the schedule of available classes grow smaller and smaller. Graduation times could be decreased, overall educational efficiency would increase. A stark contrast to how the CSU system is currently being run.
As for campus life, there is nothing to suggest that if the UoP were to buy CSU, that the CSU system would automatically turn into a 23-branch version of the current UoP system. It's very possible that campus life could remain almost unaffected by the transfer, or even become better as the UoP would almost certainly not turn anyone down, and enrollment would continue to increase. It would still be the same CSU system, but simply in different hands.
Of course, there are downsides to this possibility. Fees would most likely raise. There probably wouldn't be too much oversight. Some programs and departments would surely get a short stick and not get too much support. UoP is a business, and elements of the school that bleed money would most likely be cut, even if they were popular, especially if they weren't.
But aren't CSU students already dealing with higher fees? Aren't they already dealing with a lack of transparency? Aren't programs and classes already getting cut? Is the devil they know really any better than the devil they don't?
Truthfully, a deal like this would almost certainly never happen in the real world. These speculations are as relevant as a fantasy football team.
Despite that, however, it's good to bring up creative alternatives to the current system. Continuing to tax the people and business of California more and more to fund this mess of an educational system is an unsustainable model. Why do you think we're in this wreck in the first place?
Professor William Tierney has received a bunch of criticism for his idea, and much of that criticism is valid. But it has got the people talking, and they're talking about something that's different from the status quo. That's a great start to solving the problem that is the CSU system.
A much better start than a vague reference to a march on the capital this coming spring, which is the best our current campus leadership can come up with.
Aren't the students of the system sick of how messed up it is? After being continually screwed over by the stooges in Sacramento who only care about getting reelected, it only seems like a matter of time before students demand a change.
Students, I know we're all proud hornets.
But would being a phoenix really be all that bad?
would this make the CSU a private school system? What would happen to all of the subsidizing the government does for the CSU system fees? From what I understand, our education is actually comparable in actual cost to that of Stanford or other private institutions. I don't know this for a fact, but it is what I have heard, and that the state subsidizes a large portion of this cost, making it relatively affordable for the average student. I'm not sure that this would be a best solution. It seems like a quick fix with long term consequences.
ReplyDeleteThe writer makes a detailed case (and a loooong one) that makes many good points.
ReplyDeleteBut in places, the writer needs to give some evidence why he believes things would go as he suggests.
One example:
"As for campus life, there is nothing to suggest that if the UoP were to buy CSU, that the CSU system would automatically turn into a 23-branch version of the current UoP system. It's very possible that campus life could remain almost unaffected by the transfer, or even become better as the UoP would almost certainly not turn anyone down, and enrollment would continue to increase. It would still be the same CSU system, but simply in different hands."
Well, all of those pesky (and expensive) intercollegiate sports, clubs, organizations, social clubs, etc. might not be part of a Phoenix vision. Hard to have a competitive rowing team that only uses a laptop.
There probably is an argument that a new company (University of Phoenix in this case) would want to retain certain elements of college life - maybe make the dorms profitable instead of operating them at a loss.
But those arguments were missing.
Perhaps in a redraft (which would be shorter...).
A good argument, however some concerns arise if the CSU systems was sold. One concern is financial aid. Many students need financial aid to afford college and many scholarships could get cut if the CSU system were privately owned.
ReplyDeleteAlso, you talk about how professors could teach more students if classes were online. Much of a professor's time for each class is spent grading papers which would not be alleviated by teaching a class online.
Online classes also hinder professor-student relations. No matter how much people wish that online lecturing can be just as good as in-class lecturing, is just is not the same.