Napolitano to take helm of UC at a critical time

U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano will be assuming the presidency of the University of California’s system as it emerges from several tough financial years and is under increased pressure from elected leaders to increase graduation rates and make greater use of technology.

“We’re coming out of a recession so there’s an opportunity to be strategic,” said Timothy P. White, who was the president of UC Riverside before being named chancellor of the California State University system last year. “It’s an absolutely fascinating and important time in higher education.”

After years of raising tuitions in the face of increasingly heated student protests, including one in which UC Davis students and alumni were pepper sprayed, regents will keep undergraduate tuition the same for the second year in a row and are expected to approve hikes affecting only about 800 graduate students.

UC has an annual budget of $24 billion, 230,000 students, 191,000 faculty and staff members, five medical centers and three national laboratories.

The system is under pressure from Gov. Jerry Brown to increase graduation rates. He proposed, and then backed off of, tying future funding to improving graduation rates. About 60% of UC students who enter as freshmen graduate within four years and about 83% of them graduate within six, according to a UC report.

Napolitano, who will begin her term in September if her nomination is approved as expected next week, will also have to help steer the system through a potentially complicated technological transition. Brown has proposed increasing the number of online classes -- something the public supports, according to polling, although many academics have been resistant.

“Technology is going to be one of her biggest challenges,” White said.

She will also have to deal with several powerful unions who have had a testy relationship with her predecessor, Mark Yudof, who is stepping down in August.

Kathryn Lybarger, president of the UC system’s largest union, the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees, Local 3299, said Yudof’s legacy includes increased student tuition, “unrivaled” executive expenditures and decreased taxpayer trust.

Some of the union’s members participated in a two-day strike at UC hospitals earlier this year.

“It is our hope that Secretary Napolitano will ... restore the spirit of cooperation and respect that’s needed,” she said. “If she does, she can be assured that she will find a willing partner in AFSCME 3299.”

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jason.song@latimes.com