Strain Is Building in the Engine Driving California’s Prosperity--Its University System

As we drive our state’s infamous freeways, in every direction we can clearly see the evidence of growth. Orange and lemon groves have become housing subdivisions. Deserts have been turned into trendy shopping malls. There’s drive-up window service for everything from breakfast to banking on land that held only shrubs and bushes just months before. The entire state is fairly bursting at the seams with people from all over the world flocking here for a share in the golden dream.

California’s higher-education system is not immune to the effects of this phenomenal growth. However, in spite of indisputable evidence of the rise in the demand for a college education, there are those who are suggesting that new campuses are not required to adequately educate these future students, and that higher-education leaders are merely trying to seize an opportunity to expand their own territory. Nothing could be further from the truth.

Unlike other areas of the country, California is not seeing a drop in college enrollment, primarily because of increasing numbers of eligible high-school students wanting a college education and high in-migration from other states and nations.

California State University currently serves more than 355,000 students on 19 campuses. By the year 2000 our enrollment is expected to increase by 100,000 students. To try to accommodate this enrollment boom, the state university system is planning a 20th campus in northern San Diego County and is expanding facilities in Ventura and Contra Costa counties. These projections of increased enrollment are not limited to Cal State. The University of California, anticipating a jump of 63,000, has projected a need for three new campuses. The community colleges expect to enroll about 200,000 students over the next 16 years.

The California Postsecondary Education Commission requires extensive justification for any new campus. Twenty factors must be thoroughly analyzed, including capacity on existing campuses and in other parts of the system, expansion of existing facilities and current and projected demographics.

Educators always start with the premise that growth can be accommodated at existing facilities, and they conclude that a new campus is necessary only when the data point to no other viable option. Neither Cal State nor UC has built a campus since 1965.

Over the past three years, for example, California State University enrollment has increased by 30,000 students, and every means possible has been utilized to serve them. The system operates seven off-campus centers or satellite campuses to meet demand in areas where another campus would not be warranted. The most overcrowded campuses may close enrollment to freshmen and sophomores, thus encouraging them to use their excellent community colleges. In rural areas extensive use is made of satellite communication to televise classes to students in sparsely populated and less accessible areas. Educators are acutely aware of their public trust, and will not betray it to build unnecessary university campuses.

This state’s citizens realized long ago that their economic prosperity and social well-being depended on an educated citizenry. California’s major industries--like high technology, banking, agriculture and aerospace--all rely on a highly skilled, literate work force. And it’s the state’s higher-education system that helps fuel this gigantic enterprise. If Californians are to continue to be served by an outstanding higher-education system, they must acknowledge the devastating effect of the Gann limit. Passed by the voters in 1979, it puts a cap on state spending and severely restricts our ability to provide the structures and equipment necessary to educate students for tomorrow.

Education is an investment, and when it grows everybody profits. Our local communities, the nation and the world benefit from scientific research conducted by university professors. California State University alone educates 70% of the state’s teachers, more than 50% of the engineers, about 65% of the graduates in agriculture and 40% of those in fine and applied arts; we are the leading source of new employees for California businesses.

Growth is a California fact of life, and the university system is a vital part of that life. As the state’s educational leaders, we would be irresponsible to bury our heads in the sand and hope that these students will go away. They will not, nor do we want them to. We want the support of the people of this state so that they can in the future as in the past be the beneficiaries of the world’s most successful system of higher education.