Report Hits University Expansion : Education: Commission strongly criticizes campus construction plans of UC and Cal State systems, saying they are based on overly optimistic enrollment projections.

A new study strongly criticizes $2-billion worth of expansion proposals from California’s two university systems, saying that only two of as many as nine new campuses being sought seem necessary. The report, however, does support possible construction of as many as 22 additional two-year community colleges.

Prepared by staff members of the California Postsecondary Education Commission (CPEC), the report asserts that University of California and the California State University growth plans are based on unreasonably high enrollment projections for minority and graduate students.

It says that the UC system should build only one additional campus, not as many as the three proposed, and that the Cal State system should proceed with its new San Marcos campus but halt plans for five others.

Much of the pressure on UC’s undergraduate growth can be handled by more than tripling the size of UC Riverside and by encouraging more students to attend independent institutions with larger state-financed scholarships, CPEC staff members suggested.

In addition, they described as “worthy” but unrealistic UC’s desire to sharply increase the number of graduate students so that all nine of its current campuses become “world-renowned research institutions.”

The Cal State system is criticized in the report for assuming that Latinos and blacks will vastly improve their now low college attendance rate over the next 15 years to match that of Anglos.

“This expectation is obviously a laudable policy goal . . . yet it may not be reasonable for capital outlay planning,” the CPEC study says. The Cal State system projects that within 15 years it will have 466,000 students, about 190,000 more than now but 105,400 more than CPEC estimates.

If the educational achievements of Latinos and blacks do improve dramatically, the trend will first be noticed in junior high and high schools, allowing time to plan new Cal State schools, CPEC analyst Kirk Knutsen said at an advance press briefing Friday.

“Why make irreversible decisions now when you don’t have to?” he asked. Meanwhile, Knutsen added, expanding the existing Cal State campuses and building one at San Marcos will suffice.

On the other hand, adding as many as 22 community colleges to the existing 107 two-year schools appears reasonable to accommodate an expected increase in students from 1.33 million to 1.8 million, according to the CPEC staff. Such construction would cost about $2.3 billion, and much study is needed on site selection and financing, the report says.

The 48-page document, entitled “Higher Education at the Crossroads: Planning for the 21st Century,” was written in the shadow of tough financial realities. It presumes that the state faces enormous problems paying for anything more than modest expansions in higher education, even if voters approve the proposed constitutional amendment to adjust the so-called Gann spending limit.

The draft report will be formally presented tomorrow to the commission, which advises the Legislature on higher education matters. The commission is expected to vote on a final version next month. CPEC staffers said they do not expect much change over the month, even though officials from both UC and Cal State disagree with parts of the report.

John Smart, Cal State’s vice chancellor for university affairs, said he was “rather perplexed” by the study’s seeming pessimism on projected increases in Latino and black enrollment.

“We disagree that we are being over-optimistic. We think it’s a goal that is quite attainable,” Smart said in a telephone interview, adding that he thought that CPEC was using outdated statistics.

Cal State San Marcos is now under construction in northern San Diego County and is expected to be finished in about two years. It will be the 20th campus in the Cal State system.

The CPEC report urges Cal State administrators to cease buying other properties after they acquire land in Ventura County for a satellite education center. However, Smart said it would be economically foolish to postpone buying other land.

UC is not challenging the report’s contention that only one more UC campus is needed, acknowledging that the system’s leaders have not committed themselves to the three they claim may be needed to accommodate enrollment growth. UC is now studying possible sites for one additional campus.

However, UC will argue that the report errs in saying that large expansions in graduate programs are unrealistic, UC spokesman Ronald Kolb said in a telephone interview. In addition, UC President David P. Gardner believes that the Riverside campus should grow in 15 years from its current 6,000 students to about 12,000, not to the 20,000 recommended by the CPEC report.

“Growth of that magnitude in that short a period of time would negatively impact on program quality and quality of life on campus,” Kolb said.

CPEC’s executive director Kenneth B. O’Brien said that his staff’s report focuses on UC Riverside expansion because of political resistance to much campus growth in other UC communities such as Santa Barbara, Santa Cruz and Berkeley.

The report urges that state grants for students at independent colleges be hiked from the current maximum of $5,250 a year to the $6,500 allowable by law now. The CPEC staff thinks that such a change would shift about 6,000 students who might otherwise attend UC for its relatively low cost to such independent schools as USC, the University of Redlands or Loyola Marymount University. Excluding room and board, tuition and fees at, for example, USC total $13,446 this year, compared to about $1,700 at a UC campus.