Candidates’ Ideas for Colleges Sketchy at Best

The major candidates for governor in California’s recall election have yet to offer detailed solutions to the state’s higher education crunch, but they love to extol the virtues of college.

“A time to explore choices,” said Peter V. Ueberroth.

“How different my life would have been if I hadn’t gone,” said Arianna Huffington.

“The best social equalizer,” said Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante.

The statistics bear them out: A college degree essentially has become a prerequisite for professional and financial success.

Yet when it comes to California recall politics, the fanciest degrees may not yield the biggest payoff. The person with the most prestigious degrees, Gov. Gray Davis, is the target of the October recall. The leading candidates to replace him took unusual routes through school and years to graduate. And some educators complain that none of the candidates, wherever they were schooled, have come up with even C-plus plans to fix the state’s financially imperiled higher education system.

Whoever becomes governor after the Oct. 7 election will face an immediate dilemma in higher education: Amid a state budget crisis, the number of students attending community colleges and public universities in California is projected to grow by at least 400,000, to 2.7 million, by 2011.

Higher education -- which accounts for $8.68 billion, or 12% of the main state budget -- is an area where the governor and the Legislature have extra latitude in spending. So, “when there’s a budget crisis, it’s very hard to resist putting some cuts in higher education,” said Steve Boilard, director of the higher education unit of the legislative analyst’s office.

For now, however, most of the major candidates are shying away from talk of cutbacks. An exception is Sen. Tom McClintock (R-Thousand Oaks), who would put on indefinite hold the development of the new University of California campus in Merced. Still, neither McClintock nor the other candidates has said much else about what they would do to safeguard higher education.

No candidate has “even put anything resembling a plan or strategy on the table as for how we’re going to address the issue of the future of college opportunity in the state,” said Patrick M. Callan, president of the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education in San Jose.

In some ways, the candidates’ proposals for California’s higher education systems reflect where they got their degrees.

Ueberroth, the czar of the 1984 L.A. Olympics, earned a business degree from San Jose State. It’s part of the Cal State system -- the nation’s largest university system, although it has fewer “star” researchers than the UC campuses.

So where does he hope to save money? By pushing professors, wherever they are employed, to spend more time teaching, and put less emphasis on their own research, he said.

Davis, a Stanford graduate who earned a law degree from Columbia, is known as one of California’s most generous governors in pushing for spending on higher education. Since his 1998 election, such spending is up 17.2%, according to the legislative analyst’s office.

When forced to choose among the three state systems, however, he has repeatedly favored the University of California, the state’s elite system, over Cal State and community colleges.

During his first term, Davis added teaching training centers at UC campuses, although Cal State is the main teacher education system in the state.

And when the state financial crisis struck last year, Davis aimed his biggest fee increases and spending cuts at the state’s 108 community colleges. His January budget proposal would have more than doubled community college fees while raising UC and CSU fees by 25%.

Bustamante, on the other hand, has been an advocate for grants to low-income students, those most likely to attend community colleges. His “Tough Love for California” economic plan, unveiled on Aug. 20, calls for repealing the recent fee increases at community colleges.

At a UC Board of Regents meeting in July, a top budget official argued that, even with the fee increases, a UC education was a bargain compared with offerings at other public universities. Bustamante shot back that such comparisons are deceptive, because California students have higher costs of living than students in other states. “Liar, liar, pants on fire,” he jeered.

His populist ideas reflect his own modest education.

He attended Fresno City Community College for two years after high school and spent the mid-1970s at Fresno State. But consumed by politics and family responsibilities, Bustamante dropped out. Three years ago, with his old credits in danger of expiring, he re-enrolled. Professors allowed him to write papers from Sacramento. He also took courses online.

He graduated from Fresno State in May with an interdisciplinary studies major. “I considered myself very lucky to get where I’d gotten without a college degree,” he said.

So did Arnold Schwarzenegger. By 1979, he was already a famous bodybuilder and an emerging action movie star. But that year, he decided that he needed to round out his resume with a degree.

The tiny University of Wisconsin-Superior admitted him and allowed him to take correspondence courses from California. The school also accepted credits he had accumulated in the early 1970s at Santa Monica College and the UCLA extension program. In less than a year, Schwarzenegger had a degree in international business and international economics.

Schwarzenegger declined to be interviewed for this story, but replied to a Times questionnaire on higher education. His answers were among the least specific. “We need to make room for every student,” he wrote, by pushing for “more efficient use of all our campuses.”

Huffington, a political independent, suggested stopping the Delano prison construction project to save $600 million -- money that could be used to repeal all of the fee increases over the past year at UC, CSU and the community colleges.

The trouble, officials from the legislative analyst’s office said, is that much of the money she would like to save has already been spent.

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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)

The Times posed a set of questions about higher education to Gov. Gray Davis and the six major candidates seeking to replace him. Excerpts of their responses follow. During the course of the campaign, The Times plans to ask the candidates about other major issues facing the state.

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Q. The state budget calls for capping enrollment for the University of California and California State University. Do you support the enrollment caps? If not, how would you propose covering the costs of a larger number of students?

Gov. Gray Davis (D)

I’m against enrollment caps at our higher education institutions. But the UC and CSU had little choice in capping enrollment when Republican members of the Legislature blocked every new revenue source I proposed.

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Peter M. Camejo (Green)

No, I do not support enrollment caps. My overall budget proposal will raise sufficient additional revenue to cover the costs of enrolling a larger number of students.

Arianna Huffington (I)

I do not support enrollment caps. I would cover the cost of enrolling more students by cracking down on offshore tax shelters and imposing a severance tax on oil.

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Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante (D)

I oppose capping enrollment for our state’s public universities. Our economic growth depends on a highly educated workforce. Graduates will go on to be valuable taxpayers, contributing to our economic rebound.

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Peter V. Ueberroth (R)

I do not support enrollment caps because they would destroy the dreams of dedicated, hard-working students and their families. If we require more time with their students from the professors, we can educate more students with existing resources.

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Arnold Schwarzenegger (R)

We need to make room for every student. System-wide enrollment caps are unacceptable. I will push for more efficient use of all our campuses.

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State Sen. Tom McClintock (R)

I will oppose all student fee increases and demand that the fat and waste be eliminated from the bloated bureaucracies so that our children can again receive the finest higher education in the world.

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Q. The UC and CSU systems over the last year have approved fee increases of more than 40%. Community colleges have approved increases of 64%, from $11 to $18 a unit. Do you support repealing any of these increases?

Gov. Gray Davis (D)

Expanding access to college for California’s students, regardless of their financial situation, is one of my top priorities. In my first term, we held the line on fee increases of any kind. When the economy recovers, I may take additional steps to improve access.

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Peter M. Camejo (Green)

Yes, I support repealing all of the cited increases. Again, my overall budget proposal will raise sufficient revenue to cover these costs.

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Arianna Huffington (I)

I strongly support repealing these fee increases. I would cover the cost by canceling the Delano II prison construction project -- saving nearly $600 million.

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Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante (D)

As a UC regent and CSU trustee, I opposed the 40% fee increases. These fee hikes lack vision and are an attack on middle class families. In tough economic times, college should be less expensive, not more expensive.

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Peter V. Ueberroth (R)

Under the present circumstances, with our state’s finances out of balance, the fee increases may be necessary. However, with the positive effects of our initiatives to stimulate the economy and restore the budget to good health, we will be in a position to reexamine the fee increases.

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Arnold Schwarzenegger (R)

I regret these fees had to rise so dramatically because of mismanagement in Sacramento. We need a reliable and stable student-fee policy so young Californians and their families can plan and budget.

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State Sen. Tom McClintock (R)

BTD I opposed all these fee increases, just as I did in the early 1990s when fee increases were used to solve budget deficits. Sacramento should not be solving their self-created budget problems on the backs of our students.

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Q. Do you support the Kindergarten-University Public Education Facilities Bond Act, the March 2004 ballot initiative that would provide $12.3 billion in spending for education facilities, including $2.3 billion for higher education?

Gov. Gray Davis (D)

Absolutely. I signed the legislation that put this bond on next year’s ballot.

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Peter M. Camejo (Green)

Yes -- because these facilities are urgently needed, as an interim measure, I would support this bond. In the long run, however, we need to reduce our level of bond debt.

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Arianna Huffington (I)

I fully support this initiative. It will provide long overdue funds to help rebuild the deteriorating physical infrastructure of our schools and colleges.

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Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante (D)

Yes, I support the upcoming education bond. These funds are needed to build new classrooms, accommodate class-size reduction programs and expand access to college.

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Peter V. Ueberroth (R)

I do support the Kindergarten-University Public Education Facilities Bond Act, but it is essential that this money is spent to the maximum benefit of the students in our state’s system. We must identify measures for cutting the costs of school construction to make our scarce resources go as far as they can go.

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Arnold Schwarzenegger (R)

Yes. Over 1 million California schoolchildren attend overcrowded schools. Our public universities and community colleges anticipate 700,000 new students by 2010. We must build to accommodate this growth.

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State Sen. Tom McClintock (R)

In 1998, California had about $2 billion of outstanding general obligation debt. Next year there will be over $50 billion if all those currently approved are sold. We simply cannot afford to put our children and grandchildren further into debt.

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Q. Should the University of California put the development of its 10th campus, UC Merced, on hold until the budget picture improves?

Gov. Gray Davis (D)

No, I do not believe we should stop our progress on UC Merced just because we are facing tough financial times. We are on track for a 2005 opening of the new university.

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Peter M. Camejo (Green)

My budget proposal will provide sufficient revenue to continue developing a 10th UC campus, so we do not need to put this work on hold.

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Arianna Huffington (I)

We need the Merced campus, which will provide much-needed openings for students. California has built more prisons than state universities over the last decade; we need to reverse that equation.

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Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante (D)

We should continue with the development of the UC Merced Campus. It is needed to accommodate the projected tidal wave of new students over the next decade. In addition, the campus will serve as a major economic development hub for the Central Valley.

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Peter V. Ueberroth (R)

I support the opening of a Merced campus. The Central Valley needs a great university, and we will help make it happen. I would like to see the opening date of fall 2005, while seeing that we reduce near-term expenditures, and would like to see UC streamline near-term costs.

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Arnold Schwarzenegger (R)

I support UC Merced. This campus will strengthen a great university system. For every dollar invested by the state, UC Merced will attract three to four times that amount in additional funding from federal research grants, patent revenue, fees and gifts.

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State Sen. Tom McClintock (R)

Yes

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Q. Do you believe the state universities and community colleges need to do more to promote ethnic diversity among students and faculty? If so, how, given the state’s ban on affirmative action in public institutions?

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Gov. Gray Davis (D)

I opposed Proposition 209. As governor, I put into place an initiative called the Four-Percent Admissions Program. This program ensures admission at a UC school for the top 4% of students from every high school in California. It has helped increase freshman admissions among African American students by 30% and Latino students by 37%.

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Peter M. Camejo (Green)

BTD Yes, we definitely need to increase ethnic diversity, especially at the universities. Given that the U.S. Supreme Court has now ruled that race can be a factor in admissions, I would work to align California’s procedures within the U.S. guidelines.

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Arianna Huffington (I)

We absolutely need to do more to promote ethnic diversity at our public universities and colleges. And the best way to achieve this is by providing all the children of California with a high-quality K-12 education.

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Lt. Gov. Cruz Bustamante (D)

We should continue to promote diversity in our state’s higher education system, both in student population and faculty hiring. These efforts, while complying with the will of the voters and Proposition 209, should focus on outreach efforts to all communities in California.

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Peter V. Ueberroth (R)

BTD I believe we need to ensure that all members of our diverse population have an opportunity to maximize their potential by attending our public universities and community colleges. I support the type of outreach programs used by UC Riverside to identify and help prepare potential students from all ethnic backgrounds to make sure they are qualified for entry to the UC system.

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Arnold Schwarzenegger (R)

I am convinced that we don’t need quotas to achieve diversity. Instead, I believe we need to provide more opportunities for lower income students and recent immigrants to be able to afford higher education.

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State Sen. Tom McClintock (R)

We need to focus on providing disadvantaged students -- no matter what their race -- the proper education that they need in our K-12 schools with the resources and focus that they need to succeed and enter college.