Board of Education

Published: Monday, September 28, 1998

Monday, September 28, 1998

Board of Education

STRUCTURE: Most members of the UC Board of Regents have experience in business and politics, not education, and an increasingly diverse student population questions the regents' response to campus issues

By Shannan Rouss

Daily Bruin Contributor

While most students would be hard-pressed to name even one member of the University of California Board of Regents, the board's presence reigns high above the university's academia.

When challenged to cite a regent, fourth-year sociology student Andrea Ginsburg asked, "Other than Ward Connerly?"

Although Connerly, notorious as a staunch opponent of affirmative action, is often the only identifiable name among students, Regent Velma Montoya said the regents' obscurity is positive for the university.

It implies that they "are doing their business as overseers, and there is no reason to pick anyone out on an individual basis," she said.

However, some students say the regents are a remote, nondescript entity that doesn't always have the best interests of students in mind.

According to Undergraduate Students Association Council (USAC) President Stacy Lee, the regents are inaccessible and unconcerned with the students.

"Our representation at (their) table is minimal - if any," she said.

Like most other states whose universities have a governing board of regents, the California governor appoints 18 of the 26 board members to 12-year terms.

Past appointments have garnered criticism for being more conducive to business incentives than educational ones.

The state university system in Florida conducts their board in a similar manner, describing the regents "as analogous to a board of directors of a corporation."

The current chancellor of the Ohio Board of Regents, Rod Chu, a former executive whose qualifications include 20 years with Andersen Consulting, was appointed to "help (the regents) think 'outside the box.'"

Given the minimal educational experience of many members of the board, Lee questioned their academic credentials.

"The regents come from the richest tiers of our society," Lee said.

"(They) are often commenting ... on their lack of awareness on issues they are supposed to make decisions on," she said.

However, according to Richard Novak, director of Public Sector Programs for the Association of Governing Boards, the regents should not be from any one constituency or supportive of any single campus, since "the state-wide interest should be at heart."

"They are in a sense the surrogate for the state," he continued.

Montoya also said that the board is not a homogenous bureaucracy.

"More and more (the regents) are becoming diverse," she said, citing herself and other regents as proof. "I am a Mexican American from East L.A., (and) I was an associate professor of finance at Cal Poly Pomona," she said.

Novak suggested that one way to curtail dissatisfaction with the appointment of regents would be through a third-party screening committee to approve the governor's decisions.

Furthermore, Montoya added that, regarding specific matters of courses and curriculum, the board willingly defers authority on educational matters to the faculty.

He emphasized the importance of shared governance between the regents and the faculty, saying "the faculty is granted a significant amount of control."

Despite this delineation of power, however, the board sometimes attempts to influence educational policy.

In one instance, Connerly called ethnic studies and ethnic graduations into question and felt that such practices caused "balkanization" across UC campuses.

But Regent William Bagley, referring to the aforementioned topic, said, "Micromanaging is something that this board shouldn't be doing," implying that educational decisions were best left to the academic officials of the university.

According to Student Regent Max Espinoza, some of the appropriate duties of the regents involve "student fees, the setting of admissions criteria, enhancing diversity, construction, (and) setting financial priorities for the university."

Examples on the regents' agenda for the upcoming year are discussions regarding the development of a 10th UC campus in the San Joaquin Valley, tentatively called UC Merced.

Closer to home, the board will continue to oversee the financing of UCLA's Northwest Housing and Parking Project currently at a cost of $81.1 million.

The next meeting of the UC Board of Regents is scheduled for Oct. 15 in San Francisco.

Related site:

•The Regents of the University of California

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