Cuts to Student Outreach Threaten Universal Access

The recent death of University of California president emeritus Clark Kerr makes me wistful about California’s master plan for higher education, a 40-year-old, doorstop-sized blueprint for the college and university education of the state’s students.

With visionary spirit, Kerr -- the master plan’s chief architect -- approached the daunting task of delivering universal access to higher education while preserving the distinct and unique missions of the community colleges, California State University and the University of California systems.

As Kerr said in his autobiography, the vision of the master plan was to “serve an egalitarian democracy, a technocratic economy, and a meritocratic society,” giving as many students as possible the opportunity to attain a college education while promoting research, professional, graduate and teacher training, and community education within the different systems.

The master plan was constructed under intense and roiling pressure created by a rapidly expanding college-age population and rancorous competition among public colleges and universities.

Over the years, the plan has been criticized for being many things: too hierarchical, too rigid, too elitist, to name just a few. Nevertheless, the master plan presented a model of cooperation among higher education institutions that was unprecedented and unsurpassed in its scope and importance.

Make no mistake: The master plan is still important. The most current version -- 2002 -- has been extended to include elementary and secondary education, recognizing that public education should be a seamless pipeline from kindergarten through a doctorate or professional degree. The basic vision remains, however: universal educational opportunity and a shared commitment to student achievement that is limited only by individual ambition.

Tragically, that vision is compromised every day in our schools, colleges and universities. Many students do not have access to opportunities to learn and achieve. Many lack textbooks, college preparatory courses and transfer support. And many suffer from myriad conditions that undermine the learning culture.

These problems have evolved since the drafting of the original plan. And as California grows, diversifies, and struggles economically, those problems can seem intrinsic and overwhelming.

But for almost as many years as the master plan has guided us, our state’s public colleges and universities have been reaching out to the schools and institutes of higher education on behalf of that promise of universal opportunity.

At the University of California, those programs largely operated at the margins of the mission until about five years ago, when the UC regents and Legislature -- recognizing the enormous problem of educational disadvantage in California -- pledged $38.5 million to school and university partnerships. Since then, we have been building a comprehensive infrastructure of programs and relationships aimed at raising student achievement across the state.

Much has been written lately about the success of these programs. And despite the financial gutting outreach has sustained over the last two years -- UC outreach efforts currently constitute less than 1% of our budget -- the university has continued to expand and deepen its relationship with public schools, particularly the lowest-performing and least-supported.

But as Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger proposes immediate elimination of all outreach funding, this important work is threatened with extinction.

Why should we care about outreach? Perhaps because of the increasing disparities between affluent and impoverished schools. Perhaps because income potential is largely predicted by educational attainment. Perhaps because it’s wiser to invest more in schools now than in prisons later.

Perhaps, even, because the U.S. and California constitutions guarantee equal educational opportunity.

That alone is reason enough to preserve outreach. It is no more and no less than the most basic means to achieving “egalitarian democracy, a technocratic economy, and a meritocratic society.”

Sometimes it is difficult to keep our promises. But supporting education must be more than an empty campaign pledge; it is a promise that will mark the difference between democracy and catastrophe.

Manuel Gomez is vice chancellor of student affairs at UC Irvine and served as the systemwide vice president for educational outreach under former UC President Richard C. Atkinson.