/r/berkeley FAQ
Introduction
First of all, welcome to /r/berkeley! If you are reading this you probably want to know a little more about what this subreddit is all about. It's quite simple. We post and discuss things that are in some way related to Berkeley. We have talked about things ranging from city politics to UC Berkeley research to even those really eccentric fellows you come across occasionally. Upvote things you feel are worthy of an upvote, and downvote things you feel are worthy of a downvote. That is all the direction anyone needs to use and enjoy this subreddit :D
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What exactly do the Regents do and why are they essential to the functioning of the University?
The california constitution, in Article 9, section 9, legally appoints a board of regents to essentially govern the University of California system. So the UC Board of Regents has existed since about 1878.
The history around this, if I recall correctly, was that average folks from California wanted the educational institution to serve their needs, primarily agricultural. However, rich industrialists, mostly from San Francisco, wanted the university to serve their needs. Thus, the Board of UC Regents was created to concentrate the power to govern the university system into the hands of a few, a move that inherently benefited the rich industrialists who were a small minority.
Legally speaking, the UC Regents have total legal control over all UC property (including investments). That is why when you write a check for tuition you make it out to the UC Regents. That is why you always see "property of the UC Regents" in fine print on your cal mail and everything else related to UC property.
Now, this is where we get into an interesting legal area. The UC Regents are granted administration over this property and are supposed to do so in the public's interest. What is the public's interest? Good question. The point is it is not defined.
Additionally, the constitution adds that the UC Board of Regents "should" but not "must" resemble the general population of California along ethnic, racial, and socioeconomic lines. However, no concrete ratio can be made to enforce this. This is why essentially all our regents, while fairly diverse in gender, race and ethnicity, all happen to be rich and have interests in big business. The exact wording in the constitution is (article 9, section 9, paragraph d)....
"Regents shall be able persons broadly reflective of the economic, cultural, and social diversity of the State, including ethnic minorities and women. However, it is not intended that formulas or specifc ratios be applied in the selection of regents.”
As for the structure of the Regents themselves, there are 26 UC Regents. 18 are directly appointed by the governor to renewable 12 year terms and they have official voting power. The other 8, which do not have official voting power, include 1 student regent, the UC President, the president of the alumni, vice president of alumni, Superintendent of Public Instruction, the Governor of California, the Lieutenant Governor of California, and the Speaker of the State Assembly. So there is a strong connection between the Regents and the state.
As for what they do, essentially they control everything the UC does. This means budgeting, distribution of funds, construction projects, etc... They control fee hikes and pay raises (in fact, if you didn't hear, they voted to raise the salaries of administrators in a fairly recent meeting in November I believe). Perhaps more scandalously, they decide what to do with all the money/investments the UC's have, which is valued in the $50-$60 billion range. I think it is worth noting, as Peter Byrne points out IIRC, that the Regents lost billions in investments, which dwarfed the amount of money the state was cutting from the UC's. So it is a fallacy to attribute fee hikes primarily to lack of state funding because the UC Regents have mismanaged the wealth of the UCs.
Also, the Regents tend to invest in firms or projects that many of the Regents profit off of. Richard Blum is a pretty good example here. Here's a little fact sheet on Blum... President of investment firm Blum Capital, husband of US senator from California Dianne Feinstein, a primary owner of Career Edu-cation Corporation (the world’s second largest for proft education firm), chairman of CBRE (the world's largest commercial real estate firm), served 30 years on the board of the URS Corporation(the primary contractor for the UC’s construction projects). By the way, as a side note, many of these UC construction projects are financed by loans that banks give to the Regents because they guarantee stu-dent fees will be raised as collateral.
I mean I can go on and on about them, but hopefully this is some more help. Although, I feel this is not much of a deviation from Schwartz or Byrne, and to be honest it's because they are private administrators plundering a public system. I don't think there can be much debate around that. That should be a solid truth.