With the threat of a strike looming, faculty and others say a slew of concerns, ranging from growing class sizes to rising student fees and low teacher salaries, are an indication that the quality of the CSUs is in danger.
Among the critics is Lt. Gov. John Garamendi, an ex-officio CSU trustee and regent of the University of California, who said the CSUs are already in a state of decline.
Speaking on the phone after visiting Cal State San Bernardino last week to find out more about education in the Inland Empire, Garamendi said a decrease in per-student state funding at the CSU system in recent decades has corroded the quality of the institution.
As evidence of that erosion, Garamendi pointed to such factors as difficulty in keeping top educators in California's public university systems because of poor pay and an increase in student fees.
"Those are all signs of a decline, and if everyone says it's still the greatest, that's only because it was so terrific," Garamendi said. "But if we continue on the course that we're on, we'll be in trouble. The system will no longer be first class."
According to the most recent numbers from the teachers union, the percent of CSU faculty that is tenured or tenure- track has dropped from about 73 percent in 1996 to about 62 percent. At Cal State San Bernardino, according to the latest figures from the union, about 64 percent of instructional faculty was tenured or tenure-track, down from 73 percent a decade earlier.
Anecdotes abound about the difficulty in recruiting new CSU faculty. According to the California Postsecondary Education Commission, the average CSU faculty member earns 18 percent less than peers at similar universities are projected to earn next year.
John Travis, president of the California Faculty Association, which bargains for the CSU system's roughly 23,000 faculty members, said four Sacramento State University educators told him they were leaving in part because of low pay.
Clara Potes-Fellow, a CSU spokeswoman, said California's public universities are still the best in the country despite sustaining hundreds of millions of dollars in cuts during the state's recent budget crisis.
She said the quality of education is as high as it has been historically. The university continues hiring faculty with advanced degrees and with work experience in key California industries, she said.
Even with student fee hikes expected this fall for the fifth time in six years, CSU undergraduates who are state residents will pay less than peers at 15 comparable institutions are paying now, according to the CSU system.
With a funding shortage, some of the most vexing issues facing the CSUs lie in the realm of expansion, Potes-Fellow said. Without more money, it's difficult for the CSUs to grow or start new programs in fields such as nursing, where demand for newly trained professionals is high, she said.
Faculty leaders such as Tom Meisenhelder, president of CSUSB's union chapter, and Lloyd Peake, chairman of the Faculty Senate there, say administrators need to rethink the direction in which they're taking the CSUs.
"It's in danger of decline," Meisenhelder said.
He chided CSU managers for placing too much emphasis on administration and too little on day-to-day instruction.
CSU trustees voted in January to boost the salaries of executives, including the system's 23 campus presidents, by 4 percent. The raise came less than 18 months after the presidents - who draw six-figure salaries - received a 13 percent pay hike.
At the time, CSU spokeswoman Claudia Keith noted that presidents' salaries have also lagged behind those of their peers.
Keith Boyum, CSU associate vice chancellor for academic affairs, said he and colleagues have worked diligently to keep cuts away from the classroom.
A lack of funding limits outreach to potential students, and the CSUs have lost some staff who advise students on school and career choices, Boyum said.
"Both of those are elements of quality that don't have anything to do with learning success in the classroom," Boyum said. "My sense of things is that we have tried very hard and very successfully to preserve learning success in the classroom."
Contract talks that CSU and union leaders hope will be settled by April 6 are expected to help faculty secure higher salaries, though a deal following an independent mediator's recommendations wouldn't immediately bring CSU pay up to par with salaries at similar universities.
And an agreement won't be the answer to all the CSUs' challenges.
Despite differences in their assessments of what problems the CSUs face, Garamendi, Meisenhelder and Potes-Fellow all pointed to a decline in state funding as a major reason the system is struggling.
Potes-Fellow said the CSUs have worked hard in recent years to raise money from outside philanthropists. Heavy fund raising has traditionally been the province of private universities.
Garamendi said many of the CSUs' concerns apply at the UCs. He blamed governors and legislatures - reluctant to raise taxes - for failing to address problems, cowering instead behind fee increases that he called a de facto tax on students and their families.
"This has been going on now for 15 years," Garamendi said. "Over that period of time, there's been an erosion in the state's support."
"Teachers, engineers, scientists, technicians, all of those, we're in short supply," he said. "And the educational system is unable to produce them for several reasons. One of the key reasons is not enough money, not enough slots (for students). And if that continues, the jobs will be elsewhere. The jobs will go where the educational work force is, and we'll wind up with a lot of low-paying jobs. And that starts a downward spiral."
by Charlotte Hsu, San Bernardino Sun, March 27, 2007