MERCED, Calif. — On a former golf course in this farming town between San Francisco and Yosemite National Park, construction crews are busily laying foundations and raising walls for a library, dormitories and classrooms that will form the next campus in the University of California system.
Meanwhile, 27 professors are already at work planning the curriculum and recruiting more faculty for the day the first classes begin next year. They are also trying to attract future students by spreading the word at the region's high schools.
UC Merced is moving full steam ahead after nearly two decades of riding the highs and lows of California's finances. Thanks to strong lobbying from its Central Valley backers, the next UC campus has cleared the latest budget battle with the $20 million it sought to meet its goal of opening in the fall of 2005 with a first freshman class of 1,000.
Carol Tomlinson-Keasey, UC Merced's chancellor, said that support showed UC "desperately needs a 10th campus" and added that "as the campus grows, we promise a good return on their investment."
Even before Merced was chosen as the specific site, every governor since George Deukmejian had backed plans for a UC campus in the San Joaquin Valley. Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, in his first State of the State address, singled out UC Merced as the one project he would use to "expand the dream of college."
Critics, however, questioned whether the money could be better spent elsewhere in the university system at a time of tight budgets. Last year, for instance, state Senate President Pro Tem John Burton (D-San Francisco) called UC Merced the "biggest boondoggle ever."
UC Merced's weathering of fiscal crises shows just how "the dream of college" means not only the desire by students to earn a degree close to home. It is also the dream of politicians and communities for the construction projects, heightened land values and prestige that come with a UC campus.
Educators in the San Joaquin Valley say area high school students will be more likely to pursue a university education with a UC campus in their midst. The valley's students, who have close access to Cal State campuses at Fresno, Bakersfield and Stanislaus, already attend Cal State colleges at roughly the same rate as the rest of the state. But only 3.45% of the valley's high school graduates went on to UC schools in 2002, compared with 7.47% statewide.
