Building a new UC -- in cyberspace

We still have unsurpassed excellence, but it is now rationed and increasingly threatened. The higher education master plan's bold promise of access for the many has been shredded in slow motion. We've had decades of increasing dysfunction in Sacramento and smoldering doubts in some quarters about the value of supporting public education. Now comes the resulting surge in victims -- present and future -- in families and throughout the economy.

Many thoughtful people recognize the importance of education to the state's greatness, but President Obama's call for expanding post-secondary education sounds otherworldly to mid-crisis Californians. Based on data from the census and the National Center for Education Statistics, the state is 49th in the percentage of high school graduates going on to degree-granting colleges. So, employers must import higher-end workers, and Californians have comparatively fewer opportunities for the education that builds middle-class security and prosperity.

The UC XI cyber-campus could be a way to put high-quality higher education within reach of tens of thousands more students, including part-timers, and eventually provide a revenue boost for higher education.

A new California master plan should define and deliver state-of-the-art online education. There are scores of tough questions to be answered, and business plans to be drafted and redrafted. But every cliche about a crisis tells us that the best offense is often innovation.