Fancy Shmancy U

I have watched UCSB grow and grow over the past quarter century. There are all these new buildings, the recreation pool is fantastic, etc. Everywhere I look on campus now I see contractor trucks and their smiling crews servicing, fixing, and repairing the structures. But where is the solar farm to reduce the electric bill?

And how did the university pay for all this stuff? Did the administration consult the economics majors there in order to come up with, “Raise the cost of tuition”? Sure, you can raise the price of tuition in a public university till it’s like champagne or a Ferrari, which only a few can afford. It’s criminal in the name of education, to price out students from getting an education or have them take on a $100,000 loan to pay off, sometimes 15 years later, for $150,000.

I propose that the university simply take at least 10 percent of all research-grant funding that comes into that fancy school, and stop raising the fees. And stop spending on capital improvements.—Steve Walker, Santa Barbara