California's future strength depends on investing now in graduate education. California's economy is increasingly dependent on discovery, but California has been underinvesting in graduate education, the key training ground for the people who create those discoveries. These graduates become leaders in all walks of life, in turn creating jobs and opportunities for many other people.

California also needs more graduate degree holders because the state's undergraduates need the new faculty that graduate education will produce in the coming decade. The enrollment increases and retirements anticipated in California's institutions of higher education will require hiring 20,000 new faculty in California's four-year colleges and universities alone in the coming decade.

A 2001 report concluded that by 2010, the University of California will need an additional $215 million annually to provide the graduate student support needed to add 11,000 graduate students and be competitive for the best. The University is currently reassessing both the enrollment growth essential to support California's leadership and the well-being of its citizens in the 21st century, and the level of graduate student support needed to achieve this.

The Importance of Graduate Education to California and the University of California," Regents' meeting presentation, Jan. 19, 2005 (Best viewed in Internet Explorer. If viewing in Netscape, please click on "View" and select "Full Screen".)

Innovation and Prosperity at Risk: Investing in Graduate Education to Sustain California's Future - Commission on the Growth and Support of Graduate Education, September 2001

Regents' item on the commission report, September 2001 (attachments)

Making Discovery Work - A report on graduate education at UC (1999)