CSUN and the California Master Plan

Overview

“The Master Plan was a bold design for mid-20th century American higher education. During the review, some wished to look to the Master Plan as a continued guiding light, while others wished to move past it, to allow for more expansive conversations to address the challenges ahead. This latter perspective recognizes the differences that separate California today from the California of 1960. The Master Plan was the product of a time when Californians and policymakers were confident in the possibilities of centralized planning to address social problems and advance social goals; it was a document from the age of the State Water Project and of highway construction. Since 1960, however, California has gone through dramatic demographic, political and economic transformations; projections of technological change suggest that equally substantial changes in the character of work and shape of the economy are coming.

A coherent and shared vision for California’s system of higher education as one of life-long learning is necessary for the 21st century. In the last decades, researchers and policymakers have produced a small library of reports, reviews and research papers diagnosing and analyzing the deficiencies of California’s institutions of postsecondary education and proposing remedies. What is missing is a systemic reimagination of the ends of education in light of 21st century conditions. Taking California higher education forward requires grappling with the different expectations that today’s students have of colleges and universities and the different outcomes that they seek from postsecondary education. It also requires asking what systematically should be accomplished to prepare California’s college and university students for a rapidly changing economy and world of work.

The importance of higher education and life-long learning is likely only to grow as automation and artificial intelligence compete with human workers and place greater pressure on individuals to obtain both the technical skills that will allow them to work with new technologies and the human skills that will help to protect them from being replaced by a machine or algorithm. A clear conception of the goals for higher education and life-long learning the 21st century is needed to ensure that new policies and approaches will strengthen our institutions and benefit Californians for decades to come”.

Source: The Master Plan for Higher Education in California

California’s Three Tier System: Primary Missions

• UC is designated the State's primary academic research institution and is to provide undergraduate, graduate, and professional education. UC is given exclusive jurisdiction in public higher education for doctoral degrees (with the exception that CSU can award joint doctorates) and for instruction in law, medicine, dentistry, and veterinary medicine (the original plan included architecture).

• CSU's primary mission is undergraduate education and graduate education through the master's degree, with particular emphasis on “polytechnic” fields and teacher education. Faculty research is authorized consistent with the primary function of instruction. Doctorates can be awarded jointly with UC or an independent institution.

• The California Community Colleges have as their primary mission providing academic and vocational instruction for older and younger students through the first two years of undergraduate education (lower division). In addition to this primary mission, the Community Colleges are authorized to provide remedial instruction, English as a Second Language courses, adult noncredit instruction, community service courses, and workforce training services.

Creating a Research Culture at CSUN

Research culture includes the way we evaluate, support and reward quality in research, how we recognize varied contributions to a research activity, and the way we support different career paths. To improve research culture, start from the priorities that you think matter most to your organization; those that reflect its values, fit with what your community really cares about, or align to the activities that are already in progress. If you can, line up your agenda to an external driver.

A culture of research requires both institutional and unit‐based leaders to set clear research goals and communicate them effectively.
Institutions wishing to develop a culture of research must allocate significant resources for faculty training and support. Faculty with minimal scholarship production experience will likely need training and personal support to become proficient.
A developing culture of research requires open and collaborative personal relationships among faculty members. Congenial relationships among faculty members would support a successful faculty‐to‐faculty research mentoring initiative.
To implement cultural change, administrators must be prepared to tailor resource allocations based on faculty members’ current motivations and abilities.
A culture of research may take years to develop and, once established, requires regular maintenance. New policies relating to research must be enforced with regularity over time before they are accepted.
Plans for a culture of research should include consideration of student involvement. Institutions may develop student research skills through research assistantships. Faculty mentors may also provide personalized research guidance.

Recommended Practices

Universities can make simple changes to hiring, promotion, and tenure practices to ensure that the work scholars make their research openly available an are recognized and rewarded. Including language in hiring, promotion, and tenure guidelines that signal that open sharing of research outputs, and the impact of that sharing, is valued, will go a long way to aligning the incentives for career success with the practice of open scholarship — making what is now increasingly required, also what is rewarded.