UC Berkeley, Mozilla, me

Friday I attended the inauguration of the new Chancellor of the University of California at Berkeley.  I spent a lot of time at UC Berkeley (or “Cal” as it is known among students and alums).  I got my undergraduate degree (in Asian Studies, an interdisciplinary degree) from Berkeley.  I worked as a staff member at the Center for Chinese Studies Library for a few years, where I was generally the only non-native Chinese speaker in the Library.  In an odd turn of fate I returned to Berkeley for my graduate degree (in law).

Berkeley is part of the much larger system of public education in the state of California.  “Public” higher education may seem obvious to some, if you come from a part of the world where this is standard.  In the US, many universities (e.g., Harvard, Stanford, Yale) are private organizations, and so the public nature of the University of California is a big part of its identity.  The entire system includes a set of 2-year Community Colleges, almost 25 California State University campuses and 10 University of California campuses.  I was very fortunate because during my college and graduate years the State of California provided immense support to public education, and I was one of the many beneficiaries.  I benefited from a world-class education without the kind of crushing debt that colors one’s choices for years afterwards.  I see my work at Mozilla as possible in part because the State of California invested in me.

I have always found UC Berkeley to be a funny mix of radical, innovative, and traditional.  The student body is politically active at Berkeley.  The Free Speech Movement in the early 1960’s established the right of students to engage in political speech on campus, something I took for granted.  The faculty at Berkeley is active.  In the 1920’s a “faculty revolt” resulted in the faculty (through the Academic Senate) obtaining a much-extended role in shared governance of UC Berkeley.  The staff at Berkeley is active as well, demanding respect as part of what makes Berkeley great.  (I was staff at UC Berkeley for a few years before graduate school, so I remember this aspect as well.)

Both of these elements were present at the inauguration.  The event started with a student protest about Janet Napolitano, ex head of US Homeland Security and recently appointed as the President of the UC system.  It’s a controversial appointment since her background is in security and immigration/ deportation rather than education.  The protest was actually quite moderate.  The students sat up in the balcony, stood up as soon as the event started and chanted their position.  This took maybe a couple of minutes.  Then they left.  No on-going heckling, no need to be tossed out.

A few things I noticed about the content of the event.  During the procession (classes, faculty, other institutions, staff), I felt myself perk up at one point.  I wondered why, especially as the law school classmate I went with didn’t seem to notice.  Then I realized — the orchestra was playing the UC Berkeley  “fight song”.  I’ve heard this a million times — it’s like hearing your name.  The song refers to the UC Berkeley mascot — the Golden Bear. It includes a verse:

From his Lair he fiercely growls.
What’s he say? He says:
From his Lair he fiercely growls.
What’s he say? He says:
Grrrrrah, Grrrrrrah!
Grrrr, Rrrr, Rrrrrah!

So, after the first Processional there was a very quiet sound from the hall:

Grrrrrah, Grrrrrrah!
Grrrr, Rrrr, Rrrrrah!

After each Processional group the Golden Bear got louder.  Never as loud as at a football game, but still it felt like Berkeley.  Funny tradition of activism and chants.  Similarly, many of the speakers at the inauguration ended their remarks with the classic call “Go Bears!”  You can hear it at the end of the Men’s Octet rendition of the fight song.

More seriously, the remarks made by all speakers reinforced a few key concepts:

• Cal seeks to be the world’s pre-eminent public research university, promoting both excellence and education as an important element of democratic societies, not just economic benefit of individual students.Cal aims for excellence, affordability, and diversity of students.
  Calls for social justice, both for working people and for undocumented students.  For those not familiar with US immigration issues, “undocumented students” refers to people who hold neither a US passport nor a visa to remain in the United States.

There were also many references to the difficulties the UC System faces.  Finances are tight, the State of California has reduced its support dramatically and tuition rates have gone up. Undergraduate education vs  graduate and research efforts are a topic.  The value of studying humanity (“liberal arts”) as well as technology is a topic.

The new chancellor described all of these, plus the plans to move forward.  This part of the talk was a bit long for me.  It was a speech, rather than the short remarks of the other participants. This makes sense to me.  But I have to admit that my working life is mostly focused around very short attention spans — like 15 seconds.  🙂  Seriously, that’s advice I give people who are dealing with executives for the first time.  You have about 15 seconds to get someone’s attention, especially via email.  So even though I was a bit itchy during the end of this talk, I was still able to focus enough to appreciate the core content.

Since I moved to Silicon Valley, I’ve come to appreciate how amazing Stanford University is.  It’s a key component of the innovation and intelligence and excellence that the Valley produces.  I didn’t understand its important until I lived here a while.  I’ve always found Stanford very difficult to develop any relationship with as a non-alum, but I have come to be awed by it as well.

I have to say though, it was wonderful to be at UC Berkeley, where I felt at home — utterly, totally, and completely at home.