May and administrators discuss mask policies, student safety, research opportunities and more
By THE EDITORIAL BOARD
The California Aggie’s Editorial Board met with Chancellor Gary May, Provost and Executive Vice Chancellor Mary Croughan, Associate Chancellor and Chief of Staff Carl Engelbach, Chief Marketing and Communications Officer Dana Topousis, Vice Chancellor of UC Davis Finance, Operations and Administration Claire Shinnerl, Vice Chancellor for Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Renetta Tull, Director of Athletics Rocko DeLuca, Chief Campus Counsel Mike Sweeney, Faculty Advisor to the Chancellor and Provost Ari Kelman, and Vice Chancellor, Student Affairs Pablo Reguerín on Nov. 20.
Below is a transcript of the meeting that has been edited for length and clarity.
The Editorial Board: After several years of attempts, UC Davis was recently announced to be an official Hispanic-serving institution. What was different about this year’s admissions that made Davis reach this status? Does the university have plans to help foster an environment that is welcoming for Hispanic and Latinx students?
May: So let me first say, we’re very excited to finally reach this milestone. It’s been years or decades in the making, and we’ve been pursuing it vigorously. Let me just clarify, however, that we are qualified to be designated as an HSI (Hispanic Serving Institution) but we still have to apply to the Department of Education to get the official designation and they have to approve it. So we have numbers, we just now have to do the application. By the way, so that everyone knows, 25% of our domestic undergraduate population is Latinx — that’s the threshold.
So this just reflects our commitment to California and our diverse communities here. As I said, this is after years of efforts, recruitment initiatives, partnerships and collaboration with alumni and the community. Once we do apply and hopefully receive the designation that makes us eligible to apply for competitive grants that require HSI status, there’s no money that starts flowing in. I just want that to be clear. People think that it automatically means money comes. No, you still have to apply for the grants to get the resources, and these will be grants that are aimed at student success, academic innovation and institutional transformation. They’ll allow us to deepen our commitment to providing a supportive environment for all of our students, but particularly our Latinx students.
Tull: I was just going to say that in terms of the money and the funding, the nice thing is that it gives us an opportunity to apply for additional tracks of funding in different places. And in fact, we have two grants that are going in this Friday to UCOP (University of California’s Office of the President) and their faculty, one here at our Davis campus and one in Sacramento. The plan is to have programs that are going to help all of our students on campus, but it’s this track that allows us to be able to apply under this kind of eligibility. So we’re really excited about it and we have different kinds of things that are going to support the Avanza, as we call it, sort of the umbrella, but there are a lot of programs that have been long standing on campus, through student affairs and through other different entities on campus.
Reguerín: I think part of the real story is our enrollment is now over 8,100 Latino domestic students, and there are very few universities in the country that serve that many. So aside from the percent, and part of reaching that percent has to do is that we’re a large campus, so it’s always this numerator-denominator issue, as we grow. But it’s not just about reaching that enrollment target. Last year, at this time, we were at 7,700, so it is significant in terms of the growth. We still acknowledge, though, that Latinos make up high school graduating students close to 48% so we’re still not reflective of the state. We are still considered an underrepresented group in terms of parity, and a lot of our initiatives are around making sure students thrive here at UC Davis. So not just that you’re coming in and barely graduating but actually thriving and connected. And so we’re looking at it very holistically in terms of the programs and support that we offer. And as Renetta mentioned, the services and programs really are about creating a more inclusive UC Davis and as a larger part of the community, Latino students and non-Latino students obviously will benefit.
May: I’ll just conclude with one more point here. There are few universities that have reached this level — I would say even fewer research universities that are at this level. So that’s a very select group, and we’re proud to be part of it.
The Editorial Board: Last year, the UC Board of Regents announced they will no longer be looking for pathways for undocumented students to work on-campus jobs due to legal and safety concerns. Do you know if the regents are looking for new pathways in the future? Could this be impacted by the 2024 election in some way? If not, is UC Davis currently looking for ways for undocumented students to be involved with on-campus research and jobs?
May: We just had a regents meeting a week before last and as of right now, I am not aware of any new pathways that the regents are looking at to implement these types of programs, from a system level.
The Editorial Board: Away from a system level, is UC Davis currently looking at any ways to implement jobs for these students to be involved in research, or any other on-campus jobs and have there been any legal voices on campus that contributed to this conversation as well?
May: Yes, UC Davis is doing a couple things. I’ll just start and maybe ask Pablo to amplify. We have two programs that connect students with finding work and research opportunities. The first is the UC Davis College Corps program, which is a state-funded program that provides undocumented fellows with up to $5,500 for living expenses, and it also provides real world job experience and other benefits. The second one is called our Undocu Pathways program that we piloted last year, that funds undergraduate, graduate and professional students who engage in unpaid, experiential learning opportunities. We probably could say something about the first one since we have a bunch of students involved in College Corps.
Reguerín: So again, we have a cohort of students and besides the $5,500 there’s also a $3,000 scholarship for a summer. It can be, depending on how many hours you put in, about $10,000. The key part in understanding both College Corps and Undocu Pathways is that these are essentially what we call inclusive fellowships. So, they’re not an employer-employee relationship. You get practical training and in the case of College Corps, there’s also a course academic experience. You get field experience, and then we’re able to provide a living stipend or scholarship, depending on the situation.
It’s really about identifying the areas that is something that’s related to a student’s interest and the field that they’re in. So it’s really about connecting them. Sometimes their experience might be integrated into a course, but it’s expected that you volunteer, so we’ll provide some funding support. We’ve also increased our emergency funding support, so the financial aid office has reallocated the DREAM loan funds, which is a fairly new law that passed around how to redistribute what used to be a traditional loan program into grant and aid programs. So we’re all working together, trying to sort out the different pots of money, and then trying to ensure students have support in their various goals.
The Editorial Board: In July, the UC Board of Regents approved the construction of a new residence hall in the Segundo area to address the growing demand for on-campus housing. What is the timeline of its completion, and what kind of an impact do you foresee this new housing development having with regards to the increasing student population at UC Davis?
May: The Segundo infill project is going to give us 550 new beds for first-year students when it’s complete. The design is similar to the residence halls in Tercero — if you lived in Tercero, you might recognize it. The design was vetted through surveys administered to the residents, student staff and operational staff, and focus groups are also used to help ensure that we have the best design for student needs. The project will be complete in time for fall 2027 occupancy, and this will help us move forward with our stated goal. In fact, the goal that we have is in a memorandum of understanding with the city, which is to house 48% of our Davis-based students on campus.
Along with some other projects recently completed — Orchard Park, The Green, Shasta Hall, Yosemite Hall — we’re all moving forward in compliance with that goal and 48%: that’s a big deal. When I got here in 2017, we were in the mid-30s, maybe lower-30s, in terms of the percentile of students that were able to live on campus. So we made quite a bit of progress. We’ve added close to 7,000 beds in that time frame. So we’re seeing these efforts, along with our increased housing that’s happening in the city, having the impact of increasing the overall vacancy rate so there’s more available housing, and more availability means prices come down. So in 2023-24 the vacancy rate of bed lease and apartment lease rates hit 3%, which doesn’t sound like a lot, but again, seven years ago it was less than 1%. A healthy vacancy rate, just for comparison, is about 5%, so we’re getting toward what’s considered a healthy vacancy rate.
Reguerín: It has a broader impact as mentioned on the inventory, which is key to affordability.
Shinnerl: You’ll see construction start when you come back from winter break, so in the early spring, you’ll see construction. I’m excited about the architecture. It’s gonna pop up a little bit. It’s gonna be five stories compared to four. So a little bit more view and change and how it looks. A lot of open space, a lot of community space, a lot of social space, study space — I think it’s well done. Lots of bike parking.
The Editorial Board: The University of California recently released an updated mask policy that includes UC Davis. The policy states that “Individuals may not wear a mask, personal disguise or otherwise conceal their identity with the intent to intimidate any person or group, or to evade or escape discovery, recognition or identification while violating law or policy.” In light of recent protests on campus, what are the specific scenarios that would require someone to remove their face covering? Has the university considered implementing adaptations to the new mask policy in order to prevent potential discrimination due to ambiguity?
May: I’m glad you asked that question, because there has been a lot of confusion about this policy. So at the bottom of the UC Davis free speech website, you find time, place and manner FAQs that answer questions like this one, but just let me emphasize two points: First, wearing masks or face coverings is permissible for people that are going about their normal business, people that are concerned with health or people that have religious reasons for concealing their face. The masking directive applies only to people who are in the act of violating law or policy. So, in other words, you can’t conceal your identity if you’re in the act of doing something that’s against policy.
And while the question doesn’t really anticipate this, I want to note that the only people who can enforce the related policy are those that are specifically designated by UC Davis, which is essentially law enforcement and Division of Student Affairs staff. So an average community person can’t ask someone for their ID or to remove their mask. It has to be an officially authorized university representative.
Sweeney: I’ll just add that these provisions have already been in policy and state law before this. I’ve been at UC Davis almost 20 years; I’ve never seen an administrator arbitrarily enforce this rule. I think administrators are very reluctant to demand that individuals identify themselves. I know based on personal experience that that is the case. But it kind of makes sense if somebody is violating a law or policy but refuses to identify themselves, that in and of itself, is a violation of policy. That’s really the way to think about it. You can’t go and commit a crime and then refuse to identify yourself. That is also a violation of law and policy, and that’s probably a better way to think about it. Lots and lots of people on this campus wear masks. We all know that — actually many of you weren’t here during the pandemic, but we all wore masks. Still today, a significant percentage of people wear masks. That is not a violation of policy, period.
The Editorial Board: Is there anything different legally that the UC has to do — post this summer — about that than before? Is it the same status or is it just more public?
Sweeney: Well, I think we have had to clarify. That’s the thing we’ve had to do because it was put out there. We had to do a lot of clarification, but there hasn’t been an occasion since it was put out there that we’ve actually been in a situation where we needed to enforce it.
Reguerín: We haven’t enforced it at this point.
May: Important to note also, protesting is not a violation of policy in and of itself. So a person wearing a mask while protesting is not violating policy and keeping with time, place and manner restrictions.
Sweeney: Just to be clear, our policy explicitly states everybody has the right to protest. Some of us participate in protests. Protest is not a violation of policy, period.
The Editorial Board: In September, the admission for police forces to be able to utilize military grade weapons, including drones, projectile launchers, pepper balls and foam and sponge rounds on all UC campuses was passed. This is something that has brought many safety concerns among students on this campus. Under what circumstances would this kind of response from local law enforcement be put forward?
May: While I appreciate the question, I just wanted to really strongly emphasize that the UC Davis Police Department did not request any additional equipment, military grade or otherwise, at the September regents meeting. In fact, our campus police do not have military grade weapons or projectile launchers.
Shinnerl: I think we have a few, but they were approved in 2022. We had drones that were approved in 2023. Sorry, I can clarify, just to be completely transparent. Our police department got approval for three military grades, but they’re very, very low grade, back in 2022. Some launchers and amplified sound equipment, then drones in 2023. We have the fewest, I believe, out of any UC campus.
May: We were not in the request in the September regents meeting.
Shinnerl: Nothing new in September. These were all old requests.
Croughan: Maybe it would help if you said what we use the drones for?
Shinnerl: Only in an emergency. We do not use drones under any other circumstances. If 911 is activated and there is a law enforcement matter, then we could use our drones. We have not used them since we got approval. Also, we have very strict policies on them that are vetted by the regents, as well as a drone expert out of UC Merced. So, it’s really well documented when you can use them and how you can use them.
Croughan: Some of our original thinking was: If there’s a risk of fire, the drones can be super helpful for determining exactly where it is and monitoring hot spots.
Shinnerl: It has infrared, so it can detect heat. Sometimes we get a report of smoke, but we can’t find the source. But you can use a drone to try to find the actual fire.
Engelbach: They’re also used to assist in locating individual students who may be considered missing, oftentimes for health and welfare reasons. And so they’re used for that purpose as well.
Shinnerl: We have the largest University of California, in terms of acreage — 5300 acres — and we would have to hire a whole lot more people to try to run all the way out past Highway 113 and check up on something if a 911 call is activated. So they’re also very efficient compared to driving out there, running out there or biking out there. By the way, there is a rule that you have to keep your eye on it and be able to see it.
Sweeney: It’s also heavily regulated around airports.
Shinnerl: Which we also have.
The Editorial Board: In May 2024, Cheyenne Xiong, a UC Davis student, was arrested by UCDPD for alleged vandalism. During her arrest, the officer “accidentally” fired their gun. According to university sources, the officer is currently being investigated. Is the university taking any action to prevent situations like this from reoccurring in order to protect student safety?
May: The case is still active so I really am prohibited from providing a lot of detail. What we can say is that the discharge of weapons on campus is thoroughly investigated, and we take that very seriously, as we should. This case is no exception. It’s currently being reviewed at the UC Davis Police Accountability Board level, and the recommendations from that board are forthcoming.
The Editorial Board: UC Davis does not offer a program or major for students interested in journalism. What efforts has the university been making to support student journalism?
May: You’d be surprised with how long it takes us to get an undergraduate major. The business major case was over 20 years, but you didn’t ask about business. So, only two UCs offer undergrad degrees in journalism. UC Irvine has a Bachelor of Arts in literary journalism and UC Berkeley offers a journalism minor in the Graduate School of Journalism for the undergraduates. So, our writing program is interested in creating a professional writing major, but I’d encourage any students interested to contact that program’s leadership and support those efforts. I don’t think we have any formal efforts to have a journalism major on campus.
The Editorial Board: Last October, a UC Davis assistant professor threatened “American Zionist journalists” and their families. While you have condemned these comments previously and shared that the professor is under investigation, what is the current status of this process? Was the professor terminated for these comments, or is this still under review?
May: Still under review is the short answer. There are specific procedures for review and complaints of faculty misconduct with our university-wide policies and our system-wide policies and bylaws. Complaints against faculty members are confidential personnel matters, so we are really not able to comment publicly on the status of that matter or any other steps that we may be pursuing. I will say that the public expression of opinions, even those opinions that are controversial or abhorrent, really has a high level of protection under the First Amendment. So we’ve been carefully reviewing this matter to ensure our response is consistent in both university policy and state and federal protections under the First Amendment.
Sweeney: I’ll just add: It may sound like institutions hide behind privacy, and that’s not always untrue, but there are indeed laws that protect privacy. Student records have privacy laws — it’s called FERPA. You may have heard that that’s an acronym for a federal law. There’s a similar law that applies to personnel matters, and we’re not able to disclose information. If we actually intentionally disclose information, it’s a crime. Police officers, for example: In the penal code, there’s a specific provision that makes it a crime to disclose peace police officer personnel matters. So it’s very challenging for the chancellor to talk about these things. I mean, the chancellor wants to have transparency with the community, but there’s these laws. I’ll just say that we’re following the university process for dealing with these matters, and we’re happy to talk about processes and bore you to death with all the process, but we can’t talk about the specific personnel issues.
The Editorial Board: Specific personnel aside, how long would that process usually take for a professor or admin’s character in this kind of review?
Sweeney: At the University of California, literally everything is very slow, as you know. That is also true in our personnel matters. Certain groups of employees that have greater, I don’t want to say rights, but they’re more complicated and they’re more robust. Faculty have the greatest rights and it involves the UC Davis Academic Senate. Those processes go through at a glacial pace, not the pace that some of us in the administration would like, but, at the same time, they’re very thoughtful and they think a lot about the cases. They are moving it, just sometimes it’s hard to discern the movement. So, that’s not a direct answer, but they’re not satisfying. I will say, for faculty, it’s typically more than a year, up to two years. For staff, it’s typically six months. That’s the life cycle of a serious staff matter.
The Editorial Board: An unnamed former ASUCD unit director was recently alleged to have been misappropriating hiring practices and procedures. Does the university have plans in place to monitor ASUCD units and to intervene if funds are being used unethically and illegally?
May: As you probably know, ASUCD is 98% student-led and several unit directors in ASUCD are student-led units. Each unit has a staff, career, staff oversight and follows our Davis policy and procedures manual, or PPM (Policy and Procedure Manual). Vacancies are posted online through a publicly accessible website following the ASUCD bylaws. Interviews are conducted by student committees, and those hired have to be confirmed by the ASUCD Senate. Now, sometimes a student unit director might try to hire someone in this part of the process, which can happen in the living and learning model that we have.
So, when this occurs, we typically will find out what the hiring process was, what was not followed and when the student hired asked the personnel coordinator why they have not been paid. Then the personnel coordinator reviews the vacancy and checks where the position was posted or where any paperwork is missing. The unit directors have two training sessions a year on hiring, purchasing and day-to-day operational needs. ASUCD oversees these hiring practices and follows them through the PPM and state and federal laws. If a student believes that the process was not followed correctly, they can submit a review request, which can include a review by the personnel committee in ASUCD, a closed session by the ASUCD Senate or a complaint to human resources in those mechanisms.
So with regard to the fiscal responsibility concern, the ASUCD Senate approves the annual $22 million budget for ASUCD. If students believe the unit director is spending money in a way that is inappropriate, the controller and business manager can audit the unit director, or the senate can call a closed session. So I’m going to stop there, because that’s a lot of process and policy. I don’t know much about the specific case.
Reguerín: In terms of purchasing, there are checks and balances in place. A lot of that is actually done by staff — some within ASUCD, some outside of ASUCD. It’ll depend on the dollar amount and what process we’re talking about. But certainly I would bring forward any allegations of either not following the HR process or stewarding resources appropriately. It could be to my office. Certainly, there’s a process within ASUCD. Sheri Atkinson, the AVC (Associate Vice Chancellor for Student Life), oversees that area as a resource, and then there’s also resources beyond to report. We would just need the information to then look into it further.
The Editorial Board: This fall quarter, both the CoHo in the Memorial Union and the South CoHo began using Pachamama coffee beans to craft their beverages for students to enjoy. What was the overall process of switching coffee providers, and how does this align with UC Davis’ commitment to sustainability on campus? Will there be other efforts to follow in terms of encouraging similar sustainable practices?
May: So earlier in the year, UC Davis, including stakeholders from Health, issued a request for proposals for coffee services and coffee beans. We used an RFP (Request for Proposal) because our existing campus relationship is with Peet’s Coffee and that was expiring. We wanted to explore what the market would offer. Upon reviewing responses to that RFP, Peet’s Coffee was selected for coffee service through dining services and at the kiosks around campus. Pachamama, a local vendor founded by an alum, was added to a supplier list from beans to the CoHo and UC Davis Health. All vendors are required to serve their beverages in sustainable packaging in accordance with our UC Sustainable Practices Policy.
Shinnerl: I have a couple of things to add. The nice thing about going to bid is you set your requirements, such as meeting sustainable practices, and it’s one of the criteria for selection. If we just let everything just happen without an RFP, we get all kinds of stuff. So that’s just one of the benefits of going through a process.
The Editorial Board: UC Davis has a strong commitment to sustainability, which draws many students to our campus. What can you tell us about current plans to achieve the university’s carbon neutrality goal, which aims to achieve net-zero emissions by 2025 and how can students get involved? What can be done on campus to increase student and staff awareness about helping us reach sustainability goals?
May: Another good question. In 2023, all of the UC campuses, including UC Davis, transitioned toward pursuing more ambitious emissions goals. Currently, the new UC system-wide goal articulated in our UC Policy on Sustainable Practices is to achieve 90% reduction in total emissions by no later than 2045. We’ve been a leader in this area for many years. In 2020, UC Davis prioritized direct reductions in greenhouse gas emissions by investing in infrastructure that reduces our campus greenhouse gas emissions while immediately increasing our energy and water use. You might be familiar with our massive multi-phase project, which we call the “Big Shift,” and that replaces the campus’ natural gas, fire and steam apparatus with a system that uses electricity to generate water instead. That project will shrink the UC Davis central power plants carbon footprint by 80%.
Campus has also worked pretty proactively to identify pathways to a fossil fuel-free campus. There actually is a plan called the Fossil Fuel-Free Pathway Plan (FFFPP) which articulates areas of campus operations that would need to transition away from fossil fuel-based energy sources to achieve a 95% reduction in greenhouse gas emissions by 2040. So, we are even more ambitious than the system-wide goal here on our campus. We encourage engagement with these plans and efforts. Student engagement has been a real critical component of many of the initiatives we are talking about. There were student participants on the FFFPP committee. Students have contributed to the development and optimization of energy systems at Davis through campus as a living-lab partnership between operations managers and project-based courses like our Path to Zero Net Energy course.
Shinnerl: You said it all. We are absolute leaders; not just here but across the country, we are used as an example. We just talked about Segundo housing, that’s going to be an all-electric and minimum LEED Gold status. It will be connected to the “Big Shift,” only using electricity and no natural gas.
The Editorial Board: As a follow up to that question, how do the university’s and administration’s partnerships with companies such as Chevron and PepsiCo reflect the UCD values such as sustainability?
May: So we had the renewal of the Pouring Rights agreement between UC Davis and PepsiCo. That upholds and advances our sustainability goals particularly, with the campus’ ability to achieve the system-wide target of phasing out single-use plastics for containers and favor recyclable materials or locally compostable alternatives. The renewed contract ensures that 80% of PepsiCo beverages will be provided in non-single-use plastic containers while the remaining products transition to metal or glass by 2030. We are still trying to behave in a consistent manner with our sustainability practices with respect to the Pouring Rights Contract (PRC). You mentioned Chevron, but I don’t believe that UC Davis has any direct contract with Chevron. The College of Engineering has several research projects that are funded by Chevron; I believe a member of the advisory board is a Chevron employee who is also an alum, but I don’t think the university has any comprehensive relationship with Chevron.
Shinnerl: We picked PepsiCo over other alternatives because they really were able to demonstrate their commitment to sustainability. 80% of our products are non-single-use plastics. They already notified us that some of the products that they thought would take until 2030 are ahead of schedule, so a couple of brands of Gatorade — did you know that Gatorade is owned by Pepsi? Anyway, they told us a couple of flavors are now available in non-plastic, so bit by bit.
The Editorial Board: The Arboretum has been in the process of being restored since late last spring, with signs indicating that the full restoration should be finished by winter 2026. Can you provide any other updates or information regarding the pending restoration?
May: The project’s construction phase is actually finishing a year early, and that never happens.
There were going to be two sessions of construction, April through November 2024 and 2025, with construction to be complete by winter 2026. However, construction across the entirety of the project was just recently completed and the waterway is being refilled even now. Since all of the construction is finished, the team is turning its attention to the restoration phase, including planting some native plants on the banks and some newly created islands. We’re also encouraging students to get involved in helping to revegetate the slopes and wetland islands. The main waterway page features a link to sign on, if students have interest.
Shinnerl: It’s perfect and we are glad to have our crown jewel back with water and turtles.
Croughan: I’ll just add: That was funded by a grant that we applied for from the state of California and it’s the second waterway project we did. So the first was further up Putah Creek and then now through the campus. So it’s all completed, and it’s back to a much more natural environment for the creek and for Stafford Lake, rather than concrete, which is what was below the water before.
The Editorial Board: ChatGPT is one of several AI tools that has increased in usage, with many students using the platform for coursework assistance. Many teachers have been updating the class syllabus to indicate the terms of the usage, but it still remains unclear what the definitive lines are. Do you have any suggestions on how professors can better address the usage guidelines?
May: As you know, this is a very rapidly evolving space internationally. Some tools used for some time by students without AI components have now shifted to embed AI tools within their platforms. This can make drafting guidelines a much more complex process than it has been in the past. Last fall, I created an AI Council, co-chaired by the Academic Senate chair and the vice chancellor for research, which will help us develop principles and governance structures for appropriate use of AI on campus. We’ll also be doing sort of an inventory of what AI exists and is being developed on campus because there are dozens of projects, maybe hundreds, around campus that we just need to get a handle on what’s going on.
We also have a number of resources online related to AI in the classroom that are designed for instructional use. The system-wide Academic Center has convened a work group on AI to examine risks and opportunities for instruction and research, intellectual property, admissions, academic integrity and all other topics under faculty purview. Once that review is complete, the Academic Council and related committees will consider issuing advice and identify resources for faculty. Now on campus, a specific area of concern is academic honesty. The Office of Student and Judicial Affairs and the Academic Senate are working on ways to help faculty communicate with students as the community navigates this changing environment. The instruction work group at the AI Council is also hard at work on this, researching and making recommendations for resources on campus that will aid and clarify this space. We’ll be communicating more about this as information becomes available.
The Editorial Board: Jumping off that, besides any written guidelines explaining the usage, does the administration have any particular sense of how AI is affecting the UC Davis curriculum and whether it’s doing more harm than good?
May: I don’t think there is an administrative position on this, per say. I think AI is going to be an important tool for students and for faculty going forward. Many departments across campus are integrating machine learning, large language models and generative AI courses. This is kind of happening on its own, whether we do anything or not. My personal point of view is that it’s something that’s here to stay, and we should make good use of it to improve how we do things, both in pedagogy and in operations around the campus. So I’m not an alarmist with respect to AI at all. Anything can have benefits or detriments, right? But I think if we are smart about how we use and implement AI, it can be a very strong benefit to the campus.
Croughan: I’ll just add to that. I think the last statement is where I stand as a provost. If you use it, make sure you double check and that you verify with other resources. So Ari Kelman, in his history course, did a beautiful job over the last couple years showing how you’d get an F if you used AI to answer one of his final exam questions. I think last year, it went to a D or a C. It’s sort of a B-minus now. So, AI is improving, but it is not accurate. That’s where I have a fear, that students will think they got the right answer. It’s sort of like going to the wrong internet site. You might get garbage, and garbage in makes garbage out. So just don’t rely on it, would be my advice.
Reguerín: I’ll add a little bit. With OSSJA (Office of Student Support and Judicial Affairs), we have someone who’s become an expert, Marilyn Derby, and we’re trying to follow the changing technology, different practices and trends. We’re talking with other UC campuses and so I would say we’ve made a real concerted effort to be thoughtful, to be adaptable and nimble as things change and then looking at our processes as well: how you get assignments, whether you know if you can test it and looking at all the pieces together. We know these situations bring a lot of stress on students and faculty. So, we’ve designated her as an expert within the office, but we’re all trying to learn.
The Editorial Board: The Pantry has recently changed locations and format. What has been the feedback on the new structure? How much weight did the administration have in the location switch? Does The Pantry plan on opening its services to community members who aren’t students?
May: The Pantry will continue to focus primarily on students for now. The Davis community has access to other resources like the Yolo Food Bank and Sacramento Food Bank, so we think our proper focus for The Pantry is our students. We’ve heard some feedback about the move. It’s been mixed, but much of it’s been positive. There has been some constructive criticism about long lines. One point to consider there is that we have to comply with the fire code, and that only allows a maximum of 10 patrons at one time in the space. That can be a problem during the busiest hours. We have a lot more freezer and refrigerator space, so we can order a lot more goods to store. That means The Pantry stock can be depleted just as quickly. We have a checkout system with an item-sorting table that people have seemed to enjoy. Both ASUCD and The Pantry Unit Directors have worked on this for a while. We dedicated the new space just a month or so ago, and it was the decision of those student directors to make the move.
Reguerín: I think the key thing, too, is that it’s more of a shopping experience; so you can do your pre-order, and that’s always appreciated so they can get your materials ready. I think one of the big conceptual pieces with the shift was to try to address stigmas and trend normalizing, like a shopping experience. Everybody goes to the market and has more of an experience like that, versus just waiting in line. That issue isn’t completely solved, but it’s more the experience of going through it: It’s appealing to someone who may be really comfortable and understands it’s part of their experience or someone else who might be trying it out for the first time. We wanted to make it accessible. And then, of course, trying to fight any negative associations, stigmas or shame — those types of things that can produce a lot of stress — to make it just an experience that anybody can go through.
The Editorial Board: Academic Advising is a vital resource for students planning their course load for the upcoming quarter, receiving academic advice and guidance and graduating on time. For certain majors, there can be an extended wait time to find an Academic Advising appointment. Are there plans to hire more staff and provide more resources for students who may be experiencing these delays?
May: I’m glad you asked that question. As a result of a lot of work done by the Task Force, which we call Student Success and Equitable Outcomes, we’ve participated in an investment of $2.8 million in Academic Advising. This will result in 24 new advisors over the summer and earlier this quarter. We’ve also created a new advising executive work group which features a college dean, vice provost for enrollment management, director of institutional analysis, vice chancellor for Student Affairs and faculty advisor to the provost and chancellor are on that executive work group.
Reguerín: I also want to mention that our dean of undergraduate education is in that workforce as well. We’re trying to look at the systems and how we collaborate. So if we all look at our part, let’s say within Student Affairs and the academic retention issues, I’m just looking at that part. That’s one thing, but students’ experiences are both in the colleges and they’re in undergraduate education. We’re coming together to really look at the student’s journey through different advising mechanisms. Also, within the colleges they’re organized differently. So looking at the systems and policies, if there are any, that are barriers because they’re governed in different ways. Some are through the Academic Senate, some are through the deans. I really describe this team as trying to build the coherence for the campus overall in terms of how we look at it and shift away from looking at only your part individually, because students’ experiences and challenges and successes never start and end in one part of the organization — they flow across. It’s really that shift, and Mary charged our work group to really think about how to work collaboratively and then focused on student success, building on the talents and gifts that students bring. So, we deal with a variety of different issues.
Kelman: I think the last thing I would say is that 24 new advisors is terrific, and it’s going to be extraordinarily helpful to build capacity in the advising community in that way. The goal is to try and alleviate backlog at critical moments. That’s not to say that there won’t still be times where there’s a wait to get in to see an advisor, but the idea is to try and make those waits as short as they can be, particularly at those stressful moments in the quarter when people need support, when students need to get in to see someone. So it’s a big investment that came both at the level of the central campus, but also the colleges and Student Affairs. The Undergraduate Education Division made investments as well. It’s an example of the university community coming together to try and meet a critical need.
Croughan: One thing we identified in this process was problems with the software we were using around degree progress. Two of my own kids graduated from Davis recently. You could walk in and get one answer from an advisor in the morning and get a different answer in the afternoon, but that was not the function of bad advising, that was the function of bad software. So, we’re replacing that software with something called uAchieve. We’re in the process of doing all the development work right now. uAchieve will enable the student and the advisor to both have access to all the data, so you will know exactly where you stand in your degree progress. In other words, what courses you have left to take and what components you have fulfilled. It’ll give you the ability to search and say, “Well, I’ve already completed my human development major and my public health minor. Looks like I can get a psychology minor too, if I just take two more classes.” We’ve never had that capability and we will now, so you’ll know exactly where you stand. Your advisor will have the same information as well. I think people have to spend less time trying to get that information, because they’ll have access to it at home, and the advisors will have accurate information to help you.
The Editorial Board: Student safety is a primary concern when it comes to college campuses. Aside from Safe Ride and other services, UC Davis has 26 emergency call boxes stationed around campus. How does the university ensure that these call boxes are in working order, and are there any plans to add additional call boxes?
May: By August 2025, we’ll have seven new call boxes. Locations are listed on the Design and Construction Management page under Security Progress. That page also includes information on campus safety efforts, including outdoor security cameras, lighting improvements and Aggie access. In terms of our maintenance of call boxes, all of them are checked monthly by our Aggie Host security officers. Tools in the phone system are maintained by information and educational technology or IT. They provide real time connectivity alerts, tools within the security cameras and software also identify real time security camera issues. There’s lots of ongoing checking and maintenance of the equipment.
Shinnerl: I mean, a lot of this is feedback from students. We do what we call “lighting walks” every winter, one coming up in January, and we focus not only on lights but also on all the call boxes and feedback from students on where we should add call boxes. So, we’ve been really working diligently on that. There’s a whole map where you can see where they are and where they’re planned to be.
The Editorial Board: As a prominent STEM school, UC Davis has made an effort to promote research opportunities for students within scientific fields of study. How is UC Davis promoting undergraduate research opportunities for students in non-STEM fields?
May: We appreciate that we are renowned for our strength in STEM, but we are equally committed to fostering research and educational opportunities across all disciplines — including arts, humanities and social sciences. You may have seen or heard about the gift from Maria Manetti Shrem for our arts program, $20 million for the Maria Manetti Shrem for the Arts Renaissance, earlier this year. That gift will fund endowments for arts and design, including three new faculty chairs in the College of Letters and Science. It’s the largest-ever gift to that college, and largest in the history of UC Davis with respect to art. We also have our Undergraduate Research Scholarship and Creative Activities Conference, which showcases research from undergraduates across all disciplines. There’s a strong representation at that event in non-STEM fields like English, political science and art. It gives a platform for students to present their research and creative work to a broader audience, and they gain valuable communication skills and feedback from their peers and from faculty. We also encourage faculty across all disciplines to support undergraduate research. Faculty in the non-STEM fields often supervise students on these projects, including thesis work, and independent studies help students develop their critical thinking skills and creative inquiry skills. The Undergraduate Research Center provides resources to those faculty and students as well. Maybe I’ll stop and let one of our non-STEM faculty make a comment or two.
Kelman: A couple of things I would say. One is that doing research for undergraduates in a discipline like mine, in history, looks a little bit different than it does in STEM fields, and it can be harder to find it. The chancellor already mentioned that the history department has a capstone for all students. They all take undergraduate seminars before they graduate, and they do research in those seminars, then we, of course, have opportunities for students to work with faculty. I want to pivot though and say that we had a meeting yesterday in which the Provost reiterated one of the chancellor and provost’s long-standing priorities, which is exactly this. And the provost asked me, her chief of staff and the dean and vice provost of undergraduate education, Michael Bradford, to come up with a comprehensive list of all of the research opportunities that exist on the campus for undergraduates.
So, we are a little bit overwhelmed by this but we are going to begin doing this, and that means doing outreach to all of the department chairs of every academic unit across the campus that has undergraduate programming and finding out where these opportunities are. Part of the issue right now, again, that both the chancellor and the provost believe is really a very high priority, is that students don’t know what’s available because we don’t know what’s available. We know there’s a lot of undergraduate research that’s happening, in my home department of history, but it’s not readily available, so it’s not legible for undergraduates. They don’t know that it’s there. They don’t know that they can come to the History Department or the Department of Sociology. Again, we’re talking about non-STEM with this question. They don’t know that they can go to these departments and say, “Oh, that looks interesting. I’d like to take part in that. How do I get involved?” There isn’t that kind of a catalog, but there will be soon.
Croughan: Can I just add to that? After that meeting where I charged them with that very daunting task, it turns out that this year we had our second Undergraduate Research Fair, which is different than the conference. The conference we’ve had for quite a while, and that’s the end result of research, but the research fair is having faculty show up tabling and students can come and talk to them about what the opportunities in that department or field are. We just had the second one of those fairs, and I think that’ll be another way for students to learn more.
The Editorial Board: Given that we are a tier-one research university, what areas of UC Davis research do you find to be particularly promising?
May: I’ll just say, we have a billion dollars’ worth of research on our campus, and it would be really hard to answer that question because there are lots of really exciting things going on. I’ll just give three quick examples. You may have seen the national coverage of the UC Davis Coffee Center on the Today Show. We’re really excited about that program and the research that they’re doing on something that you would think was sort of a mundane, everyday thing like coffee, but there’s a lot of active work on how to make the coffee not just taste better but to grow the beans sustainably, to make the process efficient, etc.
UC Davis Health has a really exciting, ongoing project to essentially cure Spina bifida with stem cells. There’s a nice video that you can see where there’s a relationship between dogs and humans that have Spina bifida; Injecting stem cells into a fetus can correct some of those problems. We have a nice video that shows a bulldog and a human baby that both got the same treatment and both were able to walk now and no longer suffer from spinal deficiency. That also made the national news.
Lastly, there’s a project on non-hallucinogenic psychedelics to improve brain function and symptoms of mental disorders like depression and PTSD. We have a center for alternative meat and protein, iCAMP (Integrative Center for Alternative Meat and Protein), which is looking at transformative knowledge and innovation around the commercialization of alternative proteins. I could go on and on and on, right? There are so many exciting things happening here, and we’re really proud of our research that we do that improves people’s lives.
Written by: The Editorial Board
