University of California

George Blumenthal

Former Director, Center for Studies in Higher Education and Chancellor Emeritus, UC Santa Cruz

George R. Blumenthal served as Director of the Center for Studies in Higher Education from 2019 until 2023. He continues his involvement with CSHE as Affiliated Faculty and as a member of the ELA Advisory Board.

Blumenthal was UC Santa Cruz's 10th chancellor. He joined the campus in 1972 as a faculty member in astronomy and astrophysics and was named chancellor on September 19, 2007, after serving as acting chancellor for 14 months.

The Blumenthal era has been marked by a commitment to ensuring that the doors of opportunity at UC Santa Cruz are open to all:

The number...

Ami Zusman

Former Coordinator of Graduate Education Planning & Analysis, University of California system, UCOP

Ami Zusman previously served as Coordinator of Graduate Education Planning and Analysis for the University of California system, where she directed graduate and professional education planning and policy, as well as student outcomes assessment. She developed long-range graduate enrollment plans for the UC system, created instruments to measure and compare graduate student success, and was the lead UC liaison for the National Research Council’s assessment of doctoral programs, among other activities. Ami also authored or was principal staff for University-wide reports on interdisciplinary...

James A. Hyatt, M.B.A.

Senior Research Associate, Vice Chancellor for Budget & Finance and CFO Emeritus, Former Associate Director, Center for Studies in Higher Education, University of California, Berkeley

James A. Hyatt is a Senior Research Associate and Principal Investigator at the Center for Studies in Higher Education. He has extensive experience both as a senior level executive at a number of the nation’s major research universities, including UC Berkeley, the University of Maryland, College Park, University of Arizona, and Virginia Tech, and as a principal investigator on externally funded research projects in the areas of higher education financial management, financial reporting, pension reform and campus safety and security. From 2008-2010 Mr. Hyatt served as the President of the...

David Bodovski

Pre-Doctoral Research Fellow at the Yale University Tobin Center

David Bodovski is a Pre-Doctoral Research Fellow working under Dr. Zachary Bleemer in the Yale School of Management. He holds a B.S. in mathematics and economics and an M.A. in economics from Penn State University. His current research includes studying the relative roles of signaling and human capital on the returns to college degrees, the effects of education on political socialization, and the impacts of unionization at universities on enrollment and student outcomes.

Laura Hamilton

Professor and Chair of Sociology at the University of California-Merced

Laura Hamilton is Professor of Sociology at the University of California, Merced, and co-founder of the Higher Education, Race, & the Economy (or HERE) Lab. Her award-winning books include: Paying for the Party: How College Maintains Inequality, Parenting to a Degree: How Family Matters for College Women’s Success, and most recently Broke: The Racial Consequences of Underfunding Public Universities. Her work examines the ways in which postsecondary organizations and higher education funding structures work to create and maintain racial and class inequities.

Major restrictions, socioeconomic stratification, and student success

April 16, 2020
Zachary Bleemer and Aashish Mehta

In this policy brief for the University of California Office of the President, Zachary Bleemer and Aashish Mehta present evidence suggesting that GPA major restrictions disproportionately impact underrepresented and lower-income students with less prior academic opportunity. It links those students to postgraduate outcomes to show that, in at least one comprehensive case study, pushed-out students are sharply prevented from achieving high wages or their preferred careers after graduation.

https://ucop.edu/institutional-research-academic-planning/_files/ug-major-restri…