Gift to create UCI position

An anonymous donor has given UC Irvine $2.5 million to create a

faculty position in the department of mathematics. The new

professorship will help fulfill Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger’s pledge

to increase the number of science and math teachers in California’s

public schools.

The gift, made through the California Community Foundation, is the

largest ever given to UCI to establish an endowed chair -- an

academic office funded by an outside source. UCI officials said that

the campus plans to start advertising for the position in the coming

weeks and hopes to have it filled by summer of 2006.

The role of the new chair will be to help train undergraduates who

want to pursue careers in K-12 education. Under Schwarzenegger’s

California Teach program, which the governor announced in May,

University of California undergraduates may earn both a bachelor’s

degree and a teaching credential in four years. The program also

extends to the California State University system.

UCI, along with the other campuses statewide, will begin rolling

out the program in phases later this year.

“This initiative is a revolution among research universities,”

said Ronald Stern, dean of the UCI School of Physical Sciences, which

oversees the math department. “To have research universities assume

responsibility for the training of K-12 teachers is a big deal, and

this chair will certainly assist us in taking a leadership role in

the production of science and math teachers.”

In the next five years, the University of California hopes to

quadruple its annual production of science and math teachers.

Schwarzenegger launched the statewide program in response to recent

statistics from the National Science Foundation, which placed

California’s eighth-graders last in the country in sciences and

seventh from last in math.

Among the measures that the UC system plans to undertake are

teaching internships and classroom visits for science and math

majors. Much of the funding for California Teach comes from the state

and several corporate sponsors, but the anonymous donation covers a

specific enhancement.

“We were ecstatic,” said Sherry Main, associate director of

communications for the School of Physical Sciences, with regard to

the gift. “It’s the largest donation for a ... [chair] on the campus

of UCI, so we thought that was cutting edge, especially for math.

They’ve been ranked pretty highly in U.S. News and World Report

recently.”

Stern said the university was seeking a prestigious candidate for

the job.

“We’re hoping to have someone identified a year from now,” he

said. “We’re looking for an internationally known figure, so that

might take us two years, but we’re hoping to get it done in one

year.”

Even before Schwarzenegger launched the California Teach

initiative in May, UCI had already taken steps to turn out more

credentialed math and science instructors. Three years ago, the

university obtained a grant from the National Science Foundation to

offer preparatory courses and apprenticeships for prospective

teachers. The university also has contracts with three school

districts -- Newport-Mesa, Compton and Santa Ana -- to mentor

existing K-12 programs.

According to Sue Marshall, UCI’s academic coordinator for

education, the campus’ production of credentialed math and science

teachers has increased since it received the National Science

Foundation grant. Last year, the campus graduated 26 students who

planned to teach math and science in K-12 schools, while the totals

for the last three years were 18, 31 and 30, respectively.