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The California Master Plan for Higher Education of 1960 was developed by a survey team appointed by the
Regents of the University of California The Regents of the University of California (also referred to as the Board of Regents to distinguish the board from the corporation it governs of the same name) is the governing board of the University of California (UC), a state university sys ...
and the
California State Board of Education The California State Board of Education is the governing and policy-making body of the California Department of Education. The State Board of Education sets K-12 education policy in the areas of standards, instructional materials, assessment, an ...
during the administration of
Governor A governor is an politician, administrative leader and head of a polity or Region#Political regions, political region, in some cases, such as governor-general, governors-general, as the head of a state's official representative. Depending on the ...
Pat Brown Edmund Gerald "Pat" Brown (April 21, 1905 – February 16, 1996) was an American lawyer and politician who served as the 32nd governor of California from 1959 to 1967. His first elected office was as district attorney for San Francisco, and he ...
. UC president
Clark Kerr Clark Kerr (May 17, 1911 – December 1, 2003) was an American economist and academic administrator. He was the first chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley, and twelfth president of the University of California. Early life and ...
was a key figure in its development. The plan set up a coherent system for public postsecondary education which defined specific roles for the already-existing
University of California The University of California (UC) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university, research university system in the U.S. state of California. Headquartered in Oakland, California, Oakland, the system is co ...
(UC), the state colleges which were joined together by the plan into the State College System of California and later renamed the
California State University The California State University (Cal State or CSU) is a Public university, public university system in California, and the List of largest universities and university networks by enrollment, largest public university system in the United States ...
(CSU), and the junior colleges which were later organized in 1967 into the
California Community Colleges The California Community Colleges is a postsecondary education system in the U.S. state of California.California Education CodSection 70900(added to the Education Code by Chapter 973 of the California Statutes of 1988Assembly Bill No. 1725 secti ...
system. The statutory framework implementing the plan was signed into law as the Donahoe Higher Education Act (honoring Assemblywoman Dorothy M. Donahoe, one of the plan's foremost advocates) by Brown on April 27, 1960.


History

Prior to the Master Plan's development in the 1960s, California struggled for many years to reform and improve its social institutions. In response to the powerful railroad monopolies' stranglehold on state business and politics at the turn of the 20th century, new Progressive reformers attempted to overthrow the economic and political corruption then prevailing in the state at the time. They hoped to create new institutions infused with public morality and purpose. However, in the early years of California's modern development the population had remained largely mobile, moving from opportunity to opportunity, making it almost impossible for the state to create permanent public schools that could effectively educate children from start to finish. Furthermore, California progressives encountered obstacles in the form of people who thought that education should remain the work of local and religious groups, as well as being opposed to paying taxes for social purposes. Another barrier that they needed to circumvent was the issue of appropriating land and money for universities. The 1st and 2nd Organic Acts (of 1866 and 1868, respectively) helped by first introducing the possibility of a state secular higher education institution and second, actually authorizing the creation of a state university controlled by a Board of Regents (which would become the University of California). In the 1950s, the state's legislators and academic administrators foresaw an approaching surge in university enrollment, due to the
baby boom A baby boom is a period marked by a significant increase of births. This demography, demographic phenomenon is usually an ascribed characteristic within the population of a specific nationality, nation or culture. Baby booms are caused by various ...
children coming of age. They needed a plan to be able to maintain educational quality in the face of growing demand. The underlying principles that they sought were: * That some form of higher education ought to be available to all regardless of their economic means, and that academic progress should be limited only by individual proficiency; and * differentiation of function so that each of the three systems would strive for excellence in different areas, so as to not waste public resources on duplicate efforts.University of California (2009)
California Master Plan for Higher Education - Major Features
. Office of the President. Retrieved: 2014-04-19.
The original Master Plan was approved by the Regents and the State Board of Education and submitted to the Legislature in February 1960. In April of that year, the California Legislature passed the Donahoe Higher Education Act, which implemented several components of the plan as statutory law. However, California's Master Plan is more than a single statute. The 1960 Master Plan is embodied in several documents: # A study completed by the Master Plan Survey Team approved by the State Board of Education and the UC Board of Regents # The Donahoe Higher Education Act giving legal force to several key components of the plan # A constitutional amendment which established the Trustees of the California State Colleges (renamed the California State University in 1974).


Purpose

Kerr stated that the goal of the Master Plan was to balance the "competing demands of fostering excellence and guaranteeing educational access for all." The Master Plan achieved the following: * It created a system that combined exceptional quality with broad access for students. * It transformed a collection of uncoordinated and competing colleges and universities into a coherent system. * It established a broad framework for higher education that encourages each of the three public higher education segments to concentrate on creating its own kind of excellence within its own particular set of responsibilities. * And it acknowledged the vital role of the independent colleges and universities, envisioning higher education in California as a single continuum of educational opportunity, from small private colleges to large public universities. According to the plan, the top one-eighth (12.5%) of graduating high school seniors would be guaranteed a place at a campus of the University of California tuition-free. The top one-third (33.3%) would be able to enter the California State University system. Junior colleges (later renamed "community colleges" in 1967) would accept any students "capable of benefiting from instruction." These percentages are now enforced by sliding scales equating
grade point average Grading in education is the application of standardized Measurement, measurements to evaluate different levels of student achievement in a course. Grades can be expressed as letters (usually A to F), as a range (for example, 1 to 6), percentage ...
and scores on the
SAT The SAT ( ) is a standardized test widely used for college admissions in the United States. Since its debut in 1926, its name and Test score, scoring have changed several times. For much of its history, it was called the Scholastic Aptitude Test ...
or ACT, which are recalculated every year. No actual ranking of students in high schools is used as many schools do not rank students. Graduates of the junior colleges would be guaranteed the right to transfer to the UC or CSU systems in order to complete bachelor's degrees. This practice was carried over from previous years before the plan was enacted; graduates from the junior colleges had traditionally been accepted as upper-division transfer students at the state colleges or UC campuses by virtue of their prior coursework. Finally, the plan established that the University of California would be the sole portion of the system charged with performing research, and would award master's and doctoral degrees in support of that mission. The Cal State system, in addition to awarding master's degrees, would be able to award joint doctorates with the UC. The "California Idea"—California's tripartite system of public research universities, comprehensive 4-year undergraduate campuses, and open-access community colleges—has been highly influential, and many other states and even nations have imitated this structure. However, California higher education has had a poor record of college completion and four-year baccalaureate degree attainment. Subgroups such as Latinos and African Americans (whose demographics are large and growing) show even worsening statistics of degree attainment.


Effects

The Master Plan meant that essentially, "anyone from anywhere in California could, if they worked hard enough, get a bachelor’s degree from one of the best universities in the country (and, therefore, in the world), almost free of charge." The plan increased overall efficiency in the higher education system, as well as produced greater number of graduates at a lower per-student cost by removing redundancies. This was accomplished by clearly specifying the missions of each system segment, in addition to clarifying what "territory" belonged to each institution. The plan established a "rational" planning process for the growth of the university systems. This displaced the state legislature's past tendency to introduce bills to establish new four-year universities in members' home districts, a kind of political pork. In his memoirs, Kerr highlighted the 1957 creation of
California State University, Stanislaus California State University, Stanislaus (Stanislaus State, Stan State) is a public university in Turlock, California, United States. It is part of the California State University system. It was established in 1957 and offers 45 bachelor's deg ...
, as a particularly egregious example of this tendency. The plan was inspired in part by Kerr's pragmatic realization that not all institutions of higher education can or should become
research universities A research university or a research-intensive university is a university that is committed to research as a central part of its mission. They are "the key sites of knowledge production", along with "intergenerational knowledge transfer and the ...
. As Kerr explained in his memoirs: "The state did not need a higher education system where every component was intent on being another
Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. Founded in 1636 and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher lear ...
or
Berkeley Berkeley most often refers to: *Berkeley, California, a city in the United States **University of California, Berkeley, a public university in Berkeley, California *George Berkeley (1685–1753), Anglo-Irish philosopher Berkeley may also refer to ...
or
Stanford Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University, is a private research university in Stanford, California, United States. It was founded in 1885 by railroad magnate Leland Stanford (the eighth governor of and th ...
." Faculty members at state colleges regarded them as "graveyards of disappointed expectations" and wished they were located at the research universities from which they had obtained their doctoral degrees. Therefore, the plan was intended to concentrate state resources at the top, rather than spreading them too thin among far too many would-be research universities. Most other states were unable to restrain the ambitions of their various colleges and universities to become research universities and suffered from "a proliferation of doctoral and costly research programs". For example, Texas promoted too many colleges to university status during the 20th century, with the result that by 2009, only three of the state's universities had achieved the prestigious R1 classification assigned by the
Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education The Carnegie Classification of Institutions of Higher Education, or simply the Carnegie Classification, is a framework for classifying colleges and universities in the United States. It was created in 1970 by the Carnegie Foundation for the Ad ...
to the most advanced American research universities. It was only in 2009 that Texas belatedly enacted House Bill 51 to specifically promote the development of nationally competitive research universities. By 2019, six more Texas universities had reached the R1 classification. In 2025, Texas surpassed California for the first time in terms of the number of R1 universities, with a total of 16 in contrast to only 14 in California. By setting "rigid" boundaries for each segment of public higher education, the plan ensured the continued availability of a wide range of educational options for the types of students to be served by each segment. In contrast,
mission creep Mission creep is the gradual or incremental expansion of an intervention, project or mission, beyond its original scope, focus or goals, a ratchet effect spawned by initial success. Mission creep is usually considered undesirable due to how each ...
continues to be a serious problem in several other states which failed to impose and effectively enforce such boundaries. For example, as of January 2021, the U.S. Department of Education no longer recognized the
Nevada System of Higher Education The Nevada System of Higher Education (NSHE, formerly the University and Community College System of Nevada or UCCSN) is a state government unit in Nevada that oversees its public system of colleges and universities. It was formed in 1968 to overs ...
as having ''any'' public community colleges under federal standards, after Nevada allowed its purported community colleges to create too many four-year programs during the 2010s and thereby allowed them to deviate too far from the traditional community college role. The result was that as of 2021, Nevada could not provide its workforce with enough technicians who traditionally earn two-year associate degrees at community colleges, and needed to import them from adjacent states like Arizona and California which still have actual community colleges. The plan was the basis for a substantial surge in development in California higher education. Today, many credit the California universities for the place the state holds in the world economy, as well as bolstering its own economic makeup with great investment in high technology areas, such as
Silicon Valley Silicon Valley is a region in Northern California that is a global center for high technology and innovation. Located in the southern part of the San Francisco Bay Area, it corresponds roughly to the geographical area of the Santa Clara Valley ...
,
biotechnology Biotechnology is a multidisciplinary field that involves the integration of natural sciences and Engineering Science, engineering sciences in order to achieve the application of organisms and parts thereof for products and services. Specialists ...
, and
pharmaceuticals Medication (also called medicament, medicine, pharmaceutical drug, medicinal product, medicinal drug or simply drug) is a drug used to diagnose, cure, treat, or prevent disease. Drug therapy ( pharmacotherapy) is an important part of the ...
. The plan has contributed to the massive economic contributions that the UC, CSU, and CCC systems have had to the state and its growth. According to a study by the Regents of California, the UC system is directly responsible for adding about $32.8 billion to the gross state product, which is about 1.8 percent of the total GSP, a key indicator of economic performance.


Subsequent changes

In 1972, a review of the plan found that the basic structure was good, but that it should be changed slightly to accommodate the ideas of the time. For example, the review board suggested that weekend and evening programs should be expanded to serve “non-traditional” students, and that the plan should take advantage of then-new technologies such as
educational television Educational television or learning television is the use of television programs in the field of distance education. It may be in the form of individual television programs or dedicated specialty channels that are often associated with cable televi ...
.Boilard, Steve. "The Master Plan at 50: Assessing California’s Vision for Higher Education."Lao.ca.gov.Legislative Analyst's Office, 12 Nov. 2009. Web. 01 Mar. 2014. . In 1978,
Proposition 13 Proposition 13 (officially named the People's Initiative to Limit Property Taxation) is an amendment of the Constitution of California enacted during 1978, by means of the initiative process, to cap property taxes and limit property reassessmen ...
, the People's Initiative to Limit Property Taxation, was enacted, causing free public education to be eliminated. (Since tuition was still banned by the Donahoe Act, per-unit enrollment fees were charged instead.) The 1987 revision specifically recognized the contributions of the independent sector (i.e., private and nonprofit institutions) and made explicit provision to include the independent sector in the planning functions of the state's higher education system. It also established a policy to set the maximum award for Cal Grants in state law. In 2005, the demand for high school and community college administrators brought about a widely debated exception to the existing differentiation of function between the CSU and UC systems. The awarding of doctoral degrees had originally been exclusive to the UC system, with the provision that the California State Universities could offer PhD degrees as "joint" degrees in combination with the University of California or an accredited private university. Under the provisions of SB 724, signed into law September 22, 2005, the campuses of the California State University were then able to directly offer a
Doctor of Education Doctor, Doctors, The Doctor or The Doctors may refer to: Titles and occupations * Physician, a medical practitioner * Doctor (title), an academic title for the holder of a doctoral-level degree ** Doctorate ** List of doctoral degrees awarded ...
degree (Ed.D) "focused on preparing administrative leaders". It was argued that this fulfilled the original purpose of many of the CSU campuses, which had been founded as
normal schools Normal(s) or The Normal(s) may refer to: Film and television * ''Normal'' (2003 film), starring Jessica Lange and Tom Wilkinson * ''Normal'' (2007 film), starring Carrie-Anne Moss, Kevin Zegers, Callum Keith Rennie, and Andrew Airlie * ''Norma ...
to train teachers. In 2010, the CSU was also given the authority to exclusively offer two more doctoral degrees: the
Doctorate in Nursing The Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) is a professional degree in nursing in the United States of America. In the United States, the DNP is one of three doctoral degrees in nursing, the other two being the research degree PhD and the Doctor of ...
(DNP) and
Doctor of Physical Therapy A Doctor of Physical Therapy or Doctor of Physiotherapy (DPT) degree is a qualifying degree in physical therapy. In the United States, it is considered a graduate-level first professional degree or doctorate degree for professional practice. In the ...
(DPT). When the Master Plan was first founded in 1960, post-secondary education enrollments were equally divided among 2-year and 4-year institutions. However, in 2010, due to a lack of funding, the framers of the Master Plan limited eligibility admission to UC and CSU. The cost-cutting move diverted a large number of students to 2-year institutions, which would still allow them to finish their lower division work and then transfer to a 4-year institution.


See also

*
California Postsecondary Education Commission The California Postsecondary Education Commission (CPEC) was the higher education planning and coordinating agency from 1974 to 2011 under the government of California. History The 1960 California Master Plan for Higher Education recognized ...
*
California State University The California State University (Cal State or CSU) is a Public university, public university system in California, and the List of largest universities and university networks by enrollment, largest public university system in the United States ...
*
University of California The University of California (UC) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university, research university system in the U.S. state of California. Headquartered in Oakland, California, Oakland, the system is co ...
*
California Community Colleges The California Community Colleges is a postsecondary education system in the U.S. state of California.California Education CodSection 70900(added to the Education Code by Chapter 973 of the California Statutes of 1988Assembly Bill No. 1725 secti ...
*
List of colleges and universities in California This is a list of colleges and universities in California. Federal institutions Graduate institutions * Naval Postgraduate School ( Monterey) Other academic institutions * Defense Language Institute ( Monterey) State institutions Two-yea ...


Notes


References


Further reading

* Atkinson, Richard; Geiser, Saul. "Beyond the Master Plan:The Case for Restructuring Baccalaureate Education in California." Center for Studies in Higher Education, 2010. * Douglass, John Aubrey.
The California Idea and American Higher Education
'' Stanford University press, 2000. * González, Cristina. ''Clark Kerr's University of California: Leadership, Diversity, and Planning in Higher Education''. Transaction Publishers, 2011. * Higgins, Andrew Stone.
Higher Education for All: Racial Inequality, Cold War Liberalism, and the California Master Plan
'. University of North Carolina Press, 2023.

(2005) ''The Life and Times of Pat Brown — California Rising'' (Ch. 7) Berkeley, CA: University of California Press


External links


"The History of the California Master Plan for Higher Education," Center for Studies in Higher Education at UC Berkeley with links to relevant documents and legislation

University of California Master Plan website with copies of many relevant documents


* ttp://www.berkeley.edu/news/media/releases/2003/12/03_master.shtml ''Clark Kerr's legacy: 1960 Master Plan transformed higher education'', UC Berkeley public relations office
The CSU Public Affairs Photo Collection on the Online Archive of California
— encompasses photographic material from the late 19th century to the early 1990s and collection finding aid provides history of CSU within Master Plan.
The History and Future of the California Master Plan for Higher Education
*


''The Dream is Over: The Crisis of Clark Kerr’s California Idea of Higher Education'' by Simon Marginson

SB 724 as chaptered in 2005
{{DEFAULTSORT:California Master Plan For Higher Education M M M Education policy in the United States