The UC Regents Public Engagement and Development Committee discussed government funding and alumni advocacy at their meeting Wednesday.

During the meeting, the committee – which discusses fundraising and advocacy for the UC towards elected officials – announced funding received from Governor Gavin Newsom’s annual budget and heard presentations about funding for Black student centers. Former chairs and vice-chairs of the Alumni Associations of the University of California, who serve as ex officio regents, also gave presentations on the role alumni can have in supporting the UC.

The regents also heard from artificial intelligence experts.

[Related: UC Regents committee evaluates implications of AI in health care]

Meredith Turner, the interim senior vice president of external relations and communications for the UC Office of the President, said University lobbying has led to a $130 million increase to the University’s base budget, but acknowledged that the budget could fall next year. Regent Jay Sures said the regents were grateful that previously expected cuts to the University’s budget this year did not materialize.

During his opening remarks, Sures added that government-funded collaboration with Native American communities has also been an important part of implementing the University’s climate resilience plan.

“In 2022 and ’23 the State of California allocated $100 million to the University of California to fund research grants supporting climate change resilience in communities across the state,” he said. “Three of the California Climate Action seed grant funded research projects are establishing collaborations between academic institutions and tribal nations here in California to support climate change resilience through tribal resource management.”

However, there are also concerns in the higher education community about potential Congressional cuts to federal funding, Turner added.

Chely Saens, a rising fourth-year cognitive science and international relations student at UC Davis, said during the meeting that funding should prioritize students from underprivileged backgrounds. She added that the University does not sufficiently fund Black student resource centers and resources for first-generation and low-income students like her.

Saens also called on alumni to fund increased outreach to international undergraduate applicants from Africa and for the regents to support the measure.

“Our black student unions, student outreach centers and student retention centers, these areas are severely underfunded,” she said. “I just wanted to echo the importance of expanding the alumni network, and this means recruiting underrepresented students and allowing them to thrive in the UC system.”

Regents also heard a presentation on alumni advocacy.

Alumni Regent-emeritus Keith Ellis said the Alumni Associations of the University of California supports 2 million UC alumni living in California. However, until recently, the associations have not focused on advocacy for the University as a whole – instead focusing on each of their own specific campus needs, he added.

“Prior to the pandemic, it (AAUC) really didn’t have much of a purpose other than providing a forum for collaboration among the associations and sharing best practices,” he said.

Alumni Regent-emeritus Joel Raznick said one of the ways alumni have increased their advocacy for the University has been by selecting an “issue of the year,” a lobbying priority for the alumni. Ellis added that the Alumni Associations Board also published a new toolkit to help alumni advocate for the UC towards elected officials.

Currently, 33% of California’s congressional delegation, 31% of state assembly members and 35% of state senators are UC alumni, according to the alumni presentation slides. Ellis said alumni now receive regular updates on state budgets from state and federal officials and have made over 50 visits to the State Capital.

Ellis added that elected officials now engage with UC alumni across all 10 campuses on a unified basis for the first time, with alumni participating in a recent UC-wide letter writing campaign.

“AAUC itself did something for the first time that it has never done before,” Ellis said. “We wrote advocacy letters both to the legislature in Sacramento and to the federal government.”