California Campus: Springboard or dumping ground?

I came across this provocative article this morning in the LA Times on the University of California at Riverside. (Read it here.) The school is part of the state's vast system of higher learning and attracts a majority of minority students, several of whom express gratitude for being there, enjoying both the diversity and ability to advance their education amongst folks from their own identity group. UC Riverside has the highest percentage of African Americans and, except for the new, much smaller Merced campus, largest enrollment of Latinos in the system.

UC Riverside offers success-supporting perks such as financial aid packages, race-based programs, and "bridge [remedial] classes" for incoming students in need of help in Math and English.

UC Riverside's chancellor is a Latina, France A. Cordova, the first in the California system.

Some claim, though, that with the prestigious UCLA and UC Berkeley white and Asian bloated, the system is merely using UC Riverside as a dumping ground.

Chomsky augurs a bright future for the Americas

MIT professor and the dean of critics of US foreign policy, Noam Chomsky, has apparently forgiven Venezuelan president, Hugo Chavez, for pronouncing him dead. Chavez promoted his book, Hegemony or Survival: America's Quest for Global Dominance, a few months back, saying he regretted not having met the distinguished septuagenarian professor before he died. Not only did sales of the book skyrocket after the plug, but Chomsky has come out with a provocative and cogent op-ed in the International Herald Tribune, using the occasion of the death of US-backed former Chilean dictator, Agusto Pinochet, to grace a new era in Latin American development and integration led by Chavez and Latin America's emerging crop of leaders. Following Chavez and his neo-socialist Bolivarian reforms is the more measured (Luiz Iñacio) Lula (da Silva) in Brazil; Nestor Kirchner in Argentina; Evo Morales, first indigenous head of state in overwhelmingly indigenous Bolivia; Michelle Bachelet, detained under Pinochet and whose father was martyred by the regime; Tabaré Vasquez of Uruguay; Rafael Correa, just inaugurated in Ecuador; and the old thorn in the US's side, Daniel Ortega, recently reinstalled as president of Nicaragua after 16 years on the sidelines. And how can we forget President Fidel Castro and the failing leader's proxies in Havana, not merely a thorn, but the bane of many administrations' existence for over 40 years?
Chomsky writes eloquently and succinctly of his shared vision for an "alternative future [overcoming] a legacy of empire and terror."
Enjoy, reflect, react; let us know what you think:
South America: Toward an alternative future