Illustrations by Robbie Eich
F. King Alexander–whose seven year run as president of Cal State Long Beach comes to end this July–is a man of overt confidence.
Even though his proposed solutions to many of the problems facing California’s educational system have been met with mixed reviews by those up in Sacramento, particularly Governor Brown, Alexander stands staunchly by his own philosophies and the legacy he has left the school.
“There are issues within higher education–I agree with this since there are important issues that need to be addressed. But there are good guys and there are bad guys in all this,” Alexander told the Post, “and we really have been a good guy in not causing these problems or for the public to think poorly about higher education… I didn’t anticipate California’s abandonment of its higher education system but I think we’ve done it as good as any other campus. I think we’ve gotten through it successfully.”
Alexander’s emphasis on having already gotten through it–rather than still trudging through the difficulties–is key in his perception of confidence throughout his tenure and the idea that he is, indeed, a good guy.
The qualities that fall into that description are, for Alexander, things that he has continually fought for since former CSULB president Robert Maxson left him in a university that not only believed more in itself, but was on the on cusp of moving from a school of state significance to a national one. Inadvertently, just as CSULB was rising amongst the ranks of recognition, California hit a budget crisis that vastly affected the higher education institution–particularly the CSU and UC systems.
Vying for essential state funds, Alexander informed not just Brown but President Obama that he was baffled at how a system such as the UC, with a drastically smaller student population, could somehow be afforded the same funds as that of the CSU, a system that Alexander contends does more with less money.
“We are not the cause of the college cost crisis,” Alexander defiantly stated. “We are well below the national average. Our students are in the least amount of student debt in the country–which has become a national issue.”
In his realm of good guys versus bad, Alexander notes that the bad players consist of private universities exhausting public funds, tuition rates that are financially unsound for any normal student to ethically invest in, and a system that fails to award schools that provide the highest output of success with the least amount of resources.
Alexander reinforces this point with the idea of Governor Brown’s measure of a university’s success through a four-year graduation rate–something that, even though CSULB doesn’t achieve on a drastically high level, it can still show success through its post-graduation job and income rates. Still, he emphasizes that a degree “will not determine your first job as much as it will determine your second and third.”
“You can argue whether it’s wrong or right until you suffocate,” Alexander says, but the job market has vastly changed, with even the most common of jobs requiring post-secondary education or a degree. When one pairs this with the vast effect TV has on the major choice of students–“When ER was popular, nursing and pre-med studies skyrocketed; now you have CSI all over the place and we can’t have enough criminal justice courses open”–the student comes into the university, at least according to Alexander, not fully informed.
{loadposition latestnews}”The variety of studies higher education has to offer has clearly not been exposed to students,” Alexander said. “They change their major, on average, at least twice. And to be honest, most students don’t hit their stride until their junior year–and then they find a major that fits them.”
Within this vein, Alexander has attempted to balance the needs for studies with students’ social and emotional needs. And he hopes to continue this as he leaves to head the Louisiana State University system, further emphasizing that California will always be on his dial.
“[CSULB’s] on a good trajectory,” he says. “People always ask, ‘Do you think Cal State Long Beach is gonna be the next UC?’ and I always reply, ‘No, I hope that UC is the next Cal State Long Beach.’ We are a model… And given that, when I’m in D.C., I’m still gonna be fighting for our students here. I’m still gonna be fighting for the CSU, for CSULB, for students in higher education.”
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