Project Summary & Update
The Vasconcellos Project's Higher Education Demonstration Project elicited broad public involvement and expert support for the Legislature in the review of California's Master Plan for Higher Education. We are dedicated to improving California politics by increasing public participation and supporting our term-limited Legislature in creating models for tackling major issues in the record time required by term limits.

In our Higher Education Demonstration Project, we have engaged legislative, business and community leaders along with students and educational stakeholders to assist our Legislators in developing an agenda of solutions in time for the Master Plan's 50th Anniversary in 2010.

We are thrilled to share with you an enormous accomplishment by our Legislature, of which you and we of Vasconcellos Legacy Project played a crucial role. In November, The Joint Committee on the Master Plan (JCMP) developed a unanimously approved report which declared California’s needs for higher education for the coming decade [click on "2010 Committee Report" on the left side navigation bar].

Ira Ruskin, 2004-2010 Assembly Member from Redwood City, and co-chair of the JCMP, lauded our efforts, by saying “The Vasconcellos Project provided invaluable assistance to our Joint Committee by identifying issues essential to understanding higher education in California today, recommending experts nationwide without whose input the Committee would not have adequately understood key challenges; alerting us to strategies and processes which enabled us to more readily realize our ambitions and goals, and engaging diverse Californians throughout the state in conversation about the work of our Committee.”

The Vasconcellos Project staff and partners in higher education were actively involved throughout the committee process, not only in our hosting and attendance of community forums on higher education, but also in our live testimony at several JCMP Hearings in Sacramento.

We know you share our concerns about our beloved state of California, and the centrality of our updating and keeping faith with California's legendary Master Plan for Higher Education for our State’s future well-being.  Now is the time to get activated, get involved, and support California higher education!