*Get Involved by Signing Up for the Newsletter and Joining the Facebook Page*

California Students Return to Bigger Classes, at Higher Tuition - Cal State students will pay 20 percent more tuition this year than last, or $4,026, while UC tuitions jumped 9.3 percent in May. Community College students will pay 30 percent more this year. The UC president, Mark Yudof, proposed two more fee increases between now and next fall that would push tuition above $10,000 for the first time. The Board of Regents will review the proposal at its meeting Wednesday, said Ricardo Vasquez, a UC spokesman. New York Times

Keeping college dream alive - Is the California dream dead? Is the dream that all Californians, rich or poor, will have access to a higher education just an illusion? No, the California dream isn't dead, but it is on life support and must be re-examined in light of the state budget realities. Merced Sun-Star

Even with fee increases, some public universities are relatively affordable - The cost of a college education has increased steadily, and heavily, over the past decade. And with fees skyrocketing, undergraduates and graduate students are scraping the barrel to pay tuition. In recent months, California legislature has made repeated cuts to funding for higher education. The cutbacks are a huge blow considering most colleges gets the majority of their funds from the state, or from student tuition. The Collegian Online

Editorial: UCs need to become affordable - With all the attention given to economic stimulus, both statewide and nationwide, it seems that California is missing the boat on an important strategy for stimulating the economy — higher education. Visalia Times-Delta

UC Public Education is No Longer Affordable - It is of no doubt that we find ourselves in tough economic times. The decade's long trend of disinvestment in higher education here in California has put the University of California into a downward spiral, leaving little hope of a recovery ahead. The Daily Californian

UC students face increased fees - University of California undergraduates, who already have seen their basic fees rise $662 this year, face additional hikes of $2,514 over the next year, starting with a midyear increase this winter, according to a proposal released by the university Thursday. Los Angeles Times

UC proposing 32 percent fee hike - The University of California may raise student fees 32 percent by next fall, boosting annual undergraduate tuition over the $10,000 level for the first time ever. UC regents next week will discuss the phased increases, which for most students would include a 7.5 percent hike for the upcoming spring term and then a sharper increase for the fall 2010 term. The decision, which would bring UC tuition to $10,302, would cost undergraduates an additional $2,500 per year. Silicon Valley Mercury News

UC president recommends huge tuition increases - UC President Mark Yudof is recommending a 15 percent increase in in-state undergraduate fees that would take effect next spring, and another 15 percent increase on top of that beginning in fall 2010. San Francisco Chronicle

Funding Cuts Leave Washington, D.C., Area Colleges Grasping - The University of Virginia is shutting down its public computer labs. Maryland's community colleges are turning away students by the thousands. Classes are larger at George Mason and Virginia Tech. The University of Maryland Baltimore County is cutting positions. And Virginia's state universities are coping with furloughs for the first time in recent memory. The Washington Post

Community college students feel the squeeze - Fifty years ago, in the pre-Proposition 13 era, many other states wished they could emulate California's public college system. Led by the flagship University of California campuses such as UC Berkeley, they were buttressed by a second tier of more numerous state colleges. Even more numerous and ubiquitous were the hundred or so California community colleges, primarily run by local districts, which offered two-year associate degree programs ranging from trades such as police work, nursing and culinary arts to programs designed to prepare students to transition to the upper-tier, four-year colleges and universities. Palo Alto Daily News

S.D. City College students, staff rally to protest budget cuts - Students, professors and other college employees rallied at San Diego City College on Wednesday afternoon to protest state budget cuts that have shut 20,000 students out of classes. Student government leaders organized the rally in a bid to make their discontent visible to state legislators, whose decisions in closing a $26 billion budget gap this summer have resulted in millions of dollars in cuts at local community colleges. San Diego Union-Tribune