Chancellor Gene Block and administrators meet with the Daily Bruin Editorial Board every year to discuss issues affecting the campus and explain administrative policies. At the Jan. 8 meeting, Block was joined by Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs Monroe Gorden Jr., Vice Chancellor for Equity, Diversity and Inclusion Jerry Kang, Vice Chancellor for External Affairs Rhea Turteltaub, Administrative Vice Chancellor Michael Beck, and Mary Osako, vice chancellor for strategic communications, who facilitated the meeting. The administrators spoke about UCLA’s Centennial Campaign, the Zero Waste by 2020 program, student safety and emergency preparedness, students experiencing housing insecurity, and the search for faculty replacements.

Centennial Campaign

The Centennial Campaign was a fundraising effort by UCLA with a goal of $4.2 billion by 2019, 100 years after the founding of UCLA. The campaign surpassed $5 billion before ending in December.

Despite meeting its main goal in 2018, UCLA has not reached its $1 billion fundraising goal for student scholarships and fellowships, a reach goal of the campaign. Block said UCLA has received $655 million for the scholarship endowment fund and will continue to raise money for scholarships despite the campaign’s end.

Turteltaub said the Centennial Campaign began in 2012, continuing for seven years before its conclusion last year. In the 7 1/2 and a half years prior to the campaign, UCLA raised $268 million for student scholarships, she added.

Turteltaub added that 11% of the overall campaign fundraising went to scholarships, with 14% going to capital funds for the construction of new buildings and other campus projects.

She added that the need for scholarships continues beyond the $1 billion goal, and UCLA will continue to fundraise beyond that goal.

Zero Waste

The Zero Waste by 2020 goal was set 13 years ago by the University of California for all UC campuses, none of which have met it. UCLA had a 57% diversion rate from landfills in 2019, falling short of the 90% rate defined in the initiative.

Block said there are many reasons UCLA has not met the goal. For example, China no longer accepts recycling from other countries, which has created turbulence in the market for recycling and impacted UCLA’s efforts.

Beck said UCLA has definitely fallen short of the goal, along with all of the other UC campuses. He said the goal was very aggressive, which helped to push efforts further than they would have gone otherwise.

Beck said they want to improve communication with the campus community on how to use the recycling system on campus by reaching out to campus leaders and potentially the Daily Bruin.

Last year, Beck said, UCLA lost one source of recycling, reducing its diversion rate by 10%.

Beck said they are planning to make an announcement in the next month regarding single-use plastics.

Emergency Preparedness

With wildfires in the area surrounding UCLA growing more common every year, most recently the Getty fire, many students are concerned with UCLA’s plan to respond to a wildfire, as well as when classes may be canceled to protect students, a concern especially shared among commuters.