3 campus units to become single entity
In a reorganization to take effect Sept. 1, Berkeley Programs for Study Abroad, the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute and Summer Sessions will merge, with shared accounting, IT, human-resources and other common functions.
March 2, 2011
Three campus units — Berkeley Programs for Study Abroad (BPSA), the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute (OLLI) and Summer Sessions — will be reorganized as a single entity, the campus has announced. The move, effective Sept. 1, is designed to enable the units to combine such functions as accounting, IT and human resources, as well as collaborative programming and marketing.
In a CalMessage to faculty and staff today (March 2), Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost George Breslauer wrote that students planning to study abroad would see an “immediate positive impact” from the reconfigured unit. All study-abroad programs in Summer Sessions and BPSA, he wrote, will be combined into a single sub-unit called Berkeley Study Abroad, which he called “a one-stop shop for all students looking to go abroad.”
The change, he added, is intended to “significantly increase the number of study-abroad opportunities for Berkeley students by creating Berkeley-led programs overseas and expanded opportunities for international exchange agreements.”
The reorganization will also consolidate the campus’s administrative support to OLLI, which is scheduled to offer its first summer session in June, and plans to expand its ongoing curriculum of 60-75 courses a year.
The new unit will be led by Summer Sessions director Rick Russo, reporting to Vice Provost Cathy Koshland. Further details of the reorganization will be worked out over the coming months, Breslauer wrote, and information will be released as it comes available.