It is an investment in the future and a risk worth taking. We should be able to pool TAships to spread the resources around more equitably. This can be seen as a problem of departments vs. groups. These are different cultures. Perhaps the department chairs should discuss sharing of their TAs with the graduate groups and other departments.
Departments have to make the commitment since they have the resources.
It was proposed that we launch a pilot program offering multi-year support packages in a selected few programs. Once we show how it works and see the benefits of it, other programs will be willing to sign on. The program would be negotiated between deans and chairs through a Memorandum of Understanding that defines quality thresholds and limits of risk. The Task Force asked for more detail, including factoring by college, separate for Masters and Ph.D., and comparative statistics for other UC campuses. UC Research Funding - Numbers for all campuses.