<p>I wonder if anyone has insight into how the UC funding problems might affect graduate education. My D is accepted into the PhD program in Electrical Engineering at UCSC, among other places. Stipends are not going to be generous, and increased class sizes may make being a TA less pleasant, but these are not necessarily deal-breakers. Given graduate education in the sciences is ultimately so dependent on the PI and his/her lab, it doesn't seem like one can predict the consequences of the funding melt-down for any individual student.</p>
<p>My son is currently on an engineering PhD fellowship at UCLA. His funding hasn’t been affected, but he said that a few of his fellow students were unable to get fellowship funding. So the engineering professors at UCLA offered them TA positions (as lab assistants and paper graders) to take the place of the fellowships and living stipends that didn’t come through. Class sizes are unaffected. Likewise, course offerings are also unaffected. I suspect that UCSC is similar in this respect.</p>