This episode of Berkeley Brainwaves originally aired on July 1, 2025.
Tim Lynch: [00:00:00] You are in tuned to Berkeley Brainwaves on K-A-L-X Berkeley. My name is Tim Lynch and we are honored today to have as our guest, the Chancellor of the University of California at Berkeley, Rich Lyons. Welcome to KALX.
Chancellor Lyons: Thanks, Tim.
Tim Lynch: For you’re the 12th Chancellor of Cal, but you are the first Cal undergrad to ever hold the position.
Chancellor Lyons: That’s right, that’s right.
Tim Lynch: So, um, did you know any KALXers when you were an undergrad?
Chancellor Lyons: Oh, it’s interesting. You know, I, I listened to it, I guess, uh, from time to time, but I, I’m not sure I knew anybody who was actually producing it.
Tim Lynch: Mm-hmm. What kind of music were you listening to when you were an undergrad?
Chancellor Lyons: Oh, I was really into, uh, you know, a kind of traditional rock, uh, Rolling Stones. I still enjoy playing songs like that on my guitar. My, um, uh, I’m a big reggae fan. I’m, I’m a, a Bob Marley fan, um, Peter [00:01:00] Tosh, other, other reggae musicians.
Tim Lynch: Mm-hmm. I guess more importantly than all that, how does having been an undergrad at Berkeley influence your views and the way that you, uh, carry on your duties now as the Chancellor at Berkeley?
Chancellor Lyons: Well, Berkeley kind of, kind of affects everything you see and, and take in and, and in a good way, at least for me, a very good way. It was, it was, uh, as expanding as any experience like that could possibly have been. I, I came, neither of my parents had a four year degree and, uh, I’m not sure I knew anybody who had a Ph.D. when I got to Berkeley and then all of a sudden, wow, this is really something. Right? And the ideas I kind of fell in love with, with ideas and learning and, and in some ways never looked back. But Berkeley helped me think about what a life of learning and ideas would look like. And I chose an academic career, not because I saw it when I got here, but. Because the campus helped me to see it while I was here.
Tim Lynch: Mm-hmm. You mentioned you played guitar. Would you play us one?
Chancellor Lyons: Well, I, I will, [00:02:00] uh, thank you for asking. I’m gonna play, I mentioned the Rolling Stones. This is one of my favorite songs that, that I like playing when I want to get excited.
[Plays guitar and sings]
Please allow me to introduce myself
I’m a man of wealth and taste
Been around for long, long year
Stole many a man’s soul and faith
Was around when Jesus Christ
Had his moment of doubt and pain
Made damn sure that Pilate
Washed his hands, sealed [00:03:00] his fate
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guess my name
What’s puzzling you
Is just the nature of my game
Hung around St. Petersburg
When I saw it was time for a change
Killed the Tsar and his ministers
Anastasia screamed in vain
Rode a tank, held a general’s rank
When the blitzkrieg raged
And the bodies stank
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guess my name
What’s [00:04:00] puzzling you
Is the nature of my game
What’s my name?
Tell me honey, what’s my name?
Just as every cop is a criminal
All the sinners saints
Heads is tails, call me Lucifer
‘Cause I’m in need of some restraint
If you meet me, have some courtesy
Have some sympathy, and some taste
Use all [00:05:00] your well-learned politeness
Or I’ll lay your soul to waste
Pleased to meet you
Hope you guess my name
But what’s puzzlin’ you
Is just the nature of my game, mm yeah
Please allow me to introduce myself
Tim Lynch: UC Berkeley’s Chancellor Rich Lyons live right here in KALX, in our studio, and I’ve been on this campus for a long time. I can’t remember, I can’t imagine another chancellor before you singing at all. Much less that song. [Laughter].
Chancellor Lyons: Well, [00:06:00] maybe not that song [Laughter]. But, uh, in any event, thank you.
Tim Lynch: Well, thank you for playing for us. There are some really serious issues that you face right now. The biggest and most immediate challenges to UC that it seems to, a lot of us are coming from Washington, D.C. and the Trump administration. The issues at other universities are huge. Uh, the University of Virginia president was forced to resign last week.
Chancellor Lyons: Yep.
Tim Lynch: Columbia University seemed to capitulate to administration demands, but that still didn’t, um, satisfy them and there were still funding cuts. Harvard today was charged with violating the civil rights of Jewish and Israeli students were under threats of massive funding cuts as well. They are suing. Um, there’s been other things at Harvard as well. How severe do you think the threat to UC Berkeley, or UC as a whole is right now?
Chancellor Lyons: Well, you know, it’s a fundamental question. There’s no two ways about it. I, the whole system, all 10 of our UC campuses, uh, there are at least three action categories that we’re, [00:07:00] we’re, we’re thinking about. Um, and I, I will answer your question, how, how big is, is the potential disruption, but, um, there are a set of legal remedies that we’re addressing as, as a whole system. Things like, uh, the reduction in indirect costs and research and some of these other things that we’re not alone. Many other universities are, are involved in some of that. Um, a a second area is, there are lots of shocks that are hitting universities. That’s obvious. Uh, what, what’s your financial resilience? Do you have buffers built up? What will you do if X happens or Y happens? We all have to be thinking about that and we all are, and Berkeley certainly is. And then a third area is teaming up, right? Sort of we’re, we’re a 10 campus UC system. I think that gives us a little bit of, uh, a little bit of heft in, in, in this, uh, and, uh, that that’s a good thing. And then there, you know, there are multiple larger groupings of universities that, that are, are also, uh, are also working toward the right [00:08:00] outcome.
Look, there’s just no question about how important higher education has been to America, to America’s strength. Right? Uh. And, and we, we need to continue to do that. And at Berkeley, uh, part of Berkeley’s magic is its ability to pull talent in from the whole world, right? And get it to want to come here. Students, faculty, and staff. Right? And, and that’s really important that that continues. We’re, we’re a hundred percent behind that. And, you know, we, we need to, we need to stick to our values. That, that, I certainly can say, I can’t walk you through everything we’re gonna do if X or Y happens, but I can certainly say that, you know, our values are, are right at the core of who we are, and we have to respect them.
Tim Lynch: Mm-hmm. You mentioned, uh, international talent and threatening the visas of, of international students coming to Harvard was one of the things that they did. Um, that would have a huge impact on us here at Cal if they…
Chancellor Lyons: Yes.
Tim Lynch: Did such a thing.
Chancellor Lyons: Yep.
Tim Lynch: Alright. Um, we also have undocumented students at the university as well.
Chancellor Lyons: Yes.
Tim Lynch: Are [00:09:00] there plans being made to try and help and protect them or?
Chancellor Lyons: Well, we, we, uh, uh, uh, this is, this is really California law, but it’s true across the whole UC system. We will continue to support our matriculated undocumented students without regard to their immigration status. That’s been how, how we’ve operated for many years and we’re gonna continue to operate that way. Right? So, um, that’s, that’s really the bedrock point. There’s, there’s a lot of uncertainty in that category as well, and we’re trying to make sure that our students remain safe and, and taken, taken care of. So, uh, and, and of course we need to abide by California and, and national law. There’s also no question about that.
Tim Lynch: In, uh, recent weeks, you have been invited to testify before a House committee that is holding a hearing called antisemitism in higher education, examining the role of faculty funding and ideology. [00:10:00] It sounds like the people who have called this hearing sort of have the, uh, first the verdict, then the trial.
Chancellor Lyons: Hmm. Well, uh, it, it will be a fascinating hearing. They’ve had this particular, uh, committee called the Education and Workforce Committee of the House of Representatives. They’ve had some panel hearings of this type, this general category before, and I will be with two other university presidents, uh, Georgetown and the City University of New York. And there, you know, there’s some elements of, of Berkeley’s story and that I’ll get a chance to talk about like how many students we, we lift economically and in, in their lifetimes and, and other elements like that.
Um, and we will need to address, I will need to address some of the complicated topics around antisemitism. We, we’ve been, had a long standing commitment, uh, to, to, to not just addressing, but combating very actively antisemitism on this campus. I mean, uh, we, we [00:11:00] started a, a, a antisemitism education initiative in 20, 2019, and 2015 we started a chancellor’s advisory committee on Jewish life on campus. We, the Anti-Defamation League just gave us a rating of “Excellent” in terms of the quality of Jewish life on our campus. Uh, we’re, we’re not getting everything right, but boy are we, we’re working hard at this, and there’s a lot of new curriculum that’s been developed and so forth. So, uh, again, it it’s, society needs to get better at this, Berkeley needs to get better at this, and, and we’re, we’re working hard at it.
Tim Lynch: I found it interesting that they’re interested in antisemitism, but they make no mention of Islamophobia.
Chancellor Lyons: Yeah. Well the, this is consistent with the way these panels in this particular, uh, committee have, have played out is their focus has been on antisemitism.
Tim Lynch: How much of the university’s budget is, um, from federal sources that could be at risk?
Chancellor Lyons: Well, it depends upon how you calculate it. Our total budget, if you put it all together, is [00:12:00] around $4 billion with a “B”, that’s a lot of money. And if you round numbers, it’s about, um, 600 million. So about, you know, uh. 10, 10% would be, would be, uh, 400 million. So, so that’s about, uh, 15%, uh, of the total. That’s a, that’s a significant, uh, number. Um, now most the contract and grant, at least looking at the experiences of some of the other universities, it’s the contracts and grant revenue from things like the National Institutes of Health and, and National Science Foundation that are most at risk. There are other categories of that, that are less, less at risk, but that’s, that calibrates it roughly in total. But, but I think practically, not, not all, all of that is at risk, but we, we need to be very careful. We don’t know what’s gonna happen next.
Tim Lynch: What kind of things does that money fund?
Chancellor Lyons: Well, so I, I’d say at least 500 million of that “ish”. Uh, so, so the lion’s share by, by [00:13:00] far is, is, is research. Is research that, that our engineers are doing, research that our social scientists are doing, research that our physicists are doing across the whole university. Right? And, and some of that federal money also is funding research in, in the humanities and so forth. And so, um, it’s, it’s about the value to society of research. I mean, there’s so many pioneering ideas that have made human lives better and fuller and richer have come out of Berkeley. They absolutely have, you know, our, our faculty are exceptionally strong. Relative to any other university and, and faculty at other universities would agree with that statement. It’s just stunning how much, how much talent we have here intellectually, and that research enterprise is a big part of why they’re here and we need to keep it, keep it going, keep it thriving.
If I mentioned some of the three different action categories, and one of those was financial resilience or financial buffers, and then the question is, you know what, [00:14:00] what if you need to keep, keep the research enterprise thriving and faculty here and, and all those wonderful ideas that are being pioneered coming outta Berkeley, then you, you need to try and fund that. And if somebody said you have a bunch of dollars lying around in normal times to be able to keep, you know, add money to the research enterprise, the answer’s “no”. If in a kind of 50 or a hundred year flood, whatever the right metaphor is. Can you, can you come up with some resources by effectively eating seed corn that you would never do in normal circumstances? The an, answer to that is there, there is some resource there and, and we need to put it to that if, if, if it comes to that. So, the idea that we’ve got no buffer and if a big shock hits, uh, we’re, we’re going down, that is, that is not where we are.
Tim Lynch: Mm-hmm. If you’re just joining us, we’re talking to Rich Lyons. He’s the Chancellor of the University of California, Berkeley. The world is getting pretty polarized, or the country especially is getting [00:15:00] pretty polarized in their view, and a lot of folks are very supportive of the, you know, the research enterprise, the education enterprise. There’s a lot of scrutiny though, from others about the value of the American university system.
Chancellor Lyons: Yes.
Tim Lynch: What do you want people to know? The, what do you wish the public knew about higher education in general that seems to get lost in the debates around here?
Chancellor Lyons: Yeah. Well, thanks for asking. ‘Cause it really is a fundamental question. It’s in the data. It’s not just the institution of higher learning, but institutions in general in this country and in other countries. Trust and confidence is, is diminished. There’s no question about it, but it is true of higher ed. And you used the word “value”, which is a good, good word for it. I’m, I’m an economist. Usually we sometimes split value into cost and, and benefit, you know, and sort of, you know, on the cost side, um, quote unquote prices, right? Tuitions and so forth have, have gone up. And on the quote unquote benefit side, if we think about all the practicality of, of education and is it, is it delivering the life [00:16:00] opportunities that, that people need? I mean, we don’t, we’re not a vocational school, but, but we do want our students to have the opportunities that they want. Right? And that’s, that’s part of, part of our obligation.
Uh, you asked me what, what would I like people to know? Well, first of all, on the cost side is that, you know, the, the sticker price, the posted price ain’t the real price except for, for a relatively small subset of people. Right? So we have all kinds of grant revenue. I mean the percent, I should know the exact number, but the percentage of our undergraduates, especially who are leaving with no debt because they, they are Pell eligible or various other things is, is really quite stunning. And so when you sort of control for the grant money that you don’t have to pay back. Right? It’s not just loans, but grant money and other, other effective, you know, discounting on, on the posted price. Then you, you, you, you actually say for, I’ll give you a concrete example. If you come from a California family with income of $60,000 or less, so lower income. Then, adjusted for inflation over the [00:17:00] last 30 years, your, and, and this includes the grant, grant funding that you have, your, your cost of attending Berkeley, the, the tuition part of it, has fallen by 30%. It’s fallen by 30% over the last 20 years. Now most people have no idea that that’s true ’cause they just look at the posted price and they say, look at how much that posted price has gone up.
But we’ve done every, it’s called return to aid, right? So when prices go up, we make a commitment to return, usually one third of the additional revenue that we get to aid to students. Need-based aid. Right? And so, so that, that’s just an engine that’s always working and people kind of pretend that that engine isn’t there.
So that’s, that’s on the cost side. On the benefit side, it’s like, wow. So Berkeley, here’s a great fact. Berkeley has lifted more people further up the economic ladder than any other university in the country. If somebody wants to pin this down, National Bureau of Economic Research paper number 23618. Uh, Raj [00:18:00] Chetty, one of our own faculty members, uh, Emmanuel Saez, wrote that paper, table four. Anyways, look, it’s just whether Berkeley is an engine for economic and social mobility and I, we are very proud of that and I think that that’s Berkeley.
Also, one more, sorry, I, I’ve got the microphone. I apologize, but Berkeley produces, our alumni produce. Our undergraduate alums produce more funded new businesses than any other university in the country. And that’s, that’s a lovely thing. Now, they also produce, we just don’t have the data, they also produce a lot of civic organizations and nonprofits and public sector organizations. So it’s not like, oh, now we’re just doing private sector stuff and we’re doing all of it. And when you just look at the private sector, new businesses, venture funded new businesses, Berkeley is clearly number one. And that’s in PitchBook data.
Tim Lynch: We, uh, invent some pretty good technology around here too.
Chancellor Lyons: Oh my gosh, yes. No question about it. I, and I mean, I think people are so darn curious. [00:19:00] It is, it is crazy. I mean, that’s one of the things that, that you miss. For those of you that aren’t on campus, it’s like start talking to one of our faculty. It’s like they can’t help themselves. They can’t, they just think about this stuff all day long and they just get more and more interested and it’s part of why this place produces so much magic.
Tim Lynch: I wanna give a, a plug for our students too, because I work with a lot of students here at KALX and they are just a phenomenal bunch of people.
Chancellor Lyons: Truly, I mean, truly, you know, you, uh. So quick student story just popped into my head, I apologize. But, um, I was with some students not long ago, and there’s a, it’s a disrupted time, right? It’s, it’s a complicated time. Lots of un upheaval and, you know, there’s a lot of fear and anxiety, and we’ve all heard the phrase, uh, fearmongering and it does seem like pe, you know, me included, you read a newspaper and you want to tell people about, you know, the hard things that you’ve just read later on in the day. And so I was talking to this pair of students and they both had jobs on campus and I asked this one, you know, what is your job? And, and she said, [00:20:00] my job is I, I’m a hope monger.
Tim Lynch: [Laughter].
Chancellor Lyons: That’s, that’s lovely. That is just, you know, here comes some positive attitude in, in the context of all this, or plenty of this, uh, negative messaging.
Tim Lynch: You are listening to Berkeley Brainwaves on K-A-L-X Berkeley. Our guest is Chancellor Rich Lyons. Would you play us a little, a little more song here? We would take a music break usually, but since you have the guitar, why don’t you be the music break?
Chancellor Lyons: Well, that is kind of you. Thank you. So, I, I played a, a Stones tune. Um, I’m, I’m a big fan of Bob Dylan. I grew up with that music, so did many other people. I’ll play, I won’t play the whole thing. There are too many verses to play the whole one.
[Plays guitar and sings]
Early one morning the sun was shining
I was laying in bed
Wondering if she’d changed at all[00:21:00]
If her hair was still red
Her folks they said our lives together
Sure was gonna be rough
Never did like mama’s homemade dress
Papa’s bankbook wasn’t big enough
I was standing by the side of the road
Rain falling on my shoes
Heading out for the East Coast
Lord knows I paid some dues
Getting through
Tangled up in blue
She was married when we first met
Soon to be divorced
Helped her out of a jam, I guess
But I used a little too much force
We drove that car as far as we could
Abandoned it out West
We split up on a dark sad night
Both agreeing it was best
She turned around and look at me[00:22:00]
As I was walking away
Heard her say over my shoulder
“We’ll meet again someday
on the avenue”
Tangled up in blue
Now I am going back again
Gotta get to her somehow
All the people we used to know
They’re an illusion to me now
Some are mathematicians
Some are carpenter’s wives
Don’t know how it all got started
I don’t know what they do with their lives
Me I’m still along the road
Heading for another joint
We always did feel the same
We just saw it from a different point of [00:23:00] view
Tangle up in blue
Tim Lynch: Chancellor Rich Lyons live in the KALX Studios. What a treat. We’re, um, starting to, we could talk for, if you left it to me, um, we would talk for hours ’cause there’s so much to talk about and hopefully we can have you back again. But let’s, um, let’s wrap up with some more state issues. We talked a lot about federal stuff and yeah.
When you were an undergrad here, the, um, state contribution to UC Berkeley, as I understand it was over 50% of our budget.
Chancellor Lyons: Yes.
Tim Lynch: Now it’s about 13%.
Chancellor Lyons: Yep.
Tim Lynch: Are we still a state university at that funding level?
Chancellor Lyons: We’re definitely still a state university. I, I think public is less about the money and where you get it and more about your values and we are just unmistakably still as public as it gets. This place is [00:24:00] committed to the greater good, it always has been. We operate differently. We operate at an enormous scale at the undergraduate level relative to any private school. And, uh, that’s really the essence of our publicness tho, those kinds of values. Now, uh, the state of California has become a much smaller, as you pointed out, part of who we are. Uh, I also wanna point out though, you know, we, we had a, an 8% budget cut coming at us from the state of California. That’s what we understood. It was going to be about six months ago. And then with, with a lot of the turbulence more recently, uh, probably three months ago, we heard it might be only 3%, and we heard just a few weeks ago that it’s 0%.
Tim Lynch: Wow.
Chancellor Lyons: So the state has actually been making adjustments in real time to make sure that this University of California system is not, is not punched while it’s down. So we’re, we greatly appreciate that. Yeah.
Tim Lynch: One of the things that you had said you hoped to do when you first got the job was to move us away from an [00:25:00] austerity state of mind. That the university was often in an austerity state of mind, but yet all of a sudden we got these threats to our, to our, um, to our, our financial situation.
Chancellor Lyons: Yes.
Tim Lynch: That must have, that was must be, um, must have been a shock to you or…
Chancellor Lyons: Well, nobody saw a, a lot of this, or at least the form that it’s taking, coming in quite this way. All of that said, part of, you know, when I said, you know, let’s, let’s paint a picture 10 years out where, you know, we, we put an end to, or are thinking a lot less about austerity and some of that is, I, I, I mentioned earlier that we produce more funded new businesses, if you like, the jargon “venture funded startups” than any other university. Our alums, our alums, that is. And one of the neat things there is that in ways that are completely consistent with our values, we’re actually getting, as part of the licensing negotiations and other things, we are getting [00:26:00] equity in those, in those companies. And so we are participating.
If you ask yourself, well, Berkeley’s creating a lot of value for society, how do you again, in a values consistent way, participate more in some of that wonderful value that, that you’re creating? And we are participating a lot more, and it’s actually quite, quite non-linear. And so the idea is, well, all these positions in all of these startups that, that we have to make sure we, we manage the right way. Uh, they don’t get us out of austerity in the next year or two or three, but when you go five to 10 years, they really make a very, by any reasonable estimation, a very substantial incremental contribution to Berkeley’s budget. And when you go out 10 to 15 years with all this new intentionality. Again, value’s consistent, then we, it’s, it’s really quite extraordinary. So, you know, it’s one thing to say we’re gonna put an end to financial austerity, uh, austerity. But you need a story. You need a new story, right? You can’t just say, oh, we’re gonna do this old thing we’ve been doing forever a lot better. And this is a different story.
Tim Lynch: We have [00:27:00] talked about a lot of challenges. Um, you are finishing literally today, your first year on the job. You start your second year on the job tomorrow.
Chancellor Lyons: Yes.
Tim Lynch: Um, there’s plenty of troubles we’ve talked about. What are you most excited about from your first year as chancellor, and what do you look forward to in the year or years ahead?
Chancellor Lyons: Ooh, that’s, that’s a fun question. Well, I, you know, the, the, the things that, um, that, I’ll, I’ll tell the story to answer the first part the first year. ‘Cause I think, I think this is, this, a lot of your listeners will share this. Um, so we have a faculty member, his name is Dr. Keltner. He does work on awe. Right? This human emotion of awe. We all know the word. Uh, we probably have some recollection of having felt it, hopefully not too long ago, but it’s not something we most of us experience every day.
Uh, I was walking across campus, my wife and I, Jen and I have moved into University House, so we now live on campus. We moved in in the fall and this would’ve been sort of in the maybe February or March, [00:28:00] and I’m walking from the Faculty Club back to University House across campus. Right? And it’s, it’s a chilly evening. It’s nighttime, it’s it’s dark, it’s after dinner and I’m walking by the Campanile and it’s lit up. It’s just gorgeous. Wow! That is gorgeous. And I keep walking and I round the front of Doe Library. Right? And you look up at those pillars and it says University Library, and it’s lit up. And I was overwhelmed. I was overwhelmed by the generations of people who came before us and built this place and, you know, the, how important the stewardship of it is and that I happened to be in this seat. And, and that was, that was a feeling of awe and it was a very positive feeling. So, you know, I think when, when is it? Is it a, you know, kind of a challenging job? Yeah, yeah, it is. And when you get that kind of feeling, it, it keeps you going like crazy. So, so that’s sort of, [00:29:00] you know, the stuff that, that for me is, is, is sort of the thickest part of my first year experience.
Um, my, going forward we get to set a strategic plan, a strategic direction. I mean, Berkeley is one of society’s most valuable assets. Full stop. Nobody’s ever wanted to argue with me about that. And so, you know, to what use shall we put it over the next 10 years? Right? And, and that can have lots of different answers, but we need to bring as much value to society as we can over the next 10 years. And I think we have a lot of opportunity to bring even more value. We’re, we’re bringing tons of value. That’s what strategic planning is about. What are we gonna prioritize? What might we do less of? What are we gonna do more of? All those kinds of things. Um, but if we can paint a picture of Berkeley 10 years out that isn’t feeling so much financial austerity, is an even more powerful engine of economic mobility, is doing the kind of research that we’ve always done and some, and the whole world is starting to say, “Holy smokes! Look at what [00:30:00] Berkeley’s getting done”. Uh, that’s, that’s 10 years out that I’d love to achieve together.
Tim Lynch: Chancellor Rich Lyons, thank you so much for coming and talking with us on Berkeley Brainwaves here on K-A-L-X Berkeley.
Chancellor Lyons: Thank you. I appreciate it.
