Say what? A college turning down tax dollars? In California?

Apparently, they’re going to try a different route to revenue.

Ry Rivard of Inside Higher Ed reported.

Public to Private MBA at UCLA

A small chunk of the University of California is set to break slightly away tomorrow and become “self-supporting,” as the state system begins a closely watched experiment that could be repeated.

Following years of controversy, most of the University of California at Los Angeles’s Anderson School of Management will be giving up state funding in hopes of living off donations and likely higher tuitions. Critics deride the effort as “privatization,” a term to which the UCLA administration strongly objects and never uses.

The business school’s dean last week signed a three-year deal with the university provost allowing UCLA’s full-time master’s of business administration program to flip from state-supported to self-supported. That means the M.B.A. program will turn down state subsidies in exchange for less regulation from the top and the ability to set its own tuition rates.

While 59 UC programs, including UCLA’s executive M.B.A. program, are already self-supporting, the change at the Los Angeles full-time M.B.A. program is believed to be first time an existing UC program has been converted to self-supporting. Graduate programs at top publics in other states, including the University of Virginia’s Darden School of Business, have already made a similar move, though.

Other departments at UCLA are watching to see if the model proves to be a better one and could soon follow, said the head of the university’s Academic Senate, Janice Reiff.