University of California Online (proposed) Constitutional Amendment  |  ucoca.org

Section 1. The People of California find and declare…

  1. 1.The people have the right to audit all publicly owned postsecondary
    courses and programs online at no cost.
  2. 2.The people have the right to access — and earn full credit — all
    publicly owned postsecondary courses and programs online at cost.

Every UC, CSU, and CCC course available online. Free or full credit. Open to all. Fully accredited. Low cost. Drafted. Filed with the California Attorney General twice. Now passing the torch.

Read the full amendment

I'm giving this to the public. Anyone can take it on.

I am Boyd Roberts. I wrote this constitutional amendment and filed it with the California Attorney General in 2017 and again in 2023. There was no money. It never got circulated. The people have never had a chance to vote for the University of California Online.

Rather than let it sit in a drawer, I've released the text under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 license.

You may copy it, change it, file it under your own name, and run with it. You owe me nothing but credit for the original idea.

The University of California Online (UCO)

Division I  |  The ‘Free’ Division

  • All of the classes
  • Audit any course at no cost
  • Question professors at cost
  • Open to everyone
  • No credit, no degree

Division II  |  The ‘For Credit’ Division

  • All of the classes
  • Fully accredited courses and degrees
  • Structurally low cost
  • Open to everyone
  • Work at your own pace

Who pays for UCO?

UCO is designed to not impact the taxpayer and to be self-funding. Though the measure requires the Treasurer issue bonds to initially fund UCO, Division II course tuition must be used to service those bonds and pay for everything.

Can out-of-state students attend UCO?

Yes, out-of-state students can attend if they pay out-of-state student fees. Notably, all out-of-state student fees collected, by law, must be applied to the benefit of in-state students. Think funding for in-state scholarships, student food pantries, childcare facilities, libraries, and student housing.

Where it stands

2013
Originally conceived as a national online university with a free division and a for-credit division.
2015
Re-conceived as a state constitutional amendment.
2017
Submitted to the California Attorney General for title and summary.
2023
Resubmitted to the California Attorney General for title and summary.
2026
Released to the public under CC BY 4.0. Open to anyone who wants to carry it.

MONEY AND EXPERIENCE — NOT NECESSARY. ONE VIRAL POST CAN MAKE IT HAPPEN.

Two days after the 2016 election, Katie Fahey, a 27-year-old in Michigan, posted on Facebook that she wanted to take on gerrymandering and asked if anyone would join her. She had no political background. She worked in environmental sustainability.

Michigan required 315,654 valid signatures in 180 days. Her volunteers gathered more than 425,000, from every county in the state, without spending a dollar on signature gathering. They finished ahead of the deadline. Michigan's former state elections director called it nearly unprecedented. The amendment passed with 61 percent of the vote and is now in the Michigan Constitution.

The money followed — about $15.6 million, from roughly 9,000 individual donors.

California requires 874,641 valid signatures, gathered within 180 days of the Attorney General issuing a title and summary.

You could be

If you do it, don't forget to make the movie.

Or you could be someone who would rather fund it than run it. I'll carry it myself — but only with a real commitment behind it. Call me: 949-463-9152.

If you want to carry it

  1. Read it.The full text is four pages. Start there, not here.
  2. Change whatever you want.The license lets you revise, cut, or rewrite.
  3. Get a legal read.An election-law attorney should look at the single-subject rule and the Article IX Section 9 interaction before you file.
  4. File with the Attorney General.Any registered California voter can submit an initiative, with a $2,000 fee refunded if it qualifies. The Attorney General issues a title and summary, and the 180-day clock starts.
  5. Then go get the signatures.This is the part everyone says is impossible without millions of dollars. Michigan proved otherwise in 2018. It is the hardest thing on this list and it is not the wall people tell you it is.

Not in California? Eighteen states let citizens initiate constitutional amendments directly. Several others, including New York, do it through the legislature instead. See below.

It doesn't have to be California

Nothing about this idea is Californian. Every state has public colleges its taxpayers already paid for, and students paying twice for access to them. The text below is a template. Swap the institutions, swap the constitution, keep the argument.

Eighteen states allow citizen-initiated constitutional amendments. Arizona, Arkansas, California, Colorado, Florida, Illinois, Massachusetts, Michigan, Mississippi, Missouri, Montana, Nebraska, Nevada, North Dakota, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, and South Dakota. The process is direct in sixteen of them; Massachusetts and Mississippi route through the legislature first, and Mississippi's is currently inoperable.

Compare the percentage, not the number. Requirements are set against different denominators — votes cast in the last election, registered voters, or total population. A big raw number in a big state can be an easier share than a small number in a small one. Work out what fraction of your state's population you actually need before deciding it's out of reach.

Everywhere else, the path is a legislator. States without citizen initiative, New York among them, amend their constitutions through the legislature and then a public vote. That's one sponsor to persuade instead of hundreds of thousands of signatures. A different job, not a closed door.

Ballotpedia maintains current signature requirements and deadlines for every state. Start there.