Effective June 7, the California Social Science Experimental Laboratory, or CASSEL, will close its doors, potentially driving researchers and graduate students to universities that provide them the resources they need to do their research.
Since its inception in 2000, the lab has conducted more than 2,500 experiments with more than 100 publications in top academic journals, said Estela Hopenhayn, a lab manager at CASSEL. The lab currently hosts studies in the social sciences, including economics, finance and anthropology.
Space is a major consideration in CASSEL’s closure – there is no room for this sizeable lab in the current economic climate, and the space would be alternatively filled by classrooms or a computer lab, Elizabeth Landaw, the assistant dean of social sciences, told the Daily Bruin earlier this week.
However, the decision to close the lab as opposed to compromising with researchers to simply reduce its size reflects poorly on the UCLA administration’s commitment to remain on the frontiers of research in the social sciences at UCLA.
Last year, CASSEL’s directors proposed downsizing the lab to half its initial size and leaving the other half for the dean of social sciences, Alessandro Duranti, to use as he saw fit. This compromise is reasonable and should be adopted by university administration in order to keep a prestigious lab on campus while also addressing problems of space.
It is true that the lab has faced decreasing use since its inception, although there was a sudden spike in usage last year.
However, CASSEL’s general lack of use indicates only that the lab is too big, not that it shouldn’t exist anymore.
The closure of the lab makes it more difficult for graduate students in the social sciences to get involved in research projects, and may even force those students to do their research at other universities where labs are available.
One graduate student in economics, Santiago Sautua, says he will eventually have to find a lab for his research, and he does not know if labs in different departments on campus will facilitate his experiments. If they do not, he says he will be forced to seek out a lab at another university.
Another economics graduate student, Omer Ali, said the closure of the lab may mean he simply won’t be involved in experimental economics at all, despite his interest in it.
Considerations of space in the social sciences department are valid, but the consequences of closing the lab completely are too great to justify when it could simply be made smaller.
CASSEL has facilitated prominent and revenue-generating research from faculty at UCLA and other prestigious universities. For example, Claremont Graduate University professor Paul Zak has conducted studies linking the hormone oxytocin with human behaviors.
The closure comes at a time when other major universities, including our competitors across town at USC, are in the process of building new labs, UCLA assistant law professor and senior researcher at CASSEL, Alexander Stremitzer told The Bruin.
CASSEL’s prestige within the academic community was a major reason Stremitzer said he chose to teach at UCLA.
Closing the lab instead of reducing its size chips away at UCLA’s appeal for faculty who would choose to come here based on the existence of the lab, as Stremitzer did.
Since he took over, Duranti has consistently encouraged the lab to fund itself through donations that would match university contributions, Hopenhayn said.
The lab was previously funded completely by the university, but now receives more than 70 percent of revenue from outside donors, Hopenhayn said. Last year the lab received a $370,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to cover the costs of new lab equipment.
This grant may now go toward possibly relocating the lab to the second floor of Bunche Hall, in the graduate student computer lab. This option should be pursued – a downsized laboratory in a new location would allow students like Sautua and Ali to conduct their research right here at UCLA.