CALIFORNIA
FOCUS
FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 2013, OR THEREAFTER
FOR RELEASE: FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 1, 2013, OR THEREAFTER
BY THOMAS D. ELIAS
“FOUR-YEAR
DEGREES AT COMMUNITY COLLEGES? WHY NOT?”
Maybe it’s been just an ego thing or a
matter of turf, but administrators and some alumni groups at the University of
California and the California State University systems for years have adamantly
opposed the notion of community colleges granting anything more than two-year
associate of arts degrees.
But this idea is making more sense
than ever, especially amid continuing cutbacks at many existing four-year
schools. It’s also an idea that’s allowed in more than 20 other states.
The possibility gained more
practicality the other day, when Gov. Jerry Brown, attending a Cal State
trustees meeting in Long Beach, criticized a preliminary CSU budget plan
seeking hundreds of millions of new state dollars next year. CSU could use
that money to ease the current enrollment crunch, which sees tens of thousands of
qualified students turned away from the state’s public universities each year.
But Brown told his fellow trustees
that CSU might need to fix leaky roofs and make other structural repairs before
increasing enrollment.
So where can qualified students go
once they’ve earned A.A. degrees and want to transfer to a four-year school?
Why not let them stay put and earn
bachelor’s degrees right where they’ve been?
It’s an idea under quiet consideration
by the huge California community college system, home to one-fourth of all
junior college students in America. A task force of officials from all three of
the state’s higher education systems quietly held meetings recently about
whether to seek four-year authority for the 112 community colleges.
This move, of course, would challenge
traditional fiefdoms established by the state’s 1960s-era Master Plan for
Higher Education, which sets up a definite hierarchy, community colleges tasked
primarily to provide job training for local students.
The colleges already go well beyond
that. And many would like to join counterparts in places like Michigan and
Florida that give bachelor’s degrees, mostly in technical fields. One candidate
for such degrees in California might be nursing, where many community colleges
now excel.
There are already some breaches of the
Master Plan tradition, most notably the fact that Cal State offers several
doctoral degrees, an area once reserved for UC schools.
Letting community colleges do more
makes pure economic sense, too. The system charges far lower tuition and fees
than the four-year schools, already offers basic classes so good that both UC
and CSU allow transfer students full credit for them. Many faculty members are
at least as qualified as the majority at the more prestigious four-year
campuses.
But the four-year schools have never
liked this idea. For one thing, it would let community colleges compete for
precious tuition dollars.
Yes, there have been some tuition
increases at the community colleges, but they remain well below either UC or
CSU. The two-year schools also are often far closer to students’ homes than
their big brothers. The twin factors of cost and location make community
colleges accessible to far more students than either of the higher systems.
The notion of community colleges doing
more was first voiced prominently in 2008 by Democratic state Sen. Jerry Hill
of San Mateo (then an assemblyman), who sought the change just for the San
Mateo college district. His bill went nowhere.
In
2009, he was joined by Democratic state Sen. Marty Block of San Diego, also an
assemblyman at the time. Block, a former dean at San Diego State University and
an ex-president of the San Diego Community College District board, said he sees
no sound reason for not making the change.
“We have a lot of well-respected
community colleges…,” he told a hearing. “They could do a fine job offering
those next two years to students, at least in certain disciplines.”
But pushing a major change like this
won’t be easy, perhaps one reason the current discussions have been so quiet.
Turf battles are inevitable, as professors at four-year schools won’t want
their prestige spread around. There’s also the question of whether most junior
colleges could offer small seminars and advanced laboratory facilities to
upperclassmen.
But there seems little doubt this
change is doable, and probably in pretty short order. It’s also something that
needs to happen soon or California risks depriving many thousands of its
brightest young people of opportunities long promised to them.
-30-
Email
Thomas Elias at tdelias@aol.com. His book, "The Burzynski Breakthrough,
The Most Promising Cancer Treatment and the Government’s Campaign to Squelch
It," is now available in a soft cover fourth edition. For more Elias
columns, visit www.californiafocus.net
I think that this idea might warrant consideration AFTER the budget has been restored and the two systems..CC and CSU have been "fixed".
ReplyDeleteEspecially the CCs which have been relying on a plantation system of exploiting the majority of faculty who are PT in order to maintain the expensive tenured and administrative cohorts. I have no interest in seeing this abusive system enlarged until it has been made more fair and equitable. The 4-year CSU system already treats ALL faculty tenured and non-tenured..with respect and equity. The lecturer position can be either PT or FT, receives equity pay, medical benefits, office space and job security. When the CC's learn that the only way to create a strong institutional learning environment is to treat ALL faculty fairly, then we can start to look at expanding the mission of the community colleges.
David Milroy
Grossmont College
San Diego, CA