COMMUNITY COLLEGES IN CA.   Term Paper ID:20805 Click to get this paper

Essay Subject: Effect of state economic crisis & Gov. Wilson's plan on funding, fees, enrollment, types of students, transfers.... More...

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Paper Abstract: Effect of state economic crisis & Gov. Wilson's plan on funding, fees, enrollment, types of students, transfers. Paper Introduction: The budget crisis in California has had an effect on many programs, agencies, and departments, including the educational system of which California has long been proud. California has long held out the opportunity for every qualified child to attend a publicly funded school from kindergarten through graduate school, and one of the linchpins of this system has been the community college or junior college system, providing opportunities for higher education to students whose high school grades may not qualify them for a four-year college as yet and for students who may not yet be financially able to attend a four-year college. These colleges have been especially hard hit by the budgetary crisis and have been harmed by measures taken to cope with it. The definition of "community college" and the reasons for Text of the Paper: The entire text of the paper is shown below. However, the text is somewhat scrambled. We want to give you as much information as we possibly can about our papers and essays, but we cannot give them away for free. In the text below you will find that while disordered, many of the phrases are essentially intact. From this text you will be able to get a solid sense of the writing style, the concepts addressed, and the sources used in the research paper. These students, their professors, and administrators have protestedthe budget cuts that have been imposed on the community college system, andthey have been especially critical of Governor Pete Wilson's plans in thisregard. While the entiresystem of higher education in California was faced with budget cutbacks,the junior colleges had felt the impact more, in part because of therequirement that all qualified students must be admitted. The funds tobe transferred to public schools had also been reduced. There would also bean increase in general fees, then at $6 per unit with a maximum of $6 persemester, to $2 per unit, with no cap at all. "Community College Cuts Protested," Los Angeles Times (August 26, 1992), B1, B4.Merl, Jean. "Senate Scales Back Huge Fee Hikes for Community Colleges,"Los Angeles Times (August 3 , 1992), A3, A34."What Is A Community College?" Los Angeles Times (July 11, 1992), B7.----------------------- 6 As theresult of a court decision in 199 , the 1 7 community colleges inCalifornia, following the lead of the University of California, beganassessing new undocumented students the considerably higher fees alreadycharged to those who are not California residents. A less valuable change has been an increase in education by multiple-choice test, destroying the credibility of the institution's degree(Galloway M3). The community college has faced a fivepercent increase in enrolment each semester the previous year and a 25percent increase for summer classes. The cutbacks havebeen seen as an attack on the community-college mission to provideinexpensive vocational training to students or to adults who are seeking anew career and who do not intend to go on to a four-year college. The definition of "community college" and the reasons for thecommunity college system have been questioned given the budgetaryconstraints being placed on the entire educational structure in California. This was close to what was done by the legislature in scotchingWilson's plan, but the reality of funding changes did force a shift inadmissions priorities and created such a shift in any case by driving awaymany continuing education students. Atthe same time, community colleges were facing reduced class offerings,scaled-back departments, an increasing work load for professors, andstudents suffering from the effects of these changes. Indeed, it waspointed out that this rise in fees would make the charges to studentshigher for the community college system than the fees charged at theUniversity of California or the California State University systems. However, in the spring semester of 1992, only 6 , ofthe 118, degree holders who had enrolled in the fall returned after thehigher fees took effect, accounting for a 1 percent decrease in enrollmentover the previous spring semester (Merl, May 3 , 1993 A3). "Critics Warn of Impact From College Fee-Hike," Los Angeles Times (July 1 , 1992), A3, A39.Trombley, William. Critics charged that these fee increases would be disastrous andwould lead to a drop in enrollment of 2 , or more. "Community College Fee Hike Hits Illegal Immigrants," Los Angeles Times (May 14, 1992), A3, A23.Merl, Jean. The state senate rejected thisproposal by Wilson. Works CitedGalloway, Laura. These collegeshave been especially hard hit by the budgetary crisis and have been harmedby measures taken to cope with it. The campus wasalso faced with the relatively new phenomenon of reverse transfers asuniversity and state college students returned to community collegesbecause of tuition increases or prolonged waiting periods to get requiredcourses at the other institutions. The community colleges of California have traditionally taken up theslack when hard times hit the State University or University systems, andindeed the community colleges in 1992 were already filled to the brim, withmany being so overcrowded that increasing numbers of students were watchinglectures at home on television and venturing onto campus only rarely. He proposed raising fees to $3 or more per student per semester,which wold put higher education beyond the grasp of a number of studentsbecause about a third of the district's 12 , students have annual familyincomes of $12, or less. It is clearthat the community college system has been much affected by the budgetproblems of the state, perhaps to a greater degree than other agencies ofthe state government. Now thatcommunity colleges are charging higher graduate fees, few students havebeen paying. "Undercutting California's Education of Last Resort," Los Angeles Times (April 14, 1992), M3, M14.Merl, Jean. There were some exemptions provided for laid-off workers,displaced homemakers, and people on welfare, and some have qualified forthese exemptions. The budget crisis in California has had an effect on many programs,agencies, and departments, including the educational system of whichCalifornia has long been proud. The board of governors for the community college system had sought abudget agreement in 1992 that would include the following elements: 1) Maintain the existing 9 percent to 1 percent split inProposition 98 funding between public schools and community colleges, asopposed to the Wilson plan which would reduce the share for communitycolleges. Thefee increases would combine with the reduced budget to cause a loweredenrolment, from 1.5 million students to 1.3 million. Nearly 7 percent of the district's enrollmentis from minority groups. It isironic that this is coming at a time when corporations and businesses areexperiencing a shortage of skilled workers that the community colleges aresupposed to produce. For students who hadalready accumulated 9 college credits, the fee would increase to anaverage $9 per unit, and it was estimated that this would hit hard atunemployed workers returning to colleges for new careers. 3) Allow the board and the statewide staff to set admissionspriorities, not the governor or the legislature (Trombley, July 1 , 1992A39). With thedownturn in the aerospace industry in California, there were a large numberof such students seeking education in the community college system (Merl,August 26, 1992 B1). "A Lesson in Economics," Los Angeles Times (May 3 , 1993), A3, A26.Trombley, William. This took place in the context of a budget negotiationand was criticized as the wrong time to determine the future mission ofhigher education ("What Is a Community College?" B7). After 199 , though, the situation was reversed (Merl, May14, 1992 A1). Also of concern wasthe fact that the fee proposal was in effect setting admissions prioritiesfor the 1 7 community colleges by offering preference to students who arepreparing to transfer to a four-year college over those pursuing avocational education. The colleges would also be forced to payback a $227-million loan over the next two years, meaning that $113.5million would be deducted from their appropriation for each year beforebudget negations begin (Trombley, August 3 , 1992 A3). Governor Pete Wilson wanted to downgradevocational education, especially short-term vocational education, whileupgrading the two-year associate of arts degree an further upgradingtransfer education. The community collegeshave been especially affected by this decision, for they claim an estimated14, illegal immigrants among their more than 1.5 million studentsstatewide. One result, as noted, was an increasein "telecourses" enabling community colleges to accommodate the overflowand an increasing number of working students by enabling them to study athome. Wilson wanted to take up to $33 million from the Los Angelessystem, which is equivalent to what it takes to run two of its campuses fora year. 2) Try to maintain the current level of state support. For the system as a whole, Wilson wanted to givethem an estimated $454 million less than he had originally proposed for1992, or $178 million less than the state spent in 1991. Residents who are full-time students pay $6 per semester, while those who are not residents arecharged tuition that averages $1,32 per semester. These fee hikes posed a hardship formany students, and in particular they were found to affect illegalimmigrants who had managed to make their way to the college system. The 1988 reforms setpriorities for the community college system as follows: 1) vocational education and equally the education of studentsplanning to transfer to the California State University or the Universityof California; 2) remedial instruction; 3) continuing education or "community service" instruction.Attempts have been made starting in 1992 to change these priorities in theface of the budget crisis. Students who do want to transfer to four-yearinstitutions are also being affected, and the diminishing availability ofrequired courses has forced many of them either to delay their educationalplans or to drop out entirely (Galloway M6). A report fromPasadena City College in 1992 showed that the college was allocated moneyfrom the state on the basis of the number of high school students itadmitted from its district, but the college actually had 52 percent of itsenrollment from outside the district, a group not including transfers dueto cutbacks in the university and state university systems. The community colleges have had to deal with a state-imposed fundingcap, and as a result the 1 7 community college campuses were forced to dipinto their discretionary funds simply to handle the student load theyalready had. Those who support the higher fees state that it is wrong forpeople who are here illegally to get the same cost break as legalresidents. Officials stillbelieved that these increases would mean that systemwide enrollment woulddrop by tens of thousands of students, and adults with four-year degreeswould be especially hard hit. The systems Board of Governors wanted to set theirown priorities and to work with local campuses to serve each communitybetter (Trombley July 1 , 1992 A3, A39). This year it was reported that many ofthe problems foreseen by analysts have indeed come to pass. the reason forthis was to close a $1 .7 billion state budget gap. The general fee was increased to $12 per unit, and forstudents with 9 credits the fee was raised to $5 per unit. California has long held out theopportunity for every qualified child to attend a publicly funded schoolfrom kindergarten through graduate school, and one of the linchpins of thissystem has been the community college or junior college system, providingopportunities for higher education to students whose high school grades maynot qualify them for a four-year college as yet and for students who maynot yet be financially able to attend a four-year college. The budget of a community college is allocated as follows: 8 percent is committed, and 2 percent can be spent on staff development,equipment, and supply purchases or on faculty trips. Plans to expand vocationaleducation and to buy new equipment have been shelved. After 1985, illegal immigrants who could demonstrate that theyhad lived in California for at least a year and intended to stay weretreated the same as other residents as far as tuition was concerned. The state legislature addressed the issue in 1988 when it systematicallyrevised California's Master Plan for Higher Education, an omnibus communitycollege reform bill signed into law that year. Thishad been in response to an earlier court decision giving illegal immigrantsthese rights. Pasadena City collegecan again serve as an example, for the campus now has 13 percent morestudents than it has money to educate. Fee hikes in the community college system were instituted because ofthe need to make up for lost revenues from the state and to pay for theprograms that were being offered. If this paper is not what you are looking for, you can search again: Search for: or Click here to request an essay written just for you.