Reality check for higher education

This guest editorial comes from Dan Walters at CalMatters, an independent public journalism venture covering California state politics and government. For more info, visit calmatters.org.

As California’s population exploded in the 1950s and 1960s— surpassing New York to become the nation’s most populous state in 1962—its political leaders responded with sweeping plans to satisfy burgeoning demands for public services.

New freeway routes were plotted to carry millions of additional cars. State and local bond issues were drafted to build schools for the baby boom. New dams and canals were designed to increase water supplies. And, a master plan was written to unify California’s colleges and universities.

Six decades later, California’s population is nearly three times larger, but stalled at just under 40 million and has been declining slowly.

The much-vaunted Master Plan for Higher Education remains on the books but never achieved the seamless pathway to low-cost, universal student access it envisioned.

While the demand for higher education is huge, and while the state’s economy rests on having a highly trained and educated workforce, the state’s three collegiate systems—the University of California, California State University and more than 100 locally managed community colleges—remain more competitive than cooperative. If anything, friction among the systems has been increasing as they squabble over academic turf and compete for financing in a state budget that struggles to pay for all of its spending.

The 1960-vintage master plan, whose two political fathers were UC’s legendary president, Clark Kerr, and then-Gov. Pat Brown, delineated the roles that all three would play. UC would be the state’s premier research institution while providing highintensity undergraduate and graduate educations, with degrees up to doctorates. CSU would educate teachers, engineers and other professionals and offer both baccalaureate and master’s degrees. Community colleges would provide two-year associate

Letters

Meter woes persist

Re: Cover Story: “What’s up with downtown?” (by Jason Cassidy)

Let me get this straight. I must enter my license plate number and estimated time just to park downtown. Way to data mine your own citizens, Chico!

Bob Andersen Chico

In the July 6-August 2 issue, the cover story quotes Tom Van Overbeek, a prominent member of the Chico Silly Council, as saying that, in degrees, prepare students for transfer to four-year schools and also offer job-oriented, sub-professional training. regard to the goofy parking situation downtown that, “At this point the city is committed to it and we’re not going back.” Uncle Tom seems to think (if that’s the correct term) that the silly council is the city. No.

Demands from students that outstripped supply and budgetary pressures have eroded the demarcation lines. Community colleges have begun offering some limited baccalaureate degrees, encountering stiff opposition from the state university system, while state universities have sought, with some success, to award doctorates, thereby encroaching on UC’s jealously guarded turf.

Virtually every legislative session is marked by at least one conflict over competing ambitions of the three levels. One current measure, Assembly Bill 656, which has passed the Assembly and is pending in the Senate, would give CSU broad new authority to award doctorates.

Meanwhile, there has been constant friction over the transfer of credits from one level to another, with community college graduates often frustrated about gaining admission to four-year schools, despite the master plan’s promise.

Although there’s an official goal of boosting the number of community college students transferring to four-year schools from 89,000 to more than 120,000 by 2022, a year later fewer than 100,000 were making the transition.

“Of the students enrolled in a community college in California who said they wanted to transfer to a four-year university, an average of 9.9 percent went on to enroll at a four-year institution in 2021, the most recent data available,” CalMatters reporters Adam Echelman and Erica Yee found.

UC is opposing a measure, Assembly Bill 1749, that would make transfers easier.

These two situations—competition for degree authority and the difficulty community college students face in transferring—indicate once again that the Master Plan for Higher Education is broken. If it’s worthwhile having such a plan, it should be worthwhile to make it relevant to 21st-century realities, not 1960s theories.

Anthony Porter Chico

I have been following the controversy over the parking kiosks and as a downtown business owner for 40 years I think it is clear they are having a significant negative impact.

Since they were installed our business has been down every month from 2022. We are dealing with frequent complaints from customers and a few have said they won’t be back. We are on Fourth street between Main and Wall and there is often only a few cars parked on the entire block, whereas before I estimate the occupancy to be generally 40-80 percent. Since it’s unlikely the city will ever bring back the meters, I wonder if

by Jason Cassidy jasonc@newsreview.com

A kick-ass goodbye note

Before COVID-19, I never thought twice when a co-worker asked to meet up for coffee or lunch. Now … I get a little nervous.

It’s no secret that the pandemic dealt a serious blow to newspapers, the Chico News & Review included. We are adapting and surviving, which is good for us and good for the community, but as as we’ve soldiered on continuing over the past three years to publish monthly—with no immediate plan to return to our former weekly schedule— our resilient editorial staff has gradually thinned.

Folks have moved on, and the latest to embark on other adventures is longtime CN&R Staff Writer, and my good friend, Ashiah Scharaga, who very sweetly over coffee recently gave notice for the very-part-time writing position at the CN&R. This will free her up to commit fully to her main gig, as Marketing and Communications Director for True North Housing Alliance, as well have time to continue teaching theater to children.

In January, we celebrated Ashiah’s fifth anniversary at this paper. She’d interned with the CN&R while in the journalism program at Chico State. After graduation she moved on to an internship at the Sacramento Bee then a job at the Chico Enterprise-Record, where she worked until 2018, when then-CN&R Editor Melissa Daugherty poached her from the daily’s news department.

It’s very appropriate that Ashiah’s last story on staff (we hope that she will contribute as a freelancer when the time and the story is right!) is one focused a social-justice issue. For all her great writing and her commitment to the mission of community journalism, what will likely stand as Ashiah’s legacy at the CN&R is her passion for trying to give voice to those who have none—from telling many stories of the often forgotten refugees of the 2018 Camp Fire to illuminating the plight of trans kids looking for support as divisive politics drive policies hostile to their existence (see “Crisis Care,” page 8).

To me, and to many in Butte County who’ve told her their stories, Ashiah has been the voice for our marginalized and underserved neighbors. I respect her immensely for her work at the CN&R, and I look forward to seeing the great things she will do as she continues in other roles devoted to this community.

As I’ve said many times, Ashiah, thank you for kicking so much ass.