Community college four-year degrees

Opinion

Managing editor

Genna Gold ggold.roundupnews@gmail.com

Community colleges would veer away from its original goals and create tension with CSUs and UCs if they provide bachelor’s degrees, as the Chancellor of California Community Colleges has proposed.

The primary mission of a community college, according to the state’s 1960 Master Plan for Higher Education, is to provide academic and occupational instruction for students through the first two years of undergraduate education.

Community colleges offer English as a second language (ESL) courses, workforce training services and adult education. So, adding four-year degrees to their goals would cause a shift in the Master Plan and would broaden their scope.

Competition with state colleges and universities would ensue when students bypass a more costly education, affecting CSU and UC enrollment numbers and budgets.

Doctorate faculty to teach an upper division courses as well as more classroom space, books and access to advanced laboratory equipment would cost CCCs significantly.

Pierce does not even have the budget to open some of their existing buildings for public use, like numerous new rooms in the Library/ Learning Crossroads Building, or money to keep its foundational Agriculture department afloat.

CCCs should fix existing issues like making sure millions of students do not sit on floors to crash classes. It makes more sense to first focus on perfecting the somewhat flawed system before any changes are made.

Thousands of community college students are turned away each year under the original mission.

The chancellor’s office should make sure existing educational programs are operational before funneling very limited funds into new ventures.

Opinion -Pro-

Roundup reporter

Jesus Castro jcastro.roundupnews@gmail.com

Pierce College is already convenient and inexpensive, but if students could earn a bachelor’s degree as well, the school’s prestige would shoot up several rungs.

The California Community College Chancellor’s Office established the Baccalaureate Degree Study Group in May 2013 to study whether or not CCCs should offer four-year degrees as 20 other states already do. The group will deliver its recommendation in January 2014.

President and CEO of Mt. San Antonio College Bill Scroggins said in an online magazine article that community colleges cannot meet the demand for skilled workers in technical fields and those fields increasingly require four-year degrees. Therefore, CCCs should

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adapt to these changes. If schools like Mt. San Antonio gave out degrees for applied fields like nursing, it could only benefit communities and produce more work-ready students.

Students that live in walking distance to Pierce would agree that going here for a bachelor’s degree is affordable geographically and monetarily.

Pierce’s accessibility might be the only chance some have to achieve a higher education so it should offer the alternative.

Also, a bachelor’s degree would encourage community college students to apply themselves to a specific focus earlier as opposed to waiting to transfer to a California university.

With all of the new buildings on campus contributing to Pierce’s new university feel, the school should simply follow through on its growing presence in the community with four-year degrees.

California community colleges owes its 2.4 million students the same opportunity to earn bachelor’s degrees that 21 other states have provided their students.

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Volume 119 Issue: 9

Page 5: “Framing local buildings,” Annabelle Bonebrake’s name was misspelled.