Building a Bigger and Better Summit

It was really hard to watch the American Graduation Initiative get cut from SAFRA. It was one of the most promising initiatives for higher education in decades, representing a real shift from a culture of focus on college access to one focused on student success. I was crushed to see it go unfunded.

Of course, I'm feeling a little better since Jill Biden called for a White House summit on community colleges, to be held this fall. An Obama conference is a decent consolation prize. It's actually a coup, when you think about how seriously community colleges have been taken by policymakers in the past (read: not at all).

Washington needs to make the most of this opportunity. Doing this requires pushing far beyond a pleasant conversation about "best practices and successful models." Because let's be honest-there aren't very many "best practices" we can feel confident in scaling up right now. That's why building the body of research evidence on effective community college practices was a goal of AGI.

Instead Dr. Biden should move the ball forward on a serious conversation about the role of the two-year colleges in American higher education by asking the toughest questions. These should include:

• What constitutes positive, measurable outcomes for students at these schools? What does "making community colleges better" mean?

• Is making community colleges "more accessible" desirable, if it means bringing into college more students with less academic and financial preparation? Under what conditions?

• Are there efficiencies that can be gained without compromising the quality of the academic experience? For example, should state systems of community colleges be encouraged to specialize their in-person academic offerings and expand (and coordinate) their online offerings?

• What role should data play in informing decision-making of community college leaders? Data of what kind, and collected by whom?

• Which additional resources will generate the greatest returns for community college students?

Dr. Biden must emphasize that the entire sector needs to work together, across geographic boundaries (such as urban/rural and state lines), to come up with some common answers. Sure, community colleges grew out of independent communities but they now serve a much larger, national role. Collective thinking about solutions will benefit them, and help them to establish greater visibility and a more powerful voice.

This serious day will be a very important one. We can't be naïve. Even those who think the nation needs more college-educated adults and believe in accessible higher education openly discredit the work of community colleges. Know a kid who wants to earn a bachelor's degree? Some folks will counsel that kid to avoid community colleges. Their advice is based on pretty rock-hard statistical data, but its implications are troubling. Have we basically given up on a two-year route to a four-year degree? Or can we do more to change those numbers in the near future? I hope the answer from the Summit is a convincing "yes." We need the Obama Administration to lead the way.

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The Sky is Falling

As a child growing up inside the Washington Beltway, I learned early never to have much faith in politicians. Every few years new folks came to the city, promising "change" and leaving without having done much at all. The candidates and officials I did like never got the attention and promotions they deserved. And worst of all, those who claimed to be on my side were everlasting disappointments (read: Bill Clinton).

Somehow that cynical base inside me melted a little with the election of Barack Obama, and became a tiny puddle when he announced the American Graduation Initiative. Finally, a president who "got" it! As educators we were all working to prepare children for a full life, and that had to include a real shot at higher education. That meant finally giving sufficient resources to the colleges where the majority of those looking longingly at the American Dream were going to end up: community colleges.

My heart went pitter-patter when I heard Obama call community colleges an "undervalued asset" to the nation, one often treated like a "stepchild" and an "afterthought." I felt real hope for the world my kids would grow up in when he summoned the "can-do American spirit" of community colleges everywhere to help transform the American economy.

I thought things had really changed.

Well, it looks like I was completely and utterly wrong. Today the American Graduation Initiative sits on the chopping block, thanks not only to the money-grubbing hands of banks but also to the Democrats' fears of their powerful colleagues who throw their primary support to the nation's Historically Black colleges and universities. Community colleges will soon learn that their place in this society hasn't changed a bit-- they are expected to accomodate our national desires for widespread college-going while getting next to no support in return. The students they serve-- those without BA-educated parents or beaucoup bucks-- will get a worse fate-- locked out of the courses they need, crammed into overcrowded classrooms, expected to learn without any of the technological advancements of their counterparts.

This country has no heart for these kids. We claim to care enough to prepare them, to try and reform the k-12 system to get them ready for college-- but we won't take the necessary action to make sure college is ready for them. We're rethinking NCLB to set them up for what, exactly?

So here I am, back where I started. Deeply suspicious and cynical, wondering what all the work was for. And hoping, really hoping, that I'm wrong. Maybe the Senate will come to its senses. Maybe.

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The Invisible Institution

Community colleges have been called many things-"junior," "second chance," "sub-baccalaureate," and one of my personal favorites: places of "continued dependency, unrealistic aspirations, and wasted general education." That last one dates back to 1968, in the heat of their growth period (the author is W.B. Devall, writing in Education Record).

Despite all the disparaging remarks, I have a strong sense that many community college leaders are willing to be called just about anything, as long as they're "not called late for dinner." And this year, at least, they're at the table, and standing to enjoy a nice deal in the form of the American Graduation Initiative (part of legislation pending in the Senate).

But this period of sunshine provides only a modicum of comfort, given the longstanding backdrop of invisibility punctuated by insults. In 2005, Washington Post columnist Jay Matthews wrote a confessional column called "Why I Ignore Community Colleges." A Brookings Institution report released today reveals that Matthews was (and is) far from unique among his colleagues.

Brookings examined mainstream news coverage since 2007 and discovered that only about 1% of national coverage (appearing on TV, newspapers, news websites, and radio-and not including blogs) is devoted to education. That's education of any flavor.

Zoom in on coverage of community colleges and the picture gets even worse. Of all education reporting - of that 1%-- only 2.9% is devoted to community colleges. Public two-year colleges enroll 60% as many students as 4-year colleges and universities, but receive only one-tenth the news coverage. As the Brookings authors conclude, "From the standpoint of national media coverage, community colleges barely exist."

Invisibility is both a cause and a symptom of community colleges' low-status in higher education. The oft-unmentioned "snob factor" contributes to reporters' sense that their readers neither care, nor need to know, much about this sector. Children of journalists are unlikely to attend community colleges, and we all know that parents pay more attention to whatever their kids are doing. The same problem applies to politicians-it's a veritable miracle that President Obama is speaking with pride about institutions of postsecondary education where he's unlikely to send his own children.

Leaving community colleges out of the news means substantially skewing the American image of higher education. Stories about the critical links between the economy and education are missed-after all, it's community colleges who consistently watch enrollment rise along with unemployment. Kids and parents hear repeatedly about competitive admissions and rising tuition, expensive dorms and climbing gyms, even though these are the reality for less than half of all undergraduates. And we hear about, and from, presidents of 4-year colleges and universities, far more often than we hear about their hard-working peers running community colleges.

I think that sadly enough many at community colleges have gotten used to stereotypical representations of those schools-the lack of resistance to NBC's comedy Community may be one indication. But as William DeGenaro points out, it hasn't always been this way. In the 1920s and 1930s, community colleges were praised as essential to public education, getting ink in publications like the New Republic, The Atlantic Monthly, and Reader's Digest. Enrollment was climbing rapidly, just as it is now, and the media took notice. In fact, DeGenaro's research reveals that "the print media served as a booster, implying that the colleges resulted from common sense." That "rhetoric of inevitability" stands in sharp contrast to today's stance of invisibility. By ignoring an entire sector of higher education, the media helps to de-legitimate it. Simply put, reporters need to catch up--the President, together with many federal and state leaders, philanthropists, and citizens, sees the American community college as essential to the nation's future. What are journalists waiting for?

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House Passes Historic Community College Legislation!

Today the U.S. House of Representatives voted 253 to 171 to pass the Student Aid and Fiscal Responsibility Act. It knocks private lenders out of the student loan business, and uses the savings to make transformational investments in the nation's community colleges, as well as increase the Pell grant. Some, including La Guardia Community College president Gail Mellow, have called this the most important piece of higher education legislation since the G.I. Bill.

Let's hope the Senate soon follows on the House's class act!
(at least the House had at least 1 class act this week...)

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Community College Legislation Moves Forward

A quick update on the proposed legislation affecting community colleges-- HR 3221. Today, an online JAM in support of the American Graduation Initiative took place, drawing a virtual crowd of around 400 folks. Lots of good discussion happened, especially about issues of how to make the competitive grant process work well without leaving the more disadvantaged colleges behind, and questions about that required match for the construction funds. Even more exciting, the House of Representatives is poised to take a full floor vote tomorrow, after the rule governing floor debate passed, 241-149. The Senate is expected to begin taking action next week. Stay tuned...

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Join Us!

Dear Friends and Colleagues,

You are invited to the Jam on the American Graduation Initiative for community college leaders; an online discussion with you and others from around the country about President Obama’s recent announcement to invest $12 billion in America’s community colleges. Convened by the Brookings Institute, The Education Commission of the States, and Jobs for the Future, the Jam will be held on September 16, 2009 from 8:00 am to 12:00 Midnight EST.

Sponsored by Knowledge in the Public Interest, with LaGuardia Community College as the lead college, the Jam will solicit your ideas about:

1) WHAT we should know—the benefits and consequences--about what the administration is proposing

2) HOW we can organize ourselves to make a difference for every community college in the US

Join a diverse group of individuals—community college presidents, faculty and staff; public officials; policy researchers and advocates--to influence the discussion on this groundbreaking proposal. The result will be a tool kit for action that will be available within two weeks of the Jam.

You can RSVP for the Jam until Sunday, September 13 by:
1) Going to http://polilogue.net and complete the sign up form.

2) Receive a confirmation email from “Polilogue Admin” with a link back to the site.

3) Click on the American Graduation Initiative community to enter the Jam site.

4) The passkey is: register

Please join in shaping the community college response to the most important national higher education initiative since the GI Bill. Come and go as your time permits, post as often as you like, and move between conversation threads.

See you online.

Sincerely,

Sara Goldrick-Rab
University of Wisconsin-Madison
Lead Author, "Transforming Community Colleges,"(Brookings Institution, 2009)

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