Community colleges throughout California have seen big, systematic changes in the last two years, and while many of those are still being implemented, even more are coming.
In an effort to ease some of the “angst” spurred by recent modifications to the California Community Colleges system’s goals, funding formula, and student placement assessments, Chancellor Eloy Ortiz Oakley launched a listening tour of colleges across the state. He visited Allan Hancock College on Nov. 7.
“I wanted to let you know why we’re doing what we’re doing, and why it’s so important for colleges like Allan Hancock and communities like Santa Maria to succeed,” Oakley told a small crowd of Hancock administrators and trustees at a meeting in the Severson Theater that night. “Your students are the future of our state.”
Oakley said that while he believes deeply in the mission of the state’s community colleges system, its students haven’t been succeeding at the rates officials would like to see. That, he said, is particularly true in low-income communities of color like Santa Maria.
That’s why Oakley said the system’s board of governors recently adopted a new “vision for success,” a framework that will guide the system toward reaching its goals of increasing credential attainment by 20 percent, increasing transfers to UC and CSU schools by 35 percent, increasing employment rates among continuing education students, and closing equity and regional education gaps.
The chancellor said he hopes to reach these goals through modifications like the already implemented College Promise Program, which gives eligible students a year of free tuition, and the system’s new “student-centered” funding formula.
The new formula will give money to schools based 60 percent on enrollment numbers, 20 percent on low-income student enrollment rates, and 20 percent on student outcomes. That will essentially push additional resources to schools that serve historically underserved communities, Oakley said. The formula, which will be phased in over the course of three years, will also incentivise schools to get those underserved students credentialed, transferred to a university, employed, and so on.
Changes will also affect the way incoming students are assessed and placed in some courses. Oakley said the system’s reliance on standardized placement tests has disproportionately hurt students of color, who are often placed in remedial courses that deter their academic progress. Fewer than 5 percent of black students placed in remediation courses go on to attain a credential, he said.
“It’s not that there’s something wrong with the students,” Oakley said, “there’s something wrong with the way we’re measuring their abilities to succeed.”
The system also plans to reform the Cal Grant Program, so that more community college students will be better able to attain those monetary awards, which he said largely go to UC and CSU students.
At the meeting, Hancock officials–who were denied a $75 million bond measure by Santa Barbara County voters on Nov. 6–seemed most concerned about funding.
While one attendee shared difficulties with steady faculty funding, both Superintendent and President Kevin Walthers and Treasurer Larry Lahr asked Oakley how the system would help community colleges pay contributions to the California Public Employees Retirement System (CalPERS) and California State Teachers’ Retirement System (CalSTRS), costs that are massively increasing for employers all over the state.
Oakley said that while system officials hope to set aside funding specifically for PERS and STRS costs and push as much money as possible into colleges’ base funds, the politics of the situation can be difficult to navigate. It’s a huge issue for the whole state, Oakley said.
Lahr nodded and said with laugh, “The only comfort is that I’m not alone.”
Staff Writer Kasey Bubnash writes School Scene each week. Information can be sent to the Sun via mail, fax, or email at mail@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Nov 15-22, 2018.
