There’s nothing like the feeling of turning a dream into reality, especially after a long wait. Allan Hancock College is right there, on the threshold of bringing a long-awaited goal to fruition for local students.
For the 12 years he’s been at Hancock’s helm, Kevin Walthers has worked to get a bachelor’s degree offered on campus. The college recently got good news: provisional approval from the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office. Now it just needs the thumbs up from the California State University (CSU) higher-ups.
Walthers is holding his breath. As are the myriad students who would love to earn a four-year degree but can’t travel up to San Luis Obispo to attend Cal Poly. “It’s certainly exciting in our community,” the president and superintendent said. “A lot of our students are excited because they can’t afford to leave for a bachelor’s degree.”
He explained that this Bachelor of Science in applied professional studies is designed with Northern County in mind. It prepares students for professional roles in agriculture, professional services, manufacturing, space launch enterprises, and health care, all of which need a growing local base of employees.
“This is designed to get people into the workforce, with the help of our local industry who said, ‘This would be a valuable degree we look for when hiring people,’” Walthers said.
While we wait to see if the CSU can’t find a reason to reject Hancock’s bachelor’s degree program, Cal Poly and the community college have begun a new partnership. I’m eager to see how it works out for the 20 students who get to earn a sociology degree through the 2+2 program—two years through Hancock, two years through Cal Poly, all on Hancock’s campus.
“Twenty students is great, but that doesn’t solve the problem,” Walthers said. “That doesn’t address the need that we have in our community for additional programs.”
I’m crowning Walthers the Fierce Defender of Santa Maria Students. Well done!
I’ve got another Fierce Defender crown to hand out. This one goes to 3rd District Supervisor Joan Hartmann for speaking up against illegal food vendors. She took the issue all the way to the Santa Barbara County Association of Governments (SBCAG) on Oct. 23. The agency brings together county and city reps to tackle transportation issues, but Hartmann and her staff brought up dangerous street meat vendors because the problem knows no boundaries.
The current state rules prevent law enforcement from imposing criminal penalties on sidewalk vendors; instead, they can issue administrative fines, which don’t go on criminal records, which won’t flag potentially undocumented vendors for deportation. Thus the law solved a few legitimate problems and created more.
“[The Legislature] had good intentions, but I think they are hurting the very people they wanted to help, at least in our community, and we need to make that clear,” Hartmann said.
Folks from local restaurants shared stories of illegal vendors setting up shop in front of brick-and-mortars.
“It’s a problem that’s gotten out of control,” said Magaly Villanueva with Tortilleria Mexico. “We have businesses going out of business because of illegal street vending.”
Keep up the fierce defending work, Hartmann—that crown looks good on you!
The Canary’s Fierce Defender crown is too big. Send a tiny tiara to canary@santamariasun.com.
This article appears in Oct 31 – Nov 10, 2024.