Post on 28-Mar-2015
transcript
The Evolving Mission of the American Community College
Kenneth P. Walker, Ph.D.
Council for the Study of Community CollegesAACC Annual Convention
April 13, 2007
“The revolution in American education, in which the two-year college played a leading role, is almost over. Two years of post-secondary education are within the reach — financially, geographically, practically — of virtually every American.”
Revolution: Almost over
Evolution: Continues in full force
Education in America
Baccalaureate degrees awarded by some community colleges will continue the democratizing process for access to the bachelor’s degree.
New movement…new revolution
Joliet Junior CollegeAmerica's oldest public community college
Why Baccalaureate Degrees at Community Colleges?
Globalization of the economy
Demands of business and industry
Increased job competition
Exporting of jobs
Increasing demand by students
Limited university access
Rising costs
Benefits of Baccalaureate Degrees at Community Colleges
Maintains family and employment relationships
Increases access to higher education
Promotes cost efficiencies
Maximizes human resources
Supports success of non-traditional students
Promotes articulation and upward mobility
Provides cooperative facility use for work-based learning
Expands commitment to economic development
Responds to local need for specialized programs
Capitalizes on facilities, faculty, staff and programs
Community College Mission:Responsive, Adaptive, Growing
“The institution must be able to change as communities change with new conditions, demands, or circumstances. Any time we can describe the community college in definitive, specific terms, we will destroy it. It has to change. It has to be different in different areas.”
Ed Gleazer, Jr.The Community College: Values, Vision & Vitality
“Responding to the Crisis in College Opportunity”
National Council for Public Policy and Higher Education
“ The nation should provide a space for every eligible student to enroll in higher education.”
YET…
48% of college-qualified low-income high school graduates from attending a four-year college, and 22% from attending any college at all
43% of college-qualified middle-income high school graduates from attending a four-year college, and 16% from attending any college at all.
Study by the Advisory Committee on Student Financial Assistance
Financial barriers prevent…
Why Baccalaureate Degrees at Community Colleges?
Present Next decade
Unable to attend a four-year college
400,000college-qualified
students
Attend no college at all
170,000college-qualified
students
4.4 million
2 million
Why Baccalaureate Degrees at Community Colleges?
“The vibrancy of our democracy and our knowledge-based economy is dependent upon ensuring access to college for high school graduates.”
--Empty Promises, 2002
Access to the Baccalaureate Degree
“Access to the baccalaureate degree must be expanded so that future generations will be equipped to cope with the magnitude of change instigated by technology, industry, finance, commerce, and government.”
“Changes in the marketplace for higher education are … producing a new vision for the delivery of higher education that has not yet become fully understood.”
Frank Newman
Access to the Baccalaureate Degree
Vision for four-year colleges becoming universities not understood at the turn of the century
Vision for community colleges offering baccalaureate degrees not currently understood
Higher education mission …
…always has and always will adapt and conform to the changing needs and demands of society.
Graphic: National Conference on Teacher Quality
75 Years of the University Transformation Era
“The most prominent element in the transformation was the emergence of the university.”
– Arthur M. Cohen
Slow introduction of universities
Colleges had to modify concepts adhered to since colonial days including expanding the educational experience from four years to a greater length of time by organizing graduate schools and awarding advanced degrees.
Mission Creep Mission Adaptation
Idea: Converting colleges to universities
Attributed to men familiar with German higher education
Idea: Offering baccalaureate degrees at community colleges
Began in Canada over a decade ago
University evolutionAdded master’s degrees, doctoral degrees, postdoctoral studies, new majors:
Adding baccalaureate degrees in areas of need
Community College evolution
Business Journalism Engineering
Architecture Pharmacology Dentistry
Agriculture Mining Forestry
Psychology Sociology Education
Same factors which are driving baccalaureate degrees as community colleges
Restructuring driven by “a potent combination of social, political, cultural, and economic factors”
“Unless the old rural colleges revive themselves, it was argued, they stood in danger of slipping into oblivion.”
--Christopher J. Lucas
Today, no clear understanding of what constitutes a four-year community college
“Ultimately, the outcome of decades of ferment and turmoil…, would be the supplanting of the ‘old-time’ college as a dominate institutional model by that of the modern university. Existing colleges—some of them at least—would be transformed in succeeding years to entirely different kinds of academic institutions. The rise of the American university, marked though it was by false starts and much trial and error, was to prove itself a momentous phenomenon of almost revolutionary proportions.”
“American higher education would never be the same again.”
--Christopher J. Lucas
Baccalaureate degrees at community colleges now authorized in 15 states!
Tremendous opportunity for university faculty and graduate students to study, research and write about this new type of institution, still in its infancyGraphic: ASHFoundation
“Continuing democratization of access to the bachelor’s degree will result in a higher standard of living and a higher quality of life.”
--Kenneth P. Walker