Phoenix
The impact of the economic crisis on colleges has been the topic of discussion at almost every higher-education meeting this spring. But at the American Association of Community Colleges meeting here, talk of the economy takes on a different tone. While many private colleges, for instance, are worried about meeting their enrollment targets for the fall, community colleges are bursting at the seams as unemployed workers arrive clamoring for retraining.
That’s the good news for two-year colleges. Of course, those new students aren’t coming with additional funds from states or counties, which are dealing with their own fiscal problems. As a result, many community-college leaders here are trading tips on how to serve these new students with limited resources.
Thelma White, president of Elizabethtown Community and Technical College, a Kentucky institution that has seen its enrollment jump by 18 percent this year as automobile-parts suppliers cut jobs in the area, has developed a career-transition program. It offers a 50-percent discount on tuition up to six credit hours for workers laid off since last fall.
“The important part is that this is not costing us anything more to provide,” Ms. White said. “We’re looking to fill spaces in courses. We’re not going out to create new sections and hire more faculty.”
The program also offers free noncredit courses to laid-off workers. The college has increased the number of online courses to accommodate unemployed workers.
At the Community College of Beaver County, in Pennsylvania, the president, Joe D. Forrester, adopted a process he called “compression planning” that brought together focus groups of employees around the campus to suggest ideas for both raising new revenue and containing costs. Before the groups even met, he laid out a set of ground rules: They couldn’t gripe about the unfairness of life; they had to suggest big ideas, not the low-hanging fruit; and they needed to focus on operational issues, not on eliminating positions.
Among the ideas the groups came up with was to shift to print-on-demand for all college publications. “Usually, we have 6,000 to 8,000 catalogs, brochures, or booklets sitting around that can’t be used, and it’s a waste,” Mr. Forrester said.
Sean A. Fanelli, president of Nassau Community College, in New York, stressed the importance of communicating a simple and single message to lawmakers. The legislature and the governor there had proposed a 10-percent cut for community colleges, which in turn lobbied lawmakers telling them that if the colleges lost those funds, they couldn’t handle the increased capacity brought on by rising unemployment. In the end, lawmakers dropped the proposed 10-percent cut.
Moberly Area Community College, in Missouri, has seen its enrollment jump 14 percent this year at the same time the governor has asked two-year institutions to freeze tuition in exchange for level funds from the state. That has made giving good raises impossible, said the college’s president, Evelyn E. Jorgenson. She urged leaders at the meeting here not to put themselves “in charge of morale on campus”; otherwise, they will be constantly disappointed as it’s impossible to please everyone in this economy. “Employees must take some responsibility for their own morale,” she said.
