Community Colleges Get a Chance to Rebound

There is a mound of new money awaiting California community colleges this school year, many campuses have fresh leadership, and the public appears more willing to part with tax dollars for education.

As classes begin this week, however, at least two sticky questions face college officials and students: Will California’s long-awaited economic upswing last long enough to erase years of budget cuts and the ensuing enrollment drops? And how are the recession-weakened colleges going to prepare for a coming influx of students not seen since the Baby Boom?

“I’m more optimistic this year about the potential” for a long-term improvement in community college fortunes, said Jack Sterk, faculty president at Valley College in Van Nuys. But it will take more than one or two years of fattened budgets, he and others say, to restore a battered system.

As for the half a million students expected to knock on the door of the state’s higher education system in the next 10 years--the vast majority going to community colleges--some experts say the state is unprepared.

“It isn’t that California has a bad plan to deal with this; we have no plan,” said Patrick Callan, executive director of the San Jose-based California Higher Education Policy Center.

Despite a host of major concerns, however, 1996 was a banner year for the state’s 106 community colleges--at least when compared with most of the 1990s.

The good news began in March, when voters decisively approved a $3-billion school and college construction bond measure, $1 billion of which was dedicated to higher education. The largest bond measure in state history, it sailed through on a 62%-38% vote.

The Los Angeles Community College District, at 100,000 students the largest in the nation, will receive nearly $22 million from that pot to help fund desperately needed construction projects at its nine aging campuses.

Even more important than the money, some say, was the message the vote seemed to convey: That taxpayers are becoming more willing to repair a decaying education system.

Then in July, the Legislature passed and Gov. Pete Wilson signed what Sterk called the “best budget in years” for higher education.

That budget earmarked $3.1 billion for community colleges, $200 million more than they received last year and possibly the largest one-year increase for the system ever, said Gus Guichard, the vice chancellor for the California Community Colleges system.

About $92 million of that is dedicated in one way or another to accommodating more students through more classroom space, more teachers and courses. Many community colleges had to turn away students in recent years, after they laid off staff or canceled classes because of shrinking budgets. The $92 million aims to reverse that trend.

College of the Canyons in Santa Clarita will use many of its new state dollars to begin a weekend college. The 25 Saturday classes, quickly organized after the budget was passed, will include courses ranging from the Internet to United States history.

The new budget will allow the school’s 6,000-student enrollment to increase by 13%. The growth funds are especially prized, said college spokeswoman Sue Bozman, because in some recent years, the school had to turn away nearly one applicant for every one accepted.

But while some schools are emerging from the recession in relatively good fiscal shape, others are staring at books filled with red ink.

The budget at Pierce College in Woodland Hills has grown from $20 million last year to $22 million, thanks to the new state budget. But the school also rang up a $1.2-million deficit during the 1995-1996 school year. And new President E. Bing Inocencio said his task this year is not to erase the debt but to simply keep it from growing.

In recent years, the state has paid for most community colleges to increase enrollments, but budget constraints have often capped that growth, sometimes holding it to as little as 1%. The enrollment cap has been raised considerably for most districts this year; the Los Angeles district has been funded to grow as much as 10.1%.

But with extra money comes a challenge--luring students back to college.

Because they could not afford extra students, most schools have been turning away would-be students. Now, schools must add students to meet their new enrollment caps, enabling them to get their full share of state funding. If not, they could lose some of that money to other schools.

The trick now will be letting students know that, for the first time in years, there will be enough classes to meet the demand.

“When you turn the spigot back on, it takes time to get the word out and for students to start coming back,” said Jerry Hayward of Policy Analysis for California Education, a nonprofit education think tank. “There will be a little time lag before they get up to speed.”

Urban colleges, Hayward said, will probably have a more difficult time recovering than suburban and rural schools, which are often a more central part of their smaller community.

Urban districts “really get hammered, especially in these downward years,” Hayward said. “It will be harder for [the Los Angeles Community College District] to recover the enrollment it lost than it will be for these smaller communities.”

In the final analysis, many experts say, the windfall of 1996 is not really a windfall at all; it is merely a hopeful step in the right direction.

“Some people say we got a great year, the good days are coming back,” said Callan of the California Higher Education Policy Center. “What I’m saying is we need to use this period when things are good to do some serious planning for the future. . . . We’re not in a safe harbor. We’re in the eye of the hurricane.”