Coast Colleges to Keep KOCE for Training Facility

Despite reservations by two faculty groups, the Coast Community College District Board of Trustees voted unanimously Wednesday to retain the license for KOCE-TV and convert the Huntington Beach-based station into a “television academy” for student courses.

The new television academy will train students in a variety of television and video job skills and is scheduled to open in August, 1987, officials said.

The board’s 5-0 vote ended two years of uncertainty about the public television station’s future and its relationship to the community college. In the summer of 1984, the district board had voted to phase out its funding for the station and to divest itself of its operation by 1987 by transferring its federal license to a public-interest group.

During its Wednesday meeting, the board halted the phase-out of funding and decided to retain the license--as well as the day-to-day operations--of KOCE (Channel 50).

However, the board’s action also said that future district support for the station will be “related directly to the cost of education services” the station furnishes.

The station, which is the only Public Broadcasting System outlet in Orange County, will continue PBS broadcasts but will pay for these through grants, sale of services, private donations and fund drives.

The board said the station will be more directly related to college students in the future. According to the policy approved by the Coast board Wednesday night: “The role of KOCE-TV shall be modified to focus on district educational programs. . . . Opportunities shall be provided for productions in which students and student materials are used.”

By August, 1987, the district plans to use the KOCE studios as the focus of a “Cooperative Television Academy.” The academy will train community college students in a variety of television and video industry job skills, according to district Chancellor David Brownell.

The board’s operation of KOCE has long been opposed by the faculties of Golden West College in Huntington Beach and Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa. The Coast Community College District governs those two colleges, along with Coastline Community College, based in Fountain Valley.

The faculties’ resentment against the station has mainly focused on the money going into its operation and the faculties’ charge that the station is more of a frill than a real teaching resource.

Evelyn Weiss, president of the Golden West College Faculty Senate, warned the board Wednesday night that faculty still are leery of KOCE.

“We recommend caution in establishing a program until a needs assessment has been done,” she said. She added that such an assessment would determine if there is a need in Orange County for more television-video course offerings at the community college level.

Michael Finnegan, president of the Orange Coast College Faculty Senate, also expressed concern that the television academy should not proceed until its need has been documented.

“It’s simply silly to expand a program without knowledge (of a potential need),” he said.

Brownell responded that as curriculum for the new academy is developed, the need will be determined. He also pledged that only district money for teaching would go into the station. “We will spend an academic dollar on an academic purpose,” Brownell said.

KOCE became a political issue in 1983 when it was repeatedly criticized as a money drain by faculty at Golden West and Orange Coast colleges. Faculty members were particularly angered because the Board of Trustees in 1983 chose to give layoff notices to about 100 teachers in a budget-cutting action, but still kept funding the television station.

Recall Move

A recall move against all five board members failed in early 1983, but the faculty union successfully backed three “reform” candidates who were elected in November, 1983, and who became the voting majority on the board.

One of the first acts of the new board majority was to commission a management study that would recommend what to do with KOCE.

That study, made by Evans Management Services Inc. of Santa Monica, recommended that the college district phase out its financial support over a 30-month period and then divest itself of the station’s operation by transferring KOCE’s license.

The new board majority accepted the recommendations and voted to wean KOCE from college district support. Further, the board agreed to try to transfer the license of KOCE to some public-interest group by 1987.