What Is a Community College? : The best definition should come from the community colleges themselves

Why does California have community colleges? Four years ago, the Legislature took that question up systematically as part of the revision of California’s Master Plan for Higher Education. Assembly Bill 1725, the omnibus community college reform bill that Gov. George Deukmejian signed into law in 1988, enjoyed overwhelming bipartisan support. In the Assembly, it passed with exactly one dissenting vote.

At the heart of the 1988 reform were the priorities the state set for the community college system. These were: (1) vocational education and, at equal priority, the education of students planning to transfer to the California State University or the University of California; (2) remedial instruction; (3) continuing education or “community service” instruction.

This year, without legislative debate and in the supercharged atmosphere of budget crisis, Gov. Pete Wilson is attempting to scrap those priorities, downgrading vocational education, especially short-term vocational education, downgrading remedial education, upgrading the two-year associate of arts degree and further upgrading transfer education. The merits of the governor’s proposed revision of the master plan aside, we find its venue and timing inappropriate in the extreme. Budget negotiation is neither the place nor the time for determining the mission of higher education; Wilson’s attempt to promote his own substantive education agenda under such circumstances should be seen as a harbinger of what lies in store next year if his constitutional amendment initiative, the so-called Taxpayers’ Protection Act, is approved in November.

Once the state has determined how much the community colleges have to spend, it should be up to them, with due respect for existing law, to determine how the money should be spent. Southwest Los Angeles Community College, in the wake of the riots, may well need priorities different from those of Pasadena Community College. It is not the governor’s place to say that students seeking vocational or remedial instruction at Southwest should be served last.

Finally, though no one disputes that all branches of California higher education must accept cuts, the $451 million the governor wants to cut from the community college system--along with his proposed 500% fee increase for full-time students taking 15 units--is poor budgeting and should not be excused simply because, by design, time is now short. A compromise between the Democrats’ plan and this one must and, we believe, can be worked out.