Student Needs Should Go to Head of the Class

Re “College District Seeks Bonds, Another Might,” July 31:

There is no doubt that the three colleges in the Coast Community College District need repairs to aging buildings. At Orange Coast College, for instance, there are loose ceiling tiles in the classrooms, students and faculty have tripped on threadbare carpets and classrooms and faculty offices lack heating or air-conditioning.

On the other hand, the administration building is the most comfortable place on campus. The temperatures are always proper, the washrooms are immaculate and the carpeting is less than a year old. Orange Coast (along with Golden West and Coastline colleges) are heavily staffed with part-time teachers who vastly outnumber their full-time colleagues and who are the lowest-paid college teachers in the county and among the lowest paid in the state.

They receive no medical or retirement benefits and have no office space.

Sure, the colleges need funds desperately. Some of our buildings were built in the 1950s, and even then they were put up quickly to solve an immediate need. Some of the deterioration is severe. This year, drastic state cuts in funding to community colleges have exposed many problems that could more easily be camouflaged in better economic times.

The district has mandated severe cuts in the three colleges. The bulk of the cuts will come from academic programs. Administrative cuts, if any, will be cosmetic. Over the years our administrators have created an educational bureaucracy that is a money-devouring disgrace. Tax dollars that are sorely needed for academic programs are spent on everything but the classroom.

Those who run our district need to demonstrate a philosophy more in tune with classroom needs than with their own comfort and insulation. During the last several years, the importance of students and quality education have gotten only lip-service. Until it is clearly demonstrated that students come first, a bond issue might be throwing good money after bad.

Alan Remington

Professor of Music

Orange Coast College