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By Zach Miners
Community colleges play a key role in educating a 21st century workforce, the president says, but they also need changes
Community colleges are the "unsung heroes" of the American education system, President Obama said during a
Jill Biden, the wife of Vice President Joe Biden and herself a community college instructor of 17 years, led the one-day summit, which brought together community college faculty and students, policy leaders, and business and philanthropic groups to take a critical look at how the two-year institutions can better equip Americans with the skills that businesses and the economy need to compete in the 21st century. Almost half of all college students in the United States attend community college.
"Community colleges are at the center of America's efforts to educate our way to a better economy," Dr. Biden , "and I know the power of community colleges to change lives," she added, relating her stories of students who have returned to school to improve their job prospects or who have gone on to work in high-growth industries such as healthcare or the lab tech field.
But community colleges today also have problems -- more than 50 percent of community college students fail to transfer to a four-year school or receive an associate's degree within six years -- and the summit examined ways to improve student retention and ease students' transition into the workforce or four-year institutions. Ideas on the table include new forms of industry partnerships with community colleges, better alignment of curricula with employers' needs, and making community college more affordable for low-income students.
A new initiative also announced this week by the Obama administration aims to tackle many of those strategies head on. On Monday, President Obama announced the launch of "Skills for America's Future," a program run by the nonprofit
Not everyone views community colleges as a surefire pathway to workforce training. In a report released Monday, a marketing firm working for the
"Community colleges are a viable option for many students," she says, but there is "great concern" over whether they can really make the achievements the administration is calling for. She questions what kind of new infrastructure is really needed to combat community colleges' low graduation rates, especially given that the majority of them are funded by real estate taxes. "What is this going to cost us?" she says.
Peter Katopes, interim president at New York's
Others laud the Obama's effort to shine a light on a sector of higher education that often gets short shrift, but they argue that graduation rates and numbers are getting too much attention while the learning that goes on inside the classroom isn't getting enough.
"Getting more students to the 'college degree' finish line is certainly important," says Debra Humphreys, vice president for communication and public affairs at the
And while the focus of the summit was the administration's commitment to students' success, politics and the
2010 midterm elections did enter the discussion too. Speaking out against congressional
Republicans' "Pledge to America" that was released last week, Obama said the
Available on Amazon.com:
Why Boys Fail: Saving Our Sons from an Educational System That's Leaving Them Behind
Teach Like a Champion: 49 Techniques that Put Students on the Path to College
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Obama Touts the Benefits of Community Colleges