California community college officials say their system may be
unable to accommodate the governor’s plans to temporarily
send thousands of next year’s incoming UC and CSU freshmen to
community colleges.
The governor also announced he would increase funding to
community colleges by $125 million to help the schools deal with
the increase in students.
However, community college officials said even with the
additional funding, community colleges may not be able to handle
the increase in freshmen.
“Even though our budget looks fairly healthy for 2004-2005
it does not go far enough with providing the system with necessary
resources to accommodate everyone’s educational needs,”
said Cheryl Fond, spokeswoman for the California Community Colleges
Chancellor’s Office.
She added that while the additional funding would be a good
start, it would only begin to address the financial difficulties
community colleges will face next year.
The need to reroute thousands of students stems from the budget
proposal announced by the governor on Friday.
Schwarzenegger proposed to cut state funding to the UC and CSU,
which would result in a 10 percent enrollment reduction for both
systems.
In practical terms this means that roughly 3,200 new UC students
and 3,800 CSU students would be unable to attend their schools of
choice, with the governor further proposing to siphon those
students into community colleges.
Additionally, while the new budget calls for community college
students to face a fee increase of over 40 percent next year,
students deferred from the UC and CSU would have all their fees
waived.
This proposal would also allocate $500 per student for
counseling to assist students in class selection for later transfer
to the CSU or UC campus where they were originally accepted.
Many students wishing to attend the UC and CSU next year,
however, would be dissatisfied with the governor’s
proposal.
Even with the state paying their fees, the proposal would still
mean that thousands of students qualifying for entrance into the UC
and CSU systems will receive deferral letters.
“We very likely will be turning away some of the students
that have met our qualifications, but it is too soon to
tell,” said Hanan Eisenman, a spokesman for the UC Office of
the President.
Other officials, however, say in some ways the governor’s
proposal would be extremely beneficial for the community college
system.
Santa Monica College, for example, will have the ability to
grow, because in fall 2002 the school had 31,000 students and in
2003 that number fell to 25,000.
“We expect to handle extra students. The way community
college funding is set up, we have to grow again,” said Bruce
Smith, a spokesman for SMC.
“We expect to grow back to 31,000. It would be to our
benefit to have students come to SMC first before
transferring,” he added.
Smith also said SMC was pleased with Schwarzenegger’s $80
million proposal that all community colleges receive as much money
as the best-funded campus, as SMC is part of the lowest-funded
community college district in California.
Members of the California Postsecondary Education Commission, a
nonpartisan commission responsible for evaluating higher education
issues, also expressed their support for the governor’s
proposal.
In a statement, CPEC said though many students will bear an
additional financial burden with the proposal, the state’s
$14 billion deficit leaves few options.
“The ultimate objective is to accommodate as many students
as possible,” said Murray Haberman, senior policy analyst for
the CPEC.
With reports from Richard Clough, Bruin
contributor.