An Answer to the Cost of College and Community Collapse: Community Colleges

Townhall.com ^ | April 16, 2019 | Salena Zito

[EQAndyBuzz]

“I think it would help if states would devise a high-school system, where you could ‘graduate’ by the end of the 11th grade, and proceed onto a local community college. I think 60-percent of kids are ready for it, and that entire last year of high school is worthless.”

Maybe have the on-line schools offer classes for high school seniors to prepare them for college.

[Georgia Girl 2]

My Brother in law took the same path. One nephew just joined the marines after one year and the other finished two years before opting to work full-time. The niece is the only one to start out at a four year school.

[wintertime]

Yep!

[Reily]

My county K12 system allowed that almost 50 years ago but very few kids took advantage of it. I have no idea if they still do. I leveraged it and got my freshman English out of the way. (If I hadn’t done it I still would be taking freshmen English!)

[goodnesswins]

EXCUSE ME!!! I’ve taught at community college...business 101...it wasn’t CRAP. You can pay mucho dollars at a university for “CRAP” and end up an idiot.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

The little secret is that the CC teachers are far more likely to be conservatives although liberals are still a majority. They are also far more likely to be real people rather than an academic construct.

Most of my business class teachers were business men. My teacher for my business law class was a senior partner at a local firm that specialized in business law. The things they taught were from real life rather than books.

You also get a wider spread of students, the majority are adults who are back for either continuing education or, in things like the arts and humanities, just there for the fun of it.

[Reily]

“... CC teachers are far more likely to be conservatives ...”

You sure? I admit I have not kept an exact score but whenever I hear a kooky statement or see that there’s a “professor” arrested at some whack-O rally. The likelihood seems to be very high its a community college instructor. Of course when the media reports the event the media then likes to puff them up and call them a college professor so you the reader/listener think its some erudite person from “Big-Name-U”. You dig down and its some lecturer in Whack-a-Doodle Studies at the local community college.

[TBP]

We complain about the lack of trade people. Marco Rubio’s best moment in his presidential campaign was when he observed in one of the debates that “we need more welders and fewer philosophers.” he was right about that particular point.

What if someone established a community college and a network of trade schools tied together under one roof, under a single umbrella? It would be a different kind of institution from the standard university, but it would serve some of teh same purposes.

[SamAdams76]

My high school actually had such a program (back in the 1970s). It was called the Flexible Admissions Program. So in my senior year at high school, I only had two required classes in the morning and then jumped on a subway to Boston State College (which merged with UMASS a few years later) where I took some college level courses.

I agree about the last year of high school. Nothing but parties, proms and trying to get into a college. Very little learning happens in a typical high school senior year.

[pepsionice]

Now, I would admit this...it’d kill off a number of basketball/football/baseball players, but I think for 80-percent of kids, there’s nothing in the 12th grade. I would have easily left at the end of the 10th grade for a chance like this.

[PapaBear3625]

I think it would help if states would devise a high-school system, where you could ‘graduate’ by the end of the 11th grade, and proceed onto a local community college. I think 60-percent of kids are ready for it, and that entire last year of high school is worthless.

My school district has that program. A student who is doing well can opt to spend his senior year at community college, getting credits that are transferable to most 4-year colleges.

Our community college, in turn, has programs where you can spend two years there, then transfer to a 4-year college.

[Harmless Teddy Bear]

Yes, CC's contain less whackadoodles per square inch then Big Name Universities. That does not mean that they are not there. They are. But at least during their adult continuing education time, meaning evenings and weekends, you are less likely to run into a foaming at the mouth liberal.

Now that the BNU do indeed shuffle their complete whackadoodles off their main campus to a branch school is quite true. But a branch school is not a CC.

I have studied at all three, (I attended more collages than Sarah Palin!) and the ranking is Branch of Big Name, Big Name where they are more subtle and more dangerous and CC. Even private collages sadly are rife with liberals and whackadoodles.

The only place where there was a reasonable liberal to conservative ratio was in Bible Collage. Sadly I had no desire to be a teacher, preacher or Minister of Music so I was forced to go else where for my higher education.

[cyclotic]

Two of my kids have community college AA degrees. Both are finishing their bachelor’s online.

In Community College, one of them had an instructor who taught the same exact course at a university for $500 a credit hour vs under $100 at the CC.

Another kid is an Astronautical Engineer. He obliviously had to attend a full university, but he went to a very small, private geek college that had no ancillary junk like huge sports programs. The closest they got was a student run intramural Ultimate Frisbee team. No junk classes either and no expensive dorms. They had apartments and cooked for themselves.

Number four skipped college and got his CDL. He’s somewhere in Michigan right now doing his best CW McCall imitation.

[cyclotic]

I agree. I learned more at Community College from businessmen who were still employed in business. My university professors were either long out of the business field or had never done anything but teach.

[Oatka]

I learned more at Community College from businessmen who were still employed in business. My university professors were either long out of the business field or had never done anything but teach.

Rodney Dangerfield does a great job illustrating that starting at 2:00

[dfwgator]

Rodney Dangerfield does a great job illustrating that starting at 2:00

Great Scene!

[Tired of Taxes]

Yep. The students complaining about high tuition and demanding “free” college are thinking about living on a university campus. Ironically, these leftists (and their parents) tend to be elitist snobs, turning their noses up at community colleges.

They assume that people go to community college only because they couldn’t get into a university.

Unless a student is awarded a full ride to a university, the smart idea is to start with community college for two years and then transfer to a university for the last two years. And, if the student commutes to college all 4 years, he could earn a bachelor’s degree with little to no debt.