Monday, June 8, 2009

Community College goals and reforms to be tossed aside?

From this morning’s Sacramento Bee:

Governor offers new plan to help community colleges weather budget cuts

Lawmakers are considering new proposals from Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger to allow community college districts flexibility to use more part-time instructors as part of the state's massive budget-cutting efforts.

The proposals are opposed by community college instructors and their largest union, the California Federation of Teachers, which recently helped defeat a Schwarzenegger-backed ballot measure – Proposition 1A – that would have extended newly imposed tax increases.

"Nothing the governor says these days surprises us," [CFT communications director Fred] Glass [said]. "He seems to be using this (fiscal crisis) as an opportunity to slash-and-burn education."

Specifically, Schwarzenegger is calling for a five-year suspension of portions of state education code that require 50 percent of a community college district's educational expenditures to be used for teacher salaries and which set a systemwide goal that 75 percent of instructional hours be taught by full-time faculty….


Cal Poly Pomona cancels summer session, affecting O.C. students (OC Reg)

Facing up to $35 million in budget cuts, Cal Poly Pomona (CPP) has abruptly canceled its summer session, eliminating a broad range of classes for 6,600 full and part-time students, some of whom live in Orange County.

CPP formally announced on June 5 that it has canceled its summer quarter classes, which were to begin on the staggered dates of June 22 and July 29. [Campus spokeswoman Uyen] Mai said CPP is studying whether it can offer some of the courses through its College of the Extended University, starting July 13.

If it is able to provide this alternative, students will have to pay more for their education. Mai said that a student taking 8 units of lecture classes in the regular summer quarter would have paid about $1,200. The figure would be closer to $1,800 through university extension….

6 comments:

caroline said...

Someone told me that our district doesn't abide by the 50% ed code anyway. Is that true?

Roy Bauer said...

Caroline, it's a long story. Chancellor Mathur ignored the law (evidently), and, over a year ago, we found ourselves about to cross below the 50% line (of instructional expenditure). We took extreme steps, hiring dozens of new full-time faculty. That plus some creative moves apparently allowed us to avoid violation of the law, but at a cost, namely, some hasty hiring and all that comes with that.

Anonymous said...

The 50% ed code is union horse shit. Abolish it now!

Anonymous said...

Hire MORE part-time faculty? Can there possibly be more? At Saddleback I've never even taken a class from a full-timer.

No wait, yes I did. It was a PE class taught by one of the coaches.

Anonymous said...

Yes, 5:57, it would be just absurd to have an educational institution spend half its funding on teaching. How silly would that be? Damn unions.

Anonymous said...

The so-called "50% law" was passed nearly fifty years ago in California, and many states have such a law. Back in 1960, it was an attempt to keep down the size of administration, not to increase salaries of faculty. It has been a good law for it has done exactly that. Obviously, that a district spends 50+% on instruction has no direct implication for salaries--for one increases the "instructional" amount either being increasing salaries or by hiring more faculty (whether part-time or full-time). The law affects the ratio of administrative (and other non-instructional) spending to spending on salaries and benefits. -R

Roy's obituary in LA Times and Register: "we were lucky to have you while we did"

  This ran in the Sunday December 24, 2023 edition of the Los Angeles Times and the Orange County Register : July 14, 1955 - November 20, 2...