Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: MONDAY, April 15, 1991 TAG: 9104160463
SECTION: EDITORIAL PAGE: A-8 EDITION: METRO
SOURCE:
DATELINE: LENGTH: Long
Because of state budget cuts, little hoopla is planned to celebrate the anniversary of this landmark achievement. Also because of budget cuts, the system is coming under increasing strain. After 25 years of impressive success, Virginia's community colleges face the future with a measure of nervousness.
Born of Godwin's vision to open the doors of higher education to young people of lower income or minority status and those whose talents and yearnings for knowledge develop past traditional college age, the system put an affordable two-year college within commuting distance of every Virginia resident. Many an aspiring professional has walked through those doors. So have scores of factory workers, seeking to upgrade their skills for better jobs, and countless women whose education was short-circuited by childbirth.
The system now claims more than 3 million alumni who have taken credit courses for eventual transfer to four-year colleges or who hold jobs today because of vocational training they received. Many others have benefited from non-credit courses, workshops and seminars at the 23 community colleges, located on 35 campuses.
One need not look far to find success stories. Consider Carol Swain, the stepdaughter of a tenant farmer in Bedford County. She spent her early years in a four-room house without indoor plumbing, which she shared with 11 brothers and sisters. At 13, Swain ran away from home, to Roanoke. She enrolled in, but dropped out of, Monroe Junior High School. By 16, she was married. By 20, she was the divorced mother of two.
In 1976, Swain enrolled for job training at Virginia Western Community College, where faculty members and staffers encouraged her to continue her education. As a result, she went on to earn an associate degree in merchandising; then went to Roanoke College while holding down a full-time job in Virginia Western's library. She went on to earn graduate degrees at Virginia Tech and Chapel Hill.
Today, she is Dr. Carol Swain, a professor of politics at Princeton University. Harvard University Press will soon publish her book, "The Politics of Black Representation in Congress."
"Education has always proven itself to be the great equalizer. With education, it is possible to move from underclass to middle class in one generation," Swain said recently. "Many institutions provide opportunities for success, but few give second chances at anything." Virginia Western gave Swain a second chance.
The question for the moment, however, is how many other Virginians may be denied that second chance because of cuts in state aid and rising tuition at the community colleges.
Blaming a year's worth of budget reductions imposed by Gov. Douglas Wilder, the system's governing board last week approved a 17.5 percent tuition increase - to $35 per credit hour. This means full-time students taking 15 credit hours will pay $525 per quarter, up from the current $447. Even with the latest increase, the system will lose $14.7 million in revenue next year because of cuts already imposed. And Wilder has warned that additional cuts may be necessary this summer.
At Virginia Western, budget reductions of about 16 percent in the last eight months have led to elimination of some programs, including training courses for automobile technicians. Other courses are threatened. Some staff and faculty positions have been eliminated, meaning extra work for remaining employees - employees who haven't received a raise in two years and have no prospects for one in the near future.
At the same time - in part because tuition increases at four-year institutions have put these out of financial reach of many high-school graduates; in part because layoffs have forced many to seek new skills for different jobs - Virginia Western is experiencing record numbers of applicants for enrollment.
The door is still open. In fact, Virginia Western and other community colleges are effectively under a mandate to maintain the open-door policy, regardless of the budget squeeze.
Still, it does not take great prescience to see that when the library can't buy books, when teachers can't prepare teaching materials (unless at their own expense) and when more students are crowded into each classroom, the quality of education is endangered.
It also does not take a genius to figure out that Virginia's overall economy could be further weakened if budget reductions cause the network of community colleges to falter in its role of sustaining a qualified work force. More than 700 state businesses, industries and governmental agencies have contractual arrangements with the community colleges for training of employees.
If Virginia Western, say, can't train auto technicians, then the businesses that need these workers will have to contract with the private sector - at much greater cost - for the training (or turn unskilled grease monkeys loose on their customers' cars).
Despite the recent tuition increases, the community-college system is still the best education bargain in Virginia. The system, doubtless, will survive the current period of budget reductions. If they are wise, however, Gov. Wilder and the General Assembly will do all in their power to see that it does not merely survive but improves and flourishes over the next 25 years.
by CNB