The cost of college is rising at the same time that higher education is increasingly a necessary job requirement. That’s why President Obama recently proposed an important new Community College to Career Fund to strengthen America’s community colleges and their partnerships with employers.

Community colleges offer the flexibility and choices that working and older students need as they balance their jobs and the demands of family. They also help drive economic development through their natural ties with high schools, four-year colleges and universities, and local workforce agencies. This makes our community colleges well-positioned to identify employment needs and prepare students transitioning from high school to fill these jobs.

By boosting federal support and improving the links between these schools, employers, and local economic development agencies, we can make America’s community colleges “job advancement centers” that offer all young students and workers an affordable path to higher incomes. We should insist that four-year higher education institutions expand access to a wide variety of classes, recognize transfer of community college courses, and prioritize graduates of community colleges for enrollment.

Community colleges can also show high school students the opportunities available to them if they pursue higher education by allowing “dual enrollment” so these students receive college experience while still in high school. For a student whose parents couldn’t pursue a higher education, the idea going to college might not even seem like a possibility. Opening the doors of college early to these students may spark their dreams and show them that a degree is within their reach. Several states wisely included dual enrollment participation as a student achievement indicator in their recently-approved No Child Left Behind waiver packages. Now federal, state and local policymakers need to work together to provide a sustainable funding source to make dual enrollment programs universally accessible.

Community colleges’ strong collaborations with high schools, four-year institutions and businesses make them ideal places to help identify workforce skills that should be emphasized in higher education, such as literacy, technology, and computer science. President Obama’s proposed initiative would help community colleges build on these strengths by adding support to employers and students through trainings, apprenticeships and certifications, including on-the-job professional development. These approaches will translate into moving more students into meaningful, productive jobs and generate a stronger economy for us all.

President Obama is jumping on a moving bandwagon. Of course, community colleges should work with local employers to teach high-demand job skills -- and they do. College-employer partnerships are training students in everything from high-tech manufacturing, nuclear technology and nursing to casino card dealing. In the best partnerships, industry reps help develop curriculum, provide instructors with real-world experience and offer apprenticeships or entry-level jobs to successful students.

However, community colleges may not be able to expand these programs significantly and quickly. Trainees for skilled manufacturing and technical jobs need to understand math very well. Most community college students do not. Many also have poor writing skills.

Community colleges try to help students learn what they failed to learn in high school (and often middle school and sometimes elementary school). But most students who start in remedial classes don't make it very far. If they make it through job training, they're more likely to be home health aides than nurses.

Employers will partner with community colleges that can produce employable graduates. In fact, I don't see why employers shouldn't pay for industry-specific training. But if the program sacrifices quality to churn out people with a piece of paper . . . There's no point in that.

I'd like to see high schools tell students whether they're on track to earn a bachelor's or associate degree, complete a vocational certificate or flunk out of remedial math in community college. I also think students need to understand the various career pathways they might follow in lieu of vainly pursuing a bachelor's degree. Community colleges should design these pathways with "stackable" credentials to let students go as far as they can educationally and professionally.

My colleague Tom Darling has some interesting thoughts on these issues. Tom, who’s spent years in the trenches doing workforce ed at the community college level and now at Pearson, knows as much as anyone about the challenges community colleges face in trying to fulfill their mission.

Some of the ideas, posted on his blog, include:

1. Businesses and governments (national and state) need to work closely with community colleges to harness their collaborative strengths and develop innovative solutions to help people enhance their skills, and find jobs.
2. It takes real financial commitment to put these ideas into practice: Government needs to fund Workforce Investment Boards, not deemphasize them, and businesses need to partner with community colleges in meaningful ways, investing in educational infrastructure and training programs that will ultimately benefit them through the creation of skilled, qualified workers.


3. Manufacturing jobs – 600,000 jobs, according to one poll – are available, yet there’s not enough skilled workers to do them. Is there a stronger argument for the need for workforce training? I don’t think so.


4. Training people to find jobs – jobs that currently exist and jobs that will be created – should be among our country’s highest priorities. We need to move forward, and we need to do it together, strongly and decisively.

When discussing community colleges, I often seek the advice of Kathleen Sullivan Alioto (ksalioto@ccsf.edu), a dean at the Community College of San Francisco. She referred me to these basic data on community colleges (http://www.aacc.nche.edu/AboutCC/Documents/FactSheet2011.pdf) and replied to my query for this blog as follows:

“The decision of the Obama Administration to focus on community colleges as one of the ways to save the economy is on target. Forty-four per cent of Americans enrolled in higher education attend one of 1,167 community colleges, with 7.4 million attending credit classes and 5 million attending non-credit classes. Of these, the proportion of low-income and otherwise disadvantaged students is striking: 55% of all Native Americans who attend college are in community colleges; for Asian/Pacific Islanders, it is 45%; for African Americans, it is 44%; for Hispanics, it is 52%.

“Hundreds of community colleges are involved in working with employers and industry in educating the work force in their communities. There are excellent model partnerships across the land. This is despite the fact that community colleges, the only hope for these millions of Americans, are not viewed by many in government or the philanthropic community as the excellent first class institutions many of them are. This campaign and $8B can help highlight their critical importance.

“City College of San Francisco, one of the largest community colleges in America, symbolizes both the hope and the challenge of the campaign to Save the Economy through the Community Colleges of America. One of the areas which best illustrates the multiple challenges is health care.

“Health care is one of the largest and fastest-growing fields in California. To meet workforce demand and growth, the School of Health at City College of San Francisco (CCSF) offers comprehensive courses to 7450 students for nearly every profession in the fields of health care (serving the medical needs of individuals) and public health (protecting the health of the entire population). Its highly regarded degree and certificate programs, connected to 150 community and industry partners, afford students working knowledge of best-practice models and the latest medical technology. Most are women, and the majority is economically disadvantaged.

“Ethnic diversity is the School’s well-known distinction. In fact, its students mirror the multi-ethnic populations of San Francisco: African American, immigrant, Asian/Pacific Islander, and Hispanic/Latino students make up more than 60% of the student body. Through its large population of bicultural and bilingual students, the School of Health serves as a vital educational, social, and economic resource in educating the skilled professionals that dominate the regional and local workforce of the Bay Area.

“As Ron Smith, Regional Vice President, Hospital Council of Northern and Central California states, “City College of San Francisco is the primary source of new, qualified, and diverse staff for our hospitals. We appreciate the outstanding leadership that City College provides in its partnership with San Francisco hospitals.”

“And yet, City College is being forced by a shrinking state budget to cut back sections in

• The remedial classes which prepare inadequately educated high school graduates to be able to enter the health care field
• Essential summer, evening and weekend programs
• “Categorical” assistance to increase retention and graduation for the most needy of students

“The state budget also dictates the quality of the equipment, including basic supplies and simulation technology capabilities.

“City College staff has the passion, expertise and knowledge to work with health industry partners. The “unique challenges” that we face is a lack of money to do the job we want to do. We serve many inadequately prepared students who require remediation, have inadequate clinical placements within industry and obsolete facilities and equipment. The Campaign should help address these challenges.”