Recently, a few other students and I got together to interview the President of LaGuardia Community College. In preparing for the interview, and in the interview itself, we all learned much about the role of community colleges in America. Undervalued yet invaluable to the populace, community colleges are often overlooked by most Americans.
In preparing for the interview, my group was to read a few chapters from Gail Mellow’s book, Minding the Dream: The Process and Practice of American Community Colleges. Her book is an in-depth account of community colleges in the United States.
Some interesting insights I gleaned are as follows:
1) The average stereotype of a college student is that of an 18-year old freshman living in a dorm at a four-year college. On the contrary, the average American student would be in community college. About half of college-going students in the United States go to a community college, the 1200 or so of which makes up the backbone of the educational system.
2) National expenditures by public community colleges are less than twenty percent of the amount done by four year colleges.
3) Our self-proclaimed “hair on fire” advocate of community college interviewee estimates that about ten times more is spent cultivating a Macaulay student than is spent on a community college student.
4) Community colleges are considerably better at enveloping the democratic spirit of the United States. There is a debate however, on whether or not community colleges should venture into being more selective as time goes by. For now however, everyone is welcome.
Other parts of the book include changes in pedagogy and a statistical background on financial aid. Insights I obtained during the interview also came from two community college students who attended. One was an immigrant from China who aspires to be a college professor, and another was a female civil engineer who spent a summer at Columbia. The diverse nature of these students and their capabilities attests to the sheer amount of untapped potential in community colleges. One must wonder what could happen if community colleges were treated similarly to their more prestigious counterparts. Investing in their growth would help make America more educated, informed, and foster democracy among its citizens. I look forward to discussing the issue further in class.
