California community colleges oppose bachelor’s degree bills after last-minute changes

Community college officials now oppose bills to expand access to bachelor’s degrees after California lawmakers made last-minute changes to the legislation, which officials say will create more barriers to offering four-year degrees to community college students.

After changes to the legislation, the California State University no longer opposed the effort. But community college leaders took issue with changes that were made in the final days of the legislative session, which ended this week, and dropped their support.

News of the community colleges’ opposition was first reported by CalMatters.

CSU and California Community Colleges have been at odds this year over the effort to expand baccalaureate programs on community college campuses. Earlier this week, the Legislature passed Senate Bill 960 and Assembly Bill 2694, a two-bill package that authors say would make it easier for community colleges to create bachelor’s degrees.

CSU has previously argued that these baccalaureate programs on community college campuses are duplicative, which could siphon students away from their universities. Community colleges have advocated for these programs as a way of serving low-income students who can’t immediately access bachelor’s degree programs from where they live.

California Community Colleges Chancellor Sonya Christian expressed opposition to changes made to a bill by Sen. Christopher Cabaldon, D-West Sacramento, according to a letter sent on Aug. 29, CalMatters reported.

“These new requirements and restrictions could leave California with a community college baccalaureate framework that creates more barriers than the one we have today,” Christian wrote to lawmakers.

The obstacles Christian cited included program caps, restrictions to online programs and a five-year ban from re-submitting programs that are initially denied.

Given the yearslong divisive fight between the two higher education systems over this issue, Cabaldon said the bill package reflects the best compromise that had broad legislative support and addresses concerns raised by the governor. He noted that the performance-based tiers are designed to ensure that community colleges are focused on their primary missions before taking on new programs.

Cabaldon said including the state’s labor secretary in the process of approving new bachelor’s degrees will ensure program expansions are based on evidence, which will help avoid fights with CSU. The five-year waiting period between submitting program applications is meant to ensure the California Labor and Workforce Development Agency is not overwhelmed with reviewing program proposals, he said.

“We want to send a clear signal to colleges that they need to have their ducks in order when they prepare their workforce dossiers that will be reviewed by the secretary,” Cabaldon said.

The changes were also opposed by the Community College League of California (CCLC), an advocacy group, because they were introduced late in the session. The group said the last-minute changes did not leave sufficient time to understand the “potential impacts of the revised language,” the group said in a statement. 

“The legislation imposes more restrictive caps on the degrees that districts may offer. In addition, the proposed tier system creates a competitive ranking among community college districts, rather than evaluating proposed degree programs on individual merit, regional demand and demonstrated workforce need,” the statement said. 

In an earlier statement, CSU called the bill package “an appropriate balance of expanding access where it is needed, responding to workforce demand, and preserving the critical coordination that has long been a strength of our state.

This story was originally published by EdSource.