EDITORS NOTE: Colleges Leader Embrace Obama's Plans

SEATTLE — President Obama’s American Graduation Initiative may be in ruins, bereft of its promised financial support, but that hasn’t deterred administration officials from pushing the initiative’s goals — or community college leaders from embracing them.

In an unprecedented step, the leaders of six leading community college organizations marked the close of the annual American Association of Community Colleges convention by signing a document aimed at boosting completion rates at their institutions by 50 percent by the year 2020.

In addition to AACC, the signatories included the Association of Community College Trustees, the Center for Community College Student Engagement, the League for Innovation in the Community College, the National Institute for Staff and Organization Development and the Phi Theta Kappa Honor Society.

The pledge asks community college leaders, faculty and staff “to identify ways to help students understand the added value of degrees and certifications, and to help them progress toward their goals” and urges elected office holders “to create the policy conditions that engage, support and reward community colleges in their work to strengthen student success.”

U.S. Undersecretary of Education Martha Kanter told the gathering about 1,200 community college leaders earlier in the convention that that despite the fact that $12 billion AGI promised community colleges when it first was proposed shrank to $2 billion to be funneled through the Labor Department, the AGI’s overarching goals remain in place.

“We are solely, deeply and personally committed to what President Obama has set for us to achieve,” she said. “Everything we are doing in the Department of Education is aimed at achieving this goal.”

“We really think that the 2020 goal is the right goal at the right time in this country.”

She added: “The funding is not as great or as flexible as we would like. We recognize that. We have taken the first step forward, and we have to demonstrate what we can do.”

The document acknowledges two central facts characterizing community colleges today: first, that they are basking in a the national spotlight as never before, charged with helping the country emerge from the record-breaking recession; and second, opening the doors to college is no longer enough. Today, college success has become the coin of the realm.

But what constitutes success? On that question, consensus is far more elusive than reaching the broader goals endorsed by the six community college organizations

READ THE FULL STORY IN THE MAY 3 EDITION OF COMMUNITY COLLEGE WEEK

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