CCA CEO, Dr Don Perlgut, reports on the latest news from American community colleges and the American President:
When Donald J. Trump entered the White House in January 2017, American community colleges expressed cautious optimism: “Community colleges will finally get more of the attention they've been clamoring for,” wrote Claudio Sanchez.
The reason for this optimism: Trump’s platform stated that he would, “Ensure that the opportunity to attend a two or four-year college, or to pursue a trade or a skill set through vocational and technical education, will be easier to access, pay for, and finish.” Trump has also promised a trillion dollar infrastructure building plan, one that would rely heavily on American community colleges to supply skilled labour.
That was then.
American community colleges are now reeling from President Trump’s 30 March 2018 speech when he promoted his infrastructure plan and said, “community colleges … I don’t know what that means — a community college. To me, it means a two-year college. I don’t know what it means.”
A widely read critique of President Trump appeared shortly afterwards in The Atlantic, entitled “Donald Trump Doesn't Understand Community Colleges”. Alia Wong writes that, “In a speech on Thursday, he revealed he doesn't appreciate the vital role they play in the country's education system and economy.”
“The incorrect assumption that Trump made in his speech on Thursday was that community colleges and vocational schools haven’t been able to and can’t exist alongside each other – a misunderstanding that further underappreciates an already underappreciated component of American education,” Wong writes.
American and Australian community colleges are not the same. Australian community colleges – part of more than 2500 adult and community education (ACE) organisations (PDF) – operate mostly as independent small to medium size not-for-profit organisations, with their own governance structures (some are affiliated with larger not-for-profit organisations) – whereas American community colleges are generally owned and funded by state, county and local governments, bearing some similarity to Australian TAFEs.
Australia’s community colleges – and community education providers generally – deliver education and training to some of Australia’s neediest learners, promoting innovation because of their small size and flexibility.
American community colleges “have been at the forefront of nearly every major development in higher education since their inception,” writes Sean Trainor in Time magazine (20 October 2015).
Although the genesis of the US community colleges was that of “junior colleges” (to the established research universities), in recent years they have moved closer to fulfilling many of the functions of Australian community colleges and other community education providers:
“Confronting a quickly changing economy, many community colleges turned their attention to adult education and workforce retraining. Community college enrollees in the latter half of the 20th century came to include everyone from curious retirees eager to learn a new skill, to victims of mid-career layoffs in need of a new skillset,” writes Trainor.
“One of Trump’s stated goals is to ensure that every American knows 'the dignity of work, the pride of a paycheck, and the satisfaction of a job well done'—but he seems to be unaware of the vital role that community colleges play in realizing that vision. As Jeffrey Selingo wrote in The Atlantic earlier this year, the fastest-growing jobs in the United States require candidates to have training and education beyond high school, and community colleges … will be key to filling those openings,” writes Alia Wong.
So what, if any, is the lesson for Australia from this latest imbroglio?
The latest Trump mess underscores the importance how education and training connects with national economic and infrastructure development. Here in Australia, we still do not appear to have made the connection between vocational education and training (VET) and our national economic development goals of reduced unemployment and greater economic growth. National innovation statements that focus on the highest end of Australian research universities but ignore VET miss out on potential policy settings that will make a real difference. And as TAFE continues to struggle with its purpose and funding, Australia’s community education providers – too often unsung and under-funded – continue to provide their services.
Notes:
Dr Don Perlgut recently visited two American community colleges: Los Angeles City College and San Diego City College.
(Image by Gage Skidmore from Peoria, AZ, United States of America - Donald Trump, CC BY-SA 2.0, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=48620899)
