What really grabbed me about this article is Wisner’s description of his own “imaginative” library program where his community college library gives coffee away and he sits around talking academic subjects with students. This sounds more like a small liberal arts college than a community college. I’m sure no one is sitting around talking about MSDS sheets and the NEC codes over a cuppa, and if you are, I want to come work for your library! I just don’t see the average community college student having the time or inclination to just sit around and think deep thoughts with a librarian over caffiene. At least at my college. We have 35,000 students passing through during the school year and they are hard-pressed to get to class, get to work and get on with their lives. We do them the most benefit by being efficient and intuitive to their needs. Anyhow, rapping with students about Plato over free coffee is really the same thing as offering space to play games, in my opinion. It is simple marketing. It is getting the bodies in the door so we have an opportunity to work with them and hopefully influence their learning.

As far as our Wisner’s accusation that librarians are deconstructing the library via technology…we cannot force people to actually read, man. Our charge as librarians is to provide the best possible scenario for a patron to locate information. And not just the patron that needs the traditional books and silence library. We have to provide for disparate age groups, learning styles and abilities. Wisner accuses us of prioritizing information over knowledge. I hope he isn’t saying that learners’ acquisition of knowledge is our responsibility. Synthesizing information by engaged reading is a responsibility or choice of the individual. Librarians create conditions most conducive to the improvement of the mind. And that is the best that we can do. If the person needs a computer, we provide it. If they need silence, we provide it. If they need a collection of hundreds of books on the same topic, we hopefully can provide that or will find them a library that can. If they need to sit and talk for an hour about their topic of interest, we do it and provide free coffee to boot. And if they need us to stand on our heads–we’re all over it. I call that noble.

Wisner, W. Restore the Noble Purpose of Libraries. July 17, 2009. http://www.csmonitor.com/2009/0717/p09s01-coop.html

Transforming America’s Community Colleges: A Federal Policy Proposal to Expand Opportunity and Promote Economic Prosperity [pdf] http://www.brookings.edu/reports/2009/~/media/Files/rc/reports/2009/0507_community_college_goldrick_rab/0507_community_college_brief.pdf

Community colleges are the bedrock of American higher education, and young and old alike use their facilities to gain specific technical skills and explore the world of the liberal arts. This May 2009 policy brief from the Brookings Institution’s Blueprint for American Prosperity series offers a few policy suggestions on how the federal government might reinvest in community colleges across the nation. The twelve-page brief was authored by Sara Goldrick-Rab, Douglas N. Harris, Christopher Mazzeo, and Gregory Kienzi. The brief offers a number of concrete suggestions for the federal government, including the recommendation that they should establish national postsecondary goals and also devote a significant portion of existing funding to improve and evaluate teaching practices in these institutions.

I’m proud to announce that Prince William Sound Community College (in beautiful Valdez Alaska) has posted a 2 year IT position that will include technical coordination of our Second Life educational sites.

With campuses in Valdez and Cordova sitting on the beautiful Prince William Sound and in the Copper River Basin at the doorstep of the magnificent Wrangell-St. Elias National Park, PWSCC serves a large geographical land area that is only matched by the large diversity of its people.

The Information Technology department at PWSCC supports the technology needs of our students, faculty and staff at all of our campuses. We strive to provide friendly, prompt and exact service while delivering leading edge technology that enhances the educational opportunities our communities.

The IS Ops Technician 2 position, based out of the main Valdez Alaska, campus, assists the I.T. Manager to provide this service in a wide array of disciplines including workstation setup & maintenance, software support, networking, video conferencing, telephony, audio-visual support as well as being a team player with the other departments of the college. The work environment is fast paced and requires an individual possessing good people skills that is able to apply creative solutions in problem solving situations.

This position will also be the lead technical coordinator of our virtual world as designed in Second Life. They will act as our technical designer, admin and liaison as we venture into this new and exciting approach to education.

For more information click on: https://www.uakjobs.com , go to *Advanced search* and choose Valdez in *Location*

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Julie A. Fronzuto Ph.D.

Assistant Professor of Biology

Prince William Sound Community College

303 Lowe St.

Valdez, AK 99686

907.834.1633

“‘The president also said that he would soon ‘lay out a fundamental rethinking of our job training, vocational education, and community college programs,’ designed ‘to move beyond the idea that we need several different programs to address several different problems — we need one comprehensive policy that addresses our comprehensive challenges.’”

I’m all for anything that makes financial aid easier to get but I’m worried about changes to Perkins and the Workforce act. I’m sure we will not get screwed over but there should be a plan in place to make sure that if these programs are indeed changed or canceled that no CC (read: students) that currently relies on them will fall through the cracks. CC’s rely heavily on these programs in career and tech ed.

Warren Community College is offering free job training in retail sales and customer service: http://www.nj.com/warrenreporter/index.ssf/2009/05/warren_county_community_colleg_27.html

Northampton CC in New Jersey is offering free tuition to the unemployed: http://www.lehighvalleylive.com/bethlehem/index.ssf/2008/12/ncc_to_aid_the_unemployed.html

So is Normandale CC in Minnesota, Mott CC in Flint, MI, Klamath CC in Oregon and all of the Kentucky CC’s and all of the Maine CC’s have programs for the unemployed too. Some colleges offer free tuition for the recently unemployed such as Luzerne CC in PA under their New Choices-New Options Program. In my home state, Oakton CC is offering free retraining for displaced workers, as is South Suburban CC in South Holland.

What is my college doing for displaced workers? We raised (nearly doubled) tuition for Nursing and Dental Hygiene students because these students will make a decent salary when they graduate. (If they can afford to finish and if they can find work afterward). We also raise tuition for all other students nearly every year! Oh, but we are generous with our President who has only been with us for 4 traumatic months. I’m just SO proud.

1.) Increase Federal funding to Community Colleges. Give incentives for innovative projects aimed at increasing retention. Brookings says 50% of community colleges students drop-out. I can’t find the report they cite right now but even if its less than that we need to fix this. To do that we need…
2.) Funding. CC’s only get like 30% of Fed support that four-year schools get. We do get state and county money but since the economy has tanked, so have our budgets. And our communities need us to be great right now, not limping along and cutting every non-essential service in response to budget cuts. (These “non-essential” services usually turn out to be student support services, FYI. Can anyone say “retention?” At-risk students, anyone? God!)
2.) Help us figure out how to help displaced workers coming back to school for retraining and career changes. No, I mean really help them not just send them to registration. CC counselors and advisers need specific training for this purpose. “What Color is Your Parachute” just doesn’t get it for professional adults who really don’t know how to deal with unemployment and getting back out there in the workforce.
3.) Help CC’s improve their IT infrastructure and services to students. I bet dollars to donuts that part of CC’s retention problems are related to access to broadband and having no money for decent technology in some of our CC’s. Make somebody take care of that, Martha! Its shameful that so many citizens of the U.S. don’t have decent Internet access.
4.) Maintain the NSF/ATE‘s recent windfall. The ATE offers a special program for applicants new to the NSF with looser guidelines but why can’t they also fund smaller programs even if the College has received a grant in the past? Sometimes you just need 50-75K to get something going. Then accountability can kick in if the funds are drawn from the Govt.
5.) One last thing. Please don’t let them wear you down! I don’t need to tell Martha Kanter that CC’s train this nation’s workers. We should be great. We can be great. We need to build MORE community colleges, not strip them down.

I’m very excited. This is such great news. You Go Martha!

The College has changed so much in the last ten years, people have come and gone, the focus has gone from the students to the money and we are in a very dark period of our College’s history. In short, work has been difficult. But that doesn’t mean I’ve chosen the wrong career. There are still students there. Many of whom are just like me when I started at Henry Ford CC in 1993–scared and unsure. I can still be a librarian who works for CC students even though the place where I do this work is completely messed up. The students need the support of the Library now more than ever! I’m a community college librarian. I cannot imagine doing anything else. So, I’m not going to change the name of my blog. And I’m going to remember who I am every single day when I go to work.