With the rising costs of attending a four-year college and the growing demand for higher skills in the workplace President Barack Obama’s new plan to make community colleges free for students who qualify makes sense.
In addition to the lower cost, community college offer students smaller classrooms and more flexibility to fit classes around their work schedules.
Last week Obama announced he wants publicly-funded community college available to all Americans, a sweeping proposal that would make higher education as accessible as a high school diploma to boost weak U.S. wages and skills for the modern workforce.
“Put simply, what I’d like to do is to see the first two years of community college free for everybody who is willing to work for it,” Obama said. “It’s something that we can accomplish, and it’s something that will train our work force so that we can compete with anybody in the world.”
Administration officials said the funding details would come out later with the president’s budget next month. They estimated 9 million students could participate and save an average of $3,800 in tuition per year. That suggests an annual cost in the tens of billions of dollars.
Students would qualify if they attend at least half-time, maintain a 2.5 GPA and make progress toward completing a degree or certificate program. Participating schools would have to meet certain academic requirements.
The White House said the federal government would pick up 75 percent of the cost and the final quarter would come from states that opt into the program.
Community colleges are the main source of education and job training for most low-income Americans which helps the economy. The president’s plan would help an economy that increasingly relies on a more skilled workforce.
While the program has strong merits it is unlikely to be passed into law any time soon.
The idea has already received a chilly response from House Speaker John Boehner’s office. “With no details or information on the cost, this seems more like a talking point than a plan,” said spokesman Cory Fritz.
The cost of the proposal has yet to be revealed by administration officials, and it faces a Republican Congress averse to big new spending programs.
Obama announced his plan in Tennessee, because it’s modeled after the state’s free community college program championed by Republican Gov. Bill Haslam. So maybe state lawmakers should consider look at duplicating the program.
Lawmakers and policy makers’ must weigh the cost to the country to have an increasingly number of Americans unprepared for jobs that exist now and in the future which require post-secondary education and training.
(Reprinted from the Philadelphia Tribune.)
