Dive Brief:
- Jeffrey Selingo argues for The Washington Post that community colleges have gotten an unreasonably bad rap by the people who run the country and have four-year degrees themselves.
- Community colleges train students for well-paying, in-demand, "middle-skill" positions that require more than a high school education but less than a four-year degree.
- Selingo says middle and high schools have moved too far away from career and technical education, leaving students who don’t want to enter the four-year academic track with little motivation to enter community colleges, "the stepchild of the nation’s higher education system."
Dive Insight:
Community college is widely considered the place to go for students who can’t cut it at four-year institutions. But that is where people can be trained as nurse’s assistants, welders, diesel mechanics, and technicians. There is more demand for some of these jobs than supply, meaning the community college certificate program or two-year degree can lead directly into a family-sustaining career.
The conversation about free community college President Barack Obama started in his last State of the Union address could have gone a long way to changing the perception of two-year schools. That conversation, however, may be stamped out by the push for debt-free college.