http://www.nctimes.com/news/local/sdcounty/education-community-college-leaders-lobby-for-tax-hike/article_d9d066a8-968f-5cee-8c06-0ef022f31c02.html?oCampaign=email

“It would be more helpful if they educated the voters about the high salaries some of these administrators are making.  These folks have no conscience.  The money being devoured by the school bureaucracies is one of the principal factors driving the cost of education.”  Kris Vosburgh, Howard Jarvis Taxayers Assoc.

Blog:

The last place these folks will make cuts is to themselves.  Our state has a spending problem, not a revenue problem.  Recent budget cuts affect class sections and access for our students.  There are no student waiting lists anymore. Our colleges have become more institutionally centered than student centered.

Share This

http://www.nctimes.com/news/local/san-marcos/san-marcos-college-faculty-staff-protest-raises-to-two-administrators/article_df3a2121-79f1-5ff5-885b-f11ba86008c5.html?oCampaign=email

“Palomar College staff and faculty members last week protested the board’s decision to raise pay for two administrators by 10 and 19 percent, while most Palomar staff have gone four years without a raise.”

“Forty-seven administrators, including President Deegan,  and other vice presidents, the college’s deans and various superviors directors and managers, earned a total of about %5.6 million in 2010.”

Blog:

Boards act upon the recommendation of the Superintendent President and few elected trustees say “NO”. Community colleges across the state are reducing class sections (”workload reductions”) so why do these fat cats think they need a raise?

This is exactly why taxpayers don’t want to provide the state more dollars.

Share This

http://blogmaverick.com/2012/05/13/the-coming-meltdown-in-college-education-why-the-economy-wont-get-better-any-time-soon/
“Remember the housing meltdown?  A lot of easy money being lent to buyers who couldn’t afford the money they were borrowing.  That money was then spent on homes with the expectation that the price of the home would go up and it could be easily flipped or refinanced at a profit.  When easy money stopped, buyers couldn’t sell.  They couldn’t refinance.  Housing prices crashed.”

“It’s far too easy to borrow money for college. Right now there is a never ending supply of buyers. Students borrow as much money as you can for the best school you can get into and afford and then believe you “flip” that education for the great job you are going to get when you graduate.”

“Except those great jobs aren’t always there. Today, the minute you graduate college you face the challenge of debt against a college education whose value is immediately, “underwater”.”

Blog:

It’s time to rethink how education is delivered in California.  Time for all three of our state institutions (UC/CSU/CCC) to come together and provide online bachelors degree with open enrollments at minimum cost to the user. The potential to provide educational opportunity to thousands more students depends upon it.

Share This

“Harvard University and MIT today announced “edX” a transformational new partnership in online education. Through edX, the two institutions will collaborate to enhance campus-based teaching and learning and build a global community of online learners.”

http://chronicle.com/blogs/wiredcampus/harvard-and-mit-put-60-million-into-new-platform-for-free-online-courses/36284?sid=pm&utm_source=pm&utm_medium=en

http://web.mit.edu/press/2012/mit-harvard-edx-announcement.html

Blog:

The key word and purpose is “global”.  The future of education is for an educated workforce in a “global” employment market.  Presently, the US is at the lower/bottom ranks (25th) in world educational achievement, and thus, the concept of global online learning opportunities from noted academic institutions is attractive.

California education has become institutionally centered in preservation of it’s human resources rather than in provision of educational opportunity to the public it was purposed to serve.  Reduction in budgets will require a new way to think.  Those at MIT/Harvard are doing so.  So should California.

Share This

http://reason.org/files/california_pension_crisis_reform_study.pdf

“Those who don’t work for the government should not be forced to pay for ever-richer benefits for public employees while they are seeing their own retirement funds erode during difficult economic times.”

“The gap between public and private sector compensation is widening. It is only a matter of time before a tipping point is reached and taxpayers clamor in sufficient number for true reform.”

Blog:

The recommendations in this report (page 33) would go a long way to correct the current budget crisis in California and benefit taxpayers in the future and beneficial reading for all elected members of government agencies throughout our state.  The author, Adam B. Summers is a policy analyst at Reason Foundation and has written extensively on privatization, government reform, individual liberty, law and economics, etc., and holds an MA in Economics from George Mason University and a BA in Economics and Political Science from UCLA.

Share This

http://www.udacity.com/

Blog:

“Udacity” is a newly established educational start-up (similar to Khan Academy) offering on-line computer language/programming, taught by some of the finest professors in the field at NO COST.

Check it out!

Share This

http://www.khanacademy.org/about

Blog:  The “Khan Academy” is a nonprofit, on-line tutorial with thousands of lessons taught by an MIT graduate and purposed to enhance understanding and proficiency in educational disciplines.  It is free to any student interested in increasing understanding of a subject matter.

Bill Gates of Microsoft has endorsed and supported it.  Check it out.

Share This

“MSJC will not have to close its interim campus in Banning while the college completes an environmental review for the already-built facility, a judge told attorneys this week.”

“Attorneys for the college claimed that the residents missed statue of limitation deadlines in which to challenge activities at the district-owned site on the southeast corner of Sunset and Westward avenues south of Interstate 10.  Judge Gloria Connor Trask sided with the residents’ attorney, that their challenge was timely.”

“Trask read from a memorandum of understanding between the college and the city of Banning that the college would be responsible for the environmental review.  The City of Banning agreed to pay for $750k for site improvements, such as grading and water hookups.”

“Trask said the campus may stay open but asked that the order drafted by attorneys include a deadline for preparation of the draft environmental report.”

Blog:

The Banning campus site has three high pressure gas lines within 1500 ft of the property, one of which borders the front property line.  Two flood channels are on the property, one through the middle and one at the back property line.  The environmental impact report should address these issues.

The Banning site has not been reviewed and/or approved by the state for a future new campus.  In order to qualify to receive state funded capital construction dollars, said site would need to serve 500 FTES.

MSJC has two state approved campus sites located in the cities of San Jacinto and Menifee.

Share This

“The Budget Act -  For MSJC this reduced funding by approximately $2,931,000. resulting in a workload reduction of 651 FTES, or approximately 217 course sections.”

“The January Trigger Cuts  - For MSJC this reduced funding by an additional amount of approximately $674,000, resulting in an additional workload reduction of 157 FTES, or approximately 52 course sections.”

“The February Surprise  - For MSJC this reduced funding by an additional  amount of $1,680,000.”

Blog:

Students will continue to lose with more sections cut and less access to educational opportunity. It would be beneficial if administrative salaries/benefits would be reduced proportionately according to revenue loss and section cuts.  However, one can be assured that will never happen.

Students and taxpayers are the losers.  (-269 sections gone and more to come)

Share This

“MSJC trustees on Thuraday approved redrawn trustee areas that reflect the populations shifts in the district indicated by the 2010 census.”

“Trustee Area 1 (Kadow) remains the largest geographically, stretching from Cherry Valley through the San Jacinto Mountains, south to the San Diego County line, to lower HIghway 79 on the outskirts of Temecula.”

“Geographically, Trustee Area 4, (Motte) has shrunk as more people have moved into the area.  The area will lose parts of Murrieta and Temecula west of Interstate 15, but now includes Perris, Lake Elsinore and Wildomar.”

Blog:

County growth figures clearly indicate that the population growth pattern the previous ten years has been along the I215 corridor and the southwest county area.  The Banning Campus outreach center is a “nice to have” but not a “need to have” and a staging center of this type would have better served students if located within the highest population corridor of the I215 where most enrollments are.

Political decisions are often made in self interest rather than the highest/best interest of students throughout the district with consideration of data and facts.  Merely shifting class sections to Banning from the main San Jacinto campus requires students from San Jacinto to drive further.  Due to state budget cuts, there are no “net new classes” to offer at Banning, and many sections offered in previous years have been drastically cut.

Share This