Perspective

Overview

Community College Perspective

The Perspective is the newsletter of the CFT Community College Council, the largest organization of community college faculty in the state. It covers educational issues, politics, legislation, and collective bargaining. Browse issues here.​​

The Perspective is currently on hiatus. We welcome unsolicited articles, letters, and story ideas. Please send submissions or other inquiries to editor, Matthew Hardy, CFT Communications Director.

Sign up now to get Perspective by email! 
»Subscribe here.

Article
Education Funding

Sometimes you win, sometimes you lose…
Online college and student performance-based funding

By Jim Mahler, President, Community College Council

After a very long, hard fought battle beginning in January and ending in June, we lost our struggle against the governor regarding both the Online College and the Performance-Based Funding initiatives.

In case you weren’t already aware, the governor wields a lot of power, and, believe it or not, these two initiatives were at the top of his agenda with respect to the budget for the entire state of California!

California Teacher
Education Funding
Stephanie Rosenblatt, president of the Cerritos College Faculty Federation, says the new funding formula allows administrators to focus on dollars rather than quality.

New funding formula risks turning colleges into diploma mills

Stephanie Rosenblatt, president of Cerritos College Faculty Federation, and a librarian at the college, has seen what happened to counselors in her district when performance metrics were imposed on them.

Speaking about the school administration officials, Rosenblatt said, “They want to game the system – they don’t care if it’s quality counseling – they just want a bunch of education plans. The education plan is supposed to be the artifact of an important conversation, but they just want to check off these productivity measures,” she said. “Our counselors have master’s degrees and some have PhDs – they went to school for student contact, not to be chained to their desk all day, writing education plans.”