Americans confidence in major U.S. institutions - including higher education - has fallen in recent years, and Texas is trying to win it back. About 66,000 fewer Texas students enrolled at colleges and universities in Fall 2022 than before the COVID-19 pandemic. .
California is rapidly expanding a program which allows students to pursue certain bachelor s degrees at their local community college. Right now, 27 schools offer or will soon offer a baccalaureate degree in career-oriented fields in high demand in the Golden State. A bill passed two years ago allows the state to approve up to 30 new degree programs per year. .
Butte College campus bustles between classes on February 12, 2020. Photo by Anne Wernikoff for CalMatters
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Rarely are college bean-counters skeptical of receiving more money, but a plan to give California’s community college system hundreds of millions of dollars for faculty is dividing finance officials and professors.
For college financial officials, the new money would come at an inopportune time: Enrollment plunged across the 116-college system by 11% last fall as a result of the coronavirus pandemic. With fewer students to teach, financial officers worry that committing $170 million to hire 2,000 more full-time faculty now, per a budget blueprint approved by key legislative panels in late May, will lead to problems later.