Traub relates the daily struggles of men and women trying to gain an education against the odds at the City College of New York, telling the story of the college's difficult present against the backdrop of its 150-year history. Students battle the cultural and economic forces that perpetuate inner-city poverty while the college that produced eight Nobel Laureates now tries to prepare survivors of the public school system for college-level work. Annotation copyright by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

"This volume speaks of the multiplicity of data required to tell the community college story. The authors explore and detail how various sources - workforce data, market data, state-level data, federal data, and, of course, institutional data such as transcript files - all have something to say about the life of a community college"--Back cover.

A significant contribution to the literature about American community colleges, this guide describes the community college system in each state in terms of its purpose, history, and the current status of its governance, funding, and enrollment. Forty-eight contributors, who are professional community college leaders, have written about the schools in their respective states. The coeditors all have substantial high-level administrative experience in individual community colleges or state community college systems. This publication provides valuable insights regarding how community colleges began in each state, their amazing growth in the 20th century, and the challenges they face as they enter the next millennium.

This book provides the reader with a fresh and comprehensive approach to both considering and implementing an uncommon governance practice that emphasizes a lasting, effective, and a sustaining relationship between the board and president. This discussion encapsulates pre-hiring practices, and principles regarding CEO selection, onboarding, various board membership constructions (both appointed and elected), and new dimensions of board governance that emphasize competition, agility, transparency, effectiveness, and new business models. The discussion also includes elements of policy and by-law design, intentional governance design and development, committee structures and use, parliamentary procedures, meeting construction and effectiveness, CEO contracts and evaluation, board self-evaluation, generative thinking and planning, transparency and addressing board and organizational challenges. Given that transitioning to a new, enhanced or blended governance model can be difficult, the book will offer suggestions and guidance about how to move toward a more preferred, effective model. This component will include tools, such as a strategy canvas, and other processes to assist boards in addressing questions along the way, such as how and where to begin, how to evaluate the efficacy of the current model and how to structure the transition process and the timing thereof.

Many challenges face community; technical, and junior colleges as they prepare for the 21st century. The more than 1,400 community colleges in the United States and Canada are led by approximately 14,000 academic deans and department heads, each of whom must balance the demands of the students, faculties, sponsors, community, and the college itself. As college enrollments increase, so do responsibilities, problems, and stress. Fur-ther stress will come to bear upon com-munity colleges in the next decade, when 40% of their academic leaders are expected to retire. There is justifiable concern about the identification, recruitment, and preparation of individuals to assume vacant leadership positions. Academic Leadership in Community Colleges provides the neces-sary touchstones and guidelines for per-sons within institutions preparing for new leadership. Written by professional educators, this book is based on a survey of 3,000 deans and department heads in community col-leges in the United States and Canada. The survey disclosed the broad variety of responsibilities, organizational structures, and developmental strategies exercised by academic leaders in community colleges from coast to coast. The research was conducted by the Center for the Study of Higher and Postsecondary Education at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and supported by the National Community College Chair Academy. Introductory chapters present compara-tive information about community col-leges: their various missions, instructional units, and demographic situations. Other chapters focus on the beliefs and values, tasks, skills, competition, and challenges that greet academic leaders. Readers will find useful strategies for confronting frequent problems and procedures for achieving greater college cohesion and efficiency.

Increasingly, students worldwide are seeking post-secondary education to acquire new skill-sets and credentials. There is an explosion of community college models that provide educational opportunities and alternative pathways for students who do not fit the traditional higher educational profile. This book focuses on economic models to help local and national economies develop strong workforce training, humanitarian models to bring about social mobility and peace, transformative models to help institutions expand and keep up with societal needs, and newly created models that respond to the educational and training needs of a constantly changing world. These models seek to capture the imagination of those who are committed to learning about what works in higher education and in particular, the impact community college models are having on the changing nature of world social, political and economic landscapes. With contributors representing 30 countries, this book presents an international perspective.