Virginia community colleges to ask state for more help

Meeting Thursday in Albemarle County, leaders of the state’s community college system said they’ll ask the General Assembly for money to hire more full-time faculty and teach more students.

Virginia Community College System Chancellor Glenn DuBois summed up the system’s legislative goals for the upcoming session with a faux classified ad.

“We bring track record & passion. You bring resources. Together, we’ll make beautiful music,” the fake ad read in part.

Among the items the system wants more resources for: more full-time faculty; more students, including veterans; and building more buildings.

DuBois told the leadership of the system, assembled at the Boar’s Head Inn for its annual meeting, that the survival of the middle class is on the line, and that the governor has decided to push for more higher education. He emphasized the importance of adding more science, technology, education, mathematics and health degrees.

“This is our moment,” he told the audience. “I think the nation needs us more than ever before.”

Del. Rob Bell, R-Albemarle County, peppering his remarks with references to Piedmont Virginia Community College, had plenty of praise for the system.

“I don’t think there’s a substitute for the accessibility that you provide,” Bell said.

He spoke optimistically, but without specifics about the upcoming budget cycle.

“We are looking for groups like the community colleges, who really can step up and get things done,” Bell said, praising the system for its “customer-based mission” and “can-do attitude.”

The state’s community college system already educates huge numbers of students, said Jeff Mitchell, chairman of the State Board for Community Colleges, the system’s governing body.

“The challenge for us is to be even bolder,” he said.

PVCC President Frank Friedman said the issue of increasing the ratio of full-time to adjunct faculty is a top issue for the local community college.

Statewide, 43 percent of classes at community colleges are taught by full-time faculty. At PVCC, that figure is 45 percent. DuBois wants the statewide figure at 47 percent by 2013.

Friedman said that a decade ago the number at PVCC was roughly 60 percent and attributed the drop to the financial pinch the community college system has felt in recent years.

Since 2008 the system has seen a loss of $100 million in state funding and an increase of more than 50,000 students, according to state officials

“The only way we could afford to do it was through the use of adjunct faculty,” Friedman said of the situation at PVCC.

Full-time faculty create and revise courses and are responsible for innovation in teaching. Adjunct faculty do a wonderful job but have a more limited role, he said.

“They have other jobs, they have other lives,” Friedman said.

Friedman also emphasized the importance of faculty salaries at PVCC. If there were such an increase, it would be the first time in four years, according to state officials.

And Friedman said he hopes there might be funding for PVCC to add some square footage. The state system is pushing for the top 14 projects across the system, a cut that PVCC’s highest-ranked project misses.

“I’m still hoping that there’ll be enough money that we’ll be able to dig a little bit deeper,” he said.