Twitter Blog 2: Studying Liberal Arts and Community College

Last week, the New York Times published an article with accompanying video telling the story of Vladimir de Jesus, a 23 year-old art enthusiast at LaGuardia Community College. In many ways, his story encapsulates the challenges facing students enrolled at community colleges across the country. As we saw in Owen and Sawhill’s reading, only 35 percent of students at non-competitive schools graduate within six years, a burden especially held by parents, who comprise about 29 percent of community college students in the United States. After his daughter was born in 2008, de Jesus left school for our years and, during the six years in which he has been sporadically enrolled in school, Vladimir has amassed 27 of the 60 credits he needs to graduate and move on to Hunter College. This counts him among the three-quarters of LaGuardia Community College students who are unable to receive an associate degree within their first six years. When we think of the profile of a typical community college student, these seem to be the types of narratives that most often come to mind.

However, it was another fact about Vladimir that is typically of the majority of community college students that really stood out to me in this article. I, like many others, shared the common misconception that community colleges offer a mostly vocational curriculum. The Times notes, however, that the majority of community college students are awarded degrees in the liberal arts and sciences, making Vladimir’s pursuit of an art degree more the norm than the exception.

Given this information, it is even less surprising that community colleges have seen levels of state support that do not match their institutional need. People who support the notion that “too many people are going to college” tend to point to students like Vladimir, who pursue degrees that don’t have a clear direct financial payoff. However, I think that Vladimir’s story shows that these criticisms are inherently misguided and that supporting even those students at community colleges majoring in the arts is a worthwhile investment that has an important, positive, societal payoff.

Dr. Gail Mellow, president of LaGuardia community college, says that 60 percent of students taking classes at LaGuardia are enrolled in a remedial math course, with nearly 70 failing to complete the course in their first attempt. This has led organizations like the Carnegie Foundation to develop new frameworks for remedial math instruction, aimed at teaching community college students through a more statistics and probability-based approach. This method has already seen positive results, and will pay significant dividends for students who are seeking employment after their time in community college.

In addition to the benefits of learning these basic STEM building blocks, students studying liberal arts in community college settings have a chance to work within a structured curriculum and pursue something they are passionate about, giving them a chance to increase their own social capital. By contrast, students who are “stuck” and unable to find direction with only a high school diploma are more likely to remove themselves from the job market entirely. Avoiding this outcome seems to be in the best interest of the state and can be achieved by investing in higher education that serves all students, regardless of whether or not politicians deem their course of study to be worthy of increased state investment.