Jonathan Lightman, Executive Director~FACCC

Finding normalcy in politics is typically a futile exercise. There’s an understanding that the legislative environs carry a “Kafka-esque” quality. Those seeking rationality are surely disappointed.
Sticking with the theme of literary motifs, an outsider might conclude that the rediscovered interest in career technical education (CTE) seems a bit Faustian in its construct. It’s not that we made any deals with the devil or that there are even any good candidates for the devil in Sacramento (okay, maybe one or two).  It’s more a matter of being careful what you wish for because it may come true.
CTE is in a truly strange position of not only being courted, but absolutely coveted, by politicians of both parties. The problem is that as much as the policymakers want us to succeed they have no other choices than to cut our budgets. It feels a bit like being granted eternal youth alongside life imprisonment.
As with anything political we need to play the cards we’ve been dealt, not whine about the ones we wanted. So let’s first take stock about what’s working for us.
          Senate President Pro-Tem Darrell Steinberg has launched an ambitious CTE agenda, anchored by SB 675, enacting the Clean Technology and Renewable Energy Job Training, Career Technical Education, and Dropout Prevention Act of 2010. This measure connects varying themes long known to CCCAOE members, that CTE opportunities, when crafted correctly with educators and businesses, can return people to work while reducing the high dropout rate.

SB 675 has already passed two policy hearings, one in the Senate Education Committee and the other in the Senate Business, Professions and Economic Development Committee. In both hearings, the bill received bipartisan support, falling a hairline short of unanimity.

In the other House, Assemblymember Warren Furutani (D-Long Beach) introduced AB 552, establishing the Commission on Adequate Funding for Career Technical and Vocational Education at the California Community Colleges. The Commission would serve as a means of providing the Legislature with options to appropriately fund CTE opportunities at the community colleges.

Perhaps more significantly, Assemblymember Furutani began conducting a series of hearings on the delivery of CTE in California, the first of which featured CCCAOE representative John Means. As an invited witness, Means provided vital input to the Assembly from the perspective of those administering and delivering CTE programs in the community colleges.

This is but a short list representing today’s Capitol “buzz” around CTE. But we all know the problem – money, or lack thereof.

Before the ink was even dry on the Legislature’s grand February budget compromise, the Legislative Analyst’s Office predicted that revenues had deteriorated by another $8 billion. Today, that number has expanded by another $2 billion.

Coupled with the projected loss of the May ballot initiatives, the budget hole is expected to be in the range of $14 - $16 billion. That’s on top of the $42 billion shortfall allegedly plugged in February and the $24 billion hole filled last September. Community colleges are currently serving over 100,000 students without any state funding, and our property tax shortfall is projected at $55 million.  

How can we handle our new found attraction without sufficient, much less meager, resources? It’s a difficult question, one without an easy answer.

Without the benefit of a crystal ball to predict the future, there’s no substitute to tell and retell the story on how CTE plays a vital role in economic recovery. While nearly every publicly funded service has value, CTE has the capacity to return the unemployed back to gainful employment, the tax coffers from empty to full. Few others can make that claim.

We have less than one month prior to the May Revise when we learn the bad, or indeed the horrific, economic news. Now is the time to make that critical district level legislative appointment to relay conditions on your campus. How many students are you educating? What kinds of jobs are your students securing? How quickly can you move them from unemployment to the work world?

It’s time to use our new found attraction to our advantage. As Assemblymember Warren Furutani noted at last fall’s CCCAOE conference, this economic crisis is unlike those of the past. We know what the answer is, moving the unemployed to the jobs of tomorrow. Our only challenge is building a bridge from here to there.

No one can communicate this message for us; we need to do it for ourselves. If you’re willing to help, please contact me directly at jlightman@faccc.org; I’ll help you find or organize a support team at your campus to meet with your state legislators.

Our success or failure rests upon us. Let’s not be in a Faustian drama; instead, let’s take fate into our own hands. Ultimately, this is the way for us to handle our new found success.