For the first time in her 30-year career, LaGuardia Community College President Gail Mellow has had to close admissions at a school.
And Mellow is not alone. Across New York City – and the country – the community college system has been shocked by a surge in enrollment. While the colleges welcome the spike in interest – which they attribute largely to the troubled economy and a lack of jobs – area programs have had to shut their doors to additional students.
“For me, this is simply unprecedented to see the kind of need there is in the community for folks to come back to college and get the education and skills they need,” said Mellow, who, at LaGuardia, has seen a 22 percent increase in new student enrollment and 24 percent more continuing students compared to this time last year.
“It’s true of every community college in the City University of New York (CUNY),” she added. “All the Associate Degree programs are filled to bursting.”
The surge comes at a time when the U.S. is still in the throes of economic hardship and unemployment numbers continue to soar. Mellow also attributed the enrollment increase to “a renewed understanding of the power of community colleges,” underscored, she said, by President Barack Obama’s recent initiative aimed at graduating five million Americans from community colleges by 2010.
Obama’s plan was followed by Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s “Gateway to the Middle Class” proposal, which calls for investing $50 million over the next four years toward improving the quality, affordability, accessibility and accountability of the city’s community college network.
Another of Queens’ community colleges, Queensborough (QCC), also part of the CUNY system, has seen a similar boost in enrollment for the fall semester.
“The numbers are literally changing by the day,” Alice Doyle, QCC’s assistant director of public relations, said in late August. At the time, enrollment among first-year fulltime students was up 20 percent compared to August of 2008. And by September 1, enrollment at the school was closed and QCC was looking at a 36 percent increase in total new freshman, with 86 percent of them registered fulltime, according to Doyle.
To accommodate the influx, community colleges are getting creative. LaGuardia will offer more weekend and early morning classes than usual and has leased additional space in a nearby building. And the school has referred students to other schools – and to the spring 2010 semester. Currently, the only city community college still accepting registrants is Brooklyn’s Kingsborough, Mellow noted.
Mellow, who explained she is saddened by having to turn students away, said community colleges are the “most economical place to get a high-quality education and to get connected to the new world of work.”
“America turns to its community colleges when it’s time to really get going in the economy,” she said.
