SUNY Threatens Remediation at Community Colleges

For those of you who are not familiar with non-credit remediation courses because they are often run through our continuing education programs, NYS Education Law allows for state funding of non-credit remediation courses offered at community colleges when

"instruction concerned with diagnosing, correcting or improving such basic skills as oral and written communications, reading, analytical concepts and general study habits and patterns, to overcome in part or in whole any particular marked deficiency which interferes with a student's ability to pursue an educational objective effectively."

SUNY has the authority to approve these courses for state funding.  Such courses have included writing, reading, GED preparation, computer skills, and ESL courses.  Although THERE HAS BEEN NO CHANGE IN THE LAW, SUNY is proposing to re-interpret the law and force community colleges to re-submit all of their NCR courses for re-approval for NCR courses by January 1, 2014.  (Click on links below to see the draft of SUNY Memo and the FCCC response.)

The implications of this policy shift for our ESL students, our adult students, and our under-served populations are anything but clear.  If community colleges are democracy's colleges, if a democracy is built on an educated citizenry, we must be careful to defend our principles of open access and success for all people within our communities, no matter their race, class, gender, age, etc.

SUNY Memo to Presidents:
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B5nax1fYKFPDWXZGZWtTWExpMVk/edit?usp=sharing

FCCC Response to MTP
https://docs.google.com/file/d/0B5nax1fYKFPDbVprM3lZTjJVWjA/edit?usp=sharing