Community colleges feeling budget cuts too
Colorado four-year institutions are not the only schools being
affected by the recent state budget cuts.
As of Sept. 5, 190 community college positions have been
eliminated in the Front Range Community College system, said Briggs
Gamblin, the executive director of systems communications for Front
Range Community College. Seventy of these positions are currently
unfilled and there are no plans to fill them.
Travel budgets have been cut 10 to15 percent, Gamblin said, and
colleges have increased the number of adjunct professors who are
teaching classes.
Seventy-five percent of FRCC teachers are adjuncts.
Computer lab hours and tutors have been cut back, class sizes
have increased and some programs have been closed in order to deal
with budget cuts, Gamblin said.
“Some colleges have stopped printing their class schedules,
deciding to offer them exclusively online,” Gamblin said.
Last year, 116,000 students were enrolled at FRCC schools.
“We are the largest system and the fastest growing,” Gamblin
said.
James Butzek, the vice president of the Front Range Larimer
Campus, said Larimer is not much different from any other
school.
“We’re no different from any of the other community colleges in
being hit pretty hard (by the budget cuts),” Butzek said. “By and
large our whole program is run from what the state gives us.”
The Larimer Campus also increased tuition by 5 percent this
year.
“Nobody got a raise and we didn’t fill a lot of (open)
positions,” Butzek said.
Last year, the Larimer Campus received $12.3 million in state
funding. This year they received $11.4 million.
“Tuition is what’s picking it up for us,” Butzek said. “It’s
hurting us, it really is.”
While the cuts are hard to deal with, no programs were cut this
year.
“We didn’t close any programs this year,” he said. “We’re just
having fewer offerings.”
Joan Ringel, spokesperson for the Colorado Commission on Higher
Education, said the total state offerings to community college
systems this year is actually more than it was last year.
“Their total amount is more than it was the previous year.
Clearly it is up to the community college system now (how funds are
allocated),” Ringel said. “It certainly may be possible that some
schools don’t have as much funding.”
Ringel said last May spending efficiency was looked at in not
just community colleges, but also in regular four-year
institutions.
Three areas were looked at as areas that would help alleviate
constraints set in by budget cuts.
Ringel said recommendations to schools include getting out of
the civil service personnel system, not using central purchasing
and participating in the state’s risk-management program.
“Right now faculty and administrators are not part of the civil
service system,” Ringel said.
The other workers at colleges, such as maintenance workers, are
members of the personnel system.
“They have to give those people raises,” Ringel said. “(By
eliminating the personnel system) in good times they could give
raises, in bad times they wouldn’t.”
With the current risk-management system, schools are stuck with
the insurance policy set by the state.
“If they could insure themselves, they could save some money,”
Ringel said.
Family insurance at Larimer Campus has increased in the monthly
amount, Butzek said.
“It’s $500 to $600 more a month for the family,” he said.
Another area that soaks up budget money is using a state
printer.
“We are required by law to go to the state printer,” Ringel
said. “Instead of cutting the best deal, sometimes it costs
more.
Sorry, the comment form is closed at this time.