MONROE, La. – With President Barack Obama setting a goal of producing 5 million more community college graduates in the next decade, it seems community colleges, long an afterthought of higher education, are finally having their moment.
But they’re quickly finding out it’s no cakewalk, with new challenges coming with the added responsibility.
Community colleges’ trials are the result of a coalescence of several factors: limited space, diminishing state funding, the sluggish economy and a legislative push from states including Louisiana to funnel more students into two-year institutions.
Offering cold comfort to schools in the Louisiana Community and Technical College System, including Monroe’s Louisiana Delta Community College, is the fact that their situation is not unique: In states across the country, most dramatically in California, students are being turned away because of booming enrollment.
As Delta moves the final pieces from its former home at Coenen Hall on the University of Louisiana at Monroe campus—the building will return to the management of the University of Louisiana at Monroe, which is likely to move its enrollment services there—and prepares to open its new $40 million campus on 70 acres east of Pecanland Mall, limited space and resources are a concern.
Rapid growth at the college—enrollment this summer was up 40 percent over last year—and throughout its parent system has given rise to a set of difficulties that figure to challenge Delta’s leadership and the state for years.
Delta Chancellor Luke Robins said that, even with the new campus opening, Delta will continue to lease space at Eastgate Shopping Center as an outlet for overflow from the main campus.
