Community Colleges: A Case Study

Though Michigan’s community colleges date back to 1914, when the first junior college opened in Grand Rapids, the majority of the state’s 28 community colleges opened after 1955 (Kolins & Stackpole, 2010). Now, collectively, community colleges in Michigan educate approximately 45 percent of all students enrolled in public higher education in the state and as of 2011, 73 percent of all residents live within a community college district (IPEDS NCES, 2016; Michigan Department of Energy, Labor, & Economic Growth, 2011). Though locally funded in the early 1900s, the state began contributing to community colleges by 1947 (Kolins & Stackpole, 2010, p. 70). Even though state appropriations increased throughout the 1950s, the remarkable growth in enrollment …show more content…
In FY2015-16, state funding accounted for 20 percent of all revenue in the average community college’s operating budget, with significant variation across institutions (low of approximately 15 percent at Wayne County Community College and a high of more than 50 percent at Gogebic Community College; Zielak, 2017). Local funding accounted for 34 percent of all revenue, again with variation across institutions. At the low end, Alpena Community College received less than 20 percent of all revenue from local property taxes in FY2015-16. At the other extreme, West Shore Community College received approximately 50 percent of all revenue from local property taxes (Zielak, 2017). Differences in local revenue amounts are the result of differences in the millage rates applied to property taxes and the property tax valuations in different community college districts. Tuition revenue accounted for 41 percent of all revenue in FY2015-16, with a low of less than 20 percent at West Shore Community College and a high of more than 70 percent at Mid Michigan Community College (Zielak, 2017).
At the same time that community colleges are serving a more diverse student population than ever before, policymakers at all levels of government continue to call on community colleges to spend revenue more efficiently. The problem, however, is that …show more content…
Brent Knight, president of Lansing Community College in Lansing, MI and Mark O’Connell, president of Kellogg Community College in Battle Creek, MI. Knight has been president of LCC since 2008, while O’Connell was appointed interim president in 2015 and became the permanent president in 2016. LCC serves more than 13,000 students a year, 39 percent of whom are full-time. Forty-one percent of enrolled students come from families with annual incomes below $40,000 and more than 50 percent of students are in-district (College Scorecard, 2017. Zielak, 2017). KCC is about one-third of the size of LCC, enrolling just over 4,700 students annually. The proportion of students who are full-time (34 percent), low-income (37 percent), and in-district (just over 50 percent) is similar to the proportions at LCC (College Scorecard, 2017, Zielak,