Financing Community Colleges: Where We Are, Where We’re Going

Financing Community Colleges: Where We Are, Where We’re Going is written for community college leaders from an economic perspective, explaining how community colleges got where they are today, the financial challenges facing community colleges today, the potential financial future of community colleges, and options to meet the challenges of that future. The book details current finance issues of these institutions and discusses the emerging issues that can be challenges to their future financial stability. Current and potential community college leaders will gain important insight into day-to-day financial challenges and a better understanding of ways to navigate future financial challenges. Financing Community Colleges begins by providing background information, explaining the principles of public finance, and defining terms such as efficiency and equity that are important to this discussion. In scanning the current financial environment, the authors identify a number of significant issues and challenges that they list in Chapter 1, including expanding institutional capacity, instability of state funding, demands for greater completion, and increased need for external funding. These issues are identified to help the reader understand where we stand today. While stating that “No definitive judgements can be made about the most desirable balance between tuition, state and local funding” (p. 10), through their research the authors suggest a revenue mix of 30% to 50% coming from tuition revenue. They indicate that a key fiscal challenge for the community college is securing a mix of revenue that maximizes the yield for desired private and social benefits accrued through the education provided by a community college, while assuring that low-income and less advantaged populations are not excluded from those benefits. In the next chapter revenue and expense (cost) trends are examined in relation to college affordability. This is followed by Chapter 3, which provides an in-depth discussion on productivity —delving into the technical aspects of measuring productivity—and quality measures. Chapter 4 is a review of outcome measures and the challenge of linking those outcomes to funding. The history and development of performance funding is given ample coverage in Chapter 5, as well as lessons learned and recent state-level attempts to use performance-based funding that are gaining momentum. Before examining long-range future trends, Chapter 6, “Issues on the Horizon,” takes a look at emerging trends on both the revenue and expenditure sides of the budget, including changes in Pell and student loans, various tuition proposals (e.g., “Free Community College”), voucher systems, and efforts to measure the cost of degree programs. The final chapter, “Future Scenarios,” helps the reader gain an understanding of where community colleges are going and identifies future trends for the next 10 years. Trends identified include increased credentialing, growing enrollments, shifting institutional missions, adapting to the growing demand for more credentialing by expanding the role as a partner in the bachelor’s degree pipeline, declining state support, and growing reliance on tuition. Additional trends include the demand to do more with less, the need to increase support services for at-risk students, and the continuing move for performance funding. The authors point to potentially disruptive changes for the long term including greater diversity of learning environments, greater competition, changing views on the value of higher education, and boom and bust business cycles. In writing Financing Community Colleges, Richard M. Romano and James C. Palmer provide a resource that every community college administrator and faculty leader should read. The book describes today’s environment and why the financial viability of so many community colleges is COMMUNITY COLLEGE JOURNAL OF RESEARCH AND PRACTICE 2017, VOL. 41, NO. 8, 536–537