Education

Community colleges pushing for student success

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By CELESTE BOTT
Capital News Service
LANSING – Community colleges across the state are taking steps to increase involvement in each individual student’s education, including Macomb, Jackson, Lake Michigan, North Central and Grand Rapids community colleges. They’re developing new education and career planning programs as well as offering a wider range of advising, tutoring and financial support services. According to Michael Hansen, president of the Michigan Community College Association, those steps are being taken to change the reputation of community colleges from a last resort to a viable alternative to more expensive and less personal four-year universities. “What we’ve really seen recently is a greater focus on student success,” Hansen said. “It can be hard to get a sense of a student’s identity in a community college setting because there are so many people coming in and often leaving very soon for four-year universities.

Education

Community college network to promote affordability

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By LAUREN GENTILE
Capital News Service
LANSING – Community colleges may find themselves becoming a branded network within the next year to polish their image and show the public they are an affordable option for higher education. “We are working on making the 28 individualized colleges more of a state system and able to help one another promote each other,” said Michael Hansen, president of the Michigan Community College Association, said. Hansen said branding will be more than a logo. It will be a “new community college network.”

“As an association, we believe there is a lack of understanding by the public, that community colleges offer a high-quality education at a low-cost,” Hansen said. “Community colleges also offer programs that offer direct-market payoff, and you can graduate with a career.”
The plan will help colleges list opportunities and offerings for prospective students in one location.

Business & Economy

State’s corrections cuts focused on limiting inmates’ time in prison

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By JACOB KANCLERZ
Capital News Service
LANSING – Despite years of cuts and reforms, Michigan’s corrections budget is bigger than other portions of the state budget, including higher education and safety net programs.
Although the state’s prison population of about 43,000 has fallen from an all-time high of 51,554 in 2007, the Michigan Department of Corrections and a coalition of interest groups continue to push reforms, particularly in how long people stay imprisoned. The corrections department has closed 14 prisons and camps, bid out health care services, stripped away layers of administration and made other savings over the past decade, said John Cordell, a public information specialist with the Michigan Department of Corrections. It now costs just $2 a day to feed three meals to each prisoner. The corrections budget hovers around $2 billion annually (Cordell said it’s $1.93 billion this year), and the prison population is partly why, said John Bebow, the executive director for the Center for Michigan, a think tank in Ann Arbor. Although Michigan’s prison population is down 15 percent from the 2007 peak, a 2011 report from the Council of State Government showed that Michigan has the highest imprisonment rate in the Midwest.