Mike James
Summit — Facing another budget-cutting legislative session, Kentucky’s community colleges are launching an aggressive campaign to recruit advocates they hope will lobby for them.
Kentucky Community and Technical College president Michael McCall spent Friday at Ashland Community and Technical College, speaking to students, staff, local educators and civic leaders about the campaign.
The campaign is modeled after successful modern political campaigns and depends largely on supporters signing an on-line petition and then using their contacts with legislators to argue for the importance of community college services.
Signing the on-line petition, a link for which is at the KCTCS home page, also puts the signer on an email list that KCTCS will use to send further information on college needs and accomplishments.
Based on similar successful campaigns in other state community college systems, McCall believes it can transform lip-service supporters into active advocates who will keep pushing higher education funding onto the front legislative burner.
Given the current economic climate and recent legislative sessions that have failed to yield funding increases, the effort is essential, he said.
Actually, KCTCS doesn’t plan to lobby for large increases in its budget. Its agenda for the 2010 session seeks to maintain the same funding base of $215 million it received in the previous session.
On top of that it will ask the General Assembly for $6 million more for maintenance and operations in new facilities like the ACTC EastPark addition that will be ready for classes next fall.
To keep the $215 million base funding level, the legislature will have to find $14 million more in state money. But that amount doesn’t constitute an increase, McCall said. Instead, it will make up for the one-time infusion of federal stimulus money inserted in the last budget — an infusion that plugged a gap made by cutting an equal amount from the state.
KCTCS wants the General Assembly to fund services for students who need remedial work to be ready for college and on-line dual credit programming.
Remediation is a particular need in the community college system because 57 percent of Kentucky students who need it are KCTCS students, he said.
Also, 78 percent of KCTCS students enter the system underprepared in at least one important academic area, he said.
McCall hopes the grass-roots campaign will underscore the core mission of community colleges — to prepare students, both traditional ones and older people returning for retraining, for jobs.
He wants advocates to hammer in the message that Kentucky needs community college graduates to fill shortages in fields like nursing, skilled trades, medical technology and information technology. “That’s clearly where KCTCS fits,” he said.
MIKE JAMES can be reached at mjames@dailyindependent.com or at (606) 326-2652.
