Abstract
J. Noah Brown, CEO of the Association of Community College Trustees (ACCT), has a monumental task as he aims to identify and define the key issues that he suggests “have the power to benefit or threaten the long-term health and vigor of community colleges” (p. 8). His intent in the book is to identify salient public policy issues and articulate how community colleges can be reimagined to support the long-term health of the community college and the nation. The primary intended audiences for Brown’s book are academics, higher education practitioners, and association leaders. His book is structured according to five issues: leading with accountability, citizen governance, resource and scarcity, completion matters, and leadership imperatives. Brown guides readers through these five issues with relative ease, exploring the issues from economic, social, and political contexts.
Brown’s discussion of the five issues begins with accountability, where he argues that community college leaders should not follow but rather lead the accountability movement. The book identifies many inherent challenges associated with the accountability movement for community colleges such as the dominant use of success metrics that are more appropriate for 4-year colleges and universities, and the diverse characteristics, attributes, and behaviors of community college students that often impede students’ degree progress and success.
In his chapters on citizen governance and leadership imperatives, Brown’s role as a former community college trustee and current leader of the ACCT is most recognizable as he outlines the purposes and functions of community college Board of Trustees (BOT) and the desired characteristics and attributes of community college leaders. Not only do these chapters include useful descriptions of BOT responsibilities and leadership styles, Brown also provides practical guidance on how effective boards should operate and the appropriate roles and priorities of community college leaders.
Two chapters address two of the most salient contemporary public policy issues in higher education: resources (i.e., finance) and college completion. Brown frames the resources chapter based on the idea of scarcity and outlines the ways community colleges increasingly rely on limited alternative resources (e.g., earmarks and National Science Foundation funding, outsourcing services, entrepreneurial activities, philanthropic contributions) in a climate of diminishing state and local funding. He argues that to ensure sustained and increased public investment in community colleges, BOT and institutional leaders must be the loudest advocates for community colleges and reinforce, champion, and assert the value of community colleges in local communities and the states. The fifth chapter addresses the ubiquitous public policy issue of college completion, and Brown identifies the conflict between the college completion movement and community colleges’ open access purpose. He cautions that community college leaders must balance the contradictory goals of open access and college success and offers several practical suggestions to achieve this balance.
Brown concludes the book by arguing that history should inform future decisions and actions of policy makers and community college leaders. Brown reminds readers that the growth and success of community colleges and the higher education system are the result of deliberate investments and bold thinking. Historic national investments in higher education such as the G.I. Bill in 1944, the National Defense Education Act in 1958, and the first Higher Education Act in 1965 illustrate this type of public investment and bold thinking that has sustained community colleges and advanced American higher education to its “first in the world” status. The Community-Based Job Training Grants, the White House Summit on Community Colleges, and the Trade Adjustment Assistance Community Colleges and Career Training Grants represent contemporary examples in the community college context. Whereas these recent policies and efforts represent progress, Brown argues they will not adequately replace the public divestment in community colleges observed in the past few decades, and more resources are needed.
Brown’s identification and discussion of relevant public policies and policy solutions at the national level make this book a valuable contribution to the literature and an essential resource for any aspiring or current community college leader (president, senior administrator, or trustee). Considering that many community colleges are local institutions and responsive to local community needs, Brown’s national perspective highlights the topics and issues that community college leaders will likely encounter in the contemporary policy climate and in the coming decades. Brown’s account of these salient issues is not grounded in social science evidence but is based on his observations as a community college board member and leader of the ACCT, and his experiences traveling to community colleges around the country engaging leaders and policy makers. In this respect, Brown’s reflections represent a national perspective of the community college that is sometimes missing from books that are limited in scope to single institutions or state community college systems.
Like most texts, Brown’s book includes limitations that are worth mentioning. In his review of the five salient issues, the role of faculty and the teaching and learning function were largely absent from the discussion. Given that Brown’s intention was to review issues critical to community colleges’ longevity and sustainability based on his discussions, I was surprised that the following critical issues were omitted or not discussed more thoroughly: the growing proportion of adjunct faculty; faculty unionization, including unions for adjunct faculty; faculty leadership and shared governance; and faculty engagement in student learning outcomes assessment and the accountability movement. Because Brown’s analysis is largely based on his observations from his travels and national experience, the omission of these issues from the book may reflect the the fact that these issues were absent in his discussions among institutional and association leaders.
A second limitation of the book is the lack of application of a critical lens to some of the issues and policy recommendations. For example, in the section on Resources and Scarcity, Brown discusses the practice of outsourcing services as an institutional cost containment strategy, and he offers a positive spin on the use of such practices. Absent from this discussion are the unintended consequences of such actions whereby, for example, external contractors may engage in practices that are not in the best interest of community college students or faculty. There are several examples throughout the text where Brown offers a policy recommendation but does not adequately discuss the trade-offs, risks, or unintended consequences of policy adoption. In this way, Brown does not always provide a critical discussion of policy recommendations, which may have been helpful in understanding the depth and breadth of issues presented in the text.
These limitations aside, this book has much to offer those interested in community college leadership and policy. The book equips readers with an understanding of the leading policy issues and conversations needed to understand community colleges and their social and economic role. The book also reinforces the democratic spirit of community colleges, evidenced by their commitment to open access, citizen governance, and student success. Ultimately, it is their commitment to these democratic ideals that position community colleges to significantly contribute to educational attainment and promote social and economic prosperity in the United States.