Most community colleges provide open access, enabling both U.S. and international students to benefit from the high-quality and low-cost courses they offer with few admissions requirements. The student bodies at community colleges are enormously diverse-in terms of goals, needs, backgrounds, and life circumstances.
Community colleges were created to serve their communities, and they continue to place high priority on responding to local needs. At the same time, these colleges increasingly recognize that their students will live in a multicultural, interdependent society. For this reason, more and more community colleges are expanding their programs and services to embrace the "world community." A basic goal is to help students become more comfortable and competent in moving personally and professionally among cultures of the world.
Another goal of the community college is to prepare students to engage in worldwide activities related to education, business, and social interaction. To achieve these goals, community colleges are engaged in a wide range of efforts to internationalize the learning experience. They are incorporating international components into new and existing classes; providing special programs, activities, and classes for their growing immigrant and foreign student populations; initiating study abroad programs; encouraging faculty exchanges; and recruiting international students to their campuses.
For the international student, community colleges offer an affordable education, in a supportive, challenging environment. Students can work toward an associates degree, certificate, or diploma in a number of areas. About 20 percent of the students on campus are working toward a bachelor's degree. Others are learning a new skill, or coming back to school after being away for many years. Top-notch faculty, state of the art facilities, and small class size are the hallmarks of a community college education.
Many community colleges offer support services to international students including: international student advising, counseling services, admissions and records assistance, a comprehensive library, computer labs, learning support services, a career center, disabled student services, housing assistance, a student health office, a campus bookstore, and day and evening food services. Also, many colleges offer extracurricular activities like athletic teams and student clubs.
Just how extensive is this commitment to international education? Results of a survey released last spring by the American Association of Community Colleges (AACC) found that more than 80 percent of responding colleges have integrated international components into course work and 83 percent sponsor activities to promote global awareness.
Reflecting increased demand, enrollments in colleges with international business programs grew from 23 percent to 60 percent over the last five years. Forty-four percent of the responding colleges had recruited or hired faculty and staff from other countries or with international experience. And seventy-eight percent either sponsored or worked in partnership with others to offer travel and exchange programs for study abroad. Moreover, Open Doors 2000 reports that over 85,000 international students were enrolled in associate degree programs in 1999/00.
For more than 100 years, community colleges have been offering affordable, convenient, and accessible education and training to millions of men and women. They have produced astronauts, doctors, business tycoons, artists, sports legends, and scientists who have touched lives around the world.
As the primary advocacy, leadership, and service organization for the nation's community colleges, the American Association of Community Colleges actively supports an international role for community colleges in all dimensions of worldwide education and training. Community colleges are strategically positioned and experienced to educate and train individuals to function successfully in a multicultural and advanced technological environment that crosses all boundaries of education, communication, language and business.
Web Resources
American Association of Community Colleges
www.aacc.nche.edu
Community College Web
www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/cc/
US News and World Report Community College Search
www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/community/commsrch.htm
Submitted by
Judy Irwin
Director, International Programs
