Linda Lacy, Cerritos College president, recalls her time on the accreditation team for the City College of San Francisco, a school in danger of losing its accreditation, and how Cerritos College fares in comparison.
Lacy said that the accreditation report has to remain confidential, but did elaborate on why San Francisco is in such a situation.
“In all honesty, (it is) a good college, but (it was) trying to do too many things with very few resources. (It) tried to have centers in every district. And when you have centers, you have to provide full comprehensive services, meaning counseling, financial aid.
“Well it’s so cost prohibitive, some of these centers were literally sitting one mile to two miles apart. (It was) dividing (its) resources so thin, (it wasn’t) able to do something well. About 95% of the budget was all tied up in salaries and benefits, so it gave little room for facility improvement or innovative program services.”
With such a populous region, Lacy expressed concern for the students and hopes San Francisco can address the issues and rectify the flaws.
Enrollment has already dropped significantly, according to Lacy, and in order to continue the pursuit of a degree, students have to adapt and attend other nearby community colleges if all fails, as the looming thought of a accreditation-lacked system is a cause of concern for students.
She said that the actual review curve that one files as a part of the accreditation team is “cut and dry” and that it’s truly non-subjective.
“You have criteria that schools have to meet. It’s, do they have it? And if they do, are they doing it well? You have to ask yourself, are they meeting this standard? It has to come with that. And the evidence has to show that type of thing.”
Accreditation teams are established through experience. If one is a business expert, then one will review the business area. A librarian? Address the issues in the library. Every member is picked by a commission team, who look at applications by staffers in colleges.
Whether or not Cerritos College suffers the same fate as the City College of San Francisco remains to be seen, but Lacy is confident in the school, and even if there are issues, it can be resolved.
“We’ve kept our finances in very good shape. If we had recommendations, we would embrace them and get them fixed.”
GregoryDillon • Feb 23, 2014 at 8:32 am
Hi, I’d like to correct that San Francisco City College has NOT lost its accreditation.
What happened is the team decided that CCSF would lose its accreditation in July of 2014 if it didn’t “fix” some stuff. And of course, its not yet July 2014.
Second, Dennis Herrera, who has been a strong city attorney, and built a great staff, took the matter to court, basically saying that the team that accredited wasn’t created from a fair shuffle, “it included the husband of the political enemy of ccsf.” and then the team did its job wrong” The court granted the injunction, which is like saying, “yes it looked like the city is correct, “its a good school” and the team was wrongly built and biased” but we going to have a full public trial on if the the school is bad, or the team was bad. In the mean time, the school keeps the accreditation, even if the trial doesn’t start to after July.”
As a second point, San Francisco, is well along with a process of Manhattanization. That is a dense City where people take taxis, ubers and public transportation rather than private cars. In the densely populated nature of San Francisco, efficient location of facilities is naturally different than in an area of less building and generally lower land prices.
Thanks for your article.
Alexandra Scoville • Feb 24, 2014 at 1:16 pm
Thank you for your comment. We were aware of the correction unfortunately we have yet to make the correction online. I apologize for this delay but the correction will be made online shortly.
Thank you again.