VOLUME 103 ISSUE 10 MAY 2, 2012 first copy of the corsair is free. each copy after is 25¢
Photos by Michael Price Corsair The Santa Monica College Board of Trustees listen to a speaker from the audience at their meetings in the SMC Theater on Tuesday night. The trustees are under fire for proposing a two tier approach to provide more classes to SMC students.
Trustees hold meeting on May Day to discuss Contract Ed Santa Monica College Trustee, Margaret Quinones-Perez speaks during the Board of Trustees meeting. QuinonesPerez spoke on the contract ed issue.
Santa Monica College Trustee, David Finkel speaks to the need to make more classes available to California Community College Students.
Nathan Gawronsky & Chavi Gourarie Editor-in-Chief & Staff Writer Researchers at Santa Monica College have recently released a stark report underlying the dialogue. outlining the loss of two thirds of classes at 15 local community colleges in Los Eric Oifer, who is a professor of political science who sits on the Academic Angeles, including SMC. Senate, said candidly, “We each have our own narrative that we want to tell The report comes at a time when the controversial Contract Ed program, which from the facts.” He suggested that the Academic Senate targets some of the would offer an additional 50 courses over the summer and winter sessions, has existing misinformation. “There’s no fact sheet that we can provide that would been both cancelled and postponed due to intense political opposition from give someone a comprehensive understanding of the issue,” Oifer said. students, faculty, and workers’ union groups. The special report was also discussed at a Board of Trustees meeting, which Critics described the report as a political move to illustrate the district’s need occurred yesterday. The meeting, which included over two hours of public for the Contract Ed program, which was sent to numerous residents of Santa comments, students, faculty members, and prominent union leaders, voiced a Monica, as well as all faculty and staff members of SMC in a mass email on nearly unanimous opposition and trepidation over the Contract Ed pilot program. Tuesday, May 1. Trustee Rob Rader expressed a deep disappointment at the attempts to The program, which has been postponed for the upcoming summer session, demonize both the supporters and the opponents of Contract Ed that he’s seen is now to be vetted by the District Planning and Advisory Council (DPAC), the during the past month. advisory committee made up of various campus interest groups. “I’ve seen the caricatures,” he said, referring to posters disseminated around The special report outlines some of the dismal numbers regarding the negative campus of greedy bankers holding bags of money in front of downtrodden, trends occurring at local community colleges in Los Angeles and surrounding defenseless students. “And I weep inside,” he said. districts like Santa Monica. The number of summer classes provided has been Trustee David Finkel also spoke passionately at the meeting, at one point using slashed by two thirds since 2008, according to the report. That translates into a language that cannot be printed in this newspaper. “I used to be a civil rights loss of 168,000 classroom seats across the 15 colleges, according to the report. attorney, an old radical — I know what it is to fight.” Laughs were heard from For students, this means waiting longer to transfer, waiting longer for certification the audience. to enter the work force. “I see higher education as a lifeboat,” said Rader during his comments. “And we DPAC met for their scheduled meeting on Wednesday, April 25, to attempt to can try to either make the lifeboat bigger, or smaller.” find a new answer to the same question that prompted the Contract Ed pilot The Student Organizing Community, a small group of vocal student activists program. committed to their opposition of Contract Ed, continued to organize protests The meeting ended with a resolution to publish a fact sheet, upon which on campus, including a “camp-out” on Monday, and a rally before Tuesday’s alternative solutions to the ‘pain point’ of the course deficit will then be generated. Board of Trustees meeting. They want Contract Education officially removed as The fact sheet would include a timeline of the budget cuts and resulting class cuts a possible solution, as they believe it would cause a divide between poorer and over the last few years, and the average time for students to graduate or transfer wealthier students. compared to past years. Randall Lawson, executive vice president of SMC, said that the April 3 incident At the meeting were representatives from the Faculty Association, the Associated in which 30 student protesters were pepper sprayed “put a spotlight on the plight Students, and the Academic Senate, each representing the interests of their own of the California Community Colleges,” which he said is a good thing, but it does constituency. make things more “difficult” for SMC. He expects the fact sheet to be ready in The atmosphere at the meeting was cordial, despite the political tensions time for the next meeting, which will be held on Wednesday, May 9.
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