WASC revoke accreditation of Compton College, California

http://insidehighered.com/news/2005/06/21/compton

Cheers,

George

 

This is a big deal, I'm afraid.

I can't recall ever seeing a public institution lose accreditation before.

 

It is extremely sad for the current students when something like this happens. I hope that they can get it resolved.

It is an interesting situation, though. I'm sure WASC didn't want to do it but felt compelled. Perhaps it is an an example of why government independent accreditors work better? On the other hand it could be used to argue the opposite?

 

From 1993 to 2003 the State of California had control of the local schools in Compton. They certainly have their problems.

http://www.cde.ca.gov/nr/ne/yr03/yr03rel30.asp?

 

WASC visit report

An indicting report on possible corruption.

http://www.compton.cc.ca.us/accredspecialrpt.htm

 

It appears from the report that management was fiscally irresponsible and incompetent. No wonder they lost accreditation.

 

I had no idea that things were so bad at Compton cc. But apparently this has been building for some time.

The immediate problem is finances. The real problem is extraordinarily bad management. In my opinion the LA DA and the CA Attorney General's office should review this collection of clowns for criminal prosecution.

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From the 2004 WASC Special Visit Report:

"The Special Visit Team found Compton Community College to lack even minimal compliance with all of the key areas of fiscal management described in the overview or Preamble of Standard III D... the Board and the administration may be considered negligent in fulfilling their responsibilities.

The Board itself has contributed to fiscal conditions that would be found problematic in an external audit. The Board's use of institutional credit cards for personal expenses, its requirement that the President purchase five college automobiles for use by the Board, and its decision to hire Board assistants and multiple attorneys have all contributed to the misuse of college funds and the diversion of needed college resources from the educational programs and needs of the College and its students...

Absent a permanent qualified business officer during many of the past several years, the College continued to employ a long-time college employee as Interim Business Officer. The College Business Officer appears to have been incompetent and lacked the understanding of simple fiscal management responsibilities, such as: accounting for categorical funds, balancing the budget, and generating monthly reports. This individual was unable or unwilling to address recommendations made by the external auditors about fiscal management in the last few completed audits, which were deemed to be Qualified due to grave errors in either practices or due to lack of adequate controls.
Most of the discrepancies noted remained uncorrected or were repeated year after year....

The Deputy Superintendent/Executive Vice President reports to the President, but the President has not effectively evaluated or controlled him. College staff refer to the Executive Vice President as the "real president" and the President as the "external president."...

The team heard from several sources that Board interference in college operations and a Board practice of working around the College President by going directly to the Deputy Superintendent/Executive Vice President may have contributed to the President's inability to exercise authority over his senior administrative staff...

The College's financial management practices are poor and are not based in a knowledge of the college's revenues. The College has operated with a structural deficit for the last few years, and its planned expenditures have exceeded its expected revenues in the two most recent fiscal years. Recommendations from its Qualified audit reports have gone un-addressed for many years. Some of those recommendations concern the need to provide more accountability for the Board's use of college resources.

The District hired approximately 170 "Independent Contractors" in 2002-03. A FCMAT examination of a sample of these contractors indicates that all of them were likely not qualified to be contractors. If the IRS finds the District to have hired contractors inappropriately, it will require payment of back payroll taxes as well as fines...

The Fair Political Practices Commission has recently imposed a fine of $100,000 for the College's failure to file required annual conflict of interest statements for its employees and consultants for the last 20 years.

Finally, the College has Title IV, Title III and other federal funds. Given that the College has been using all of its cash for operating expenses, it is likely that the College is out of compliance with federal and other regulations regarding the use of categorical funds...

The Board itself pursues benefits that have a negative fiscal impact on Compton Community College. (Standard IV B.1.a., b., c., d. and e.) The Board has contracted with five different attorneys, and uses their services at will, allegedly without the approval or participation of the President...

The Board hired a personal assistant for each Board member... The Board has used the new college bus (a luxury cruiser, not a "school bus") for non-educational purposes, namely for trips to Las Vegas that appear to have been for raising funds for political purposes of Board members...

The College has set up several off-campus "educational programs" at community sites in its service areas. According to statements of college staff, some of these programs were directed by Board interests (their stated rationale being to reach underserved communities) and were designed to channel College funds to the community entities....

Individual board members have been involved in negotiating with prospective contractors, undermining the College's bidding process and creating a conflict of interest for the Board[/b]... Poorly conceived and executed contracts for construction and for technology, as noted in the FCMAT Report, have left the district with an inadequate and incomplete infrastructure...

Some persons interviewed indicated that the Board has historically rejected the President's recommendations for individuals to fill the permanent position in order to retain the temporary Business Officer. The President and others report that when the District hired, for a brief time, an experienced higher education business officer, he tried to lead the College through a fiscal planning and budgeting process. In that process, he advocated for stricter fiscal controls and more realistic budget planning. It is said that the Board acted to terminate this individual. (Standard III D.2.g.) The Board's own use of College resources, including those resources that have a direct impact on the institutions' fiscal integrity and stability, suggest that the Board has had an inappropriate interest in keeping the College's fiscal management weak and therefore responsive to Board desires to use the College's resources for their own purposes....

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WASC is just getting started, but the point's been made.

Frankly, I think that loss of accreditation is the least of this bunch's worries.

The sad part is that the perps will probably all dance away and it will be the 6,000 Compton College students that are going to suffer from this. Most of them are low-income and from struggling homes, working days and going to school at night to improve their lives. They are the ones I care about.

 

I also enjoyed the part about the president making physical threats against a committee member. He obviously has personal problems in addition to fiscal irresponsibility and general incompetence.

Amen to that