CA Master Plan for Education

A California joint legislative committee, headed by Sen. Dede Alpert, is creating a comprehensive set of policies for education, K-12 and postsecondary. The second draft is available here:

www.senate.ca.gov/masterplan

Recommendation 41 pertains to private postsecondary education in general, and the BPPVE in particular.

Pam

 

Pam,

What affect, if any, will this have on the BPPVE and CA state approved schools?

 

As it is currently written, the BPPVE as we know it would cease to exist. Recommendation 41 describes taking the regulatory authority over degree-granting schools (those that offer Associates level degrees or higher) and transferring that authority from BPPVE to a new agency. It also recommends moving the federal Veterans Affairs program, which has been a source of funding for BPPVE. I believe the vocational programs would also transfer to another agency.

As for the effect on CA approved schools, this is being currently, er, discussed Read the items that follow the Recommendation. The thrust of it is a move toward greater articulation between the private and public colleges. Even if this language is ultimately tempered in the final legislation, I think that simply moving degree schools into a more higher-ed-oriented agency would be a big first step toward restoring the reputation of the private postsecondary sector.

 

I can't read pdf files from the machine that I'm posting from, so I have to comment on the earlier html version of the master-plan proposals.

Some things that struck my eye:

The consolidation of power over state education in the hands of the Governor.

The creation of a new Califonia Education Commission to coordinate all state education from kindergarten to graduate school.

The transfer of authority over state-approved degree-granting schools from the BPPVE to the CEC.

The recognition that the non-accredited sector has a very poor reputation.

Attempting to blame the BPPVE for that. Why the plan's authors do that isn't clear, beyond the obvious political motives, since the BPPVE is doing a pretty good job. Things certainly haven't gotten any worse under its watch. So the implication is that it may all be a matter of perceptions. If CA-approved schools are approved by the CEC rather than the Dept. of Consumer Affairs, they can brag that they are approved by the same people that approve the prestige schools.

If this analysis is correct, then what sounds superficially like an attempt to tighten up on the CA-approved schools may actually be an attempt to cater to them.

There is a proposal that CA-approved schools' program approvals must meet the same standards as those faced by the state's public colleges and universities. But given that programs in the public systems are approved by their respective systems and by the relevant institutional and specialized accreditors, this plan recommendation seems to me to be meaningless. If taken literally, it would simply outlaw non-accredited schools. If it isn't taken literally, it could mean anything or nothing.

There is a recommendation calling for increased articulation between the state-approved schools and the accredited ones, allowing for recognition of state approved credits and degrees in the wider academic community. How that would be accomplished, and what kind of enforcement the new CEC would have over it, is a mystery. I don't think that the state's colleges and universities will take kindly to this being forced on them. They will probably insist on the strong interpretation in my program approval comment above, which the CA-approved schools obviously could never accept.

Finally, there is a recommendation that approval by the CEC represent the approval necessary for eligibility for veteran's benefits. But since the VA is a federal agency, and since it seems to currently use the federal student aid eligibility list, I don't know what effect California state legislation could possibly have on this.

My impression: Apart from moving authority for state-approvals from the BPPVE to still another new office, with the inevitable downtime and backlogs that such a bureaucratic upheaval would cause, I see little in this of relevance to the CA-approved schools except platitudes.

These schools will probably end up better off, out of the demeaning clutches of the Department of Consumer Affairs, regulated by the same California Education Commission that oversees Stanford and Cal Tech, and being held to the same state program approval standards as UC and the CSU. What a great "fact" for their advertising! (Of course, if the CEC has no real role in approving UC or CSU programs, it's meaningless and even misleading.) What's more, the state proposes to twist arms to try to get their degrees and credits accepted, and to try to get them eligibility for VA benefits.

All in all, very positive for them, I'd say.

 

Pam,

If the BPPVE does by chance cease to exist, and you should suddenly find yourself among the unemployed, I suggest you make application to DegreeInfo for the position of executive secretary/administrative assistant. You would do an excellent job.

Seriously, thanks for the information.