Browsing by Subject "Community colleges -- Texas -- History"
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Item The emergence and development of the community/junior college in Texas(Texas Tech University, 1991-05) Blair, Sue JohnsonThe community/junior college is a significant part of higher education in Texas. Funding for higher education accounts for over 40% of total state appropriations, and some $500,000,000 went to community/junior colleges for 1990-91. There are sixty-eight separate campuses in forty-nine community college districts, plus four campuses of the Texas State Technical Institute. Approximately half of all higher education students in the state attend a public community/junior college. This historical study focuses on the emergence and development of the community/junior college in Texas. It provides a chronological report of the emergence of different institutions and identifies factors significant to the development of both local institutions and the Texas community/junior college system. Demographic, economic, political, and societal forces have all helped to shape the institution that exists today. The development of community/junior colleges in Texas has basically paralleled national trends, but it has been without plan or pattern and has consistently been ten or more years behind. Much of what has been the community/ junior college movement in Texas has been a result of desire and energy of people in the local districts which the individual institutions serve. Texas has consistently lagged in terms of state recognition, coordination and funding of public community/junior colleges. The history of the community/junior college movement in Texas is cyclical, in that certain problems or concerns recur at rather regular intervals. These recurring concerns include financing, standards, quality, local versus state control, and duplication of effort. The permanence of the public community college as a part of the higher education system of Texas is assured, but the problems that have been recurred over the years have not been solved. Additional research topics that are suggested relating to community/junior colleges in Texas offer opportunities to increase understanding of the past in order to meet the challenges of the future.