Four-Year Degrees at Community Colleges

Legislation has been reintroduced in Lansing, to open the door for community colleges in Michigan to offer four-year degrees in certain disciplines. Under the proposal introduced in the Michigan Senate, the four year degree could be in programs such as nursing, ski area management and wastewater treatment. Traditional four-year universities in Michigan vow to fight the proposal, as they have successfully done in previous legislative sessions. Mike Boulus of the President’s Council of State Universities of Michigan says the proposal is unnecessary because they have capacity in fields such as nursing, and there are empty seats in university classrooms right now. Boulus says the proposal is also counterintuitive to the mission of community colleges.