LTCC needs more students to balance budget
By Kathryn Reed
When classes start Sept. 23 at Lake Tahoe Community College officials hope to see a lot more students than last year. The budget the board approved Tuesday night is banking on it.
Enrollment dropped dramatically last school compared to the previous year. The 2013-14 budget is calling for 1,750 fulltime equivalent students.
Lake Tahoe Community College’s finances are not quite on solid ground. Photo/LTN file
“Until we know the FTES, the budget is only as good as the assumptions it was built on,” LTCC President Kindred Murillo told Lake Tahoe News.
FTES history:
• 2008-09 – 1,935
• 2009-10 – 2,021
• 2010-11 – 1,834
• 2011-12 – 1,819
• 2012-13 – 1,530.
Between 2008 and 2010 the college had a dramatic drop in the number of Lake Tahoe Basin residents attending the college. This is based on a study done by ZIP codes. In 2008-09, 5,925 basin residents took classes at LTCC, while in 2012-13 that number was 3,766.
People keep moving out of the area, fees increased, the number of classes declined, the state changed how it calculates FTES, the good neighbor policy with Nevada went away – those are some of the reasons for the decline in numbers.
Online classes have helped increase the enrollment for people living outside the basin.
While Sept. 10 was the public hearing on the budget, no one showed up.
The board has discussed the budget extensively, with a tentative budget presented at the June 25 board meeting, lots of talk at the Aug. 23 retreat and then again at a study session on Sept. 5.
The college is taking $403,408 out of reserves to balance its budget.
In Murillo’s summary of the budget she wrote, “The major goal of the budget development process has been to create a budget that more accurately reflects the fiscal outlook, knowing that it does not benefit students or the college if the organization does not have a true picture of the budget when making decisions.”
Murillo has been working to establish a realistic budget since she came to the college. The previous practice had actual expenses coming at about $1 million less than projected. She and Jeff DeFranco, vice president of administrative services, have strived to make the budget more factual.
“There’s no longer fluff,” Murillo said. “It’s as close to real as you can get.”
A potentially fluctuating number is what the college pays out in health and welfare benefits. The agreement with all bargaining units for that segment of their contracts expires Nov. 30.
The college pays for the entire premier health plan for each employee. This comes to $17,350 annually per employee.
(Murillo and two board members have opted for the school to pay for the standard plan for them.)
It is the college’s desire to have all employees go to the standard plan. A committee has been formed to come up with a proposal that would be presented to Murillo who would in turn bring it before the board.
The board on Tuesday agreed to set aside $10,000, if need be, to have a consultant compare the current options available to LTCC through the health and welfare joint powers authority it belongs to to others in the state.
In other action:
• The college has tentatively set June 7 as the date to celebrate its 40th anniversary.
Love LTCC
They need to offer more evening classes…I am in my forties and I would love to take computer (learn how to really use Excel, word, power Point and build a website) and business classes as well as photography etc but the classes are offered at times I can’t take it. I work daily from 6:30 to 4:30 Monday to Thursday. It also seems there are not many Friday classes. I have taken many classes in the past in the evening, but I find they are lacking classes. Just a thought form a working woman wanting to expand on her horizons!!
Keep core class offerings strong. Continue to expand community classes, and look at developing a unique program(s) that is complimentary to the area, that will attract the best teachers, and will have a wait list of students. Something having to do with outdoor recreation, environmental stewardship, or something along those lines.
How about a class or short program for customer service, so we would have the best service in any resort town, and other employers would come here trying to recruit workers for their resort towns.
Why are taxpayers funding health insurance for part-time board members?
So, nepotism and cutting access to classes for students that aren’t pursuing an advanced degree was a bad idea? Just like the casinos, the average Joe or Josephine is your bread and butter, not the high-rollers. Put the community back into Community College.
not mentioned are the reductions in repeat-ability for even adult skills classes such as the arts and physical education and the increases in # of students needed to offer a course – and it’s only going to get worse as the town looses more and more people and class offerings continue to get reduced or cancelled. After a while, people other than a traditional 18-19 year old post high school student – just stop looking at what the school has to offer. Ironic that this comes after they built such nice buildings….I guess build it and they will come didn’t work out too well here did it?….
How absurd! Crying about low enrollment yet they put regulations in place that hamper their goal. You cannot repeat classes and their is a capricious requirement of a minimum of 15 students per class or the class is cancelled. Looks like a good location for a Whole Foods.
well in defense of the school, these changes came from the state system – in fact LTCC has been out of compliance for a while…we just dont have the population or interest to really sustain this community asset do we?
A couple other possible causes:
Online registration has become a bit of an ordeal, over and over again, I hear people say how they ran into trouble with the online system.
I personally stopped receiving a quarterly catalog a year or so ago, so signing up for classes has fell off my radar.
Unfortunately the college is getting whipsawed by the funding formula. For each student enrolled in a class, the school gets x dollars from the student and y dollars from the state. Traditionally, community colleges loaded up their enrollment in “adult ed” type offerings to maximize the reimbursements from the state. With the multiple state budget shortfalls over the last few years, the state has said that instead of paying for a student to take the same class over and over, or paying for “enrichment” classes, we’re going to focus on the most fundamental part of our core mission of preparing students for transfer to 4 year schools. This has left smaller community colleges like LTCC in a tough spot of needing to increase enrollment while eliminating course offerings that appeal large segments of the community.
There’s no easy answer to the problem for LTCC. The state isn’t in a position to re-institute subsidies for people taking fitness classes and the like, and the college isn’t in a position to be able to increase more traditional transfer student enrollment.
They are having problems with enrollment, yet they are going to spend $10,000 on a consultant? Seems to me there is at least $5,000 worth of advice in the comment section here already.
Couldn’t agree more to put the community back into community college. Yes, more evening classes so the members of the community can take advantage of them. Classes that can enrich and further personal development and employability. Ski area, hotel and restaurant management, more classes in computer software operations to name a few. Offer them when the people who need them most do not have to take time off from work to attend. The state needs to reinstate the good neighbor policy. The high cost of out of state tuition for Nevadans could cause them to look for another state to attend college.
I have taken many classes there and for the most part I have received exceptional instruction. I agree that the “Passport” system has made online registration a very frustrating experience. It is so difficult to navigate through that they need proctors at the school to help you with the process. Rather than encourage the standard Heath Care Package, it should be mandatory and if one prefers the “Premium” package it should be a personal out of pocket expense. For Murillo to say that “There’s no longer fluff.” is a statement that needs to reexamined.
Gorgeous campus… As a senior, I would like to take the fitness drop-in program forever… and since my taxes are involved, why not? LTCC might consider sub-contracting motel space for student houseing; do community outreach in the Bay Area, Sacramento, etc. to get a academia-sports ciriculum advertised out there; focus a new degree program on environmental sciences and engineering; get a biotech program collaboration going with big pharma in the Bay Area (satellite programs). Customer and hospitality service programs are fine — but they do not offer well-paying careers. Get Vail/Heavenly Valley to offer marketing programs that lead to real careers — not $8.50 per hour jobs.
I hope Ms Murillo and the board read these comments — maybe Kae should forward them. There are great ideas here. I too am a working mom and I would love to have more evening classes! Website design would be one I’d take to help my own business.
worldcycle is right — everyone should get the standdard package and if you want more, you pay for it.
LTCC should have never wasted the money or the time to change the online registration system, from WEB REG to Passport. This upgrade to a “better” system has proven not only to be cumbersome to use, but is a turnoff to young and old alike. So much so people don’t want to sign up for any classes. In my opinion, all the college has done, has been to pay for free email addresses for it’s students, we can get those on our own. LTCC needs to contact the pied piper who sold them this bad bill of goods and get a refund. By the way listen to your faculty, I’ve heard the same grumblings from them. Passport was implemented for the 2012 Fall season, LTCC take notice, the decline in registration is in direct relation to the new PASSPORT system implementation, hello! I also agree more online and evening classes as well as early morning classes. This schedule is not just for the older working adults, it is also for the younger adult students who have to work full time to cover the costs of their education. Flexibility is the key here, not rigidity or spending $10,000 on a consultant who is going to tell you the same thing the community is telling you.
Several of you noted that you hoped we are reading the comments, and we are. There were a lot of good ideas presented in the above comments and we will pass them on. One concern that is important to address is the registration system. The decision to pursue a grant and implement a new registration was made many years ago, and as painful as it has been, it was the right decision. Federal and state requirements for data drove that decision, and the old registration system did not provide the systems to allow LTCC to meet these requirements. If we don’t meet the requirements we will not be here. A lot of effort has gone into making the new registration system more user friendly, and we will appreciate any feedback on how to continue to make it easier to use.
South Lake Tahoe deserves higher education, so even as the State changes its priorities we will continue to respond appropriately. The State is focusing on funding transfer to four year institutions, workforce development, and basic (foundational) skills.
One last note about student enrollment. The college lost the largest amount of its local students between 2008-09 and 2010-11, so the registration system is not the only cause for a decrease in students, as it has been portrayed. There are multiple reasons for the lost of enrollment. We have been steadily drawing more students from other counties in California, which helps us fund more classes for our local community.
LTCC will survive all the changes, although may look different that it did five years ago. We are trying very hard to keep the “community” in community college, even though the majority of our funding comes from the State of California.
If you have other thoughts or suggestion you are always welcome to email me at murillo@ltcc.edu or call me at 530-541-4660 ext 715.
Thank you for caring about LTCC.
Kindred Murillo