The Contested Space of Community Colleges in the Age of Neoliberalism: The Case of City College of San Francisco Through the Accreditation Crisis of 2012-2017.
The Contested Space of Community Colleges in the Age of Neoliberalism: The Case of City College of San Francisco Through the Accreditation Crisis of 2012-2017.
Date
2018-08
Authors
Chlebnikow, Molly A.
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Urban and Regional Planning
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Abstract
This is a case study concerning a California community college with a long history of working to
be an open access, working class institution, despite the California policy structures pressuring
and asserting community colleges to become more efficient and business like. For the state, the
main focus is on raising graduation rates, prioritized over all other endeavors. On the surface the
problem seems to be how The City College of San Francisco (CCSF) was threatened to be shut
down due to loss of accreditation. Below the surface there is the issue that the Accrediting
Commission of Community and Junior Colleges (ACCJC) was using the power of accreditation
to enforce an institutional restructuring that is dominated by the ideology of economic efficiency
and aligned with an outcomes-based community college planning approach. And yet this
restructuring does not align with the open access mission. People focused on open access formed
an instrumental part of the resistance to the ACCJC’s actions.
Through a grounded theory methodology, the lived experiences of people within the CCSF space
are analyzed as they act to either align or resist neoliberalism. Through this analysis an
interpretive understanding is offered as to how power dominates through claims to rationality
with the erasure of other rationalities, and how structural issues make the aspirations of
democracy difficult to achieve. The alternative social imaginary of open access offers insights
into radical planning theory and practice. The focus of open access is to center those who are the
most impacted; where understanding who is being oppressed and how becomes information for
what kinds of practices are necessary toward overcoming barriers and changing the conditions
perpetuating oppression within the community college context. The emerging concepts and
inferred principles are offered to contribute to radical planning theory. Particularly, how acting to
transform systems and structures can be addressed through centering issues regarding systemic
oppression as a process of planning for equitable education within a local context.
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Community college,
open access,
community planning,
radical planning theory
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