BY HANK REICHMAN Calbright College, California’s ridiculously named and fully online community college, graduated just 12 of its 900-plus students in its first year and saw more than 40% of them drop out, according to a scathing report released May 11 by the California State Auditor. The college, which expects to receive more than $175…
BY HANK REICHMAN Calbright College, California’s totally online community college, a target of withering faculty criticism from its inception by former Gov. Jerry Brown, may be just a few steps from a well-deserved demise. Last week the California Legislature agreed on a state budget for 2020-21 that will eliminate all funding for the school. The…
BY HANK REICHMAN I’ve been posting pieces about California’s ill-conceived all-online community college, Calbright, and faculty resistance to it pretty much since its inception. You can find those posts here. Now that all the state’s community colleges, like pretty much all of higher education nationally, are now offering classes only remotely, using online methods, the…
BY HANK REICHMAN In a sudden and unexpected move, Heather Hiles, president and CEO of Calbright College, California’s new online community college, has resigned after less than a year on the job. The college’s board voted unanimously yesterday to accept a separation agreement with Hiles, who will step down effective March 31 but be on…
BY HANK REICHMAN October 1 was the legislatively mandated opening day for California’s new ridiculously named fully online community college, Calbright. But there were no classes. There were no instructors. There were no students. There were, however, some applicants. According to Taylor Huckaby, Calbright’s communications director, about 655 people had started an application, of which…
BY HANK REICHMAN In the waning months of his term as California governor Jerry Brown embraced a new pet project: a totally online community college. With the enthusiastic support of California Community College Chancellor Eloy Ortiz Oakley, Brown got the Legislature to somewhat reluctantly agree to spend an initial $100 million to get the online…