She expects to graduate next month from New York University prepared to teach either special education or elementary school. N. Y. U is one of the nation's most expensive colleges (tuition room and board come to around $50,000 a year) but she has managed to pay a fraction of that.
I found Ms. Tharani in her classroom at Public School 3 in Greenwich Village where she is a student teacher. A half-dozen second and third graders were taking turns reading a story. After each one read aloud she asked questions trying she later explained. "to make sure they were really comprehending what they were reading."
Ms. Tharani's parents came to the United States from India about 40 years ago. They met and married here and now own a wholesale clothing business. Ms. Tharani is the first in her family to attend college. In that she resembles 39 percent of community college students. Her younger brother goes to.
"As the tuition has been going up more steeply in four-year institutions community colleges are an increasingly attractive alternative for savvy kids who want to save money. " says Prof. Nancy Shulock of Sacramento State University. "They know what they need know how to get it and don't need a lot of the student services community colleges are struggling to provide students. They can get through in two or three years and transfer."
Ms. Tharani saw an academic counselor regularly. "There were lines but I always managed to see the same woman," she said. She took only courses that the Nassau counselor said N. Y. U would accept for credit but just to be sure she double-checked with N. Y. U.
A favorite professor suggested she apply for a scholarship from the Community College Transfer Opportunity Program designed to attract transfers from 13 area community colleges to the Steinhardt School of Culture. Education and Human Development at N. Y. U. Ms. Tharani graduated cum laude from Nassau and won $20,000 a year for her junior and senior years.
A number of prestigious private institutions encourage transfers. Richard H. Shaw dean of admissions at Stanford calls community college transfer applicants mature and interesting candidates. Every year Stanford has 1,400 to 1,600 applicants for about 70 openings in the junior class. This year 26 percent of those accepted came from community colleges he says.
Amherst aggressively recruits community college transfers says Thomas H. Parker its dean of admissions and financial aid. The Jack Kent Cooke Foundation provides scholarships of up to $30,000 a year to transfer students. One of this year's 38 recipients is attending Amherst. The foundation is also doling out almost $7 million in grants — to Amherst. Mount Holyoke. Bucknell. Cornell the the the and the. Berkeley — "to more effectively reach out to high-achieving community college students."
But access to the high end is not necessarily a shoo-in. In a 2006 report the Cooke Foundation found that the number of community college students entering the most competitive institutions had declined (from 10.5 percent in 1984 to 5.7 percent in 2002 at private colleges and from 22.2 to 18.8 percent at public ones).
Depending on what measures are used only about 35 percent to 50 percent of potential transfers make it according to a Department of Education study. A major hurdle is simple confusion. "A student could be ready to transfer to one institution," Ms. Shulock says. "Then your life circumstances change and you move only to find that the requirements are different at another college." In many states transferring credits is hit or miss. Unless a two-year college has an articulation agreement that makes a university comfortable with the material covered in its courses transfer students are not likely to enjoy full credit for their efforts.
In California. Ms. Shulock says. "we do not have one standardized set of courses that a community college student can take and know they are transfer-ready to any of the 23 Cal State campuses or the 10 University of California campuses."
Where state policy makers have intervened and created incentives transfer rates are higher. For example in Florida students with associate's degrees are automatically admitted to one of the 11 state universities. Apparently it works: according to David Armstrong the chancellor of Florida's community colleges. 71 percent of students hoping to transfer actually do; an additional 4 to 6 percent transfer into private or out-of-state colleges. Programs to draw community college transfers have also been developed at the the the University of California at Davis and the University of Michigan.
There is a certain paradox when two-year colleges educate savvy students like Reshma Tharani. If more college-ready students begin their postsecondary careers at community colleges transfer rates will improve. Community colleges will be doing what they were established to do — except some of those most in need of the stepladder will be turned away.
When the number of applicants becomes overwhelming says George R. Boggs president of the American Association of Community Colleges. "the students who register last are turned away and that's usually first-generation and economically poorer individuals who do not know how to navigate the system."
So how does Ms. Tharani compare her two experiences? "I had great professors at both places," she said. "but at Nassau I never had any huge classes where no one knows your name. And when I hear friends talking about all the loans they'll have to pay back it makes me feel even better about my decision."
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