Two Community Colleges Placed on Probation

Updated 9:09 AM PST, Fri, Jul 10, 2009

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Two Los Angeles community colleges have been warned to improve procedures or lose accreditation.

The Los Angeles Times reported Friday that an accrediting commission has placed L.A. City College and Trade-Technical College on probation for failing to properly evaluate the effectiveness of their learning and support programs.

Gary Colombo of the Los Angeles Community College District, which operates both schools, says the problems don't reflect the quality of instruction and he expects the problems will be fixed and probation lifted next year.

"They really are sort of technical issues," said Colombo.

Barbara Beno, president of the accrediting commission, responded this way, according to The Times:

"Would we think a hospital review of a patient death was just a technicality?

"Two-year colleges have a lot of students entering, but by the time they get to graduation, the numbers are way down.... We want to get institutions to focus on student success, and I don't consider it to be a technical issue," Beno said.

Losing accreditation would mean other institutions wouldn't recognize course credits earned at the two-year colleges and the schools couldn't grant financial aid. However, educators say few schools actually lose their accreditation.

The sanction is the second of four increasingly serious actions that can be brought by the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges, which has jurisdiction over institutions in California, Hawaii and elsewhere, according to the Los Angeles Times.