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Editorial: More innovation from community colleges, NIU

Community colleges may still have a way to go before establishing their own four-year degree programs, but five suburban community colleges took a step last week that essentially will do the job for students who want a business degree with a Northern Illinois University pedigree.

Harper College, Elgin Community College, Oakton Community College, College of Lake County and McHenry County College signed an agreement Friday with Northern Illinois University whereby students enrolled at the two-year institutions can take classes coordinated to NIU's business program, then transfer seamlessly to the university. When students complete work at their local community college, they will already be well on their way to completing work on what NIU's business dean calls a "mini-MBA." The implications of a program like this for local students are diverse and considerable. Students from low-income families who might otherwise have thought themselves unable to shoulder the tuition costs and living expenses of attending a four-institution away from home, now can begin building a business degree while living at home.

They can hang onto tuition savings - the program allows students to pay rates frozen at the time they were admitted - and supplement them with job earnings saved for the time when they will have to move to Northern.

Typical of the mindset at these institutions, this program is not "college lite." In order to participate, students must adopt a rigorous class schedule, adhere to high academic standards and meet other requirements. If they stick to the program, students will find college more affordable and, with their local institutions monitoring their progress, have a better chance of completing in four years. "If students see the pathway early and they work toward that pathway, they're more likely to finish," NIU Executive Vice President and Provost Lisa Freeman said.

Kenneth Ender, president of Harper, noted that the agreement lays the groundwork for a program that will provide both postsecondary credentials critical for achieving a sustainable middle-class career and the capacity to build on them.

And ECC President David Sam suggested further that this program may be just the beginning, that institutions will continue "to look at other programs and see what we can work out together." By all means, they should. The day may yet come when certain four-year degrees are right for community colleges, but entirely aside from that discussion, NIU and the five local institutions have shown how well a community college can fit into a four-year degree program.

The business-degree agreement demonstrates a sincere commitment from NIU to making a high-quality educational degree accessible to all students, and it stems from the kind of nimble, cooperative thinking we've learned to expect from two-year colleges responsive to the needs of their immediate communities.

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