Community College Times - When it comes to immigrants, colleges offer an open door(December 22, 2011) - Community colleges across the country are not only providing extensive assistance and services to their immigrant students-whether they are here legally or not-they are also educating the public about the value of educating all students...

Inside Higher Ed - Top of the Mountain? (December 21, 2011) - The enrollment boom at community colleges may be over, according to a new analysis that found a nationwide decline of almost 1 percent since the fall of 2010. But two-year colleges remain crowded, as enrollment remains up by about 22 percent since 2007...

Inside Higher Ed - Job Training Programs Strained at Community Colleges (December 21, 2011) - State community college leaders say they are struggling to meet workforce training needs because of high unemployment levels and budget woes, according to a new report from the University of Alabama's Education Policy Center...

CT Mirror - Higher Ed savings expected, regents president says (December 20, 2011) - The state's newly merged higher education system expects to meet a target of $4.3 million in administrative savings over the next two years -- money that could be used to hire more full-time faculty, the system's top official said Tuesday...

Inside Higher Ed - Tenure Conversion (December 20, 2011) - Delta College, a two-year institution located in Michigan, has moved to make all of its full-time faculty positions either tenured or tenure-track. That means about 55 instructors at Delta have the option of replacing their one-year renewable contracts with tenure-track status...

Chronicle of Higher Ed - Estimates Show End to Surge in Community-College Enrollment(December 20, 2011) - National enrollment in community colleges has declined slightly in the past year, following three years of significant increases driven by the economic downturn, according to a report released on Tuesday by the American Association of Community Colleges...

CT Mirror - To stay competitive, UConn will raise tuition over next four years (December 19, 2011) - Adam Scianna said that as an undergraduate at the University of Connecticut nine years ago, it was common to see multiple sections for one class, often with 20 to 30 students per section. Now, he works as a teaching assistant for one of the same classes he took as an undergrad -- but he teaches one section with almost 200 students...

Community College Times - Funding bill would change Pell eligibility (December 15, 2011) - Republican appropriators in the House appear willing to keep the maximum Pell Grant award at $5,550 for fiscal year 2012, but they want to rein in eligibility in order to cut program costs as they look to trim overall federal spending...

Inside Higher Ed - Maximum Pell Preserved (December 16, 2011) - Although final details were still elusive late Thursday, members of Congress appear to have reached a compromise on a federal budget for 2012 that would preserve the maximum Pell Grant while changing the program's eligibility criteria. The spending plan would also slightly increase funding for the National Institutes of Health and end the grace period for interest on subsidized student loans...

Hartford Courant - Macaroni-And-Cheese Is A Show Stopper At Tolly's 41 (December 20, 2011) - Few chefs can say their food is literally show-stopping, but now David Tolly can. As executive chef of Tolly's 41 on the Farmington River...Tolly, a Bloomfield native, earned a culinary degree at Manchester Community College and built his career through several local kitchens...

Rocky Hill Patch - Police Department Adds Two New Officers (December 20, 2011) - Two officers from the same academy class joined the ranks of the Rocky Hill Police Department during a ceremony Monday morning. Jeffrey Foss-Rugan, 24, was born and raised in Wethersfield and is taking criminal justice courses at Manchester Community College. He graduated first in his police academy class...

CT Mirror - Bridgeport tabs national figure to head school reform effort (December 20, 2011) - A nationally known educator who led school reform efforts in Chicago, Philadelphia and New Orleans will try to turn around one of Connecticut's most troubled public school systems. The Bridgeport Board of Education was expected late Tuesday to name Paul Vallas as acting superintendent while the school district prepares to find a permanent successor to John Ramos, who leaves at the end of the month...

CT Mirror - Malloy outlines broad principles for education reform (December 20, 2011) - Gov. Dannel P. Malloy today outlined six broad principles that he says will guide the debate on education reform next year, including "intensive interventions" by the state in troubled school systems and a lighter bureaucratic touch at successful ones...

CT Mirror - Lawmakers fear state budget cuts forced UConn tuition hike (December 21, 2011) - Defending a plan to collect an extra $50 million per year from students by 2016, University of Connecticut officials said Monday that represents the cost of adding nearly 300 faculty. But another way of describing the extra student costs is that they also match a hole punched into UConn finances in recent months by Gov. Dannel P. Malloy and the legislature...

Hartford Courant - Governor Calls For 'Academic Excellence For All' (December 20, 2011) - Gov. Dannel P. Malloy got good grades from both sides of the political aisle for the principles of education reform he outlined Tuesday as a road map for the upcoming legislative session...

Inside Higher Ed - Free, If You Can Get It (December 20, 2011) - Is a free textbook a good deal? It depends. Textbook costs are a real issue for students at many community colleges. For the intro to biology sequence, for example, the textbook and lab manual combine to cost over three hundred dollars. That's pretty close to the tuition and fees for the course...

Community College Times - Credential completion requires an institutional effort (December 20, 2011) - President Barack Obama has made degree completion a major plank in his educational agenda for the immediate years ahead. It is viewed by the U.S. Education Department as a "federal-state partnership," and it has up to $500 million a year behind studying and formulating retention practices that will work...

Wait, What? - Shared Sacrifice Strikes Again: No additional new taxes - oh except for you over there... (December 19, 2011) - When Governor Dannel Malloy delivered his proposed state budget last February he included the deepest cuts in state history to Connecticut's public colleges and universities. The Democratically controlled legislature followed his lead and approved those cuts...

Inside Higher Ed - What Do You Mean, I'm Not Graduating? (December 18, 2011) - It's the end of the semester, which means it's time for some students to figure out that they've taken the "wrong" courses for their programs. This happens every single year...

Chronicle of Higher Ed - For Community Colleges, a Time to Shine (December 11, 2011) - What is the best community college in America? Ask a similar question about universities and you'll prompt a vigorous debate. Caltech and MIT would duke it out for engineering supremacy while Harvard and Princeton compete for maximum selectivity and prestige. Amherst is near the top of everyone's liberal-arts-college list, with Swarthmore close behind...