City College vows to resist closure, takeover

Student Trustee, William Walker shares information, as Interim Chancellor, Dr. Pamila Fisher, discusses the accreditation situation the City College of San Francisco is currently facing, with faculty and staff, on Friday July 6, 2012, on campus in San Francisco, Calif. less Student Trustee, William Walker shares information, as Interim Chancellor, Dr. Pamila Fisher, discusses the accreditation situation the City College of San Francisco is currently facing, with faculty and staff, ... more Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle Photo: Michael Macor, The Chronicle Image 1 of / 10 Caption Close City College vows to resist closure, takeover 1 / 10 Back to Gallery

As City College of San Francisco contemplates the unthinkable - that the vast school of 90,000 students would close next year if it loses accreditation - a look at the state's only college forced to close for that reason holds a surprise.

Students enrolled at Compton College in 2006 may never have noticed much of a difference when the school shut down that year.

That's because a neighboring community college near Los Angeles, El Camino, took over the Compton site. Students continued their studies, but with the new college's curriculum and leadership, according to the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges that is now requiring City College to show by March 15 why it shouldn't undergo the same fate as Compton.

"We really don't want to go there," Pamila Fisher, interim chancellor of City College of San Francisco, told a room packed with faculty and staff members on Friday. "So we'll do everything possible to keep local control."

During the wide-ranging discussion of the college's precarious position, some faculty members said that City College's problem is that it lost $17 million in state funding last year.

Fisher said it wasn't. All 112 community colleges have suffered deep cuts, she said, yet only two others, College of the Redwoods and Cuesta College, are in a similar position.

"We will not be able to use that as an excuse," Fisher said.

Structural problems

The accrediting team said the college's problems were structural: failing to live within its means, ignoring a growing retiree health obligation, and paring administration to skeletal levels.

But a key clue about why a huge, seemingly solid institution like City College reached the point of possible closure is evident on page 4 of the 66-page evaluation released Tuesday.

There, even as the evaluators praise the college's commitment to students, they conclude that the administrators and faculty who run the school are a squabbling, mistrustful lot.

"There exists a veil of distrust among governance groups that manifests itself as an indirect resistance to board and administrative decision-making authority," says the report, which points to a confusing structure in which everyone - chancellor, vice chancellors, faculty, staff and students - has a say.

"The team did not find evidence of clearly delineated roles and authority for decision making, thereby hindering timely communication, decisions and results," the report said.

And that problem has had a domino effect on fiscal management and leadership.

Now City College will rely on help from the state's Fiscal Crisis and Management Assistance Team to get its finances in order. But some college leaders are less confident that the debilitating culture of disagreement and inaction can be unraveled as quickly.

'Shared governance'

The college has a unique brand of "shared governance," a common and highly regarded approach in higher education in which faculty have an advisory role in running the institutions.

At City College, the system includes faculty, administrators, staff and students. While their role is officially advisory, several college leaders and even some faculty members say that in practice the system keeps things stagnant.

"Let's say I have an idea to change the grading system," said math instructor Hal Huntsman, former president of the Faculty Senate. "I have to start four or five levels down from where the decision gets made. The authority is at the Board of Trustees. But down from that, there are councils. Down from that, there are committees. Then subcommittees."

Huntsman said it can take months for an idea to get to the top, only to have it kicked back to the bottom with a request for changes. And if anyone goes directly to the board, they are "accused of going around the process and being political," he said.

'Shame on you'

The tortuous process was evident at a board meeting this spring, when faculty members in the audience shouted "shame on you!" as Trustee Steve Ngo criticized efforts by the English Department to delay for one year a new program intended to more accurately place incoming students into English classes appropriate for their level.

"That's the exact root of the problem," Ngo said. "There are barriers to decision making, and resistance to board and administrative authority."

Leaders need training

The accrediting team urged college leaders to undergo training, and Faculty Senate President Karen Saginor said she welcomes that. "It can work better," she acknowledged.

Others took a different view.

"I don't agree with the statement that there are too many cooks and nothing gets done," said Jane Sneed, chair of the Transitional Studies Department that helps students become ready for college. "Our primary problem has been the diminishing funding from Sacramento."

Meanwhile, the college is expected to produce an action plan by Oct. 15 - right around the time the interim chancellor's contract expires.