Verde Independent dual enrollment editorial light on facts

On August 1 the editor of the Verde Independent wrote a commentary on the editorial page lauding Yavapai College for its dual enrollment program in the Verde Valley.  (Click here to read the commentary by editor Dan Engler.)  So that readers received more accurate information about the program and the contributions by the high schools in the program, Blog editor Bob Oliphant sent the Independent a response. The following is the response to Mr. Engler’s commentary.

Commentary

Dear Editor:
I found your August 2, 2015 editorial, “College’s dual enrollment program hardly an example of not caring about the Verde Valley” short on facts and disingenuous in content. It read like a script you might have been handed by Dr. Penelope Wills during her recent visit to your office.

First, you state that “fiscal wisdom of this business model is suspect.” Since when has post-secondary education been relegated to a “business model” rather than an educational model? Those of us fighting for decent post-secondary opportunities for residents of the Verde Valley firmly believe that educational opportunities are not to be sacrificed on the alter of some cockeyed and wasteful business model dreamed up by the Prescott administrators. We actually believe in education!

Second, the dual enrollment program is offered to all high schools in Yavapai County; not just the Verde Valley as your editorial implies. It is not some kind of a gift to the Verde Valley because the Prescott bureaucrats care about students over here. It is a part of existing state law and a county-wide project.

Third, you failed to tell your readers that the College administrators are circulating a proposal to Yavapai County High School superintendents in which they propose to lay a tax on the already cash strapped high schools for students who are participating in the Dual Enrollment program. According to the letter, they propose a tax on each student credit that ranges from $10 to $25 per credit.

The Prescott administrators, who have an insatiable appetite for revenue to drive programs on the West side of the County surmise, without supporting data,  that dual enrollment is cutting into their profit margin. By imposing this tax on student credits, they believe it will generate more revenue so they can invest into such noneducational projects as a $1.3 million tennis court, which was built primarily for the City of Prescott (the College has no tennis team). Or, waste $5 million dollars on renovating a decent college auditorium on the Prescott campus so it could become an 1105 seat dinner theatre for the residents of Prescott.

Or, maybe the proposed tax on credits will kill off the growing dual enrollment program because our high schools cannot afford it. Is that caring for the Verde Valley? Hardly.

Fourth, you also failed to explain to your readers what the high schools are providing to the dual enrollment program at no additional cost to taxpayers or the College. The high schools provide classroom space, heat/air conditioning, and electricity without cost to the College. They also provide desks, technology, and a qualified teacher to teach the dual enrollment class to qualified students. The high school teacher receives only a few hundred dollars for teaching a college level course from the College. The dual enrollment program results in a savings to County taxpayers of hundreds of thousands of dollars!

Your editorial should have been thanking the high school superintendents and faculty for agreeing to provide this opportunity—not the college.
The College, which receives state funding for a portion of the dual enrollment program, says it is losing revenue on the project. The loss they claim is about $300,000 a year. Those of us in the Verde Valley who pay around $16 million dollars a year in property taxes to the College, a large portion of it going to noneducational or limited educational projects on the West side of the County, believe that even if the $300,000 is a true and accurate estimate, it is peanuts when compared to the enormous savings to taxpayers and the enormous benefits received by the residents of the County. Certainly our $16 million is sufficient to subsidize $300,000 of the dual enrollment program it allegedly costs the College.

Dual enrollment is skyrocketing in the County. However, all the current crop of Prescott based College administrators can see is an opportunity to add more revenue to the College coffers to finance their wasteful spending. That’s not caring about the Verde Valley. That’s not caring about the County. That’s not caring about real education.

Bob Oliphant
Cottonwood