According to City College Public Information Officer Amanda Davis, 232 applicants were chosen from this campus to receive grants, based on income and GPA criteria. However, historically, the state has not funded any grant programs until the state budget has passed.

While the Los Rios Community College District has advanced Cal Grant funding to students who use it to pay tuition and fees, those who receive checks for books and living expenses have not yet been paid according to Davis.

“This shouldn’t happen,” Debbie Harris, a City College business administration major who has not received her Cal Grant, said. “I need it for books and transportation. I waited two semesters to qualify but they haven’t sent it to me.”

“While we can’t speculate, both the district and college staff work very hard to support students in pursuing their educational goals during tough budget times and always,” Davis said.

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In 2005, through the leadership of LRCCD Chancellor Brice W. Harris and the Board of Trustees, the district created the Education Initiative Program, which is designed to increase the success rates of students, with a focus on incoming freshmen ages 18-20.

Counselor Mary-Sue Allred said City College works hard to help students engage in school and strengthen basic skills, including reading, writing, and math. Allred said the initiative targeted freshman students because many have a tough time finding a sense of direction.

“We encourage students to come to school, to stay in school, to look at all the different options that there are in terms of support on campus,” Allred said. “There are so many different programs that have been initiated in the last decade really that are all for promoting student success.”

One program receiving special commendation during the award distributions, the RISE (Respect, Integrity, Self-Determination, Education) program, provides in-class tutoring to City College students.

Second-year City College student Estrella Ramirez believes that her teachers are always willing to accommodate the needs of students by having open office hours and keeping the lines of communication open with students.

“I definitely felt more welcomed, I felt more at ease coming into college from high school.”

Barbara Davis-Lyman, recently retired City College psychology faculty member and a current member of the Board of Governors, said the programs have evidentially increased student success — measured by the reduction in drop-out rates.

“It was a very wise and brave thing for the chancellor and our board of trustees to do. And is it has achieved some really incredible success rates,” Davis-Lyman said.

The Education Initiative manifests itself throughout the entire district, through different types of programs catered to the different cultures of the colleges.

“There are similar programs that all of our sister colleges and various faculty member have implemented and supported. So it does address the work of many people who have made the focus of their work helping students succeed,” said Virginia Gessford coordinator of Learning Skills and Tutoring center. “I believe it is a well-earned award.”

“We care about our students. We want them to succeed. We want to do the best job we can do in the classroom as well as getting the support from classified staff because one person can’t do this,” Davis-Lyman said. “It takes a whole college to help a student succeed.”

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The Los Rios Community College District was the highest-ranked participant in the program of all of the districts involved for the program’s first year.

Bill Silvia, director of general services for the LRCCD, is proud of the award and feels honored to have received it. “Recently all of the districts were looked at and we were one of the few that stood out, using facilities, staff and consultants,” Silvia said.

The award couldn’t have come at a better time, according to Silvia. “It gives us extra money and we now have a little fund that can help us with training facilities. This fund allows us to have a resource we can pull from if we need too.”

The Risk Management Pays program works with the LRCCD police department to gather ideas for safety training events for faculty and staff. Included in the events are training videos for proper custodial procedures and safety measures if a contaminated spill or accident happens. The training events also examine the necessary codes to upgrade buildings with the LRCCD as well as forklift training.

The Risk Management Pays program is similar to a credit union with a mutual insurance program with allocated allowances. “They have programs that help prevent us from [budget] losses and in helping us in training,” explains Silvia.

The Risk Management Pays program manages over 20 programs that are on-going and take place throughout the year. The district safety committee holds meetings every quarter and makes decisions regarding district safety issues.

For more information students and faculty can contact Bill Silvia, director of general services at silviab@scc.losrios.edu

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Though new shiny buildings are great, if there are no classes scheduled to use them because of the cutbacks and cancellations, it seems like a waste.

For the 2009-10 fiscal years, the Los Rios Community College District lost $25 million in funding from the state. Because of these funding cuts the LRCCD asked City College administrators to cut course sections.

Each City College academic division received a 20 percent reduction in funding from last year, according to City College Vice President of Administration Robert Martinelli, at the beginning of the 2009-10 academic years.

District wide, this accounts for a saving of $2.9 million. Before the fall semester began, approximately 2 percent of the overall classes were cut. Next semester, Martinelli says another 2 percent will be cut.

City College Vice President of Instruction John Ruden said that the Humanities and Fine Arts Division, along with Physical Education department, was among the hardest hit in section cuts.

Logic would dictate moving some of that money from Measure M over to help with class funding. Maybe just improving our buildings rather then demolishing them and building new ones would be a better use of the money. Though this solution is glaringly obvious, language in Measure M dictates that the funds are to be used explicitly for facility upgrades.

The money being used to improve campus conditions was earmarked long before the state funding was reduced. But continuing to spend that money on improvements to a campus that no one will be able to attend makes it look like we have an addition and subtraction problem.

As usual, the politicians and bureaucrats have taken a simple accounting issue and turned into a multi-million dollar issue of checks and balances.

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Three Los Rios Community College Police officers patrol the campus Quad. Crime statistics recently released by the LRCCPD show a reduction in auto thefts on campusRandy Briggs

The annual Clery Report for the Los Rios Community College District, which discloses crime statistics from the last three years, was released Oct. 1 by the Los Rios Community College Police Department.

This year’s report covers 2006-08. It includes separate data for all LRCCD colleges,
including on-campus, non-campus and public property sections.

The most dramatic difference is in motor vehicle theft, which at City College
was 17 times higher in 2006 than 2008, when only one vehicle was reported stolen.

According to Los Rios Police Department Sgt. Brian Washington, the reason for this drastic change is that the officers are doing more patrols.

“Captain Valerie Cox has really emphasized community-oriented policing around here,” said Washington. “The police officers are more accessible to the students and staff.”

Robbery on the City College campus, however, has steadily risen from zero in 2006 to five in 2008. Washington said this category includes things that aren’t as serious as people might imagine.

“It could be the snatching of a cell phone or something like that,” he said.

Another category that has seen a rise at City College is illegal weapons possession, which saw three reports in both 2006 and 2007, but rose to six in 2008. Washington said that the weapons involved are mostly knives.

City College student Kevin Meng wasn’t surprised by the statistics.

“In every community there’s going to be someone who carries around a weapon or does drugs or something like that,” Meng said.

Forcible sexual offenses went from one each in 2006 and 2007 to three in 2008.

According to Washington, however, those were unfounded claims.

“When we investigate further … we find conflicting stories, lack of evidence, lack of cooperation from the victim,” Washington said.

The Clery Act is a federal law, requiring colleges and universities to disclose crime statistics for occurrences on and around campus.

“Some things are not Clery reportable,” said Washington, explaining that the report doesn’t include everything that happens — only what the government requires. Despite increases shown in some areas of the report, Washington said, in general, crime is down.

The full report can be found at the Los Rios Police Department Web site:

http://crc.losrios.edu/police/clery.html

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