March 28, 2024

Hart stops at SWCC during education tour

Rita Hart, state senator and Democratic nominee for lieutenant governor, made a stop at Southwestern Community College during her “Investing in Iowa’s Education Tour” Monday.

During the stop, Hart met with the college administrators – President Dr. Barb Crittenden, Beth Kulow, dean of student services, and Bill Taylor, vice president of instruction – to highlight the Hubbell-Hart vision to prioritize investment in education.

Crittenden asked Hart to talk about her background.

Hart, who taught more than 20 years in the Calamus-Wheatland and Bennet school districts, talked about the impact community colleges had on her own life. As one of nine children who grew up on a farm near Charles City, Hart said the opportunity was particularly important to her family.

“There’s a lot of people who get their start at community colleges – particularly for large families,” said Hart. “It was such an affordable opportunity.”

Hart said her parents never went to college but both valued higher education deeply.

“We didn’t have a lot of money, so it was such a big deal ... that they were able to get us to college and we are really appreciative of that,” said Hart.

Hart earned her Associate of Arts degree from North Iowa Area Community College before earning a bachelor’s degree from the University of Northern Iowa and a master’s degree in educational administration from the University of Iowa. After teaching, she spent four years in school administration before joining the Iowa state senate in 2012.

“Community colleges really help people who are those first generation to go to college,” said Hart.

As a school administrator, Hart worked as a liaison between the K-12 system and Clinton Community College to develop a school to work program, which connected high school students to career pathways.

“In fact, we were one of the first schools in the state to start that cooperation where the teachers on our campus taught college courses,” said Hart. “It didn’t take long before most of our graduates were graduating with more than 20 college credits. I truly think that’s been transformational.”

Hart said school to work programs that expose high school students to careers not only help them start career planning earlier, but also to fill the skilled-workers gap. However, she believes the programs need to be extended to younger students.

“I’m a true believer that we have to drill down to the junior high schools and even the sixth grade to start that career pathway conversation and get kids to understand what the possibilities are and what their skills and talents are. That there’s many pathways to get to a place where they’re employed in a job that is fulfilling, that pays well and has a great future,” said Hart.

Hart asked what SWCC is doing to make these early connections.

Kulow agreed with Hart and said SWCC currently hosts two eighth-grade career days, where students explore different careers with hands-on projects, such as building functional LEGO robot arms, wiring a switch to make a light bulb glow, or working in the nursing simulation lab, all of which help students learn about the different career programs offered at the college.

Taylor described the different career academies to Hart – automotive repair technology, carpentry and building trades, electrical technology, health sciences, information technology systems networking and welding.

“We have 855 high school students who took at least one class here last year,” said Taylor.

Hart asked if the college has had to raise tuition, which Crittenden told Hart it had been raised to $184 per credit.

“Our board really struggles with that every year,” said Crittenden. “They really are sensitive, particularly with the counties and the area of the state that we serve. With the household incomes, they really keep that as low as they can.”

Crittenden shared a graph with Hart detailing state appropriations and how it has declined over the years.

“You can see ... how it has really forced us to put a burden on our students that we really don’t like to,” said Crittenden.

Hart asked if the tuition increase had contributed to reduced enrollment. The administrators said while they haven’t necessarily seen a drop in enrollment, the average age of the students has lowered over the years.

“What we know is that our unemployment rate is so low, our underemployment is so high ... we’ve got a lot of people that ... want to improve their lot ... they want to get a higher income, so they would go back to school ... but now they can’t because they have to have a second or third job. Could that be part of the equation there?” asked Hart.

Crittenden said the local unemployment rates are very low, but did agree that many area workers are underemployed.

Hart said underemployed is an important group of people to serve, because school enrollment drops and wages will fail to increase if nothing is done.