President Obama frequently portrays health care and clean energy as pillars of any sustained economic recovery. But he used his first presidential trip to economically devastated Michigan on Tuesday to dwell on a third component: education, specifically to role community colleges can play in retraining the U.S. work force.
President Obama departs from the South Lawn of the White House for Michigan. (Getty Images/AFP/Chris Kleponis)
Obama used the occasion to unveil a $12 billion initiative designed to spur enrollment in the two-year schools and prod high-school graduates to commit to at least one year of higher education. Of the total, $9 billion would be devoted to grants for innovative programs, including efforts such as performance-based scholarships aimed at preventing students from dropping out of college. Another $2.5 billion would go toward construction and renovation projects on community college campuses. And $500 million would be applied for online education.
"Some of the jobs that have been lost in the auto industry and elsewhere won't be coming back," Obama said in remarks to be delivered at Macomb Community College in Warren, Mich., a state where unemployment is 14.1 percent, the highest in the nation. Likening his effort to Abraham Lincoln's establishment of land-grant colleges and Franklin D. Roosevelt's championing of the G.I. Bill, Obama said, "Time and again, when we have placed our bet for the future on education, we have prospered as a result - by tapping the incredible innovative and generative potential of a skilled American workforce."
Obama said the goal is to have an additional 5 million community college graduates by 2020. The administration proposes paying for the effort by eliminating waste from the student loan program, by replacing guaranteed loans with direct loans administered by private companies.
One of the key players behind the initiative is White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel, who worked extensively with community colleges as an Illinois congressman and believes the schools have been overshadowed in education policy debates by four-year colleges and universities. Emanuel told the Democratic Leadership Council in June that he forsees a major rewrite of legislation dealing with job training and vocational education to streamline programs and retrain workers in a more integrated fashion.
Obama outlined some of the possibilities on Tuesday, including offering dual enrollment at high schools and universities, promoting the transfer of credit among colleges, and aligning graduation and entrance requirements of high schools, community colleges, and four-year colleges and universities.
Beyond redirecting funding and overhauling existing laws, the White House also is encouraging more partnerships with leading businesses. Administration officials cite Cisco Systems Inc.'s Networking Academy as an example of a corporation that's collaborating with community college to develop online courses and interactive tools to train students for jobs in health care information technology, broadband deployment and other areas.
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