CC on track to meet state education goals

Clarendon College is ahead of the game in positioning itself to meet higher education goals now being pursued by the State of Texas.

The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board’s 60x30TX plan calls for 60 percent of the state’s 25- to 34-year-old population to hold a college certificate or college degree by 2030, and CC President Robert Riza was in Lubbock recently to help find ways to reach the state’s goal.

Also attending the meeting were representatives from Texas Tech University, West Texas A&M University, Amarillo College, Frank Phillips College, South Plains College, Midland College, and Odessa College. They were joined by Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board Commissioner of Higher Education Raymund A. Paredes and Assistant Commissioner Rex C. Peebles.

“It was a good meeting,” Dr. Riza said, “and much of what we talked about will make it into Clarendon College’s next strategic plan. In fact, a lot of what we’re doing already aligns with these goals.”

The 60x30TX Plan, which is now in its second year, is broken into four distinct goals with the first being the overarching goal of having 60 percent the aforementioned age group holding a degree or certificate by 2030.

The second goal is for at least 550,000 students in 203 to complete a certificate, associate’s, bachelor’s, or master’s from a higher education institution in Texas.

The third goal focuses on making sure all graduates from Texas colleges and universities have marketable skills, and the fourth goal is for undergraduate student loan debt to not exceed 60 percent of first-year wages for graduates Texas public institutions.

The state’s 15-year plan is crafted to position Texans to benefit from the modern economy in which statistics show that workers with a high school diploma or less have seen virtually no growth in jobs. According to the Higher Education Coordinating Board, out of the 11.6 million jobs created in the post-recession economy, 11.5 million went to workers with at least some college education. Workers with an associate’s degree saw job growth of 3.1 million, but workers with a high school diploma or less grew by only 80,000 jobs.

CC is giving its students a head start toward advanced degrees through its collaborations with area school districts and programs that feed directly into four-year programs in health care professions and technical occupations, which are two areas that are seeing the second highest job growth in the nation.

Clarendon also has worked hard to get out in front of these trends, doubling dual credit enrollment in the CC service area since 2014, reducing the hours needed to complete a degree, and restructuring developmental education, Riza said.