Free community colleges part of candidate’s plan

Democratic gubernatorial candidate Richard Cordray proposed Tuesday to make community college free for all Ohioans.

“This is a win-win for Ohio businesses and workers,” Cordray, former director of the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, said in a conference call with reporters. “It is affordable. The cost is modest.”

Sixty-four percent of Ohio jobs will require an associate’s degree by 2020, but at present, just 34 percent of working age adults in the state have that level of educational attainment, the Cordray campaign said in a statement. One factor possibly driving the disparity: Ohio ranks 45th in terms of college affordability, the statement said.

Columbus State Community College student Shaquan Culpepper joined Cordray on the conference call and he said he’s experienced student cost concerns himself.

“I’ve been going part time for years so I could continue to work while going to school,” he said, explaining that at one point his grades dropped while he worked full-time managing a KFC restaurant.

Cordray estimated that Cordray free tuition would add 35 percent to Ohio’s community college enrollment, but if students take full advantage of available grants and loans, the price tag for the program would be $60 million a year.

That amounts to a needed investment to grow the economy of a state in which job growth has sputtered in recent years, Cordray said.

“We have fewer jobs in Ohio today than we had in 2001,” Cordray said.

He did not answer questions about how he would pay for his plan.

In addition to making free community college available, Cordray also proposed to expand Columbus State’s Preferred Pathways program to other colleges. It guarantees graduates’ admission and complete credit transfers to a dozen fouryear colleges and universities in Ohio by putting students in a sequence of classes for each course of study.

“This reduces choice paralysis for students and helps lead them on a more focused path to setting on a specific career,” Cordray’s campaign said.

In addition, Cordray is proposing to expand the Accelerated Study in Associate Program, or “ASAP.” It offers scholarships, intensive advising, transportation stipends and other services to help students graduate on time.

Cordray said that he’s familiar with the issue because of efforts by the Obama administration to provide free community college nationally and his own work cracking down of forprofit-college abuses at the consumer bureau.

“The issue isn’t new to me,” he said.

Also running in the May 8 Democratic primary are former Congressman and Cleveland Mayor Dennis Kucinich, Ohio Sen. Joe Schiavoni of Boardman, and former Ohio Supreme Court Justice Bill O’Neill. Seeking the Republican nomination are Ohio Lt. Gov. Mary Taylor and Attorney General Mike DeWine.