an update on the economy and the jobs report at 11:30 a.m. eastern. watch those remarks live here on c-span. >> today, a house financial services committee task force looks at whether artificial intelligence can address systemic racism in housing and financial services. live coverage begins at noon on c-span, online at c-span.org, or listen on their free c-span radio app. " continues. host: david baime is with us, with policy analysis, vice president, senior vp with the association of community colleges. he is with us to talk about the american rescue plan, president biden's proposal, of two years of free community college prude welcome. guest: good morning, great to be here on behalf of the american association of community

colleges to talk about our support for two free years of community college. we think this is extremely important at this time of economic transition as we try to move out from the pandemic, particularly because community colleges bring people into higher education for those who are least likely to enroll in college and go on from there. host: how many community colleges do you represent? guest: 1044 community colleges across the united states. host: just a look at the most recent figures on the cost to go to community college versus the average four-year college, it's difficult for your university in terms of average cost, $37,650 for a private public four year out-of-state at $27,000 a year and public year -- public four year in-state, 10,000 dollars. community colleges $3770 per

year. community college, 1044 in the u.s., 4.5 billion part-time students, 2.4 million full-time, and the average age for a community college student is 28. how does that shape sort of the way the community colleges not only educate their students, but the help they seek from the federal government in your role? guest: well, given the fact that we have this very diverse group of students, as you mentioned, the average age is 28 years old. we have students who are older than that and we also have many students who are traditional college age, and we also enroll many students who are high school students who take community college courses for credit and what we call dual enrollment students to get a feel for college so they can accrue college credits in advance of enrolling formally in an institution of higher

education, so we have the whole gamut of our society to enroll in community colleges. what that means for institutions is we have to offer a broad array of programs to fit all student needs. we have to offer general education programs for many students who would like to do the first two years of college inexpensively and then move onto a four year institution. we also have programs for people who are in the world of work with family responsibilities who would like to get a skills upgrade or want to do better personally and economically, and we have to offer programs for them that perhaps don't take too long to complete and are offered in such a way as to allow them to mesh their studies at a community college with their other responsibilities. host: what role did the american association of community colleges play in helping the biden administration or giving guidance to the biden administration in developing the

community college plan? guest: we have been longtime advocates of free community college. the first major federal proposal we made was in 2015 by former president obama. we supported legislation at that time and congress was controlled by republicans at that time and president obama's proposal did not move very far. in terms of president biden's proposal, we communicated to presidential candidates, to former president trump, as well as former candidate biden's agenda that this was a high priority for community colleges. across the country, our president see the value of making their institutions more assessable, although, as you mentioned, we are by far the least costly in education. host: it would offer two free

years of community college to all americans, including the dreamers, those immigrants brought here as children, undocumented children brought here as children. it would be the first time for students and workers who would like to rescale and earn a benefit for free and it could be used over three years or four years depending on circumstances. currently, if your student goes to a community college, can you take it advantage of pell grants and other things the federal government offers to assist you with tuition? guest: yes, absolutely, bill. you can take advantage of the pell grant program and other financial assistance programs. starting with the pell grant program, it is an extremely efficient and well targeted program to deliver support for tuition and other expenses that college students have to undertake to help them finance their education. first and foremost is the pell

grant program, which is important to community college students being that most financially needy students across education, but it benefits all students, including those who inspire to go tomorrow expensive institutions and need the financial support. having said that, one of the things that my organization is advocating for is to get some type of additional eligibility for the shorter-term programs, and we know many students do not have the time, frankly, as one of my members puts it, time is the enemy of the students, and they do not have the time to enroll in college for four years or even two years, so they would like to get a skills upgrade that will enable them to move to a higher paying job, and probably they are going to be taking that education while they are already working, so for things like a certified nurse's

assistant, a welder, or someone in i.t. who would like to get that certificate, that way, many of those programs are not eligible for federal aid, so we are asking congress to support this, and congress has a good deal of support for the signed one thing encouraging about it is we have bipartisan support of this, so it is not for the left, the right or anybody, but very much a proposal that appeals to both republicans and democrats. host: that is $109 billion in the biden proposal, with echo directly to states and localities? or does that many go to students in terms of payments for tuition? how does that work? guest: ultimately, the $109 billion would go to students. the way the biden plan has been articulated in the legislation introduced in the house and the senate is that the federal government would provide on average about three dollars for

every dollar that the state provides. essentially, it would be a partnership between the federal and state governments. there would be a total amount of money about $4000 overall that would be provided to states to make community college free. the average tuition and fees played -- paid by students, so the federal government would pay the bulk, but states would be required to also contribute a significant amount of money. one thing that has not gotten as much attention in the discussion is the fact that students who would benefit by this, and that money would ultimately go to students, as to your question, because this would all be in the name of limiting community college tuition, for a limited amount of time, and that is one thing that i don't think people understand, and it is important to recognize this proposal, as

you mentioned in your introduction, require students to advance through community college. i will not go through particulars because the time duration has to do with how intensively they are enrolled, whether taking three or four courses or a full course load, but bottom line is students would not be able to dollop through education and then say we expect you to get the graduation and then exchange for the additional support that it is providing. host: that is an interesting phrase, doddle in education, you think that could be a problem with community college students? guest: what we find is that life gets in the way of our students. the majority of our students, it is now 65% or almost two thirds of our students are enrolled part-time, and in truth, we would love for them to be able to enroll more intensively in community college by taking more courses because the more courses

you take, the faster you get through your degree, and the fewer courses you take, obviously the longer it takes, and statistically speaking, the less likely you are to retain your degree, so one of the beauties of this free community college proposal, as we see it, is by making tuition zero and making the cost burden on students less, that maybe students can take more classes at one time, advance to their degrees more quickly and then either go onto four-year college or get through the workforce more rapidly, so community college students, again, because of their enrollment and the fact they have many commitments for the most part, it has to be said that they have challenges in making it through as quickly as we would like them to. it is not like they are your traditional four-year college student like when i was an undergraduate, where there were many students who enrolled

full-time and did nothing but that for four years as an undergraduate student. it is a great opportunity for people to have if they can afford it, not all can. host: david baime is with us, with the american association of community colleges. if you are in the eastern and central time zones, (202)-748-8000. mountain and pacific, (202)-748-8001. and if you attend or attended community college, that line, (202)-748-8002. let's go first to carl in chicago, good morning. caller: yes, good morning. i attended city college in 1960, and it was only $10 for tuition. i graduated and then went on to get my bachelors and masters. my sister in the 1980's, she

went to student college -- city college. every chance i get, i tried took sling to young people, go to a community college first and then you get to spend money and get pell grant's and wait until you finish the second year. your last few years, go to traditional college. host: carl. guest: that is encouraging to hear. that is the model really of what community colleges supposed to be, where students are able to take their two years of higher education upfront and community college and that affords them the opportunity for the career you ate your sister had by subsequently child --

transferring into a four-year institution. the point you made is really important, and that is the $10 you paid, may be $10 per credit, but when we talk about free community college, one thing important to remember is in the early days of community college and the early growth was in the 1960's and 1970's, community college had very, very low tuition or no tuition in many places, including most well-known like the state of california that charged zero dollars for many years. the discussion of making community college free reverts back to the concept of free community college associated with these institutions when they were first getting underway, which began really in earnest with the publication of something we call the truman report after world war ii named after former president harry truman, but as i mentioned, the

college really started to explode in terms of numbers sometime after that. host: most community colleges do not have on-campus residents, but why have community colleges, it seems, keep costs in check versus four-year universities and colleges? guest: first thing, community colleges actually have quite a few residential halls. there are very few overall and the terms of number they serve, but almost 200 of our institutions have a residential facility of some kind. the reason why is because students come from all over to attend them. we had a substantial number of international students. some of our colleges, particularly rural colleges, serve tremendous geographical areas. as a result, there is a need for students who would like to study full-time to have a place to live. increasingly, our colleges and building dormitories, as i mentioned, is not a lot in terms of the numbers to take advantage of that, but in terms of how

community colleges are able to keep tuition slow, we do ask more of our faculty in terms of education, the average community teacher teaches five courses and they are paid less then faculty and other sectors of higher education. those two factors are the main reason why our tuitions are able to be so much lower than other sectors. we don't get more government funding than other sectors, we do not spend money on certain aspects of the campuses that some of the four-year colleges do, but basically it is by stretching that funding we get a little bit more broadly that we are able to continue to offer education at a lower cost than four year institutions. host: tony next up in walcott, connecticut. caller: good morning, good morning.

i am a full believer in community colleges. i attended one in the 1970's. i am a simple man doing simple math, and looking at your numbers, $109 billion. i rounded up the number of students, 7 million, i divided that and that is $15,000 per student. plus $15,000 plus for $3700 a year tuitions. what the heck is going on with the rest of that money? is that the cost of administration? what are you doing with the rest of that money? why can't we just give the people at $3700 and cut the cost down? help me understand, thank you. guest: tony, that is a good question. thank you for asking it. you inadvertently stumbled into washington, d.c., budget numbers, and it can be a dangerous case to go because they are looking using. that $109 billion figure is a 10

year figure, so the amount of funding provided on average to community colleges is about $11 billion a year, and that would be matched, as i mentioned a moment ago, by a state contribution between 23 -- two and $4 billion a year, so it would be about $15 million a year or a little less to allow for the free community college tuition, so that is how it is done. in terms of the cost, because the numbers are so large, it is difficult for people to wrap their heads around them. the $11 billion, in terms of federal contributions, that is a whole lot of money without questions, but the $11 billion is about one third of the annual pell grant program, which we talked about a moment ago, which is the fundamental student

financial aid program providing financial support to needy college students. so the pell grant program, as i said a minute ago, is incredibly important across higher education. the community college program would about one third of the cost of the pell grant program each year, so a significant amount of money but not a budget buster by any stretch and in fact a good investment in the future of our country. host: this is oscar in yucca valley, california. good morning. caller: yes, thanks, c-span and thanks, mr. baime. the four-year colleges need to accept more two-year students . hopefully if it is voted in, four year students will realize a lot of their future students will come from two-year colleges, and that will grow four-year universities more and allow the two-year program to be a success. i also think that people mature at different levels and at that

junior college level, you might be ready to accept more of your future planning. i also think these junior colleges become cultural hubs were communities grow around them and expand and bring in different lecturers and so forth and the community benefits. i also think that the benefits to reducing crime and social benefits are huge in this. i also hope that the people who now have available two-year colleges will have more critical thinking skills so we can keep up with the rest of the world, which we are falling behind at a rapid pace, particularly engineering, and if they can build and trade schools for those who do not want to go into more technical training, like my local junior college has a automotive class for example. so it benefits everybody and it

is a catalyst, not an end-all. it is the beginning of expanding local colleges, which will then become more attractive to people, maybe because it is free initially, but then ultimately, it will grow as a cultural center and will benefit people, and money will flow towards four-year universities, as well. host: thanks, multiple points, david baime. guest: yes, well-made, thank you, oscar. i will pick up on a couple. one, it is no accident you are calling from california, the largest community college system in the nation with 116 institutions and enrolls about 2.1 or 2.2 million students every year, so it is a huge system, and it is particularly well integrated into the four-year colleges in california, both california state university's as well as the university of california, as

well, so students have very good pathways into those four-year institutions after they have left community college, so we are very pleased with the general framework in that state. having said that, transfers do not work as well as it ought to in all places. one of the things my association, the american association of community colleges, is taking an equity initiative, making sure that not only do students transfer in good numbers from community colleges, but also all of our students from the very rich gamut of the types of students who attend our institutions are able to make that transition in an easy way because it is an easy transition in many cases. one of the things we know is that when students lose credits in the process of transferring, it is bad in many ways, bad for

the students because they end up paying twice for credits they already took. it is bad for the government because they are paying for money twice supporting them at community colleges and a year college if it is a public one. and it is bad for student success because it is shocking really how many students lose their educational progress when they lose their credits and transfer, so it is absolutely essential the transfer be accommodated as efficiently and effectively as possible. heading back to the biden plan and legislation pending in congress is one of the things we are excited about in that bill is it has a requirement on states in exchange for receiving federal support to make the community college free. the state would have to implement basically a seamless transfer of policies between two-year and four-year public colleges and they would need to be coordination between the two

sectors so the problem i was just discussing is eliminated once and for all. they may be one other thing to mention in terms of good comments is that the role community colleges play as a hub , as a cultural hub, as a place where people from different perspectives can come and meet, and political context to exchange views, it is important in all areas, particularly rural areas where they'r -- where there are not as many opportunities, and also urban settings, community college serves as an integrating force within the community and pulling people together to have a safe place to not only study but also engage and exchange views. we know that at this point in our national life how important that is. host: this is bob in york, pennsylvania. welcome. caller: thank you for taking my

call. i went to a community college and spent four years the air forcei in the late 19n 60's and then was able and understood how important education would be. as i was working full-time, i used the g.i. bill to go to night school, and it took me five years to obtain an associative agree, which i am very proud of. five years down the road, i was able to transfer that degree to a college where i spent five more years going to night school to get my bachelors degree, which has been quite successful. the question i am going to ask, because as being an alumni of a four-year institution and community college, i support and make donations to each one of those schools each year. the question i have about the free community college is, will the students have to complete their certificates or their degrees to obtain this free

status? if they don't, will they have to reimburse the government for that? thank you. host: thanks, bob. guest: thanks, bob, for that question. the answer is that no, students would not have to repay any funds if they did not ultimately require a significant -- certificate or degree. the incentive for them to do that is that there is a limit to the amount of eligibility. it is a waiver, technically speaking in terms of tuition, and a waiver of tuition and fees that the college would otherwise charge them. that is one incentive. what else we like so much about free tuition plan, getting back to other forms of federal assistance of benefits, our students attending other types of institutions is that america's college promise program, free community college, would allow students to use

financial assistance funds to pay for non-tuition expenses, so they would not have them as long as the olive five. it would provide them with a firmer financial grounding to make it through community college. i would like to commend you for contributing to your former community college. i do not know if it was harrisburg coming he college you attended, bob, -- harrisburg community college you attended, bob, but community colleges do not do nearly as well, understated quite substantially, in terms of contributions from students like four-year colleges do. as i mentioned earlier, they are lean and mean colleges, and they need every nickel they can get, so we are putting more of an emphasis on fundraising and working with alumni and encouraging them to contribute. one of the great things about community colleges that is different from other institutions is that students

who take courses there, and graduate there, they stay in their local communities. they are not going away to school to take the job at another city when they have their four-year degree. they go to their local community college and they stay in their local area most times, hopefully in an employment situation better than when they started. some students transfer, but the overwhelming majority stay local. that is one of the reasons why community colleges have the bipartisan support that they do because they are locally focused institutions and legislators from both parties love them because it is their people. it is their constituents. host: next up is lee in rockville, maryland. caller: yes. host: good morning, lee. go ahead. caller: yes, good morning. i am enjoying the discussion.

i taught at three maryland community colleges as an adjunct for 26 years. maryland right next to where you are has a very, very good community college system. the students, 99%, were just real, real go-getters. they want to get their degree, their bachelors degree, and then live the american dream and then make a lot of money in a new career. the problem with the students that i found was very, very few of them have the skills to do any writing or to d they are wedded to their electronic devices.

looking at their electronic devices as the be-all and end-all. they are very, very good at writing text messages, but they cannot connect a subject and a verb. host: thanks, lee, i think you made that comment yesterday. david baime, would you like to respond? go ahead. guest: we could all talk about getting our children away from devices, or at least many people who are watching this morning can relate to that issue, but one of the things that community colleges do to address your point, lee, is provide the basic instruction for students who do not have the aptitude when they enter college to develop them in short order to then enroll in credit courses to meet the educational goal they established for themselves. writing is fundamental to being

a well-functioning member of our society. we certainly hope it is in high schools, as well. in some cases, some students who come to the door of community college have not received the instruction or have not been focused like we would like them to be focused, so community colleges, i will not go into details, but community colleges have structured and rigorous programs to allow students to come up to speed quickly by focusing on this shortcoming in their academic preparation, but thank you for all those years you put in to serving as a faculty member at our colleges, and, yes, our maryland system is an excellent system of institutions. host: we will hear from cj next in minneapolis, minnesota. caller: hey, how are you doing? thank you for letting me get in on this conversation. i went to a city college in chicago, a junior king college and i studied heating, air

conditioning and refrigeration. before i went there, i went to a trade school in chicago and then to city college afterwards. the one thing i noticed -- i went to school on the g.i. bill. i was in the navy, so when i went to school on the g.i. bill, i noticed the feeder program in effect back in the 1970's under jimmy carter, it had more people in my classroom on the feeder program than the g.i. bill, and the majority of the people there were minorities, so i strongly believe that city college, and when i got my degree, this was back in the 1980's. i started my own company, which did not turn out to be as good as i thought it was going to be, but i still learned a lot. i really promote city colleges because now, living in minneapolis and since i've been

here, i have landed some jobs in my field. they did not land that long -- last that long, but i felt supported because it got me through a lot of different things. host: things, cj. david baime? guest: thank you, cj. when i was coming on the program, i was reflecting upon all of the people who have interacted with me and who i have come across in my daily dealings, so i have gone -- so those who have gone through community college and benefited from that. one person came to our house last summer when the air-conditioning was gone, and he had gotten a training similar to the one you got, and, you know, that is the kind of job we are proud that we prepare people for, and that is the kind of job that pays pretty darn well if you get into a situation that many are able to. so, that is the kind of program,

the hvac program, that we are very proud of. there are many other programs ranging from nursing programs, cybersecurity training programs, there is a program in eastern missouri, a welding program that i am very familiar with and they do an extremely good job. another thing to mention about the feeder program, it is an old program and it has long been terminated and has evolved into the current program, which is the workforce innovation and opportunity act, and we are grateful leaders in that program, but it is not particularly well-funded. it is funded well below the levels of the former program, and we are asking congress to provide funding for community colleges to do the kind of job training that the previous program did to allow us to work

with employers to create skilled people who can go and work for them immediately and get into good jobs. that is something where we are looking for greater federal support because the equipment that is involved and entailed in those programs makes them more expensive than other kinds of programs. host: i would like to get your response to criticism of the biden proposal on community colleges from forbes contributor christian cooper, in a piece entitled "community college students need that her options, not free tuition." he writes that "free community colleges solves a problem that is not largely existing since they are quite affordable, but it will affect the existing problem such as high student loan defaults." he says "taxpayer should wonder what exactly they are getting from the investment in community college and demand better."

david baime, do you have any response? guest: yes, my organization, the american organization of community college has very different views on all of those points made in the forbes piece. first of all, we believe that affordability does remain a major hurdle for many students. i have heard, as he said this morning, the average community college tuition in fees is 3700 -- administrators will tell you that the smaller financial gaps are a lot less than $3700 from students completing studies, so we expect it to differ on the impact of providing greater financial support for students. in terms of completion rate, how do -- how you look at completion has to do with how you evaluate that. we are always getting our

students to achieve academic goals. for some students and a couple of courses that enable them to improve skills and their employability and then go into the workforce. 60% of our students who start full-time have either gotten a degree, transferred or still enrolled, but about 60% of our full-time students achieve their educational goals. it isn't perfect, it is not the levels of most selected institutions, but it is pretty darn good from our perspective, and as an organization, we sponsor something called a voluntary framework of accountability which uses metrics more relevant to community colleges and capture our institutions in a more complete way. and finally in terms of student debt, and of course, we are all aware of the burden of student debt, the anxiety about student debt, community colleges thing

from their point of view, the best thing is there is no student debt. only one out of six of our students has to take out federal loans to finance our educations because of our low tuitions and we encourage our students to borrow responsibly. the government has good ways to help low income students manage their debt once in repayment, but the best way we feel like dealing with the loan issue is to have them not borrow. we have been remarkably successful in keeping students out of loan programs so that if they continue on and they need to borrow at a four-year college, it is more expensive and they are able to manage and take on the debts. our colleges run pretty tight ships, and we do try to keep the loans away from them from students to the extent they are able to. it is not for every student,

some need to borrow expenses that is acceptable in the government can help them do that. host: our guest is david baime, with the association of american community colleges. thanks for being with us. guest: thank you, bill, for having me. it has been a pleasure to talk about the american association of community colleges. i would like to say that if community colleges did not exist, somebody would have to invent them because mother's day is in a couple of days, i would just like to wish all the mothers out there a very happy mother's day, community college mothers, many of you balance work, studies and raising your families, and we salute you. there was a mother out there in pittsburgh, pennsylvania,>> "wa" continues. host: we are continuing our focus on education, particularly proposals of the biden admira