Community college Chancellor Philip Westin is considering shelving a faculty-proposed reading comprehension standard for graduates that some instructors argue does not measure a student's ability to read at the college level.
The recommended graduation standard for those seeking an associate in arts degree would not include any assessment of reading comprehension but assumes the required competency level is met if a student successfully completes 60 units of general education courses, the minimum required for the degree.
Some Ventura County Community College District faculty members contend that an assessment of reading comprehension is crucial, considering how many district students are not native English speakers or are attending college many years after completing high school.
But faculty members who support the proposal say the district has not created a valid assessment test that is free of cultural bias.
Since the 1980s, the state has required community colleges to award associate degrees only to students who have met minimum competency requirements in mathematics, written expression and reading comprehension.
Because of differing curricula, the specific graduation requirements have varied among the district's three campuses for years. In 1998, a faculty committee representing Moorpark, Oxnard and Ventura colleges set out to draft a set of requirements that would be consistent across the district.
The majority of the English department at Ventura College has come out against the reading comprehension requirement proposed by the committee, and faculty members there have been pressuring Westin to block it from being adopted by the district's trustees.
"This is, in part, about protecting the integrity of the degree," said Kathryn Schoenrock of Ventura College's English department, who, along with another instructor, is leading the fight against the proposal. "I want to know that there are standards the degree represents."
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More important, Schoenrock advocates that students' reading skills be measured when they first enroll in the district. Those showing poor comprehension skills could be directed to courses that emphasize analyzing and understanding texts.
Statistics are unavailable on the number of district students with limited reading abilities. But Schoenrock pointed to a recent study that found 46% of incoming freshmen to the California State University system needed remedial work in reading and writing. That system accepts the top third of California's high school graduates.
