PORT ANGELES — There is no official state budget yet, but the Legislature is indicating that there will be no cuts this year in the community college system, Peninsula College interim President Brinton Sprague told the Port Angeles Regional Chamber of Commerce on Monday.
“For the first time in four years, we have the opportunity to stabilize funding and enrollment,” Sprague told a luncheon audience of about 80 at the Red Lion Hotel.
Despite the freeze in budget cuts, the college expects to increase tuition by 12 percent in the 2012-13 school year, he said.
Sprague, a retired community college administrator who came out of retirement at his Port Ludlow home to lead Peninsula temporarily, said that in the past few years, higher education has seen a loss of 22 percent of its state funding.
Sprague has been interim president at the Port Angeles-based college since Tom Keegan departed to become president of Skagit Valley College in early February.
The college’s board of trustees selected Luke Robins as the new president in March.
Robins is currently chancellor of Louisiana Delta Community College in Monroe, La.
The board is expected to approve Robins’ contract during a 2 p.m. meeting April 10 at the college’s Forks extension, at 71 S. Forks Ave.
The college maintains classroom facilities in Forks and Port Townsend.
Robins is scheduled to visit Port Angeles twice now through June, to familiarize himself with the college and community and to house-hunt, Sprague said.
Assuming the contract is approved, he will begin as president July 1.
Currently, from Sprague’s perspective, the college is looking good.
“It’s the most beautiful community college campus in Washington,” he said.
But, more important, he said, the college offers the community a wide variety of opportunities, including college transfer programs to customized employee training and cultural enrichment programs.
The college’s Running Start program, which allows high school juniors and seniors to take college courses for both high school and college credit, is one of the most successful programs in higher education, he said.
In 1991, five colleges began a pilot program.
Today, there are 19,000 high school students in Running Start, including 259 at Peninsula College, he said.
Under the program at a cost of less than $1,000 per student, high school students can earn an associate degree at the same time they earn their high school diplomas.
That compares with $7,800 for two years at Peninsula College, or $22,000 for two years at the University of Washington.
The double-dip spending on students when they are in high school saves taxpayers a lot of money in college grants, he said.
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Reporter Arwyn Rice can be reached at 360-417-3535 or at arwyn.rice@peninsuladailynews.com.
