EVERYBODY IS IN THE SAME BUSINESS.

Young people who used to think of a state-flagship university or a converted normal school as their safety school are discovering community colleges.

Relatively affluent young students are typically better-prepared academically and have a good chance of earning a degree. They are also more likely to attend full-time, require less remediation than their peers and can be cheaper for community colleges to educate.

But this group is also demanding, as traditional-age students want a full campus experience with amenities like fitness centers and extracurricular activities, which can mean new buildings and strained student service budgets. They are also more likely to seek out counselors, experts said.

The dean at Anonymous Community, in a reaction to that article, notes that community colleges are in the same business as the more visible residential colleges.

If community colleges start to serve people who could afford to go elsewhere, that bodes well for their institutional survival.

Put another way, if community colleges start to serve people who expect what the pricier institutions offer, that bodes well. By continuity, this argument applies to the land-grants and mid-majors as well.

And that will redound to the benefit of all the students here, particularly including the less wealthy ones.  If the daughters of privilege start demanding the services that “real” colleges offer, then the single moms who come here will have access to those, too.  We won’t have students showing up in tears, asking to be treated like real college students.  They’ll finally be treated as the real college students that they actually are.

Indeed, although whether those single moms he refers to, and the academically marginal students and life-management-difficulties cases and GED holders might find the competition with "real college students" another source of frustration.

I wonder, though, whether additional extracurricular activities, and sports teams, might make community colleges less available as spacious places with ample parking for weekend train shows.  (I'll be at this one Saturday.  Look for a middle-aged white guy.)