Eastern Oregon community college to end prisoner education program, cut 17 jobs

Two years in the past, Blue Mountain Neighborhood School teamed up with different schools throughout the state to persuade the Oregon Division of Corrections to proceed the universities’ grownup schooling and GED applications in state prisons. At a particular assembly final week, the BMCC Board of Schooling voted to finish their applications on the route of the school president.

The transfer resulted in 17 layoffs at a college that’s been battered by staffing reductions lately. And it’s now unclear who will present schooling in an space that homes hundreds of state prisoners.

In a joint assertion from the Corrections Division and the state Greater Schooling Coordinating Fee, the businesses stated they’re trying into methods to proceed providing these applications with out interruption as soon as the contract ends June 30. They didn’t specify who could be taking up these duties.

The most recent spherical of layoffs as soon as once more put BMCC’s college and categorized unions at odds with administration, which is arguing that the corrections GED and grownup teaching programs don’t align with the school’s future.

“I imagine that we as an business, as greater schooling, have an ethical obligation to supply as many instructional alternatives as attainable for all members of our society, whether or not they’re serving time or not,” BMCC President Mark Browning advised the board. “We shouldn’t have to do all the pieces for everybody, daily, on a regular basis. We merely shouldn’t have that capability.”

Browning advisable the board drop the school’s GED and grownup schooling programming at state prisons in Pendleton, Umatilla and Baker Metropolis in favor of coming into the “for-credit enviornment.” Beneath a newly revived U.S. Division of Schooling program, inmates may take decrease degree faculty programs in topics like studying, historical past and math by acquiring federal Pell grants.

Browning stated he hoped the laid-off workers would come again to BMCC to show for the brand new for-credit program, however the faculty hadn’t utilized for eligibility but and he didn’t know what number of positions it could create.

Browning additionally made a monetary argument. When the Oregon Division of Corrections wished to finish all of its group faculty contracts and take its instructional choices in-house in 2021, the Legislature intervened and made the Greater Schooling Coordinating Fee the intermediary between DOC and the group schools that present courses behind bars.

The Legislature offered further one-time cash to schools as part of the deal, however Browning stated lawmakers don’t have an urge for food to resume the funding. With out an additional income, Browning stated it could price extra to function the applications than the state is paying by way of the contract.

When the board gave workers an opportunity to talk, all voiced opposition to the cuts.

Dulcie Hays, a veteran teacher at Two Rivers Correctional Establishment in Umatilla, advised the board that workers was “blindsided” by the cuts as a result of, up till the assembly announcement, workers thought the contract was nonetheless being negotiated.

“I believe I converse for lots of us at any time when I say we’re simply devastated that this contract and this program hasn’t meant extra to BMCC,” she stated.

Browning disputed Hays and different workers members’ accounts, saying that faculty administration knowledgeable union leaders a number of days forward of the assembly.

The BMCC board has authorized layoffs and job cuts 4 years in a row. When the school introduced plans to chop 10 positions in 2022, the BMCC college union organized a public rally to persuade the school to reverse course. The school ultimately lowered the variety of cuts from 10 to 5, however the reductions nonetheless moved ahead.

BMCC has attributed the layoffs to statewide tendencies like an total swoon in group faculty enrollment, and native elements like elevated competitors from different schools in Jap Oregon and southeast Washington. Union leaders have argued that much less workers means much less instructional programming, which can in the end additional harm enrollment.

Workers on the particular assembly advised the board that what college students in prisons really wished to see was a program that built-in each GED programs and faculty courses.

“What number of adults in incarceration proper now have a GED and will apply for this Pell for prisoners grant? Not many,” stated Sascha McKeon, the president of the BMCC college union. “If we let that contract lapse, we might be buying and selling (full-time positions) now for a fraction of that down the street.”

The arguments weren’t sufficient to sway a majority of the board, with just one member voting towards the layoff plan.

The cuts come because the Legislature is taking motion on payments meant to increase group faculty entry in state prisons. The Oregon Capital Chronicle reported that the state Senate handed two payments this month that might enable group schools to supply extra tutorial applications in state prisons and require the jail system to work extra carefully with the Greater Schooling Coordinating Fee on jail schooling coverage. Neither invoice consists of further funding for jail schooling.