In Chapter 4, page 107, the term "Interdependence" is defined as the wholeness of the system and its environment and to the interrelationships of individuals within the system. Immediately after reading the section on interdependency, I started thinking about the tragedy the California State University (CSU) system is going through. My next thought was "...wait its a tragedy that the whole California Education system is going through." California Education system is going to have the biggest and the long-term impact due to the State budget crisis, which is essentially going to impact the future of the next generation of California youths.
Each of the 23 CSU campuses is facing funding cuts in millions of dollars. As a result, the first step that all CSUs took is they started limiting enrollment. This means thousands of qualified students were denied admissions and were directed to community colleges. The community colleges are also facing similar budget cuts and lack of infrastructure to serve large volume of students. Thus, students graduating from high schools are devastated with the limited options they have for pursuing their higher education. High schools administrators are struggling to resolve the transition problems faced by their graduating students. There is this whole chain reaction of tragedy that is happening in California's Education system. It is amazing to see what a high level of interdependency there is between the housing market crash, the financial market crash, the State's budget deficits, and the universities, community colleges, high schools of California.
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Hello, TM! I agree with you and I also worry about this issue. The economic crisis has been disturbing, through their interdependency, a variety of educational facilities, such as (as you mentioned) the universities, community colleges, high schools of California, and so forth. I would like to add one thing, in that the victims are not only students but also the teachers and staff. This is because the interdependence also exists between students and teachers (I'm a teacher at a community college). If we do not have enough students, we don't need teachers. Recently, I have heard that one approach that schools, including SJSU and my college, are trying to help the budget. It's to enroll more international students rather than resident students because the tuition from the residents (cheaper) goes to the state, but the tuition from the international students (very expensive) stays at the schools, which means the more international students, the more money at the schools. However, 80% of the total spending budget for my college comes from taxes that residents pay. So, if the schools take more international students to gain more funds, and if the resident students are not allowed to enroll, it doesn't make sense. This issue goes around in circles....
ReplyDeleteAs a student, I am pretty alarmed by the problems of the housing market and financial institutions crashing, trickling down to our state's budget, and to CSU's own budget crisis. Thanks for highlighting the tragedy in a framework of interdependence. The system seems like it's crashing down due all the consequences associated with this essential quality of the system. The exploitation of public space for private gains I see reflected in the housing and banking crisis. The market belonged to the public and was treated like an ATM by so companies were seeming to bail out. They may have thought they were disconnected to the greater system that held institutions like the CSU system together. It is really unfortunate turn of the wheel.
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