Nature-Based Studies and Environmental Clubs

While a wide array of community colleges across the country offer traditional music programs in musical practice, theory, and study, many new community college programs are offering more unique and specialized musical education courses. Today, students can enroll in programs to study historically-informed instruments, or they can even enroll in courses that teach students how to become employed in the field of music management and production.

Edmonds Community College offers a thorough and diverse array of music-oriented courses. Together, the Music Department of ECC established clear instruction goals, which include: “Giving students a solid foundation all facets of music, providing a range of performance and creative opportunities, offering diverse music theory and digital music courses, creating a dynamic, rich learning environment for students to pursue their passion for music and performing.”

To guide students towards achieving and engaging in these goals, ECC provides a variety of performance opportunities and events. Most notably, ECC fosters positive programs for musical enrichment through organizations such as the symphonic choir, the jazz band and choir, and the jazz workshop. These groups, along with many others, serve to enhance student learning and performance experiences.

Adding to these support systems, ECC’s Music Department also provides students with specialized acoustic fixtures in their music classrooms, various practice pianos and state of the art recording gear, in addition to ECC’s state of the art recording studio with a digital interface that students can interact with through hands-on opportunities.

Virginia Highlands Community College

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As a societal approach to improving health conditions in public settings, many offices, community centers, and restaurants have initiated tobacco and smoking bans on their properties. While public schools, such as elementary and high schools, have banned tobacco products on their educational campuses for years, community colleges across the country are now beginning to follow this health-driven trend.

Banning Tobacco on Community College Campuses

The Growing Trend

Institutions, businesses, and other settings possess the legal right to ban smoking and tobacco use on property grounds because private properties can be governed by owners/managers/leaders. As a result, those who own personal property often have the supreme authority over the rules and regulations of their grounds and boundaries.

On the other hand, community colleges had to earn their right to ban tobacco in 2006, as community campuses are not necessarily “privately” owned properties. In 2006, Katherine McDonald of the Chatham Journal explains, “The General Assembly adopted legislation exempting community colleges from a law requiring public institutions to set aside areas for tobacco use.”

According to McDonald’s investigations, community colleges that have adopted smoke-free and tobacco-free policies include schools such as Asheville-Buncombe Technical, Cleveland, Guilford Technical, Haywood, Pitt, Roanoke-Chowan, Stanly, Wake Technical, and Wilkes Community College.

This video describes the Truth Initiative, which helps community colleges and Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs) bring tobacco-free policies to the campuses that serve young adults from minority and low-income communities.

Community colleges across the country have implemented specific support programs to stimulate student support and success. Often referred to as “mentor services” or “mentor programs,” community college mentors can be paramount leaders for guiding and encouraging younger students. Mentors are often older community college students who have demonstrated specific academic or professional successes in their collegiate studies. By sharing their knowledge and insight with new and younger students, community colleges have designed powerful programs to enhance the success of all students and campus members.

What is a Mentor Program?

While each community college has its own unique mentoring program, the general concept focuses on pairing a new or young student with an older, more experienced student. Oftentimes, mentors will guide new students by helping them set their schedules, by providing campus tours, or by offering to serve a new student as an academic tutor or study buddy.

When engaging in a mentoring program, mentors are considered to be the “experts” in their field or organization, while mentees are the more novice and less experienced organization members. In the case of community colleges, mentors are normally students, although may often also be professors, while mentees are new and younger students or students who may need special support services, such as ESL support, transfer support, and so forth.

This video offers a look at the peer mentoring program at Guttman Community College.

Alternative spring break is an opportunity for students to engage in service-oriented trips to help struggling groups of individuals, areas, or communities. While fun should always be in the equation of spring break, you can also make a difference during your vacation.

As spring break becomes an increasingly travel-based event for millions of students across the country, community colleges are embracing alternative spring break programs in order to provide students with local, national, and even international opportunities to spend a week having fun, while also making an impact on a specific area. By engaging in these programs, Life-Changing Travel asserts that students can “Come back with a tan, an impressive addition to your resume, great stories, new friends and a fresh perspective not only on Spring Break but on the world!”

This video offers some alternative activities for spring break activities.

Community Colleges and Alternative Spring Break Opportunities

Central Piedmont Community College

As Central Piedmont (CPCC) describes, “Alternative Spring Break (ASB) is a low-cost service trip that provides students with an opportunity to participate in meaningful service activities, learn more about community issues, and have fun.” By engaging in the variety of ASB programs, students can choose from an array of projects that are “designed to encourage civic responsibility.”

In the past, CPCC students have taken trips up and down the Piedmont coast, traveling to Atlanta, Georgia to help homeless