Unlike most other counties in the state, where adult classes are offered through the local school district, in San Francisco that task has historically been relegated to City College. Since 1970 the school has been a vital link for everyone from the newly arrived immigrant looking to learn English to the newly unemployed looking for a leg up. Santa Ana and San Diego are the only two other counties where adult learning is offered through the local community college system. Louis Freedberg, executive director of the Bay Area-based non-profit, EdSource, says more than half of the 90,000-plus students enrolled at City College are there for non-credit and non-degree bearing certificate programs that range from ESL to computer skills and gardening. Together, these classes account for a majority of courses offered at the school. The students in these classes, he adds, represent some of “the most marginalized of California’s adult population.” In the event that City College does close, he says, “they would have no other place to go.”
http://news.newamericamedia.org/news/view_article.html?article_id=22a3678461735af6d50166d5ff3af85e
