This is an historic and exciting opportunity for all of us in the community college world. For years I have said that community colleges are one of America’s best-kept secrets. Well, with the President of the United States shining a light on us, I think that secret is out. (Laughter.)
Today’s summit is an important next step in our efforts to meet the President’s goal of having the best-educated, most competitive workforce in the world by the end of this decade.
As we meet here today, families all across our country are struggling. We see that struggle firsthand in community colleges. We see people who are determined to build a better life for themselves and their families, no matter how hard it is.
Today, community colleges are the largest, fastest-growing, most affordable segment of America’s higher education system. For generations, these schools have been an option for many students who didn’t have other options: recent immigrants, working adults, or students who could not afford or were not quite ready for a four-year institution.
Community colleges are uniquely American -- places where anyone who walks through the door is one step closer to realizing the American Dream. These schools are flexible and innovative. For that reason, countries around the world are looking at community colleges as a model to increase workforce preparedness and college graduation among their own citizens.
Community colleges are uniquely positioned to provide the education and training that will prepare students for the jobs in the 21st century.
Schools are forming partnerships with businesses in their communities, ensuring that students are trained for jobs that need to be filled.
Getting Americans back to work is America’s great challenge. And community colleges are critically important to preparing graduates for those jobs. We are here today because community colleges are entering a new day in America, and here’s why: For more and more people, community colleges are the way to the future. They’re giving real opportunity to students who otherwise wouldn’t have it. They’re giving hope to families who thought the American Dream was slipping away. They are equipping Americans with the skills and expertise that are relevant to the emerging jobs of the future. They’re opening doors for the middle class at a time when the middle class has seen so many doors close to them.
As the President said, the nations that out-educate us today will out-compete us tomorrow. That is why he is committed to increasing the number of college graduates in America, so that we will once again lead the world in the percentage of our citizens with a college degree.
Community colleges are absolutely critical to reaching this goal, and to ensuring out country’s economic prosperity in the future. That is why the President has also challenged all of us to graduate an additional 5 million community college graduates by 2020.
Reaching that goal will take the commitment of everyone in this room, and all of the hardworking community college leaders, faculty and students you represent.
Community college students and graduates across the country are working in jobs that will enable us to expand our green economy, provide Americans with the excellent health care they deserve, and rebuild our country’s infrastructure.
These are the students like the ones I visited in their state-of-the-art radiology lab last spring at Delgado Community College in New Orleans. Or the woman I met who, after 16 years as a lab tech, came to Kingsborough Community College in New York for retraining, and graduated in nursing with a job offer waiting.
I meet students and learn about industry partnerships on every campus I visit that reinforce what we in this room know well: Community colleges are at the center of Americans’ effort to educate our way to a better economy.
I’ve been a teacher for nearly three decades, and I have spent the past 17 years teaching at a community college. I know the power of community colleges to change lives.
I have seen the wisdom of Yeats who said that, “Education is not the filling of the pail, but the lighting of a fire.” All of the teachers here today know the magic of lighting that fire in the soul of a student.
But as I work hard every day to inspire students, it is ultimately they who inspire me. I’m inspired by students who overcome significant odds just to show up, workers who have returned to school to improve their job prospects, mothers who juggle jobs and childcare while preparing for a new career, and students who spend two years at a community college before transferring to a four-year school.
At the President’s request, I have visited community colleges around the country to see innovative job partnerships and creative student support programs. At each school, I hear stories about the perseverance of community college students to make a better life for themselves and their families -- students like Albert, who inspire me and who I am thrilled to welcome here today. You’re amazing, Albert.
The programs are different, the students are different, but the aspirations are the same. These students are working hard to get the training and education they need to make their lives better. They know that education can open the door to a world of new opportunities.
They are students like the mother who shared her experience with us on the White House website of working towards a degree while raising three children and straddling financial challenges. Now employed and the holder of a Bachelor’s and a Master’s degree, she wrote, “Community colleges didn’t just change my life, they gave me my life.”
Community colleges do that every day. With the support and the attention of the people in this room, we can serve more students and serve them better than ever.
Our challenge is not just to get students into college, but to keep them there and to graduate them faster with the skills they need to succeed in the American workforce. This is the moment for community colleges to shine.
Teaching is my life’s work. I am grateful and tremendously proud to work with a President and Vice President who value that work. President Obama is committed to restoring the promise of the American education system. He recognizes the value of community colleges and is investing in them so that they are the best that they can be. His leadership is inspiring to all of us who believe that each and every American deserves the opportunity to realize his full potential.
I am honored to introduce a leader who shares our belief in the power of the community college, President Barack Obama. (Applause.)
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you. Thank you very much. Thank you so much. Thank you, everybody. Thank you very much. Everybody please have a seat. Thank you so much.
Read more: Remarks by the President and Dr. Jill Biden at White House Summit on Community Colleges
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