Monthly Archives: April, 2021

Online college classes can be impersonal, isolating and disengaging. But with high demand among their students for online learning, California’s community colleges and universities are trying to find better online teaching practices.

As CalMatters’ Adam Echelman explains, about 40% of all community college classes are online. Online courses enable students, especially those who are part- or full-time workers, to complete their degree while juggling jobs, caretaking responsibilities or other obligations.

But taking these courses also requires “self-directed learning skills,” including a “very high level of self-time management,” said Di Xu, a professor at UC Irvine’s School of Education. 

• Xu: “In an in-person environment interaction happens naturally. But in an online environment, especially asynchronous, that opportunity needs to be embedded. Otherwise, the student will feel very lonely.” 

Students prefer online courses, and they’re less costly for colleges to offer than in-person ones.

Rebecca Ruan-O’Shaughnessy, the director of program and strategy at College Futures Foundation and a former executive at the California Community Colleges Chancellor’s Office, said schools need to adapt. Some new approaches she cited as promising include shortening the length of classes or trying to integrate adults’ work experience since so many online students have jobs.

To address some of the shortcomings of online foreign language courses, Julia Simon, a professor of French at UC Davis and the chairperson of a task force on languages for the university, is considering creating a set of conversation classes.

Simon said students who take online courses miss out on opportunities to practice speaking. Once students enter UC Davis, they’re unprepared, she said. But since “we can’t make them repeat courses they’ve already had,” Simon said, a conversation class could be offered as remedial education to help students catch up.

Read more.

We know that Californians are curious about elections at the Board of Equalization this year. Our page for that contest is drawing the second-largest audience in our voter guide, second only to the governor’s race.

That’s surprising considering the agency’s funny name and its fairly narrow portfolio in the world of California taxes. The agency had a lot more power until 2017, when then-Gov. Jerry Brown signed a law stripping it of almost all of its employees and authority.

• Betty Yee, former state controller: “I just really do question how this board continues to have relevance.”

But we can also see that the races for the four board of equalization seats are going to be competitive. Three current lawmakers are running for open seats, and a former assemblymember is up for reelection.

• State Sen. Tom Umberg, who is running for a seat on the board: “Although it’s not a high-profile job, it’s a critically important job, especially when we’ve got so many revenue challenges in California.”

Read more on the race here.

The Tijuana River is severely polluted. When it rains, the river waters rise and flood part of Saturn Boulevard in San Diego. The part of the road the polluted waters flood exacerbates the already dire situation, spraying contaminants into the air. 

Fixing this particular situation — not solving the river’s pollution but curbing some of the negative health effects caused by the pollutants becoming airborne — would cost $25 million, reports CalMatters’ Deborah Brennan. The positive effects of the repair could be felt as soon as next year, according to San Diego County officials, but coming up with the cash will be a challenge. 

Lawmakers submitted a request in the state budget to cover $23 million, and its possible money from 2024’s $10 billion Proposition 4 could be drawn upon, as well as increasing the county sales tax. 

Read more.

A federal appeals court blocked California from enforcing a law requiring masked federal agents to display identification during operations. CalMatters’ Nigel Duara and video strategy director Robert Meeks have a video segment on how the April ruling is a setback for the state’s effort to curb aggressive immigration enforcement tactics, as part of our partnership with PBS SoCal. Watch it here.

SoCalMatters airs at 5:58 p.m. weekdays on PBS SoCal.