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Alas, as I rolled off the board earlier this summer, our results had not improved significantly. Our enrollment in 2025 was only a smidge higher than it was in 2015. This in a county whose population grew substantially during the decade. This in a county that reveres education (roughly one-third of Montgomery residents hold graduate degrees — one of the highest such rates in the world). This despite the opening of our fourth campus two years ago. Happily, Montgomery College’s enrollment is trending higher over the last 18 months and we have climbed most of the way out of our Covid-created hole. But the college has not overcome two barriers: a poor reputation in some quarters (undeserved), and vicious rush-hour traffic.
The experience of a former student opened my eyes.
He was the student trustee on our board four years ago. One night, I asked him why he had chosen MC. He said he had been actively discouraged by his public high-school guidance counselor. When this student, who had a nearly straight-A average, told her of his community-college plans, she replied: “Oh, no, you don’t want to go there. You’re too good a student to go there.”
But he was precisely the kind of student who should attend Montgomery College. He was worried about the cost of four-year colleges. He wasn’t ready to leave his family. He knew that MC could be a springboard into his hoped-for career as an accountant. Today, he has an M.B.A., a first job, and a solid future. But to get there, he had to swim against an abiding view of MC, and of community colleges in general. Supposedly, you choose them only if your high-school grades aren’t great, your ambition isn’t huge, and your bank balance isn’t robust. Community colleges are seen as junior varsity. They are Default U.
This perception is a huge problem. At MC, where you can major in auto mechanics, or English literature, or dozens of disciplines in between, 40 percent of the faculty hold Ph.D.s. Each year, MC graduates add $1 billion to the county’s economy. There’s nothing junior varsity about that. But remaining one of MC’s 40,000-plus students can pose major challenges. That’s where rush-hour traffic comes into play.
Last year, on a sleepy Saturday, I wandered into my neighborhood Trader Joe’s grocery store, wearing a Montgomery College polo shirt. As usual, I couldn’t find the crackers I was looking for, so I asked an employee for help. He noticed my shirt, said he was a chemistry major at MC, and told me he was about to drop out.
Why? He works at one end of Montgomery County. Organic chemistry is offered only once a day, and only at the MC campus 20 miles from his job. He finishes his Trader Joe’s shift at 4 p.m. Chemistry begins at 4:30. He owns a car, but he still can’t hope to get to class on time. He has no other source of money beside his job. So, he planned to quit MC. It was the proverbial no-brainer.
I eventually learned, however, that rush-hour traffic hadn’t won this time.
Just the week before, this student’s professor said he’d stick around after class to fill this student in on what he had missed because of his late arrivals. The student is now on track to attend a four-year college in the fall, and medical school after that. His professor hasn’t gotten a halo yet — it must be caught in traffic — but he deserves one. This story had a happy ending, but this student was within an inch of quitting community college because he works and studies in a crowded suburb where traffic is soul-crushingly bad.
We cannot fix rush-hour traffic. No college can. No county can. Even if a college were to gin up a system of shuttle buses — which we have done — these buses would get caught in the same traffic as students in cars. At my urging, this student now visits local public high schools to tell students about the professor who threw him a life raft, and the college that offered him the right pathway. It’s impossible to know how many students he has actually recruited. But to judge from the clusters who approach him after his talks, he’s making a real difference.
The Trader Joe’s student was lucky to hit the right savior, but rush hour is a direct threat to enrollment every day, and his struggles are, unfortunately, typical. Students who are parents need to pick up their kids from day care on time, or incur penalties. Hit with a bill, that student drops out. Students who are the sole supporters of their families can’t be late to work, or they might get fired and three generations might go hungry. College? That’s for some other day. They disappear.
I am far from the first person to notice these problems. Across my 10 years, three Montgomery College presidents have all focused on enrollment. Budgets have boosted online recruiting. More on-boarders have been hired, so first-day students don’t vanish because of the complicated forms and unfamiliar systems that confront them. MC recently spent $1 million to spread the word via bus and television ads. And yet ... an institution that’s a proven route to a job, a four-year college, and a solid place in society hasn’t reached nearly as many potential students as it should.
Montgomery College does not field a football team. It does not have dormitories because its students are all commuters. It does not have a full-service restaurant on any of its campuses. It lacks the homey, rah-rah feel of many four-year campuses. One of the college’s greatest strengths is also one of its greatest weaknesses: Because it is open-enrollment, anyone can attend. So, MC is several colleges rolled into one.
The largest chunk of its students graduated from high school within the last two years. But MC also attracts older part-timers who want new careers. It’s where retirees come to figure out computers. It’s where students who majored in Budweiser and flunked out of four-year colleges can relaunch their academic journeys.
1. Recruit in languages other than English. Each year, at commencement, the president of MC asks the assembled grads to stand if they speak a language other than English at home. More than two-thirds of the students rise to their feet. Clearly, immigrants know they need additional credentials to succeed in America. But so many potential students have never heard of Montgomery College, are suspicious of American institutions, or don’t speak or read English well. Meet these potential students where they are. Recruit them in their native tongues. Make them comfortable.
2. Encourage employers to allow employees to attend college during lunch hours, or after work. Since much of our curriculum is available online, employees can attend class in just a few clicks, without traveling to a campus. This approach would enroll more adults in their 30s and 40s, the largest cohort of could-be students in our county.
3. Go hard after soon-to-be veterans. Every soldier gets an information packet near the end of his or her tour. A community-college leaflet in that packet could point the way toward a high-paying post-service career.
4. Emphasize sports. In my years as a trustee, I got to know a community-college president in New Jersey. Her college offers a full boat of teams, for both men and women — including less-celebrated sports like lacrosse and tennis. She reports that such athletes enroll, and complete their associate degrees, more often than the general student population. MC, and most community colleges, offer some sports, but not as many. More would be merrier.
5. Market to public high-school leaders, not just guidance counselors. Who inspires a high-school student to choose a certain college? It might be a coach, a teacher, or an assistant principal. Get literature and videos into the hands of those people. Arrange personal appearances like those that the Trader Joe’s employee is doing. Seventeen-year-olds are forever impressionable. Take advantage of that.
6. Offer child care. Granted, this can be very expensive, for both a college and its students. Montgomery College once tried it, on a limited basis, but retreated in the face of red ink. Yet bringing your kids with you to college, and having a safe place for them, would change the enrollment and retention odds for student parents. Federal, state, and county subsidies might be possible here.
7. Use trustees as recruiters. Many presidents are wary of letting trustees pitch their colleges. Perhaps they’ll go off script. Perhaps they’ll cause political problems. These concerns are entirely legitimate. But so is the value of trustees in the community. They wouldn’t be trustees if they didn’t have networks. Thousands of their neighbors don’t even know, or care, that the local community college exists. Who better to ford that stream?
As for this trustee emeritus, I have my own personal plan to boost enrollment at Montgomery College: I plan to enroll in an MC history course in the fall.
