Recent trends in the development of the community college make it seem inevitable that its institutional freshness and promise will be squandered. It will neither ameliorate the problems of those excluded from opportunity through public education, nor break through the bureaucratic, self-sustaining rigidity of public education. (DM)

Community colleges, in a quest for increased enrollments and expanded educational access, seem less concerned with quality than they were 15 years ago. This is evidenced by the move toward open enrollments, reduced academic requirements, promotion of sporadic course-taking patterns, and vocational, as opposed to general, education. Adjustments…

Recaps major criticisms of the community college and predictions made in "Dateline '79" (Cohen, 1969). Plots trends for the 1980s, envisioning five distinct institutions: the resurrected secondary school, educational broker, rapid response college, and certification and satellite centers. Forewarns community colleges not to neglect their basic…