Should Community Colleges Offer Four-Year Degrees?

James G. Martin Center for Academic Renewal ^ | February 11, 2026 | Jonathan Butcher

[karpov]

More junior colleges are offering four-year bachelor’s degrees in addition to two-year associate’s degrees, and traditional universities hate the competition. But while students and policymakers should welcome new options, junior colleges (also known as community colleges) have obstacles to overcome as they attempt to create reliable alternatives to four-year institutions.

Over the last two decades, lawmakers in at least 24 states have adopted provisions allowing community colleges to expand their degree offerings to include four-year bachelor’s programs. Customarily, community colleges offer high-school graduates who are not prepared for four-year degree programs the chance to earn two-year associate’s degrees and offer high-school students the opportunity to earn college credit before graduating (called “dual enrollment”).

Obviously these are different goals than those of traditional universities that enroll students aiming to complete a four-year degree. Correspondingly, the two types of postsecondary institutions—junior colleges and traditional universities—attract different types of students.

Community-college students are older (27 years old, on average), while most college students fall within the age range of 18-24. Community-college tuition is typically less expensive than tuition at four-year institutions, so a larger share of the students in junior colleges come from lower-income households than do students enrolled at four-year institutions.

---

TOPICS: Education
KEYWORDS: college; communitycollege

[pangaea6]

No, don’t mess up a good thing

[ClearCase_guy]

College is a stupid choice for most people.

You want to be an engineer? a doctor? Fine — you should attend an actual 4-year university.

Everyone else should learn a trade or just get a job where they offer On The Job training. Our society needs to rethink education because what we are doing now isn’t smart.

[quantim]

“high-school graduates who are not prepared for four-year degree programs”

In today’s world high schools are pushing out kids who can’t even read. Most people don’t even look at their tax bill as their mortgages pull it out of the payments automatically. You are partly financing community colleges/universities whether you like it or not.

And it’s even worse this century as many young adults are dumbed-down by going to these community colleges/universities in the first place.

[maro]

Exactly. That’s mission creep.

[albie]

We taught our daughters that some of the most successful people in America have 0 college. One took business and does well with that degree. We paid 25% while she worked and paid the rest. The other didn’t go and does very well.

Most of our friends paid for their kids college. I never understood that.

[Mlheureux]

I attended JC’s, Tech colleges and Univerities. The u’s are overrated.

[Skwor]

NO NO NO, in fact time for nearly all Universities to be shut down, imo 95% of all 4-year degrees now are utterly worthless.

[dfwgator]

In business, it’s “Scope Creep”.

[Leaning Right]

> The u’s are overrated. <

Agreed. Most community college professors are focused on teaching. Most college professors are focused on graduate-level research. They teach only because they have to.

I say give the community colleges a chance here.

[Vermont Lt]

Community colleges are great. My wife and daughter both went to them, and then onto a four year degree. They both graduated from their four year schools without any debt.

The infrastructure and additional staffing to meet the requirements for a four year degree would seem redundant to our state college/university system. Of course MA has had a pretty decent state college system for more than 100 years. I know other states might not have that existing infrastructure, so it might apply there.

I would hate to see the CC system try to “grow up” and ruin it in the process.

[FreedomPoster]

E graduate here, including MS. E from STEM, to be clear.

I don’t see OJT replacing the university for that. There’s a large body of basic knowledge and computation to be learned.

Now, the Communications degree a niece got? Total waste of time.

[T-Bird45]

First paragraph - Agreed.

Second paragraph - using your career examples, it can be a winning strategy to start the process while staying at home (no dorm fees) & completing the standard courses (English, history, basic sciences, college math, etc.) at a lower cost than the 4-year college. This choice is dependent on confirmation of full transferable credits to the 4-year school. Example - the community college in the town where I went to HS all those years ago has an engineering program with guaranteed transfer to the 4-year university in the largest nearby town about 60 miles away.

Final paragraph - lots of these community colleges have trade school courses so it’s not necessarily an either/or choice.

[Opinionated Blowhard]

One issue is whether they will offer useful four year degrees that are taught by professors who impart useful knowledge. Community college professors have a certain level of knowledge and a certain skillset. They teach basic college level classes. But to earn a four year degree, a student is supposed to go beyond the basics. I know that in the current college and university system, that doesn’t happen and a lot of degrees are useless. But in theory, at least, a four year college degree is supposed to expose students to rigorous advanced thinking. If the community colleges keep teaching the same thing and slap a four year degree on it, or have their current professors take on other classes and teach them the same way they teach basic classes, a four year community college degree won’t be worth much and the students will be in debt for a degree that doesn’t get them anything.

[Texas resident]

A smart thing for a kid to do now is go to community college for a year, take business classes, then head out to a trade school. By the time they are 40, they will own their own business and know how to keep the bills paid.

[DIRTYSECRET]

**Our society needs to rethink education because what we are doing now isn’t smart.**

True. I’ve heard from more than one degreed individual say that college is not what it’s cracked out to be. What it means to me is that they followed like sheep and the sheepskin then gave them the ok to express their real opinions. You can’t put down something while you’re doing it.

[anton]

They renamed a high school here “Withrow University High School.” WTF is with that?

I’m sure many of the “honor students” attending will go on to the Ohio Correctional Institution Graduate School of Robbery and Drug Dealing.

[Sacajaweau]

Why does college require 4 years to start with. Half the classes were a waste of my time....Engineering Degree.

[BobL]

“No, don’t mess up a good thing”

Yep, you’re making me think that this is a Leftist ploy to get control of 2-year colleges as most students graduating still love the country, and are Americans.

[Raycpa]

I got my associates degree in accounting in a community college and transferred to a 4 year state college to get my bachelor’s. The quality of my accounting and business education from the community college from the professors who were active and retired in business was far superior.