Free Republic

Queens Community House in Jackson Heights, N.Y., doesn't advertise its free English courses, but for many years its lotteries for places in the class drew hordes that required police presence. A new system has eliminated the crowds -- and the need for cops -- but competition for spaces remains fierce: Three out of four interested applicants are turned away. "People plead and cry on the day the names are posted," says director K.C. Williams, an 18-year veteran of English-language programs. "You cannot imagine how much these immigrants want to learn English. Demand is off the charts." English classes are crowded...

If you're looking for the action in education, forget the Ivy League. Talk instead to Anthony Zeiss, president of Central Piedmont Community College in Charlotte. It has six campuses and 70,000 students taking classes in everything from remedial English to computer networking. With about 12 million students, the nation's 1,200 community colleges help answer this riddle: Why do Americans do so badly on international educational comparisons and yet support an advanced economy?

The American Council on Education is a coordinating body for higher education. Recently it released some interesting statistics - interesting to people who care about higher education, non-profit and fopro alike. Just one in six of the undergraduates in college are the "typical" 18-year-old who lives on campus and gets a BA by cramming 4 years into five. Students who are 25 years old and up account for almost 40 percent of undergraduates. More than half of all the older students attend a community college - 29 percent are in private schools, and 12 percent attend fopros. Most of the...