Laurel Rosenhall at the Sacramento Bee – a very sharp reporter who I’ve worked with on stories before – has a great piece on the efforts underway to fix the college transfer system in California.

The ongoing budget crisis makes the suggestion even more urgent, said Judy Heiman of the state Legislative Analyst’s Office.

“Now is the time to do something that makes it more efficient for students and for campuses,” Heiman said.

“This is a huge thing you could do that doesn’t cost a lot of money and would really make a difference for students.”

The idea is to get all three branches of higher education in California to agree on transfer requirements for each major. Under Shulock’s vision, a community college student could follow a single course of study in a given major and be prepared to transfer to any UC or CSU campus.

That would be a big change from the way things are now, where transfer agreements mostly are built between local institutions rather than entire statewide systems.

“The problems derive mainly from the structure of transfer,” Shulock said. “It is not student-centered.”

To illustrate, Shulock described the requirements a community college student faces if she wants to transfer to UC or CSU as a psychology major.

San Jose State requires the transfer student take biology or anatomy to be admitted. Sonoma State doesn’t require science but does require statistics. Sacramento State doesn’t require either.

If the same student also wanted to apply to a few UC campuses, she would face even more prerequisites: a course in research methods to apply to UC Davis, precalculus to apply to UC Santa Cruz, two natural science classes (including one with a lab) to apply to UC Merced.

To fulfill the varying prerequisites, students wind up staying in community college longer than two years, accruing excess credits and taking up seats that cost taxpayers and keep other students out of the classroom. The problem is especially relevant now, as budget cuts have caused UC, CSU and community colleges to slash course offerings and reduce the number of students they serve.

“We’re causing students to have to take extra units when there’s not enough funding for the units students need in the first place,” Heiman said. “It makes no sense.”

Navigating the college system effectively is too complicated and resource intensive. No successful business can treat their customers that way, and I’m excited to see our state’s education system making an effort to fix it.

Photo Credit: Sac Bee

The Union newspaper called and asked to profile me on the topics of Sierra College and adoption. I agreed to do so, and did a fairly extensive interview with their staff writer, as well as a photo shoot at our house with the kids.

One of the questions I often get when the media covers me is “what did they miss?” The better question is, “what did I miss?”

If there was one piece I’d add to the story, it’s the fact that serving in elected office has been both a leadership and learning opportunity. Working together, our board has made a huge difference in the lives of thousands of students by protecting their access to college through fiscal sustainability.

But it’s also true that I neither had all the answers during that process, nor did I do everything right. Especially at the beginning of my term, there are things I could have handled better. Hindsight is always 20/20, and if we fail to learn from that, we can’t improve in the future.

I also made a rookie mistake and said the words “not closing the door” to higher office. I’m certainly closing the door in 2010 and am totally focused on dealing with the budget crisis at Sierra College. While I might consider other opportunities for public service five or ten years down the road, I’m enjoying making a difference where I’m at.

To me, the most important part of this story is about adoption. From my perspective, if just one family decides to make a difference in the life of a child because of this story, it will have been worth the time we invested into it a hundred times over.

When the bell rang to start Aaron Klein’s political career, he came out swinging.

Then 26, the business owner and conservative was elected to the Sierra Community College Board of Trustees in 2004, representing most of western Nevada County on the panel.

He wasn’t content to sit on his hands and observe the machinations of his elders. For Klein, there would be no back bench.

Klein immediately demanded the community college system start funneling more money into reserves. His actions led to the eventual resignation of former college president Kevin Ramirez.

He looks back on that time, and a relieved smile crosses his face.

“It was intense,” Klein said. “Things turned into World War III quickly, a hard-edged fight. I learned change is very hard to effect.”

Some bitter feelings remain, as opposition groups tried hard to unseat Klein during his re-election bid in 2008; they still call for his resignation. But, he said, the rifts are beginning to close.

“I’m proud of the fact some of the people I work very closely with now were on the opposite side from me in that argument,” Klein said.

…the couple took on another challenge shortly after: adoption. Klein’s younger sister was adopted from Romania, and the process seemed natural for their family.

“We made the decision in 2006, right after this intense period on the college board was coming to an end,” Klein said. They went ahead with plans to adopt a South Korean child, and in November of 2007 got the call to fly to Seoul to pick up a 7-month-old named Sang-Jin. Their son is now 3 and called Spencer Daniel.

“I’m the oldest of 6, and Cacey is the oldest of 8, so we joked that we had had kids for years,” Klein said. “But it was an incredible experience to become parents, to see those first steps.”

The family was ready for a second child right away, Klein said. Smack in the middle of his 2008 re-election campaign, the two decided to adopt from Ethiopia.

In July 2009, they were matched with a baby girl named Asnakech. Now 10 months old, they picked up the daughter they call Emma Nichole in Ethiopia on Christmas day.

“I couldn’t have thought of a better Christmas present,” Klein said.

You can read the entire article in The Union here.

Photo Credit: The Union

The college established a program vitality committee, which will have eight months to develop a workable plan for these three programs.

The Board committed several years ago to being a community college not about quantity of students, quantity of degrees, or quantity of programs, but to be a community college focused on quality, exemplifying excellence in education and ensuring student success. A quote that I like to steal from our President sums it up: “access without success is a cruel hoax.”

So for these three programs to survive long term, they have to figure out how to reshape, realign and refocus to thrive in the midst of the resource constraints we have. The program vitality committee is going to take a hard, honest look at that and there will be a variety of opportunities for members of the community to contribute as well.

So these programs are definitely not out of the woods yet, but at least we have a pathway to a logical decision at the end of eight months. I am optimistic that each program will find a way to thrive, even in the midst of California’s budget hurricane.

Here’s an excerpt of the coverage from the Auburn Journal:

The Sierra College board approved limited continuation of vocational automotive, agriculture and construction programs Tuesday but are due to revisit their status in November. …

Instead of ending the longtime vocational programs in the face of a potential $10.7 million funding shortfall next year, school officials are continuing stripped-down versions and embarking on a collaborative process to determine whether they should stay or go in the future. …

Rachel Rosenthal, vice president of instruction, outlined plans at Tuesday’s meeting that would see fulltime vocational faculty retained but classes drastically cut back. Agriculture, for instance, will have 40 percent fewer course offerings while dropping animal science and equine studies.

Excited to see this outcome, and hoping I get to cast a positive vote in eight months.

The patent system in the United States was first adopted in 1790, and was designed to grant inventors a limited-time monopoly on the use of their inventions, in exchange for the public disclosure of those inventions to advance science and innovation.

But the patent system isn’t keeping up with the changing world, especially when it comes to new kinds of innovation. What worked well for protecting Thomas Edison’s ability to monetize his invention of the incandescent light bulb – giving him 20 years of revenue from the invention in exchange for opening up the details of his discovery to other inventors who could improve on the concept – isn’t working when it comes to software and business methods.

This is a common topic of discussion in the entrepreneurial community, and you’d think that software innovators might be in favor of software patents, right? No, quite the opposite.

Basic software concepts, like the best way to lay out a user interface, or a fundamental concept like tabs in a spreadsheet, are being patented, and the patent owners then sue software makers in an attempt to either (a) extract large sums of money, or (b) put them out of business.

The latest news is that Facebook has been granted a patent for the concept of “dynamically providing a news feed about a user of a social network.”

One commenter on venture capitalist Fred Wilson’s blog post said:

This is weird news. I run a small local social community and also use some kind of newsfeed system. Yet the earliest version of my newsfeed dates from 2003, way before facebook’s feed. If they wanted to, they could easily crush me with this patent as I dont have the judical knowledge and financial power to enter a legal battle with facebook. The could close me down, although everyone would know that it’s only because they have this patent, not because I copied the newsfeed from them.

What’s worse is, there are companies being founded for the sole purpose of buying up the rights to these patents, and filing piles of lawsuits against any new startups in the technology space that might possibly have a remote link to the patent. These brand new companies have no resources to fight back, so they often have to pay off the “patent troll” or just drop their idea and go out of business.

The pace of innovation and monetization in software far exceed the types of innovation that the patent system was designed to protect and nurture. The patent system can continue to be extremely valuable in these other areas, but It’s simply an outmoded and unnecessary structure for the arenas of software and business methods.

It hurts competition, hurts consumers, and hurts innovation far more than it helps.

Of course, we’ll continue to have copyright and trade secret protection. If I had invented Facebook, somebody couldn’t just copy my code and launch a clone the next day. They would have to outwork, out-innovate and out-execute me in the marketplace.

I think that’s the way it should be.

What do you think? Do patents belong in the software arena? How about hardware? Pharmaceuticals? What are the standards for deciding where they foster innovation and where they don’t? Use the comments below to share your thoughts.

If this keeps up, the Sacramento Bee will be next and then I’ll really think the apocalypse is upon us.

Sierra College is planning a major move into solar power at its Rocklin and Grass Valley campuses.

With plans for ground-mounted solar cells in parking lots and others on buildings, a report from the college estimates savings of from $75,000 to $125,000 a year on what is now a $1.5 million electricity bill.

The college has put out a request for proposals to construct solar arrays at the two campuses at no cost to Sierra. The contract would also include a power-purchase agreement that could save the college money on electricity. …

Trustee Aaron Klein, a member of the college board’s facilities and planning subcommittee, said that with federal tax credits for businesses, the financial details have been looking better for the college.

Klein said that he and fellow subcommittee member Nancy Palmer returned from a community-college trustees conference enthusiastic about the possibilities of solar after seeing what several other districts were doing.

After a presentation by Kirk Uhler, a former Solar Power Inc. employee, and Jim Conkey, a former construction partner with Solar Power, it was decided to hire an independent consultant to develop a request for proposals, Klein said.

Proposals are due Wednesday. Palmer and Bill Martin, the other member of the subcommittee, have volunteered to do interviews on March 18th before a recommendation is made to the board on bids.

“My goal for the project is no upfront capital investments by the college and no higher costs for energy down the road,” Klein said. “We just need to get the best deal that protects the college.”

Let me know if any of this makes sense to you, either.

Special Board Meeting Details:

• March 9, 2010 at 4:00PM
• Sierra College Rocklin Campus, Board Room, LRC-133
• Main agenda items begin at 4:00PM, public comment for items not on the agenda at 5:40PM
• Meeting Agenda
• Contracts (General / Capital Projects)
• Warrants

Our work continues to deal with the budget issues facing Sierra College. We’ll be hearing an update on the realities of trying to save the three career training programs recommended for closure out of the 24 we are currently working to maintain.

Use the comments below to answer the Question of the Month! (You can “log in” with your Facebook or Twitter account with a single click, or just fill in your name and e-mail address to leave a guest comment.)

Should Sierra College be focused on having as many educational programs as possible, or should it have a smaller number of programs but put our resources into achieving high levels of excellence and quality in each one?

Having Rocklin police officers on campus has been a very good step forward in safety for our students, our staff and the local community. After a 120-day initial contract, both the city and the college have now agreed to extend the contract in a multi-year deal.

Here’s the coverage from the Placer Herald.

A safe campus is spurring Sierra College leaders to give Rocklin Police a longer contract, according to school officials.

“At this point, the (Sierra College) board of trustees agree we will enter into a long-term agreement with the city of Rocklin,” said Sierra College President Dr. Leo Chavez.

Sierra College’s private police force was disbanded Nov. 1 after the police chief left for a state job. Chavez said since Rocklin officers took over law enforcement duty on campus, they’ve turned the school around.

“It’s possible the campus had developed a reputation as somewhat of an easy mark (for criminals),” Chavez said. “We’re losing that rapidly and we’re going to end up with a much safer campus, as a result.”

The former Sierra College Police Department reportedly wrote a handful of reports a month for serious incidents like accidents, theft and minor criminal activity, according to Rocklin Police officials. In the first month, Rocklin officers issued 29 reports and made two drug arrests. Just last month, Rocklin officers initiated a parking lot stake-out to catch a vehicle burglary suspect allegedly responsible for a series of thefts. Some students said they haven’t noticed the activity but admit that may be part of their success.

I don’t endorse political candidates all the time, but once in a while I get asked to. In this case, I didn’t even get asked – but recent events in the news made my decision for me. (For those of you who don’t live in the Sierra Foothills in Northern California, feel free to skip this post if it bores you!)

Nevada County has had a long history of drama in its Clerk-Recorder’s office. This is an important and critical function in county government. They protect your identity when you get a birth certificate, wedding license or death certificate. They manage the safe transfer of property between buyers and sellers. And they protect the foundation of our representative democracy by running our elections.

The Clerk-Recorder before this one, who was appointed to the job, made a bunch of idiotic mistakes in the process of running elections. Then it was discovered that she was moonlighting for another city two hours away and collecting double salary.

Fortunately, she resigned. But her replacement, a fellow I’ve never met named Greg Diaz, has continued the drama. He’s gone through four assistant recorders in the last fifteen months. And in the last couple of weeks, a new story exploded on the scene: Greg Diaz is now the only County Clerk-Recorder in the state being sued in federal court for fraud.

More on that in a second.

Barry Pruett, who is a local attorney and former small business owner, decided to run against Diaz many months ago, before the lawsuit was filed. He made that decision because he was witness to some highly questionable actions that Diaz took, which have now been documented in a story that appeared in The Union yesterday morning.

I met Barry back in 2008. He and his wife Kim were supporting Tom McClintock’s campaign for Congress (as was I). He’s a good guy and I’ve always been impressed by him. He owned a local gymnastics/athletics business before he got his law degree. Before that, he was a Director of Business Development for Apple Computer and did a stint overseas for them. He’s sharp, professional, communicates clearly and always exhibits a boatload of common sense. As I stated earlier, he hadn’t asked me to endorse him, so the thought hadn’t occurred to me.

Until now.

As many of you know, I’ve spent a great deal of time as a Sierra College Trustee working on the issue of keeping our tax dollars local. I spent a year and a half working with the Nevada County Contractors Association to create a level playing field for the campus expansion and renovation project at NCC, and making sure that a local team had the chance to bid for the work.

That effort wasn’t required by law, but it was the right thing to do, because it creates jobs here, in our community. By some accounts, because of the effort we made at Sierra College to keep our tax dollars local, we generated a $35 million dollar stimulus into the local economy. I was honored to be a part of that effort.

So when I see a local elected official doing exactly the opposite, it stops me in my tracks.

According to this news story, Nevada County has had a relationship with this local company for ten years, costing $377,000. The local company serves numerous counties all over California and the nation. They’ve since been replaced by an out-of-state company with costs estimated at $714,000 for ten years.

If you cut through all of the fluff in the story, here’s the bottom line: Diaz didn’t like this local company. Apparently they sent his office a letter and addressed it to his predecessor. So he cut them out of the bidding process. (This isn’t the first elected official to have an ego this big. Not cool.)

Diaz claims he didn’t oversee who was included in the requests for proposal. I can’t understand this. As the guy in charge of this decision, how can you NOT be involved in knowing who you’re asking to bid? It raises serious questions as to whether or not he’s engaged in his job or not. His claim doesn’t hold water.

The local company, who at the time had Barry Pruett as their attorney, raised the issue, and were told they could submit a bid. They got half the time to prepare their bid, and Diaz decided their presentation wasn’t quite as nifty as the others.

So Greg Diaz gave the contract to a higher bidder – the out of state firm – choosing their $357,000 proposal over the local firm’s $303,000 bid.

Unbelievable!

The story continues. About five months ago, Barry stopped representing that local company. They went and hired other lawyers, and believe that Diaz handed trade secrets to their software over to the out-of-state company with the higher bid to give them an unfair advantage. So now they’re suing the county and Greg Diaz for fraud.

Now, I’m told there’s no way this will all get rectified or the local company will get their contract back. That’s not the point of Barry’s decision to run.

But it’s simultaneously amusing and disturbing to think this whole episode might have been avoided, and all of this taxpayer money saved, if only the Clerk-Recorder wasn’t ticked off by a bad mail merge in a form letter.

Our local small businesses are struggling to make ends meet, fighting to preserve and create jobs for our taxpayers. We need all the help we can get from our elected officials to support our local economy. To have an elected official actively working to hinder local job creation – well, that person isn’t going to get my support. They’re just not qualified to hold office.

So for what it’s worth (and I’m the first to say it’s not worth all that much!), I wholeheartedly endorse Barry Pruett for Nevada County Clerk-Recorder. He’ll end the drama, bring professionalism to that office and support our local economy, small businesses and local jobs.

It’s still hard for me to believe that after New Jersey, Virginia and Massachusetts, the White House is refusing to listen and intends to try to ram through a $2 to $3 trillion dollar subsidized health insurance bill that the public doesn’t want.

(And yes, it is $2 to $3 trillion. The CBO still hasn’t scored this proposal because there isn’t enough detail. But we know relationally that the last proposal was in the $2 trillion range. And just because you delay the implementation of your program for four or five years doesn’t mean that you can cut the ten year cost in half. This is the kind of flim-flammery that we put corporate executives in prison for, and for good reason.)

Here’s the excerpt of the Wall Street Journal piece today (hat tip to Fred for sending this my way):

A mere three days before President Obama’s supposedly bipartisan health-care summit, the White House [Monday] released a new blueprint that Democrats say they will ram through Congress with or without Republican support. So after election defeats in Virginia, New Jersey and even Massachusetts, and amid overwhelming public opposition, Democrats have decided to give the voters what they don’t want anyway. Ah, the glory of ‘progressive’ governance and democratic consent.

‘The President’s Proposal,’ as the 11-page White House document is headlined, is in one sense a notable achievement: It manages to take the worst of both the House and Senate bills and combine them into something more destructive. It includes more taxes, more subsidies and even less cost control than the Senate bill. And it purports to fix the special-interest favors in the Senate bill not by eliminating them — but by expanding them to everyone. …

The larger political message of this new proposal is that Mr. Obama and Democrats have no intention of compromising on an incremental reform, or of listening to Republican, or any other, ideas on health care. They want what they want, and they’re going to play by Chicago Rules and try to dragoon it into law on a narrow partisan vote via Congressional rules that have never been used for such a major change in national policy. If you want to know why Democratic Washington is ‘ungovernable,’ this is it.

Republicans aren’t smart enough to have designed this great of a playbook for sweeping the 2010 elections. I honestly thought President Obama was an exceedingly smart guy when he was elected (despite my disagreements with him on policy). His inability to heed multiple warning calls has dramatically changed that perception.

Now they’ve released the music video. (Mobile, feed and e-mail readers: the embedded video is above.)

This entire project was the brainchild of Christian music artist Michael W. Smith, and the results are simply stunning.

Buy “Come Together Now” today – 100% of all proceeds go to Haiti.