DeAnza College

Best Community Colleges: DeAnza College (CA)

DeAnza College, located in Cupertino, California, also home to Apple, Symantec, Sun, Hewlett-Packard, and many other high-technology firms.

The community college is part of Silicon Valley’s Foothill-De Anza Community College District, which also administers Foothill College in Los Altos Hills, California. The district serves the cities of Cupertino, Los Altos, Los Altos Hills, Mountain View, Palo Alto, Sunnyvale and San Jose.

The annual enrollment is ~22,000 students, with a transfer rate of ~1,800 students. DeAnza College has 10 instructional divisions which sustain more than 100 areas of study.

The college offers 90-plus associate degree and university transfer programs, including popular majors such as Animation, Broadcasting, Biological, Health and Environmental Sciences, Graphic Design and Computer Graphics.

The college’s Intercultural/International Studies program has garnered much attention and the college attracts students from more than 50 countries.

The Community Education program offers non-credit classes, weekend adult workshops and summer programs for children.

DeAnza College is a cultural hub for the Silicon Valley area. It is the home of Flint Center for the Performing, the Fujitsu Planetarium, the Euphrat Museum of Art and the California History Center.

The Kirsch Center, which opened in 2005, is a carbon-easy, sustainability-leading building and was the first community college building in the US to receive a LEED platinum rating. It’s a favored location for Silicon Valley conferences and events.

DeAnza College consistently ranks #1 or #2 in the state annually for the number of students who transfer to the University of California and California State University campuses. The college ranked #10 in the CNN Money listing of top community colleges in 2012. DeAnza ranked #45 in the 2010 Washington Monthly ranking of the top 100 U.S. community colleges.

Georgia Military College

Best Community Colleges: Georgia Military College (GA)

Georgia Military College, established in 1879 and located in Milledgeville, Georgia, is a co-educational liberal arts junior college and a separate preparatory school (grades 6-12). GMC focuses its educational programs on two facets: 1) Development of the intellect and 2) Elevation of character and three values: Duty, Honor and Country.

The main campus in Milledgeville serves approximately 275 full-time, resident ROTC students (the Corps of Cadets) and 200-300 commuting students. GMC’s 5 distance learning centers and 2 extension offices in Atlanta, Augusta, Columbus, Madison, Sandersville, Valdosta and Warner Robins serve ~4,000 students.
The distance learning centers also serve as junior colleges to their local communities. The preparatory school’s ACCEL Program enables qualified seniors to attend classes at the junior college and the high school simultaneously, while earning credit for both their high school diploma and their college degree.

GMC is one of five military junior colleges in the Army’s Early Commissioning Program (ECP). Cadets who graduate from the college’s two-year, military science-oriented curriculum receive an officer’s commission in the U.S. Army.

After completing the two-year degree, GMC graduates pursuing a 4-year degree at Georgia’s senior military college, North Georgia College and State University (NGC&SU) in Dahlonega, Georgia qualify for a transfer scholarship. After completing their four-year degrees, they are promoted as a 1st Lieutenant in the US Army. In addition, numerous articulation agreements exist between allied colleges.

The college offers 3 degrees: Associate of Arts (AA), Associate of Science (AS) and Associate of Applied Science (AAS) in a variety of study areas, e.g. Criminal Justice, Human Communication, Logistics Management, International Affairs, Psychology.

GMC’s classes are small, typically no more than 15 students, and ensuring individual attention; for students who request it. Every course provides free tutoring.

College Atlas.org named MMI one of the top 25 community colleges. The college ranked #9 in the CNN Money listing of community colleges in 2012. GMC ranked #12 in the 2010 Washington Monthly ranking of top 100 U.S. community colleges.

Victor Valley College

Best Community Colleges: Victor Valley College (CA)

Victor Valley Community College, located in Victorville, California, offers associate degrees in an array of areas. The community college offers majors such as business management, registered nursing, music, welding, agriculture and natural resources, animation, criminal justice and construction technology. The college offers traditional classes and some online classes.

Victor Valley Community College, one of the largest community colleges in California, has about 12,000 full-time students.

Victor Valley College’s Health Science/Public Safety/Industrial Technology division provides career technical education.

The Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (S.T.E.M.) division prepares students to transfer to four-year colleges and universities and prepares them for careers requiring a math or science background.

The Victor Valley College Office of Instruction provides traditional classes, online classes and hybrid classes

The community college also provides the Instructional Programs, Humanities, Arts & Letters Division

Victor Valley Community College provides vocational technology labs in agriculture, engineering, construction, welding and in other fields.

The Center for institutional Excellence provides guidance and support for all the school’s academic and non-academic programs on campus. The center evaluates change and offers best educational practices via evaluations and program reviews.

Victor Valley College ranked #3 in the CNN Money listing of top community colleges in 2012.

Southeast Community College Lincoln

Best Community Colleges: Southeast Community College Lincoln (NE)

Southeast Community College Lincoln (SCC-Lincoln), a community college network, is located in the southeast portion of Nebraska. It has three campuses and more than 20 learning centers in a 15-county district. The annual enrollment of full-time and part-time commuter students across the various campuses is ~11,000.

SCC-Lincoln provides over 50 programs of study; it also offers 12 online study programs and more than 300 courses each term.

The college awards the Associate of Applied Science Degree, Associate of Arts Degree, Associate of Science Degree, Diploma, and Certificate. The Nebraska Transfer Initiative, a cooperative effort among Nebraska’s higher education institutions, provides a seamless transition for SCC-Lincoln graduates to four-year schools.

For eight consecutive years SCC-Lincoln has produced the most graduates in Precision Production fields (Computer Aided Design Drafting, Machine Tool Technology, Manufacturing Engineering Technology) than any other school in the U.S.

SCC-Lincoln offers workshops, classes and seminars to people of all ages in its Continuing Education Program. The junior college also hosts a nationally-renown Entrepreneurship Center which operates a business incubator for new and growing enterprises.

The community college has a special focus on global education, aiming to infuse global perspectives into all courses to better prepare students for an increasingly global workplace.

Southeast Community College Lincoln ranked #8 in the CNN Money listing of community colleges in 2012 and listed among the top 120 U.S. community colleges by the Aspen Institute in 2011 and 2013. The community college ranked #8 among a list of 786 community colleges in the U.S. for Student Success Rates, based on graduation and retention stats.

Northwest Iowa Community College

Best Community Colleges: Northwest Iowa Community College (IA)

Northwest Iowa Community College (NWICC), an institution of higher learning, is situated on a large campus in the rural town of Sheldon, Iowa.

For local residents, the Northwest Iowa Lifelong Learning and Recreation Center is a state-of-the-art recreational facility which includes an indoor walking/running track, fitness classes, yoga, Pilates, indoor cycling, training with certified personal trainers, and much more.

Northwest Iowa Community College offers vocational technical programs and arts and sciences transfer courses, a total of 43 programs. Examples of areas of stuffy include:

• Engineering Design
• Photography
• Early Childhood Education
• Paralegal
• Natural Resources & Conservation

NWICC’s student placement rate averages 98% and its skilled specialist programs have consistently had 100% employment success for its graduates.

The junior college has transfer agreements with universities throughout the Midwest, including South Dakota State University, University of Iowa, and Iowa State University.

Enrollment in credit programs is approximately 2,000 annually; non-credit enrollment exceeds 28,000 for students of high school completion, continuing education, online education and skill training services for area businesses.

The NWICC College for High School Students offers a chance for some to complete their high school diploma and begin career training or college-level study.

The NW Iowa Development Network is comprised of local and regional businesses and partners with NWICC and the Iowa Department of Economic Development (IDED) to address the rapid growth in the rural sector of NW Iowa.

Northwest Iowa Community College ranked #7 in the CNN Money listing of community colleges in 2012 and The Aspen Institute listed NW Iowa Community College among the top 10% of U.S. community colleges in 2013.