CSULB semesters may go year round

By Chris Ledermuller
Daily Forty-Niner

Year-round school may be just around the corner for Cal State Long Beach as summer sessions may be converted to a regular semester due to the steadily increasing student enrollment.

The California State University Chancellor's Office has asked every campus in the system to look into implementing a year-round schedule.

"The enrollment of CSU system is growing rapidly," said Ken Swisher, spokesman for the Chancellor's Office. "Long Beach is one of the campuses where enrollment is growing rapidly.   In order to accommodate these students, one way to do it is to go to a year-round schedule."

One possible solution would be to take the three summer sessions offered through University College and Extension Services and convert them into a regular semester. Although this may shorten the summer break for some students, a regular semester would be less expensive to attend than classes taken during the summer.

With an additional semester, more classes could be offered to satisfy California's rapidly growing enrollment, according to Swisher.

"The enrollment of CSU system will expand from 360,000 to half a million in 10 years," he said.

While the idea for year-round classes has been discussed, CSULB does not currently have any set plans, said Armando Contreras, executive assistant to University President Robert Maxson.

"It's not completely set and done, because it would be a very complicated process that would involve adjusting calendars," he said. "It also has budget implications."

Under the year-round scenario CSULB would also have to find a way to schedule major maintenance work normally performed in the summer when fewer students attend, Contreras said. The Academic Senate must be consulted before such an overhaul is made.

The cost to take a summer class through Extension Services is $130 per unit, compared to $872 for undergraduate California residents taking more than six units and $572 for those taking six or fewer units. Currently the state does not allow financial aid to pay for summer classes, though there have been two pieces of legislation dealing with financial aid and year-round universities that were never passed.

Assembly Bill 126, sponsored by Rep. George Runner, would have established year-round campuses in the CSU and University of California systems but the bill died in committee earlier this year.

Bill 252, sponsored by Rep. Jack Scott, would have allowed financial aid to pay for summer classes but Gov. Gray Davis vetoed the bill on Sept. 7.