COMMUNITY-COLLEGE GEOGRAPHY - A QUESTION OF PLACE

The claim is made that community college enrollment accounts for one-h alf of the enrollment in higher education. It would be reasonable to a ssume, therefore, that a significant amount of geographic instruction, particularly at the introductory level, takes place in community coll eges. Despite this fact, community college geography remains in many w ays a substantial terra incognita. It is not easy to generalize the re lationship of community college geography to the discipline. Community college geography is so varied that discussion of the nature, scope, and standards of community college geography prevents simple generaliz ations. Understanding geography in community colleges involves the con sideration of several questions of place. What is the place of communi ty colleges in the structure of higher education? How has the place of the two-year college become marginal to higher education over recent decades? What kind of a place is a community college to work in? In th is paper I will rely on personal observation and a review of the liter ature in an attempt to focus some of the questions regarding community college geography and its relationship to the discipline.