Fall enrollment is about 12,200 students, up 12 percent on the year and 27 percent higher than two years ago. Like Reddin, thousands of veterans are enrolling in community colleges, especially in areas with large military populations such as San Diego and northern Florida.īunker Hill is the largest community college in Massachusetts. Military benefits will pay for his tuition, books and, ultimately, a housing allowance. military in Iraq and Afghanistan, lives in a Boston shelter for homeless veterans. economic downturn has forced many families to look for less expensive ways to send their kids to college, and encouraged older workers to pick up new skills.Īmong the BHCC night students is 29-year-old Eric Reddin, taking his first college class.

Nationally, enrollment in community colleges surged by 16.9 percent to 8 million in fall 2009 from two years earlier, according to the American Association of Community Colleges.

But on the other end of the spectrum, community college enrollment across America is surging as students on a budget look for a way to get a higher education. But the hardscrabble school, which sits in the shadow of an interstate highway, seems a million miles away from prestigious Harvard, frequently ranked the best university in the world.Ĭompetition to get into schools like Harvard is always intense. “Students are looking for a way to start their college career, and all the day, weekend and early evening classes were closed.”īunker Hill, in Boston’s Charlestown neighborhood, is about 3 miles (4.8 km) from Harvard University. “The idea of midnight classes was something of a novelty, but it’s turned into a necessity,” said BHCC President Mary Fifield. Welcome to Bunker Hill Community College instructor Charles Daniel’s writing class, one of five this semester scheduled from 11:45 p.m. Students listen to professor Christian Agunwamba during their 'Fundamentals of Algebra' class, which is held from 11:45pm to 2:30am, at Bunker Hill Community College in Boston, Massachusetts September 9, 2010, one of five midnight classes offered this semester due to surging enrollment.

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