Establishing a Real-World Credential

Community College of the Air Force to award 300,000th associate degree.

By David Pluviose

With 342,000 students enrolled in 102 Air Force-affiliated schools, the Community College of the Air Force is the world’s largest two-year higher education institution. Headquartered at Maxwell Air Force Base in Alabama, CCAF was founded in 1972 as a means of establishing a real-world credential for training given to enlisted personnel — an associate of applied science degree. CCAF remains the only regionally accredited two-year institution in the U.S. armed services, and the college will be celebrating the awarding of its 300,000th associate degree this fall. Last year, the college conferred 16,771 such degrees.

Community colleges nationwide have been scrambling to cover gaping budget shortfalls as state and local government appropriations continue to dwindle. Col. Thomas D. Klincar, CCAF’s commandant and the first minority to lead the college, attended a session at this year’s American Association of Community Colleges conference that addressed some innovative ways community colleges are working to make ends meet.

For example, several community colleges are pooling resources to form state centers of excellence in order to participate in expensive new DNA research. Klincar, however, thanks “generous taxpayers” for allowing CCAF to stay on the cutting edge for more than 30 years.

“If you attend your typical community college, they’re somewhat resource constrained, based on what their sponsoring government can push in their direction,” he says. “I won’t say the Community College of the Air Force isn’t resource constrained, but the Air Force spent $2.5 billion last year on education and training, and we leverage those programs into this regionally accredited program.”

CCAF is on the verge of launching its Associate to Baccalaureate Cooperative Program, designed to be a 2+2 articulation agreement with 20 civilian four-year colleges. The program will allow CCAF graduates to transfer 100 percent of their credits into a range of bachelor’s programs, including business, computer information systems and emergency and disaster management. Klincar says one of the most useful features of the ABC program is its distance-learning component, which will allow enlisted Air Force personnel to participate even while deployed overseas.