The Brownwood School Board met Monday night with several issues and reports on the agenda.  Under General Communications, Ranger College’s Bill Champion came to speak to the board regarding Ranger College serving the local area.

Champion expressed how Ranger will strive to work with the school to offer dual credit courses.  He also congratulated Dr. Reese Blincoe for the initiative that the school board is developing, which would be a new honor to graduates who complete 30 hours of college credit during high school, called the Lone Star Graduate.  Under this program, students would be able to take college credits and be reimbursed up to $1,000 for their tuition expenses, giving them their first 30 hours of college at virtually no cost.

Blincoe mentioned that it is also in the works, with the help of one of our Senators, to make this a statewide initiative.

One other point of interest in Champion’s speech, he mentioned that during the fall of 2009, there were 477 Brownwood graduates attending a community college.  It was promised that Ranger College would work extra hard to be Brownwood’s local community college, making it more available for the students that choose community colleges to attend the local Ranger College.  He mentioned that community college students are usually not the same students that attend a 4 year college/university and that they are not a competitor for Howard Payne.  The local community college would offer a local choice to students that may move off for school, and also a chance for others to attend college that cannot afford to move away from home…making a beneficial relationship between Ranger College and the local community.