🔒Bill to allow accelerated three-year bachelor’s degrees at CT colleges dies in committee

A bill that would have allowed Connecticut colleges and universities to offer accelerated bachelor’s degree programs died in the state’s Higher Education and Employment Advancement Committee this week, despite support from the state’s hospital association and a coalition of private colleges that backed the proposal as a workforce development tool. Senate Bill 396 would have permitted higher education institutions in Connecticut to seek approval from their regional accreditor, the New England Commission of Higher Education, to offer accelerated bachelor’s degrees requiring 90 credit hours instead of the traditional 120. The committee chose not to act on the bill before its Tuesday deadline, effectively killing it for the session. The committee’s Democratic co-chairs, Sen. Derek Slap and Rep. Gregory Haddad, said their caucus did not support the bill as written, citing concerns about academic standards and the potential confusion a shorter degree could create in the marketplace. “There are real concerns about redefining a bachelor’s degree and reducing the academic standards for a liberal arts education by 25%,” the co-chairs said in a joint statement. They raised a series of questions about the proposal, including whether employers and graduate schools would recognize the degrees, how they would be distinguished from traditional bachelor’s degrees, and whether students would be better served by existing pathways such as dual and concurrent enrollment programs. In testimony submitted before the committee’s deadline, the Connecticut Business & Industry Association, the Connecticut Hospital Association, the Connecticut Conference of Independent Colleges, Goodwin University, Quinnipiac University, the University of Hartford, the University of New Haven, Mitchell College and the University of Bridgeport all backed the measure. Jennifer Widness, president of the Connecticut Conference of Independent Colleges, said that CCIC is “deeply concerned” by the committee’s inaction on the bill. She said the bill would have allowed institutions to explore select majors for innovative, lower-cost degree pathways under strict accreditation oversight on a case-by-case basis. “We hope policymakers will consider revisiting this issue soon to support responsible innovation that meets the needs of today’s students and employers,” Widness said. Goodwin University President Mark Scheinberg testified that the 90-credit degree is not a replacement for the traditional four-year model but a targeted, competency-based pathway for specific high-demand fields. He said the university anticipated only a small percentage of its offerings would follow the accelerated model, primarily in sectors with acute labor shortages. Opposition to the bill came primarily from faculty at the state’s public universities. Wynn Gadkar-Wilcox, president of the WCSU-AAUP and a history professor at Western Connecticut State University, testified that the bill would erode educational quality and produce degrees regarded by the public as inferior. Gadkar-Wilcox is the husband of Sen. Sujata Gadkar-Wilcox, who serves as vice chair of the Higher Education Committee. He argued that 90-credit programs would cut into general education requirements and undermine associate degrees offered at CT State Community College. New England Commission of Higher Education Vice President Laura Gambino testified that her accreditation group has approved institutions in Rhode Island, New Hampshire and Maine to offer bachelor’s degrees with fewer than 120 credits, but only on a limited basis — no more than five programs per institution. Massachusetts has finalized a pathway for approving three-year degree proposals, with support from Gov. Maura Healey’s office. Indiana, Minnesota and Utah have also moved forward with similar programs.