Community Colleges: Reshaping an Educational Vision Mary Amsler, 1989 12 pages. Abstract Designed to keep educational practitioners informed of current trends and practices, this policy brief explores the changing identity of the nation's community colleges and presents four special inserts describing specific trends for the community college systems of California, Arizona, Utah, and Nevada, respectively. The brief reviews the traditional access to community colleges provided by the open-door philosophy, which led to rapid growth, a diverse student population, and ultimately a loss of cohesion in the curriculum as remedial programs gained emphasis. Two indicators of the current confusion over the colleges' identity are examined: the controversy over transfer, including the decline in students transferring and bureaucratic hindrances to transfer, and the rapid expansion of occupational education. Finally, the shift in funding and governance from the local- to the state-level is explored as a contributing factor to the changing identity, especially as it has limited educational access by the imposition of new fees and less direct community control. The two-page special inserts discuss responses of four state community college systems to the changes in funding, student demographics, faculty needs, and identity. The inserts include: (1) "Reform for the California Community Colleges," by Aileen Murdock; (2) "Community Colleges in Arizona: The Challenges and the Responses," by Virginia V. Stahl and Robert T. Stout; (3) "Utah's Community Colleges: A Time of Change," by Michael Murphy; and (4) "Nevada's Community Colleges: Portraits of Growth and Change," by Myrna Matranga.