A closer relationship between Los Rios Community College District and Sacramento State began with a breakfast between two old friends. Los Rios Chancellor Brice Harris and Sac State President Alexander Gonzalez, first became friends while working at Fresno colleges during the 1990s.

These two leaders signed a memorandum of understanding Feb. 2 that will pave the way for improved cooperation between the two systems, enabling transfer students to graduate sooner and eventually bring Sac State courses to community college campuses.

“Alexander Gonzalez was the driving force behind this agreement,” Harris said. “He recognized that we ought to develop a compact. This will be an effort to marry up the programs at the community colleges with the university.”

Evidence of how this collaboration will benefit students can be seen in the Sac State nursing program that began an integrated program with Los Rios three years ago, said Mike Lee, special assistant to Gonzalez for planning.

“This is a good model of a seamless transfer,” Lee said. “More units from the community college can transfer.”

Lee stated that before the integrated program started, it took two more years for a student who had earned an associate degree in nursing from Los Rios to earn a bachelor of science degree at Sac State. Now a student can earn that degree with only one year at Sac State.”The first wave of students will graduate this spring,” Lee said. “It really speeds up graduation.”

The first project under the new agreement will be in the culinary art management program. Sac State will build on the culinary programs offered at American River and Cosumnes River colleges by first offering a certificate program and eventually offering a degree in hospitality management, Lee said.

“We’ve had a chance to talk to the business owners in Sacramento,” Lee said. “In the past couple of decades, Sacramento has become a high economic industry. There is an increasing need for high quality hospitality.”

Lee said the integrated program will “open up a new door” for people who are interested in the hospitality field.

Facility sharing is another avenue that the two education systems hope to develop.”We hope that the university could come on our campuses and offer upper division classes,” Harris said.

“As our population grows, many people are beginning to live further away (from Sac State),” Lee said. “It makes a lot of sense to deliver some of our courses taught by our faculty at the community college facilities. It’s a win-win situation.”

Another program discussed in the agreement is a leadership program that will be a joint effort of Los Rios and Sac State to eventually offer an educational doctoral program.

“This will be to train up leadership in the K-12 and at the college level,” Lee said. “Many of the future principals, deans and superintendents could be Sac State graduates through this program.”

The key to success in all these endeavors lies in the cooperation with the two systems, Lee said.

“The faculty will play a big role in this collaboration,” Lee said. “We will continue to devise ways to help students graduate with their degrees before and after they transfer to us.”

“This is just the beginning. This will show our intentions for Sac State to work with Los Rios. The underlying importance of the (memorandum of understanding) is the leadership role of Sac State in this region for higher learning. It’s our role to play.”