TThe budget crunch in California has many ripples. One of the small but significant ripples affects California community colleges.</p><p>Because there are now so many students wanting to take community college classes -- because of severely reduced funding -- and such a limited number of classes available, many prospective students are being turned away.</p><p>There is now talk statewide about placing a limit on which students can enter a community college and enroll in credit classes.</p><p>One proposal is to exclude from credit classes all adults who, according to their assessment tests, have reading scores three levels below university-level course work. If this happens, thousands of students now taking courses for credit would be ineligible to do so and would be limited to taking noncredit courses.</p><p>Adults assessed at "three levels below university course work" are reading at the norm for high school freshmen. </p><p>Some people think that students reading at this level have too big an educational hurdle to overcome to be successful in college.</p><p>But I disagree. In the last three years I have been teaching reading classes to community college students who start at this level. I have found them to be typically bright, motivated, eager and able to learn and to succeed in college.</p><p>Their problem is that somewhere along the line, schooling didn't "click" or life got in the way. Maybe they weren't ready or willing to learn in high school. Perhaps they needed to learn in ways different from the pedagogies they experienced.</p><p>Maybe they had to work, tend to a seriously ill parent or became pregnant. In some cases they might have been discouraged from succeeding in school by peers or even family members.</p><p>But now, at whatever age (18 to 58 was the age range in my class last fall), these adults are ready to learn. Currently -- as long as regulations don't change -- community colleges have the opportunity, and the challenge, of providing credit classes to these students.</p><p>I say challenge because community colleges need to find new approaches to teaching and learning, in order to bring out the talent and potential of these adults. Within these approaches three elements are needed: well-designed curriculum, creative pedagogy and, most of all, outstanding teachers.</p><p>Students who have not developed college-level skills especially need teachers who can make a difference in their lives -- talented, passionate professionals who not only know their subjects well but are familiar with the science of cognition and understand how the brain works.</p><p>Two colleagues at Merced College who are reading specialists, Meg in Los Banos and Pam in Merced, agree. They contend that the first step in teaching adults who lack academic foundational skills is cognitive retraining.</p><p>Their viewpoint corresponds with recent studies in cognition theory. Psychologists like professor Carol Dweck of Stanford University have found that the brain is a flexible and adaptive organism. It can develop and grow new cells at any age. It can find new pathways to learn.</p><p>Neurologists, like Oliver Sacks in his recent book "The Mind's Eye," have shown that for a person to read well, neurons in different parts of the brain have to fire correctly and in sync. If this isn't happening, there are ways of retraining the brain to function more efficiently.</p><p>Meg and Pam have found that a kind of brain retraining can work. With the right curriculum, pedagogy and teaching, students taking classes three levels below university course work are able to use new approaches to reading and succeed, often jumping two reading levels in one semester.</p><p>As we begin a new semester this month at the Los Banos Campus of Merced College, I am glad that all Californians with an ability to benefit, including those reading at three levels below university course work, can still enroll in credit community college classes.</p><p>I'm even happier that teachers like Meg and Pam are enabling them to reach their academic potential.</p><p>On another note: I hope anyone interested in the autumn Italian holiday trip will join Joanne, Margaret and me at the Vagabond Inn at 7 p.m. on Jan. 25 to hear more about it and enjoy the "flavors of Italy."</p><p>Comments on the writings of John Spevak, an Enterprise columnist for 28 years, are encouraged, and can be sent via email to john.spevak@gmail.com.