Over earlier objections from the state’s Department of Higher Education, Gov. Bill Ritter has agreed to give college-bound students in Colorado’s high country a new way opportunity to earn bachelor’s degrees in their own communities .

Signed into law by the governor last week, Senate Bill 101 grants Colorado Mountain College , a network of campuses spread across the mountains, the authority to offer four-year degrees in addition to two-year programs already in place.

When the bill was up for debate in the recently concluded 2010 legislative session, Rico Munn, the executive director of the Colorado Department of Higher Education, told lawmakers that he opposed the bill because the department is in the midst of putting together a strategic plan for the whole state and that CMC was jumping the gun.

“We’ve got a system of higher education, and what that means is that we’ve got to go with a system of system-wide planning, and CMC is going at it alone,” Munn said earlier this year.

Munn was persuaded to change the department’s position after an amendment was adopted that limited the number of degree programs to five rather than an open-ended number although some sources say the support was given reluctantly. Despite any lingering reluctance, Munn was present for the bill signing.

“When SB101 was introduced, the Department of Higher Education opposed the bill because it proposed a major systemic change at the same time the state had just begun a statewide higher education strategic planning process,” said Munn. “We worked with Sen. Gibbs and CMC to narrow the bill’s scope and to … look at certain criteria such as demand and cost to the state before approving any programs.”

Ritter, Munn’s boss, said he believes that higher education is one of the single best drivers for economic development and welcomed CMC into the fold of Colorado’s four-year institutions of higher learning.

“Today, CMC enters that conversation in a different and distinguished way,” said Ritter. The governor did not address the concerns of the CDHE.

The two Democratic bill sponsors, Sen. Dan Gibbs, of Silverthorne, and Rep. Christine Scanlan, of Dillon, both former CMC students, were on hand to witness their bill signed into law and said they were pleased that local students would have even more opportunities.

“Currently, mountain communities are exporting their residents because they can’t get four-year degrees in their towns,” said Scanlan. “This new law will stimulate our local economies by home-growing our own college grads who may become teachers or business owners in our communities.”

Dr. Stan Jensen, president of Colorado Mountain College, said the change will be an expansion of, not a replacement for, what he said the college does best – provide mountain communities with quality higher education for all who seek it.

“We will continue to be a servant to our communities,” said Jensen. “We will continue to be a community college. We will continue to welcome every student, whether they’re a valedictorian or whether they’re not quite ready for college.”