The California community colleges represent one of the few remaining tuition-free postsecondary systems, a position strengthened by recent legislation establishing a no-fee policy for all credit classes and removing the 21-year-old "defined adult" State funding limitation. Today's community college students average 25 years of age, most are married and working, with incomes in the lower and middle economic groups, and two-thirds enroll part-time. That tuition/fee imposition results directly in restricted opportunities for higher education is illustrated in studies by the First National Bank of New York, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, the American Council on Education, Stanford Research Institute, and the Educational Testing Service veterans' study. The University of Wisconsin lowered tuition at two of its two-year centers with resultant enrollment increases of 47% and 23%, illustrating the relationship of tuition and enrollment. Arguments for increasing tuition while also increasing student aid ignore evidence that the need is greater than available funds, that only the poor benefit, and that funds are subject to political pressure. Also, aid programs are not designed for today's older, part-time students. For them and a healthy community college system, the only financing solution is the continuation of a tuition-free policy. (RT)