President’s Update - March 12, 2008
Good Afternoon!
The end of winter quarter, and hopefully, winter season is behind us. These terms expire more quickly each year. Perhaps, that’s due to the continued excitement of working in such a dynamic learning environment with students diligently working to meet their daily challenges and talented faculty and staff members dedicated in providing the necessary life’s skills and knowledge for them to succeed.
Last Thursday several of us witnessed an example of incredible student success as a result of this important community college work at the annual dinner (28 years) of the Center for Career Alternatives. It was held at the Sheraton Seattle with about 600 attendees there to honor several successful students and many others who contribute to these individuals. Kyla Skinner, a student in the EVCC Youth Re-Engagement Program this past year, gave a stunning speech about her families challenges (drug addiction and her mother’s death) and how she has managed to work through these difficulties with a 4.0 grade point average and continued aspirations to succeed in a nursing career. She thanked many who worked with her including the
And there are many more examples of similar successes that occur on this campus daily. The work, thought and commitment that is expended by you maybe one reason our times seems to pass by so rapidly.
The Board of Trustees will conduct their regular monthly meeting this evening and it will occur in Whitehorse. The agenda is full and includes a presentation on the recent faculty Leadership and Innovation Award as well as updates from Board members on several conferences they attended this past month. Board action will take place on the proposed academic calendars, faculty professional leave proposals, and faculty tenure and renewal recommendations. And we will recognize the All Academic teams members and Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship nominees. It will be a busy evening.
In terms of other items of interest, we continue to wait on the legislative deliberations, and while there will be few actions that are the result of many weeks of work with our representatives, we continue to be interested in hearing about the final outcome of the proposed Opportunity Grant reduction. We have attempted to intercede with more information about the important work of this program and hope our efforts will pay off with the restoration of funding.
Speaking of funding, the college’s budget deliberations continue and there should be more budget hearings in the next several weeks, once the legislature has released their budget for this next year. We also await the release of numbers which will allow us to figure what allocation levels we have received. Enrollments for this year appear heading in a positive direction and so we are optimistic. Several budget issues that will receive considerable attention include increased marketing and publications funding, Hi-Q,adding campus security, increased custodial personnel, international education initiatives, and restoration of last year’s budget reductions. We have committed to three new faculty positions that are currently being recruited. And we are also recruiting for vacant faculty positions from last year, the HR leadership position, campus security director, and will begin the IT director and VP for Student Services in coming months. The bookstore director and Executive Director of Corporate Training searches have been completed.
So there remain considerable decisions and actions prior to the end of this school year.
Finally, to end this blog posting, we congratulate Tina Evans on her recent award received several weeks ago as an “Outstanding Educator” in Professional and Technical Programs. Congratulations and thanks for all your work.
My next scheduled presidential chat is tomorrow at 12:30 in the Olympus Board Room. Hope to see you there.
Have a great week and upcoming spring break!
David