President’s Update for July 17, 2008
A friendly summer’s hello!
It’s been quite sometime since the last blog has been written. The school year’s break and summer term have been quite pleasant. And the great summer time weather does not add to motivate writing during evening hours as is the typical case for these communications to the campus.
It has been a great summer time experience so far with the pleasant weather and sunshine. Additionally, my son, Tom, has returned for a break from firefighting in northern California. That both comforts me and gets my thoughts moving in another direction. It’s very good to have him home and safe.
There’s been a great deal that’s happened since my last posting. There were many great moments to celebrate with the different graduations including Medical Assisting, Nursing, High School Completion, Fire Training and our annual commencement. Great joy and celebration for many on their accomplishments! Additionally, our internal “leadership academy” honored 22 employees for their participation and contributions as leaders within the college community. Through their efforts and ideas the college will commit greater efforts to the need of sustainability. In this next year and beyond, you will hear more about this important topic.
Last week the Board of Trustees approved the 2008-2009 annual budget. We’ve seen considerable progress toward a more stable financial condition for the college in the past twelve months with enrollment growth and meeting state targets, positive constraints with expenditures and the attainment of an increase in fund balance. This most definitely places the college in a better position to move forward with initiatives that will contribute to even greater fiscal stability.
Next year’s annual budget includes positives for the college: salary increases for all employees; implementation of a new and proactive collective bargaining agreement with faculty; new positions for faculty, facilities, grounds, human resources, accounting services and the International Education Program. All of these positions will assist in developing new initiatives to increase access to education and to generate new enrollments for the college.
The school year is off to a very good beginning with projected increases in summer and fall enrollments. This is very good news as we’ve budgeted for student enrollment increases of 102 FTE this next year. We’re very optimistic that these can be attained.
In addition to the new enrollment initiatives in various areas including math and science, we hope to increase student involvement in international education, corporate training and education, new degree programs, efforts with the Tulalips and ongoing efforts to recruit new students considering costs of travel and related expenses. We continue with the College commitment and efforts in expanding our activities in Monroe, as you may have recently read about in a newspaper article. We achieved some important initial goals, but still have a number of hurdles to increase access to more educational programs in that area of the county.
We will also begin and, in fact, have already done so with discussions in the northern communities of the county. Our efforts there will increase in the next year. Considering the cost of transportation, these initiatives could not be more timely.
There are a number of personnel searches that are ongoing in the areas of VP’s for Student Services and College Advancement. There are Dean level searches to be completed in Health Education, Adult Learning, and Business and Workforce Education. The Director for International Education search has moved into a reference checking phase and an announcement will be forthcoming. And then, the newly approved positions in this years budget will soon begin the recruitment efforts.
In light of the increased costs of transportation for both students and employees, we continue to have discussions regarding campus operational hours. There will be several campus surveys concerning this topic so please participate so that we might secure more ideas and thoughts on this topic. Any change in hours/days will not occur sooner than winter quarter, if then. But we do need to examine this topic.
The new style guide for the campus logo went into the full phase of implementation on July 1. Please refer to the guide and use the new logo materials for all publications and printed materials. Contact Katherine Schiffner with any questions.
So, hopefully, you are getting some time away from work and enjoying this season with family and friends. We will be heading back to the flooded mid-west at the end of this month for several weeks to celebrate birthdays and spend time with family. My youngest sister’s family did evacuate their home for two weeks and now are in the rebuilding phase so we will see some of the destruction. But I am looking more to visiting and enjoying our celebrations.
Have a great rest of the summer.