Cavin shares "State of the Collge 2010"
The CommuterFriday, January 22, 2010
LBCC President Rita Cavin sent her “State of the College 2010” to all campus employees this week:
STATE OF THE COLLEGE 2010: THE FORWARD PASS
There is no way to thank all of you enough for the support and guidance you have given me for the last six and a half years. As I prepare my office for the next president it is time to reflect, take stock and look forward to the wonderful opportunities awaiting Linn-Benton Community College and its students. Remember, when opportunity knocks on our door — open it.
WE LIVE TO SERVE
Enrollment is off the charts for winter term. There has been a 50% increase in placement tests and we have received 1500 applications compared to a historic high of 1000. Financial Aid has processed 10,000 FAFSAs to date compared to 6000 during all of last year. I thank and commend all of our faculty and staff for helping students find options, make arrangements and work within our financial and facility limitations. It is clear that the work Student Services is engaged in to improve academic planning is enhancing our ability to serve more students than ever before. Our enrollment surge illustrates that the community agrees that LBCC is the pathway to a new life.
Thank you to everyone who has helped with the parking challenges this year. Due to our liquid sunshine we can’t park on the lawn as we did in the fall. Central Willamette Credit Union generously allowed us to park on the north side of their parking lot for the first week. Please encourage the use of buses, car pools, drop offs, swimming, surfing and alternate rides.
THE GREEN MACHINE
Did you read about it in the paper? We now have electric vehicle charging stations in front of the Activity Center. Madrone Hall is full to the brim with students. Thank you to everyone who worked to make this Impossible Dream come true. You never gave up. You were creative and dedicated. I know that the moving in period will stretch your patience to the absolute limit. Building a new facility is a little like having a new baby: the anticipation and waiting, the pain and labor of delivery, the celebration at the birth – we are now in the 2 a.m. feeding and constant tending stage. This period will pass and Madrone Hall will be a shining example of sustainability leadership in our community.
MORE GREEN NEWS
Joel has announced that LBCC will be offering the Climate Master Program which parallels the Master Gardener Program. This model program is in partnership with OSU, UO, Benton County extension, and Climate Master.
A SHINING SPOTLIGHT ON LEBANON
The opportunity for LBCC to be a participant in the College of Osteopathic Medicine of the Pacific medical campus opens many new doors for our students. As a part of this partnership between Samaritan Health Services and Western University of Health Sciences, we envision a Nursing and Allied Health Center that will give us room to expand existing programs, develop new allied health programs as the community need emerges, build a ADN-BSN-MSN pipeline for nursing students, and support our national leadership in health career distance education. We anticipate a synergistic partnership with all other academic entities on the medical campus.
The Advanced Transportation Technology Center (ATTC) will create leadership opportunities for our Automotive, Heavy Equipment, Diesel and John Deere programs. The building will include space for corporate certification training that could create a revenue stream for LBCC. Both the City of Lebanon and Snap-on Tools are working with LBCC to move this project forward. We have asked for and expect to receive a Federal appropriation to contribute to the building of this facility. Kudos to Fred Haynes and our faculty for envisioning these possibilities and advocating for his dream.
The East Linn Center will continue to support general education and our high school partnerships. The Lebanon school district is very interested in increasing participation in the Beyond LHS program which is now in the fourth full year of operation. This innovative program is seen within the community as helping students move successfully from high school to college. Bruce will be meeting with the Lebanon Superintendent Rob Hess to lay out plans for the future.
OVER THE RAINBOW: OUR NEXT BIG PROJECT
Our Gateway project will be the front door to our Albany campus. Not only will Takena expand north into the courtyard, but it will expand south as a transportation hub to support students awaiting car pools and the loop bus. In addition to Takena being remodeled for 21st century student services and for our increased enrollment, this project will include a new building – a sister building to Madrone Hall – that will fill in the lawn south of Willamette Hall.
This new facility will house an expanded Culinary Arts Program that will integrate in exciting and innovative ways with students and our community. Our Culinary Arts Program is a signature program of Linn-Benton Community College and our Gateway Project is designed to showcase it. We will use our Academic Master Plan to determine which other instructional programs will be included in the Gateway. This project is highly placed on the list of state appropriations for community colleges and it will be our job to match the state construction money. As a new building at LBCC, it will incorporate green principles.
NEW PROGRAMS
LBCC has received approval of its Occupational Therapy Assistants Program which is based on the same statewide distance learning model as our award winning Diagnostic Imaging Program. Our first cohort of students will begin in fall 2010. This program is yet another example of LBCC’s innovative leadership – maybe there’s another crystal trophy in our future.
Scott and John have expanded the Culinary Arts Program into the afternoon and evening with classes in international food, pastry and baking. Thank you for providing more community access to our popular Culinary Arts Program.
Beth Hogeland has led a wonderful community study of our Theater Program. The plan that has been developed will blossom into a Theater Program that mirrors and enhances our award-winning Music Program led by James Reddan. You can be proud that LBCC continues to support our humanities programs. If we are to continue as a shining light in the community, it is important to bring beauty and meaning to our community. The efforts of our fine and performing arts faculty and students make LBCC a more joyful place to work and study. Thank you!
DATA, DATA, DATA
It’s time again for our graduate survey – BJ reports that it is our culture of tenacity that makes our culture of evidence so darn rich. LBCC has a history of high response rate from graduates because we call them again and again until we get the follow-up information we need.
Jeff is leading a task force to explore new avenues of service in Benton County. It’s no secret that Benton Center enrollments have exploded and that we are parking lot challenged. It will be interesting to see the task force recommendations that are due this spring.
When we complete the staff diversity climate survey we will be able to analyze both the student and staff impressions of the diversity of LBCC. The results of these paired surveys will help us chart our future as we celebrate the gifts of diversity.
KUDOS
Our Business Office published its own financial statement for the first time and recently received an unqualified audit report. Thank you to the staff for taking our work to the next level.
Ann Malosh, Stacy Mallory, and Marcene Olson recently published an article in the Community College Journal of Research and Practice entitled “Going the Distance: Taking a Diagnostic Imaging Program to Frontier and Rural Oregon.”
Congratulations.
Alan fudge has published an interesting article in Officials’ Quarterly entitled “Tax Basics for Officials.” Alan, who directs the Small Business Development Center, is a certified public accountant and a baseball umpire.
Thank you for your generosity during difficult economic times. Many of you understood that our students need help now more than ever and contributed to scholarships in the Foundation Annual Fund Drive, to the United Way drive and to various food and coat drives. We should all take a moment to be grateful for our blessings and our ability to share with others.
WHY DO SO MANY GIVE TO LBCC?
We have many friends in the community. Our friends understand that an investment in the college is an investment in the community. That is why local business and industry, chambers of commerce, our local hospital, our elected representatives and our graduates find ways to support us and our students. This support comes in many forms – support for facilities such as Madrone Hall, contributions to endowments and scholarships, unrestricted gifts to the Foundation, gifts of property and equipment, and gifts in wills. It is this generosity that allows us to grow and to serve. It also inspires us to be worthy of their confidence and trust.
THE OTHER GREEN STUFF
I guess it wouldn’t be a State of the College report without talking about state appropriation money. In the last biennium Oregon community colleges received $500M from the state. In this biennium we are receiving only $450M. We have already balanced our budget to this lower appropriation. Depending, not only on the results of the election, but also on the depth and length of Oregon’s recession, the Legislature may make a decision in February to take some of the $450M away from us. The reduction to our income could happen as soon as April.
On the positive side, LBCC worked together to save over $500,000 last year through Close Position Review (CPR) – reviewing every job opening as an opportunity to restructure the work in an area or to hold the position open, not automatically filling it. This year, using the same procedure and principles, we have saved over $120,000 and we are projecting that our 09-10 savings may be more than they were last year. We are also receiving more than we budgeted in tuition and fees because of the enrollment surge. Of course we don’t net all the tuition and fee money – it costs to add classes. But CPR has created a financial safety net. Thank you for your help, creativity and understanding as we keep positions open.
We plan to hang onto the safety net – not spend the money – to see if we need it to backfill any losses from the state. We can also increase tuition to fill in a state appropriation gap. Stay tuned for more information as the situation evolves – we will know more after the election.
THE LAST SOAPBOX: INVESTING IN EDUCATION
The state’s investment in community college students has decreased from $2800 per FTE in 05-07 to $2002 in 09-11. When the state decreases its investment in students it is also decreasing its investment in our workforce, business and industry, and our communities. While state investments in prisons may make us feel safer, the reduction of investment in post-secondary education closes the door on hope. When our poorest students can’t go to college we create a state of permanent poverty – not just for those students and their families, but for our communities. We are thrown into the cycle of taking college investments and spending them on law enforcement and corrections, substance abuse, and uninsured health care.
Our poorest students who attend college bring with them Pell grant money from the federal government. These grants flow into the community as the students use the money to pay for not only their education, but for groceries, rent, and gasoline. Pell grant money flows through student recipients directly into the poorest neighborhoods where they live. Our students brought $1.7M in Pell grant money to Linn and Benton counties in fall 08; in fall 09 they brought $3.5M.
When the state closes the door on these students by running out of promised Oregon Opportunity Grant funds, they are hurting more than the students. There is a dire economic ripple effect throughout our community. During tough economic times college students and small businesses are in the same leaky boat. It is important to be informed of the unintended consequences of shortsighted fiscal policy. Reduced spending power and lower enrollments of OSU and LBCC will close businesses in our communities.
KEEPING IT IN PERSPECTIVE:
You may have noticed that we are in a deep recession – it will end. They always end. The last element of a recession to improve is the unemployment rate and Oregon’s rate is higher than other states. But it will end. It is important to keep bad news in perspective and not to be overwhelmed by media reports of catastrophe. The advent of 24 hour news and news rating wars has increased sensationalism and simplistic “bumper sticker” messages that pass for thoughtful analysis.
When I was little polio was a killer. It was hard to imagine a world without polio – now, thanks to Jonas Salk and significant efforts to eradicate the disease, it is almost gone from the world. I grew up in an era of bomb shelters and “drop and cover”. I remember stocking up on canned goods during the Cuban Missile Crisis that was going to be the start of a nuclear war, the Berlin Wall that was never going to come down, the Arms Race that would never end, the battles in Northern Ireland that had no solution, Viet Nam and the draft, the Watts riots, and long gas lines. I remember where I was and what I was doing for the King and both Kennedy assassinations. I remember the fate of the Challenger.
These crises pass. History softens the “nevers” and finds solutions to the unsolvable. Then we are presented with new challenges. What overrides those tragedies in our memory are the inspirational “ask what you can do for your country” and “I have a dream” moments. It is important to remember that the Berlin Wall came down, the draft ended, the Soviet Union dissolved, and Magic Johnson built a multiplex theater in Watts. If we only focus on what is tragic, we miss the moon landing, the hope embedded in inaugurations, and the confidence of a new generation.
I encourage you to focus on hope, inspiration and the potential of our students rather than the daily talk shows that foster intolerance, the news headlines designed to scare you, and the idea that our problems are unsolvable. We are educators, we are hopeful, we believe in complexity and nuance, we celebrate diversity, we believe that learning changes lives.
Rita
Comment
Commenting is closed for this article.
