This past fall, the Board of Trustees affirmed four areas of focus to help guide the work at Shoreline Community College during the 2014-15 academic year.
The areas of focus are:
- Increase Enrollment, Retention and Completion
- Leverage Community Engagement
- Develop Human Resources and Physical/Technical Infrastructure
- Strategic Planning
When the areas were adopted in October, President Cheryl Roberts said: “As we move forward, this work will help us create a clear plan to lay the foundation for our strategic plan. Each area of focus includes components that will define and direct our work to meet the needs of our students now and into the future.”
Now, four months into it, Roberts said the college is making good headway.
“We’ve launched projects in every area and our dedicated employees are working together to make progress,” Roberts said. “It may seem like we have a lot of moving parts right now, but they are all aimed at making a difference in the lives of our students.”
Here are some of the things on the college plate that are addressing the areas of focus:
1) Increase Enrollment, Retention and Completion
Student Success Coordinating Committee
Clearly addressing the first area of focus, Vice President for Academic and Student Affairs Bob Francis in December took the moribund strategic enrollment management group and renamed, re-launched and reinvigorated it as the Student Success Coordinating Committee.
The purpose of this large committee is to communicate and coordinate retention efforts, as well as all efforts related to student success, from pre-enrollment contact with the college to the ultimate achievement of students’ educational goals. Francis notes that a key word in name of this group is “coordinating.” The larger group is meeting several times each quarter and forming smaller work groups to implement projects. On the committee’s March 12 agenda, for example, were discussion items for a proposed math work group, a proposed first-year seminar work group, and an update from the orientation and advising work group.
2) Leverage Community Engagement
Shoreline Community College Foundation
Focusing on community engagement, Laura Rehrmann, Special Assistant to the President for Community Engagement, has been working closely with the Shoreline Community College Foundation board members. Foundation Board President Stephanie Santeford, other board members and Rehrmann participated in a board retreat in January that was facilitated by Tom Mesaros of The Alford Group. The retreat worked to align their strategic directions with the college’s current funding needs for student scholarships and capital campaign support to raise $3 million for the Health Sciences and Advanced Manufacturing Complex. At the time Santeford said board members appreciated the retreat and focused outcomes generated by the Foundation board.
“Engaging the community to reinforce existing relationships and establish new partnerships will be an important part of increasing college resources,” Roberts said.
3) Develop Human Resources and Physical/Technical Infrastructure
Diversity project
In January, Roberts announced that she had asked Seattle University Prof. Bob Hughes to help explore the ways in which the college can reflect the growing diversity of the communities it serves. Since then, Dr. Hughes and his associate Ericka Turley have met with groups of employees. Last Tuesday, Hughes met with ELT members to review his finding and propose next steps. “We knew our diversity work needed to be embedded in the life of the college. That was affirmed during our conversations this past week.” Roberts said.
Dr. Hughes is working closely with Vice President for Human Resources and Legal Affairs, Stephen Smith on next steps. Dr. Hughes is charting progress on the work at: diversityworkprogress.blogspot.com. Check out the blog! The information will shared will show our progress and milestones.
Creating welcoming spaces
Shoreline is currently on the state’s list for a new Health Sciences/Advanced Manufacturing complex but not yet funded. She is working closely with our district senators and representatives to work our capital request through the legislative process. Roberts is also interested in making the rest of the campus a more welcoming place for students, employees and community members. Facilities Director Bob Roehl and Executive Director Mary Kelemen are working with Roberts to prioritize projects across campus. Helping with the work is Seong Shin, principal for interior design with McGranahan Architects.
Following campus walk-throughs, an extensive list of potential work was created. “We’re still looking at the list to prioritize, but there is enough work to last the next several years,” Roehl said. Once the list is prioritized, user groups will be created to inform this work.
4) Strategic Planning
Strategic Plan Task Force
“The strategic plan is the foundation,” Roberts said, adding that the effort clearly addresses No. 4 on the areas of focus list. “As the work continues this spring, it will be critical the entire campus and community have opportunities to be involved. We are putting together such opportunities.”
Tom Mesaros, of The Alford Group, Stuart Trippel, Executive Director of Business and Student Support Services and others have been working on putting the initial structure in place for the process to move forward. Planning committee members are being recruited now and will be representative of the constituencies on the campus. That group’s first meeting is anticipated later this month.
The general outline of work for the task force will start with establishing and populating work groups. Each work group will focus one or two strategic areas. “These are typical areas any strategic plan must be addressed, such as facilities, academics, communication and core values of the college,” Roberts said.
A SWOT (strengths, weakness, opportunities and threats) analysis will be done with broad campus and community input. Five to six, one-hour open sessions are anticipated to be scheduled this spring to gather SWOT-related information. In addition, an environmental scan will be conducted. That scan would look at both the on- and off-campus factors such as labor trends and campus data that could have an impact on strategic planning.
Throughout the spring, touch points for the process will include the Strategic Planning and Budget Committee, College Council, the Executive Leadership Team (ELT) as well as opportunities for college-wide review.
The bulk of the information gathering is expected to be finished in June with the Task Force delivering a progress report to ELT and the Board of Trustees. Some work will occur over the summer, including the convening of an external advisory group of people from communities served by the college. Also, task force members would create a draft plan.
Once the campus comes back for fall quarter, the draft plan would be available for wide review, any adjustments made and forwarded to the trustees for consideration and adoption in late fall.
“It is a long process that calls for thoughtful participation,” Roberts said. “But, if we take time now to do it well, we’ll create a plan that has both the forethought and flexibility to serve this college, our students and our communities in the coming years. It gives us a common picture of student success and helps us balance our efforts, resources and time to focus on activities that will foster student success.”
Governance
“Throughout this past fall, I was listening carefully to the campus,” Roberts said. “One of the things I heard and saw was an opportunity to bring clarity and a clear direction to the policy and decision-making structure, which is what governance is all about.”
Starting this past fall, Roberts began working with members of ELT and others to revisit the governance structure. The key principles include:
- Establish a clear line of authority between the Board of Trustees and the President
- Align college decision-making with governance structure
- Shared participation and responsibility
- Open, honest communication
- Appropriate and timely decisions
Recently, she spoke with College Council to share those principles and outline some common features of governance groups, such as:
- A charter
- Purpose and scope of work
- Terms of Membership
- Membership Composition
- Sponsor – some will have a liaison from ELT
- Policy review
- A plan to communicate with their constituencies.
Some discussions have occurred with College Council and Strategic Planning and Budget Committee. More work will occur this spring toward the goal of governance implementation next fall, along with the strategic plan.
Other college projects
Community standard
During fall quarter, separate incidents of intolerance by defacing posters for the Project Pride and Muslim Student Association clubs brought immediate responses from President Roberts, who called together employees and students to discuss potential courses of action. Out of those discussions has come an effort to create and implement a community standard regarding intolerance.
“We’re working on three areas,” Roberts said. “First, defining a response; second, creating a policy around the values of inclusiveness and dignity for all and statement or motto to reflect that policy, and then third, how to infuse those values in the campus culture.”
Housing
The college continues to work toward the goal of offering housing opportunities to students. Since this past summer, Executive Director Mary Kelemen has led the Housing Implementation Task Force that explored a variety of factors that impact college housing. The task force completed and submitted its report to President Roberts in February. The next step is reviewing the report with ELT and putting together a recommendation to the board during the summer.
With the principles of student access, affordability, accountability and outcomes, the task force used eight work groups to investigate areas such as: student life, student conduct, rates and business office functions, safety and security and communications and marketing.
“I’m very appreciative of the task force’s contributions,” Roberts said. “We are continuing to look at a variety of possible opportunities. Decisions are still to be made, but we remain committed to the concept of providing student housing.”
Day at a Glance 
I applaud these efforts. It bothers me somewhat to see terms borrowed from business creeping into our distinct pillar: “Leverage” is not the term I would use for “community engagement.” If I were a member of the community, I would not want to feel I was being “leveraged.” Those in the investment world who are leveraged are in peril, as I understand things. Does this term reflect who we are and want to be?
I also know that SWOT is a common acronym used in analysis of businesses. It might provide useful focus, but we need to keep the distinction between business and education clear. Education is not the military. Military is not Business. Business is not Education. This is not to denigrate any of these institutions. They all have much to offer, but if we surrender Education’s own non-profit, learning-for-the sake-of -learning, critical-thinking values and virtues by adopting terms from the other legs of the social stool, we surrender the unique things Education as an essential social institution has to offer.