President’s Report
To the
State Board of Community Colleges
January 19, 2007
Since we last met, we all enjoyed our Thanksgiving break. I am daily thankful for the leadership and dedication of this Board, of our staff at the System Office and all of our employees at the colleges across the state. Clearly we are doing the Lord’s work as we give those entering the workforce for the first time the skills they need and as we work with those in a changing economy to retrain for new skills and for new challenges.
Between Thanksgiving and Christmas I was in Scotland and Ireland for a week spreading the gospel of North Carolina’s brand of economic and workforce development. As you know, there is great interest in our model in other states of this country and around the world. This was my first meeting in Scotland, where the interest is similar to that of Northern Ireland. The Scots learned of the work we have been doing in Northern Ireland and wanted me to come keynote a conference they were having on economic and workforce development. Like Northern Ireland, they are refocusing their post secondary education to be more attuned to the needs of the workplace. I returned home via Belfast where I met with the panel on which I have been serving for a couple of years which is advising that country’s educational leaders in the redesign of their programs so they will have a greater impact on the country’s economy.
We have begun working with Robert Powell, the State Controller, and his staff as we implement “Beacon,” a new human resources computer program that will impact how all of us receive our pay and benefits.
Turnover at the executive level continues at a record pace. Since you last met, I have met with the trustees at Cape Fear Community College as they begin their presidential search to replace Eric McKeithan. Next week I will be going to Asheville to speak with the trustees at Asheville-Buncombe Technical Community College as they begin the search for the replacement for Ray Bailey. Though the trustee meeting at Surry Community College has not been scheduled, President Frank Sells has also announced his retirement. These retirements represent a great loss of experience and dedicated leadership.
Many meetings have been held since you last met with various members of the System Office staff and staff from our colleges on compliance with the mandates of the State Board of Nursing for Accreditation; the challenges of community college intercollegiate athletic competition; the challenges of continuing education fee waivers; the impacts of the new public schools schedule on dual enrollment and Huskins Bill classes; the preparation of the next biennial budget; virtual learning and the interest of the Governor in making available to high school students more college-level work online; the interest of Chinese higher education leaders in our programs and how we might work together; and the implementation of a cross sector data warehouse in cooperation with the public schools, the University System and SAS Institute.
With regard to the latter, Erskine Bowles, June Atkinson and I, along with University staff, visited with US Secretary of Education Margaret Spellings about the possibility of federal funding to assist with the Data Warehouse Project. Because this will link all of our systems into a single data system and will allow us to track students from their kindergarten days until their PhD is received and to analyze the various influences on their education, she was very excited to hear of our initiative and we are optimistic that we may get federal assistance to implement this ambitious program.
The holiday season brought a slightly more relaxed work schedule for a couple of weeks. It also brought lots of eating! Each of our divisions had covered dish lunches and the entire System Office staff had our annual holiday party at Edenton Street Methodist Church with great food and great entertainment. It was the largest such party since I have been here and everyone seemed to be in a great mood.
Earlier this month the periodic meeting of senior staff members from our System and the University System was hosted by The University of North Carolina General Administration. Erskine Bowles and I agreed that this was our best and most productive joint meeting since we have been holding them. We covered a wide range of topics and worked through various issues. We are pleased that out of that meeting came resolutions to be adopted by you and the Board of Governors cross endorsing the other’s budget priorities.
Fred Williams, Susanne Williams and I attended the Economic Forecast Forum sponsored by the NC Citizens for Business and Industries and other business entities. The forecast is positive though not glowing. The information was helpful to our own planning process.
Several of you joined Fred and me and a number of current and former college presidents at the memorial service for Dr. Dallas Herring who died the first week of January. I have shared with you the very moving eulogy written and delivered by Dr. Joseph Westcott, the person who catalogued all of Dr. Herring’s papers for the D.H. Hill Library at North Carolina State University. Dr. Westcott’s doctoral dissertation was also on Dr. Herring, so he had much information to share about the life and philosophy of this great man.
Dr. Larry Keen, Willa Dickens, George Millsaps and I presented at the Conference of the National Association of Community College Entrepreneurialship in Orlando, Florida, last week. As is always the case, we came home confirmed in our belief that ours is the best and most comprehensive system in the nation and that practically every conference participant envies what we have in North Carolina! You would have been proud of the great presentations made by your staff.
Earlier this week I was happy to have Susan Seymour introduce Matt Meyer to the North Carolina Biotechnology Center Board, substituting for me since I attended a funeral in Goldsboro. As the new director of our BioNetwork, Matt is off to a great start. Quite by coincidence that same day I was scheduled to be in Goldsboro to speak to the Rotary Club.
That night I welcomed a delegation from the Northern Ireland College of Agriculture, Food and Rural Enterprise who visited us to learn more about our agriculture and life science programs. In addition to visiting the System Office, they had presentations by Wayne Community College, James Sprunt Community College, and Caldwell Community College and Technical Institute on their agricultural and horticultural programs. They visited the Research Campus in Kannapolis to supplement what they learned in the System Office visit about BioNetwork and our participation in Kannapolis. They spent a day at North Carolina State University’s College of Agriculture and Life Science.
Dr. Peggy Teague was selected and trained to be a Peer Reviewer for the Early Childhood Associate Degree and Accreditation process run by the National Association for Education of Young Children.
Kim Jernigan will be working with the Institute of Medicine on updating the 2004 Task Force on the NC Nursing Workforce Report. They will be focusing particularly on retention of our students in our nursing programs.
The Academic and Student Services Division has recently launched its “Lunch and Learn” program as a professional development tool. The first program was on Karen Brown’s month-long visit to Bolivia last August through the Partners of the Americas program.
The 18 Phase 2C colleges have completed their training, data conversion and testing for the student module of CIS. They will go live with admissions and financial aid in late February and will register their first students online for the fall 2007 semester.
CIS Release 18 is transitioning from the planning and design phase to the build and execute phase. Considerable vendor and System staff resources have been dedicated this transition so that the six pilot colleges can test and implement the release in April to enable the other colleges to do so in the summer.
The IT Project Office, under the leadership of Bruce Humphrey, has completed the close-out phase of the “Improved Student Access to Services” project, and he and his staff are providing strong leadership for Phase 2C implementation and the Release 18 migration project.
Kennon Briggs and his staff have really been stretched out in providing information to the State Budget Office on our 2007-09 Consensus Budget Request. The meetings with the Governor’s staff and the State Budget Office have gone very well and we are optimistic about what might be included in the budget submitted to the General Assembly.
Regional meetings of the Association of Community College Business Officers were held in Wilson, Raleigh, and Asheville.
Kennon Briggs and Fred Williams met with college presidents who operate intercollegiate athletic programs at Davidson County Community College and continue to work with them on the challenges of providing those programs without the use of state funds.
David Sullivan and Kennon have been working with Rowan-Cabarrus Community College and the leaders of the NC Research Campus at Kannapolis on the memorandum of understanding for this initiative. Fortunately, the university’s memorandum of understanding was completed first and has been an excellent guide.
The Human Resources Development Conference was held in Winston-Salem and in conjunction with that Conference the Career Start Training Academy was held. The latter is a collaborative effort with the NC Department of Social Services and the NC Employment Security Commission. Two hundred and thirty-eight participants were involved.
The very successful Career Readiness Certification program was expanded through an RFP process in December. Twenty-one colleges submitted proposals and the following colleges were selected as new sites: Caldwell, Cleveland, Edgecombe, Halifax, Haywood, McDowell, Pitt, Robeson, Stanley, and Vance-Granville.
Fred Williams was the speaker at the kickoff of a $3 million fund raising effort by Richmond Community College to build a new satellite facility in Scotland County. It will house computer science, allied health and continuing education programs. Fred also represented the System at Alamance Community College’s annual meeting with elected officials and business leaders to enhance the college partnerships with business and industry and to educate elected officials on their cooperative programs. Their culinary arts program prepared an excellent meal for this occasion.
The Hunt Institute for new legislators was held in Pinehurst to engage legislators in policy discussions on education at all levels. Fred represented the System.
Fred also represented the System at the open house at Lenoir Community College for its culinary arts addition to the Waller Building.
The legislative season is upon us. With our most ambitious legislative agenda in my ten years, we will need your help as never before in contacting legislators on behalf of our System.
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