President's Report
September 17, 1998
Though two months have passed since we last met,
there seems little to report with regard to legislative action on our budgetary
and other priorities. We are encouraged to hear that there may be some
progress this week, however. I am pleased that each of our policy
changes requested was favorably acted on except for official status for our
student representative. Speaking of which, I am pleased by the
success of Hugh Bryant's solicitation for funds to help reimburse the meeting
expenses of our student representative. Thank you, Hugh and contributors.
I completed my graduation speeches with very fine
ceremonies at Edgecombe Community College, College of The Albemarle, Cape Fear
Community College, and Randolph Community College. From May to August, I
spoke at thirteen graduations. This is a very happy time to be on campuses
as graduates, their families, faculty and staff all gather to celebrate success.
In conjunction with my speech at the College of The
Albemarle, I met with the Higher Education Task Force in Dare County which is
very interested in significantly enhancing higher education offerings in Dare
County, with some on the task force endorsing a campus of the University of
North Carolina to be built from scratch in Dare County. At a minimum, the
task force is very focused on dramatically improved academic offerings by the
College of The Albemarle and at least several degree programs to be offered
using distance technologies and traditional lectures by the University System.
They are also very interested in dormitories for students whether the program is
two-year or four-year.
Work is going well on rejuvenating the Foundation.
The wisdom of our choice of Greg Poole is being demonstrated every day. He
has taken the ball and is really running with it. He and I have met with
several potential Foundation Board members, but he has met with many more
individually. We now have five or six really top-quality board members who
have agreed to serve whose names are synonymous with statewide leadership and
education. More of similar stature are under consideration. Our goal
is to complete the Board reconstitution by Thanksgiving and begin the campaign
early in the new year.
Meetings were held during the interim at Montgomery
Community College and Alamance Community College to kick off their search
process for choosing new presidents.
The Board of Trustees of Johnston Community College
hosted a very impressive farewell dinner honoring Dr. John Tart on his
retirement. Close to one thousand people attended and the speakers paid
tribute to Dr. Tart's leadership in founding Johnston Community College and
bringing it to its present state. I have just received from the Board the
names of the finalists for his replacement. As you recall from our last
meeting, Dr. Jerry Owens is serving as interim president.
I also visited three additional community colleges
in my ongoing effort to visit all. Excellent visits took place at Western
Piedmont, McDowell Technical, and Blue Ridge community colleges. I
continue to be impressed by the diversity and quality of our programs and the
excellence of our leadership, faculty and staff. In conjunction with those
three visits, I joined Greg Poole in making calls on potential Foundation Board
Members and met with Central Piedmont Community College President Tony Zeiss en
route home.
Immediately following our last State Board meeting,
I left for Seattle to attend the annual conference of my counterparts from
around the country. Just as last year, I came away feeling truly blessed
to be working with you in providing leadership to the most comprehensive, most
accessible, and highest quality program in the country.
Among the many meetings that occurred during the
two months was a very productive meeting with Edgar Moore, the new president of
the Trustees Association, to discuss his agenda for the coming year.
Perhaps the most interesting thing that he is proposing is to provide leadership
for the formation of a political action committee which will become very
involved in campaigns across the state. It is President Moore's belief
that the success of public schools and universities in obtaining funding has
resulted from their significantly greater level of political activity.
I met with the Deputy Minister of Education from
Israel and with the owners of the School of Communication Arts, as we continue
to struggle with their ongoing audit problems. In my efforts to better
serve underserved areas, I met with leaders of the Association of General
Contractors and the Institute of Architects to discuss the significant shortage
of trained workers in the building trades, and with Dr. Charles Hamner of the NC
Biotechnology Center to obtain an update on our biotechnology initiative.
All went very well.
As usual, I did much speaking around the state, it
just sounds like more when you combine two months. I spoke at the
Management of Student Information Systems Conference, the summer conference of
the President's Association, the Human Resources Development Conference, the
Basic Law Enforcement Training Conference, the Workforce Preparation Commission,
the Annual North Carolina Firemen's Association, White Memorial Presbyterian
Church Education Forum, the New Bern Rotary Club, the Sanford Kiwanis Club, the
Trustees' Association Leadership Conference, the Adult Educators Conference, and
the Fall Convocation of Fayetteville State University. I was on WPTF for
two hours of call-in and on WUNC-TV to kick off the fall telecourses.
Within the divisions, Kennon Briggs and his staff
continue to respond to inquiries from legislators and legislative staff as the
session slowly winds down. At the same time, they have been working hard
on the next biennial budget. Hard work was required to meet the stringent
deadlines for our budget submissions, both continuation and expansion.
The Vice President for Business and Finance has
made presentations to the North Carolina Association of Community College
Trustees, the Association of Community College Presidents, the new
Administration, faculty and staff at Lenoir Community College (at their
requests), and met with staff from the Division of Purchase and Contract, OSBM,
and UNC-General Administration.
Colleges have been extremely anxious about the
status to their 1998-99 budgets, especially as it relates to Technology,
Equipment and Salary Increases. Numerous calls have been fielded within
the Division about budgets.
Staff has worked with MGT of America to ramp up for the "Legislative Issues
Study Committee," which meets next week. Staff also completed the
close-out of fiscal year, 1997-98, and initiated operations for 1998-99.
These are busy times for Kennon's Division.
Dr. Brenda Rogers' Division of Administration has
been hard at work since our last meeting addressing the special provision of the
General Assembly to review accountability measures and standards for the purpose
of guaranteeing to the General Assembly that our meager dollars are well spent.
Bill Lewis, President of Isothermal Community College is chairing a committee to
address this mandate. Dr. Rogers has also completed an Annual Reporting
Plan which lets everyone in the community college family know what reports must
be filed and when. This, in and of itself, will be a tremendous boost to
accountability and will keep us and the various colleges out of trouble for the
future.
Dr. Beth Johns met with the leadership of BellSouth
to discuss the needs of the telecommunications industry and set in motion
exciting potential opportunities in that important training area. She also
hosted the first Biotech Advisory Committee with very broad representation from
biotechnology and pharmaceutical industries from across the state. This
will be a tremendous boost to the Biotech initiative which we unveiled in early
summer. Beth and her Division continue to be involved in many
collaborative efforts with the Department of Public Instruction, including
service on the School Improvement Panel, and committees dealing with teacher
preparation and professional development, enhancement of high school teaching
resources using community college programs, and assistance to low-performing
schools and schools at risk of becoming low performing. A focus group was
conducted with selected new and expanding industry coordinators and staff of the
Educational Development Corporation of Boston to explore how The Teaching Firm
Project could be used to train industrial workers in North Carolina.
Linda Douglas and her colleagues on the executive
staff published our new newsletter. Scott Ralls and Gayle Harvey worked
with Chairperson Rachel Smith and her committee on the guidelines for Small
Business Centers.
Working with Barry Russell and these other fine
Vice Presidents is a true joy for me. You and I are blessed to have their
leadership, their hard work, and the creativity and hard work of their
respective staffs.
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