The President’s Blog

Will Governor Bredesen roll out a plan to reorganize higher education this year?  Will UT and TBR be combined and THEC dropped from the list of state organizations?  Probably not.  At least that is what I am hearing from those who work in and around Nashville.   Apparently the political realities of reorganizing higher education are too much to tackle, even by a term-limited governor who has tremendous credibility and support among the people of the state and in the legislature.

There are issues that Governor Bredesen will tackle, however, and those issues revolve around funding and accountability.  The Governor and an unofficial taskforce are looking into “reorganizing” the funding formula for higher education.  When this issue is brought up, my greatest fear is that the real agenda is how to get more money into UTK’s hands at the expense of Pellissippi State.  In other words, how to give more money to fewer and fewer people rather than to provide funding where the people are going.   I hope that the conversation about the funding formula can move quickly  in the direction of “how can we serve the people of Tennessee” and “how can we improve the fortunes and opportunities for our state.”   Our mission is no less important than that of the University of Tennessee and I hope a new formula will honor that reality.

The thinking about accountability and about measuring student achievement usually starts out with graduation rates.  We know how to have great graduation rates.  We just do the same thing that Harvard and Yale have done: raise the entrance requirements to a point that most of those who enter will graduate.  We can do that, but it is not our mission.

For community colleges, student achievement will need many measures if we are to be judged accurately.  With an open door policy,  we serve students with diverse levels of  preparation, motivation, and broad intentions, so, we will need to measure many things to get a fair record of our students’ achievement.  Fortunately, there are some good discussions being held around the nation.  Here are some milestones suggested by the National Governor’s Association:

1.  Successful completion of remedial/developmental and core courses.

2. Advancement from remedial/developmental to college credit-bearing courses.

3. Transfer from a two-years institution to a four-year institution.

4.  Attainment of credentials (licensure, certification, certificates, diplomas less than a degree).

I think that these measures are a good point from which to start the discussion about measuring student achievement, and I hope that Governor Bredesen and THEC will give these standards serious consideration.  Without a fair and equitable level of funding, our ability to provide quality instruction is hampered by lack of full-time faculty, equipment, and professional development opportunities.   And quality matters to us and to those we serve.

This morning I was hand-delivered the information about the College’s Internal Campaign–a fund drive to support scholarships, emergency loan funds, and other activities of the Pellissippi State Foundation.  I have seen first-hand, and you have to,  how important our Foundation Scholarships are to our students.   There’s a great video about the importance of scholarships at the Foundation website:  www.pstcc.edu/foundation.

This internal campaign is very important to the College in another way too, because when we ask the public to support our campaigns, the first question they ask is usually “Do your employees support the programs of the Foundation?”  So far we have been able to answer with a very strong “Yes they do.”

Of course, the other fund raising campaign that just got underway is the Charitable Giving campaign which includes such organizations as United Way and Community Shares among others.

I have seen how the good works of the Internal Campaign and the Charitable Giving Campaign make a difference in our college and in our community.  I hope that you will consider a gift to each of these great campaigns.  They need your help this year more than ever.

They like us…

This semester has been a whirlwind of activity and it’s hard to believe that we are staring mid-term in the face already.  With over 10, 250 students enrolled, our place in the community is secure.  We know for sure that when the going gets tough, people turn to Pellissippi State for help.  I am very proud that we provide this place and this opportunity for the people of our community.

We have been able to provide some other remarkable opportunities this year already.  We have given  over 500 new scholarships to those students taking courses on the weekends.  We have put into place 20 full scholarships, including books, for students selected into our new Electro-Mechanical program.  We have added dozens of new faculty members, both full-time and part-time, to help carry the load in our classrooms, and we have been approved to offer an Associate of Science Degree in Nursing.   This may count as one of our busiest years ever, and we are not done yet.

Senator Woodson

I met with Senator Jamie Woodson this past week about the reorganization of higher education in the State of Tennessee.  Governor Bredesen is moving  toward a system of accountability for higher education which will focus on graduation rates as a key indicator of success.  This accountability measure causes me some concern.  You know the reasons why.  First, most of our students do not intend to graduate.  Plus, we advise many of our students not to graduate because some of the requirements we have for a degree will not transfer into UTK.  Finally, many of our students will simply not complete a degree program because they were not prepared for college work.  As hard as we try…and we must try…it is very difficult to remediate a student who enrolls with poor reading, math, and English skills.  The first thing we ask them to do is to succeed in the very areas in which they failed in high school.  It is very discouraging for them and frustrating for us.  We are getting better, but we have a long way to go.  Yet, these developmental courses are very important.  We provide our citizens the opportunity to grow and achieve beyond all expectations.  This is a predominately American phenomenon  and I do not want to lose it to an artificial accountability system suited better for the upper 10 percent of our population.

Chancellor Cheek and Provost Martin

I also met with UTK Chancellor Jimmy Cheek and Provost Susan Martin this week to discuss the relationship between UTK and Pellissippi State.  I am very encouraged by the visit and by the commitment they have to make UTK the best university possible.  A strong and healthy UTK is important to us, to our community, and to the State of Tennessee, and I believe that good leadership is in place there to get the job done. 

While Chancellor Cheek and Provost Martin were here, we discussed a possible “dual admissions” pilot that would let UTK admit students on the condition that they successfully complete specified coursework at Pellissippi State first.  The number of applicants to UTK has increased so dramatically in the past few years that they are trying to find ways to accommodate additional students.  We are interested but have not worked out any details yet.

Thanks to all of you who admitted, oriented, advised, counseled, taught, tested, and comforted our many students this semester.  On to mid-term, then Halloween, Thanksgiving, and we are done for another semester.  It is just hard to believe, isn’t it?

Managing growth and change…building an infrastructure for the future.

Pellissippi State, like so many other higher education institutions in the State of Tennessee, faces many difficult decisions over the next few years as enrollments increase and state resources decrease.  Even as enrollment increases, the College may have to operate with the same, or fewer, resources than we have now.  There is an obvious challenge for the College of becoming more efficient in its operation.  However, I think that the real challenge for us is “how do we do it better?” even as resources decline.  The time is right for us to prepare ourselves for the changes ahead.  I think that we have an incredible opportunity if we act now.

There is one major initiative which has dulled our initiatives and, I believe, has made us slow to respond to changes in our technical environment– the TBR-wide conversion to Banner administrative software.  Although necessary, the conversion has been expensive and complex and has deprived our employees of time and energy.  Unfortunately, it has created an environment in which  we are too often trying to “survive Banner” rather than create an environment where we evaluate and embrace new technologies routinely (something of which we have been proud  in past years.)   Consequently, I think other technologies and social media have passed us by.  For example, we are only beginning to use Twitter, Facebook, and texting to communicate with students even though we know teenagers use these social media as a primary source of communication.

Our enrollment increased dramatically this year to well over 10,000 students.  However, we know that we will not be building more classrooms even as we expand our course offerings in order to accommodate increased demand in the future.  We will often rely on adjunct faculty members, yet we do not do enough to train and orient them to the culture of the college. We know that blended instruction, which combines on-line experiences with face-to-face instruction, has proven very successful, but we haven’t really made the necessary adjustments to our infrastructure to accommodate this level of instruction.

In addition to these challenges, Pellissippi State must prepare for a reaffirmation of accreditation process which will culminate in a peer review visit to our campus in Spring 2011.  This effort alone will require that we have an infrastructure for collecting and using data in decision making that surpasses what we have in place right now.  Within that process, we will need to develop campus-wide input into selecting a “Quality Enhancement Proposal” which will effectively improve teaching and learning—and, we will have to measure every aspect of that QEP.   Also, TBR is beginning a new cycle of strategic planning which will affect our planning process and will determine new goals for our institution that reflect the influence of our governing board and legislature.  All of these efforts will require a level of data gathering and data usage that we are not quite prepared to support.   We have to act now if we will be prepared for the future.

In this time of dramatic economic, demographic, social, and technological change, the role of institutions like Pellissippi State Community College has become paramount.  Indeed, Pellissippi State Community College is working hard to meet the needs of diverse students, to respond to the economic needs of our community, to partner with K-12 school districts and universities, to adopt new and potentially transformative technology, to expand efforts to analyze effectiveness in teaching and learning, and embrace our role as an open access, civically engaged institution.

Given this context, Pellissippi State Community College is keenly interested in being a local, state, and national leader in providing high quality education and services for our students.  Building on its already strong foundation, Pellissippi State has engaged the services of Dr. Mark David Milliron, and his company, Catalyze Learning International, to help us over the next several months in analyzing our technical infrastructure and assisting us in our planning processes.  Dr. Milliron has worked with Sinclair Community College in Dayton, Ohio, and El Paso Community College in Texas, and Minnesota State College and University System with similar initiatives which he calls Catalytic Change Initiatives (CCI)

Dr. Milliron’s work will focus heavily, at first, on helping us to assess the capacity of our technical infrastructure to gather and use the data we will need in developing goals for our strategic plans.

Although we have occasionally used outside consultants, I don’t like to use their services unless I believe that it is absolutely necessary.  In this case, I believe that it is imperative to move forward now, and we have contracted with the very best available in Dr. Milliron.    We are fortunate that we have been provided private funding to pay for his assistance.

I am very glad that Dr. Milliron is available as we engage with the multiple tasks that confront us.  His knowledge of both technical and academic systems is extensive, and Dr. Milliron is the one person that I know of who has the community college background, the technical background, and the experience of managing successful change initiatives that we can trust to do the job correctly.  I look forward to working with him over the next few months as we prepare for the changes and the challenges before us.

Message from the President’s Office

Although it has been the busiest summer we have ever experienced, tomorrow marks the official kick-off to our new school year.  The bathing suits are packed away and football practice has started in earnest at the big university across town.  This means that it is also time for our annual Conference on Student Success.  This year’s speaker is Dr. Belle Wheelan, President of the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools (SACs).  Her selection as our keynote speaker is an indication of our move into a cycle of activities which will lead to our reaffirmation of accreditation as a college.

Reaffirmation of accreditation is scheduled every ten years in SACS and it is the process through which our peer institutions and employers around the nation accept our credit hours and our degrees as valuable college-level certificates of accomplishment taught by faculty with appropriate credentials and supported by qualified and effective staff.  It’s a big deal.  It is such a big deal that we’ve enlisted the help of two of our very best faculty members to lead the process.  Lois Reynolds will chair the overall college effort and Marilyn Harper will take responsibility for developing our Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP).  You will hear much more about these efforts in coming days and will be involved in our efforts throughout the next two years.

The College has been overwhelmed this summer by new applicants and by registration of former students.  In fact, as I write this, we know of over 10,000 students who have made some plans to attend Pellissippi State this autumn.  Many will be dropped for non-payment, but we fully expect a large percentage of them to re-register for courses again before the semester starts.

We have done everything possible to provide for those who want to study here.  For those who are willing to come on the weekend, we have provided half-scholarships for courses taken on Friday evenings and Saturday and Sunday.  We have opened many more sections on site campuses and in the evening.  We currently have sections open that have no faculty assigned yet.  All in all, we are doing everything possible to accommodate the public need.  However, in the end, if enrollment patterns hold true, then many potential students cannot be served.  We will simply run out of space and out of qualified faculty to teach.

You will find many improvements to our campus again this year.  The bookstore has been expanded and the auditorium in the Goins Administration Building has been renovated.  The Pellissippi State Foundation has new offices and we are carrying through on plans to add new classrooms on the second level.

Magnolia Avenue is being updated with new energy-efficient windows, new landscaping, and a traffic plaza is being built out front there.  Blount County Campus continues to rise into its full two story being and looks magnificent even as a skeleton of what it will become.  We’ll start our new year in 2010 on that campus.  We have purchased some derelict houses in  front of Division Street Campus and will turn those spaces into much needed parking along that street.

Funding for the year is stable at present, thanks to ARRA (stimulus) monies.  Although we are still not quite clear on how we can spend all of the funds, the money has allowed us to start the year with a full faculty and staff and with money for travel and professional development.  We know that the State of Tennessee is struggling with tax collections though and other state agencies will still face sharp cuts in budgets that were cut only last year.   In this dynamic  fiscal climate, Pellissippi State will still be very conservative in how funds are allocated throughout the year.  Half of our income, however, now comes from student tuition and fees, and so an increase in enrollment could offset much of the damage of an impoundment by the State of Tennessee.  I will keep you posted as we progress through the year.

In case you missed it, we now have a new name: Pellissippi State Community College.  The irony of the loss of the word “Technical” is that we are moving to shore up old technical programs and possibly add new ones in the next few years.  For instance, this year we are adding faculty in a new Department of Nursing  for the first time as we prepare to operate our own nursing program beginning Fall 2010.  We also have over a hundred students on a waiting list to enter our new Industrial Maintenance option of Engineering Technology.   We are exploring the possibility of adding a program to prepare students to become Veterinary Technicians and discussing the possibility of collaborating with the University of Tennessee-Knoxville to offer a premier culinary arts degree.  We have certainly not lost our mission of providing  technical education to the community.

August is here;  it’s time to start a new year.  Best wishes to you all.

Allen Edwards

It has been said before, but I couldn’t be prouder of our Pellissippi State team than now. We faced a “perfect storm” this semester with Banner looming over us along with the redesign of Developmental Studies, the addition of “confirmation testing” and a new Vice President for Student Success and Enrollment Management. The storm passed with very little damage done. In fact, I think this was our smoothest, best organized process that we have ever developed.
My thanks to all of you who made this such a successful start. Dr. Ashford has made a great start in her career at Pellissippi State. She and the members of her teams were much more patient than I could have been as they helped late arrivals find their way through our system. In addition, Dr. Wise and his team were everywhere filling in gaps, putting in advisors when we needed extra help, and monitoring everything very closely.
Once again,

The Business Office and Financial Aid worked overtime to provide the best service they possibly could at this time, and the Physical plant, Security, and Information Services were all on hand to make this year a very good one for us all.
I am very proud to be president of this college and am deeply grateful to you all for that you have accomplished this year.

Recession
During our last frantic days of registration before classes began, a faculty advisor made the remark that “it looks like the recession is here” as last minute scholars swarmed around the Educational Resources Center. I think the faculty member is correct. Our experience has been that as people lose jobs or become concerned about their jobs they shore up their skills with education and training. Our last minute registration surge could very well be a result of job loss or concern about job security. Overall, our FTE enrollment increased by 6.25 percent this spring over last spring semester. Good news for the college, but we don’t know what it means for the overall economy.

Budget Message
The Governor’s message last night strengthened the case for recession. It was actually a somber message for the state of Tennessee’s higher education community. With no new operating dollars proposed and no new capital projects proposed either, it is the slimmest of all projections, and actually means that we will have less money from the state to spend next year when you factor inflation into the mix. Just like at home, it costs the college more for electricity and gasoline each year, and our expenditures are quite large, over a million dollars just to pay our electric bill alone.

However, it wasn’t a budget cut in the strictest sense of the word, and for that I am very grateful. It was not all that long ago that we did cut our state budget by 9 percent and that is something I don’t ever want to repeat as a college president. Although we didn’t cut any faculty slots during that time, we cut back sharply on staff positions, and I don’t think that we have ever fully recovered from that loss. I am very glad to be spared real budget cuts this time around.

Capital Projects
Given that no new capital projects were funded for higher education in this budget, I am also grateful that the legislature funded the Blount County Campus last year. Although that campus was not in the Governor’s original budget, the legislature added it to the list at the last moment. It would have been very disappointing not to be able to move forward with our plans for that new campus after 12 years of anticipation. We are very close to announcing the site selection and contractor for that new addition, and the people of Blount County are helping by raising money to furnish and equip that facility. Our goal for the Blount County campaign is $2 million.

Pay Raises
Governor Bredesen is proposing 2 percent pay raises for state employees, including higher education employees. The state will fund 2/3 of these raises and the school must fund the remaining 1/3 of the raises. For Pellissippi State, this will amount to approximately $126,000 plus benefits. This must be taken from other school budget areas.

New Salary Study
Pellissippi State contracted with compensation specialists from the University of Tennessee to assist in the development of a new salary schedule for all employees. Although our salary schedules are still competitive within the system, we have found that changes in job duties and descriptions and salary compression made it necessary to review the salary ranges. Our salary schedule for all employees has been outdated by inflation, poor funding years, and turnover. Although our salary schedule is competitive within the TBR system, we want to be among the leaders, and we have to change it to be sure that we maintain our position.

The college did ask the compensation specialists at the University of Tennessee to advise us regarding current salaries with respect to experience and education. The study identified a number of employees who should be adjusted and the college has done so with the amount of money that was allowed by the Tennessee Board of Regents salary structure. These adjustments were approved by the Tennessee Board of Regents and were implemented effective January 1, 2008.

In order to make further adjustments to faculty and staff salaries, we must have a new salary plan in place, and it must be approved by the Tennessee Board of Regents. Therefore, the college has again contracted with the University of Tennessee compensation specialist to continue a review of our salary structure. The results of this review will be submitted to the Tennessee Board of Regents at the December 2008 board meeting.

Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP)
This spring semester, Pellissippi State officially begins its preparation for our reaffirmation of accreditation. The on-site review team will be on our campus in the fall semester of 2011. This means that our compliance certification report (new name for the self-study) will be completed by March, 2011. The major focus of the reaffirmation process will be the Quality Enhancement Plan (QEP). The QEP topic must be identified through a college-wide process and it must focus on improving student learning. I believe that we have laid the groundwork for selecting a topic for our QEP through our efforts in Foundations of Excellence process, but we need to be sure that everyone, including faculty, staff, and students on all campuses, participates as we move toward reaffirmation.