A descriptive approach called
benchmarking was used to describe processes
meeting NDTYI design specifications. We intended that institutions wishing to
transform a major design element in the direction of NDTYI recommendations
could use the processes benchmarked in this report as means to set concrete
goals for outcomes and identify specific activities needed to reach the goals.
While only five sites for five different design elements of NDTYI were selected
for benchmarking in this report, the general approach serves as an illustration
of what could be done in any design element which an institution wished to
transform.
We want to thank the following
individuals who conducted the benchmarking
studies with our direction. The studies reflect their special talents in
investigating and reporting new designs for higher education. The individuals
are (in order of the chapters in the report)
- Reid Haglin (with the assistance of his wife, Lynn)--Learning Process
- G. David Sayre--Learning Partnerships
- Jan Doebbert--Learning Environment (emphasizing learning technology)
- Kathy Hefty--Learning Finance
These individuals have a common
characteristic in that they are all
participants in the doctoral studies component of the Leadership Academy for
Two-Year Institutions of Higher Education at the University of Minnesota.
The other chapter on Learning Staff
and Staff Development was conducted and
written by me with the support of the National Center for Research in
Vocational Education site at the University of Wisconsin-Madison as part of the
project entitled, "Teacher Learning in the Workplace and Community." Special
thanks go to L. Allen Phelps, University of Wisconsin NCRVE Site Director, for
his encouragement and financial support to do this part of the study. The
chapter on Learning Staff and Staff Development will also be published as a
case study series by the Teacher Learning in the Workplace and Community
project.
Most importantly, we want to give special thanks to the individuals and
institutions who opened their doors to our study request and took time to
graciously host site visits and respond to our questions. These individuals are
noted in each of the chapters, and there were several at each site. The
following are the study sites and the key individuals at each site:
- Learning Process: San Diego Community College in California; Barbara
McDonald, Director of CWELL Action Research Center
- Learning Partnerships: Fox Valley Technical College in Wisconsin; Martin
Gentz, Vice President for Instructional Services
- Learning Staff and Staff Development: Miami-Dade Community College in
Florida; Marie Nock, Director of College Training and Development
- Learning Environment (Technology): Higher Education and Advanced Technology
(HEAT) Center at Lowry in Colorado; Don Goodwin, Executive Director, and Mary
Ann Roe, Planning, Development & Special Projects
- Learning Finance: Sauk Valley Community College in Illinois; Jani Bradley,
Vice President of Administrative Services
The following individuals were central to producing the report in a quality
fashion:
- Lauren Jacobs who served as outside reviewer for NCRVE
- Michelle Englund who provided overall editing assistance
- Tami Hanson, Amy Petricka, and Sarah Sargent who provided secretarial
support
Thank you for your thoughtful and careful attention to the content and format
of the report.
We hope individuals and institutions
interested in New Designs for Two-Year
Institutions of Higher Education find this report stimulating and encouraging
as they address the needed transformations in our institutions of higher
education.
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| | | | | | | | | | | | | | | |
| George H. Copa
November, 11, 1997
St. Paul, Minnesota
|
This report is a companion piece to
New Designs for the Two-Year Institution
of Higher Education (NDTYI) (Copa & Ammentorp, in press). The benchmark
studies included in this report focus on learning sites that meet the design
specifications for 21st century two-year institutions of higher education as
described in NDTYI. The studies are meant to be illustrative rather than
definitive in showing how two-year institutions are meeting student and
community needs in new, cost-effective ways. The studies also illustrate the
use of benchmarking as an organizational transition process--a means toward
envisioning more concretely what is desired and the way it can be realized. The
purpose of this report is to scan for sites exemplifying new designs in a more
comprehensive and systematic way and describe selected sites in a more thorough
manner than in the NDTYI final report.
In this study, benchmarking activities
focus on particular design elements of
two-year institutions. That is, we set out to discover benchmark processes
related to each of the steps in the design process advocated in NDTYI. These
processes were selected using the design specifications associated with the
design element in question. In this way, the resulting benchmark studies
preserve the integrity of NDTYI, and their discoveries can be readily
implemented in a comprehensive process of organizational change.
The first chapter of this report
provides an introduction to the project, "New
Designs for the Two-Year Institution of Higher Education." Sections of the
chapter address the purpose of the project, its focus in terms of institutions
and motivations, and the research and development process used to achieve its
purpose.
Chapters Two through Six present five
benchmark studies that illustrate design
specifications for various design elements of NDTYI. They deal, respectively,
with the design elements of learning process, learning partnerships, learning
staff and staff development, learning technology, and learning finance. Each
study is organized to discuss the following:
- The rationale for selecting the benchmarked process in terms of the
design specifications associated with the design element in question.
- The objectives underlying the benchmarked process and how they are
defined and communicated in practice.
- The key features which make the benchmarked process unique and how
these are related to the design specifications.
- The impact realized by the benchmarked process.
- The future directions planned for the benchmarked process.
- The design implications or lessons learned that we see in the
benchmarked process.
- The contacts for further information about the benchmarked process.
The contacts include the author of the benchmark study report and contacts at
the site of the benchmarked process.
Chapter Two presents a benchmark
study for the design element of learning
process. The Consortium for Workforce Education and Lifelong Learning (CWELL)
at San Diego Community College was selected for benchmarking because its
conceptual approach is unique, and the project incorporates many of the new
design specifications for learning process. CWELL is an innovative project to
improve adult education in local contexts and is a collaborative partnership
between the San Diego Community College District - Continuing Education
Division; San Diego State University - Department of Educational Technology;
and the Applied Behavioral and Cognitive Science, Inc. These organizations are
working together to meet the needs of new immigrants and undereducated youth
and adults for noncollege credit education and training.
Chapter Three presents a benchmark
study for the design element of learning
partnerships. Fox Valley Technical College (FVTC) was selected for study in
relation to learning partnerships. FVTC has two campuses and five regional
centers which serve a five-county geographic region in Northeast Wisconsin.
FVTC is part of the fabric of the community it serves. The college has formed
partnerships with employers, agencies, and other educational institutions (both
public and private) within the community, the state, and nationally.
Chapter Four presents a benchmark
study for the design element of learning
staff and staff development. The Miami-Dade Community College (M-DCC) site was
selected for study in relation to staff development. This chapter focuses on
the special attention given to staff development at M-DCC beginning in 1986
with the initiation of the Teaching/Learning Project. From the start of the
project, the central commitment was to improve learning for all students and
the focus, while starting with faculty, soon moved to include all staff.
Chapter Five presents a benchmark
study for the design element of learning
environment, focusing specifically on technology. To facilitate breakthrough
modeling and application of NDTYI relating to the element of learning
environment, the Higher Education and Advanced Technology (HEAT) Center at
Lowry: A Colorado Community College and Occupational Education System
Innovation, was chosen as a benchmark site because of its exemplary practices
in the area of technology in the learning environment. The HEAT Center at Lowry
is a developing education center housed on the site of the former Lowry Air
Force Base. While in a continuing process of renovation and expansion, the HEAT
Center at Lowry now is the site for delivery of programs offered by six
participating community colleges. The HEAT Center at Lowry also provides
training and assistance through private sector alliances and affiliated
baccalaureate and graduate colleges and universities.
Chapter Six presents a benchmark
study for the design element of learning
finance. The design specifications for learning finance proposed in NDTYI
served as the basis for selecting Sauk Valley Community College (SVCC) located
in Dixon, Illinois, as the site for this study. The effective design of SVCC's
financial structure is evident not only in its strong financial ratios, but
also in the college's physical environment. SVCC also has an effective program
review process which ensures that resources are allocated in areas that add the
most value to the college.
The final chapter of this report
presents a summary and implications of the
benchmarked studies. The design process described in NDTYI provides a helpful
framework for assessing the utility and value of the benchmarked processes.
Each of the design specifications can be viewed as a standard against which the
potential contributions of a benchmark can be evaluated. By reviewing these
specifications for each design element, the two-year institution can make
informed decisions concerning organizational change and innovation.
Benchmarking is only the starting
point for organizational change. It opens
the door to considering something other than "business as usual" by showing the
two-year institution how other institutions serve their stakeholders in unique
ways. Benchmarking provides a baseline and pathway for authentic change in that
it defines processes that "work." They are not exercises in "what might be";
they are real activities that deliver outcomes demanded by students and the
larger community.
The benchmark studies included in
this report are offered as exemplars of the
processes meeting the design specifications for 21st century two-year
institutions of higher education (TYIs) as described in New Designs for the
Two-Year Institution of Higher Education (Copa & Ammentorp, in press).
They are meant to be illustrative rather than definitive in showing how TYIs
are meeting student and community needs in new, cost-effective ways. The
studies also illustrate the use of benchmarking (Boxwell, 1994; Camp, 1995) as
an organizational transition process--a means toward envisioning more
concretely what is desired and the way it can be realized.
This section provides an introduction to the project, New Designs for the
Two-Year Institution of Higher Education (NDTYI), conducted during calendar
years 1995 and 1996. Sections of the chapter will address the purpose of the
project, its focus in terms of institutions and motivations, and the research
and development process used to achieve its purpose.
Project Purpose
NDTYI had three purposes. First
was to develop a design process that was
sufficiently powerful to overcome traditional approaches and responses to
designing TYIs. The second purpose was to develop a set of design
specifications for an effective 21st century TYI. The resulting design
specifications were to serve as the criteria for new TYI models--a way to
stretch thinking and stimulate responsible critique of current practice. The
third purpose was to develop and/or identify and describe new designs for TYIs
that met the proposed design specifications referred to above. The new designs
were to make the design specifications very real and concrete for use in
dissemination, training, and implementation. The final report (Copa &
Ammentorp, in press) for NDTYI addressed these three purposes. The first two
purposes are addressed at length in the NDTYI final report; however, the
scanning for new designs was abbreviated and the descriptions very brief. The
purpose of this report, therefore, is to scan for sites exemplifying new
designs in a more comprehensive and systematic way and describe selected sites
in a more thorough manner than in the NDTYI final report.
Project Focus
The work of the project was focused
in two different ways--(1) by type of
institution and (2) by motivation for considering new designs. First, the
project focused only on TYIs and not four-year colleges and universities. TYIs
include technical institutes and colleges, community colleges, and private
proprietary schools. TYIs offer a wide variety of programs culminating in
certificates, diplomas, and associate degrees. Comparable European educational
institutions are colleges of adult and further education, the latter years in
higher-level vocational schools, and the earlier years in polytechnic
institutions.
The project also focused on a
particular target audience in terms of
motivations for considering major changes in the above-mentioned institutions.
Three specific groups were of interest: (1) administrative leaders responsible
for designing entirely new institutions; (2) administrative leadership
responsible for major restructuring (i.e., merger, reengineering, downsizing)
of institutions; and (3) policymakers at the local, state, and federal levels
responsible for policy, regulations, and funding for TYIs.
Project Process
This section of the report will
briefly describe the design process used in
developing specifications for a future-oriented TYI. Detailed information on
each of the design elements and design specifications for each element is
provided in the NDTYI final report. Each of these components of the process is
a product of the project in the sense of providing a strategy or "roadmap" for
design in a particular institutional setting.
The design process was made up of
ten design elements, executed in a
particular order referred to as "designing-down." The design process is shown
in Figure 1. The design elements were addressed in this particular order so as
to get careful alignment among the design elements and to get "first questions
first." The idea is to ensure that the design fits the needs of the situation
and proceeds in a logical order from aims to actions to supporting structure,
culture, and environment. Each of the design elements will now be described.
Figure 1
New Designs Process
Learning Context
Learning Signature
Learning Outcomes
Learning Process
Learning Organization
Learning Partnerships
Learning Staff and Staff Development
Learning Environment
Learning Finance
Learning Celebration
(Copa & Ammentorp, in press)
|
Learning Context
Each design for a TYI must meet the
needs of a particular context or
situation. The context is described in terms of assets to be kept a part of the
new institution, problems with current institutional operation, opportunities
to be taken advantage of with a new institution, and aspirations to be sought
after in the new institution. Studying and analyzing the learning context
results in a set of design criteria used to guide and monitor the
accomplishments of the other design elements.
Learning Signature
Learning enterprise designs are
given direction and energy by the symbols
and metaphors representing the hopes and expectations of policymakers,
educators, and their students. An effective design process must first try to
elicit and understand these hopes and expectations as a way to give coherence
and focus to learning design. Often the signature takes form through symbols
and metaphors (e.g., words, pictures, people, stories, objects) representing a
deeply shared perspective on the learning enterprise.
Learning Outcomes
Globalization and its associated
complexity demand that TYIs have a clear
idea of the value to be added by the learning enterprise as a starting point
for program improvement. In short, TYI leaders must clearly know the
competencies, standards, or results they want to produce for and through the
learners. At the same time, students must be able to see what TYIs can do for
them in terms of their personal development.
Learning Process
Learning outcomes are accomplished
through the design of an appropriate
learning process, traditionally viewed in terms of the language of curriculum,
instruction, and assessment. Too often in higher education, the attention is to
teaching in contrast to learning and to subject matter (curriculum) at the
expense of instruction and assessment. Most faculty in higher education are not
required to study the learning process--instead, they center almost solely on
subject matter. If TYIs are to address the learning design challenges and
opportunities of the future, they must have a working language and knowledge of
the learning process with foundations in human development.
Learning Organization
For the learning process to be
successful in reaching the learning outcomes
in a manner called for by the learning signature, a learning infrastructure or
organization must be put into place and continually improved. The learning
infrastructure is made up of the organization of learners, learning time,
learning settings, subject matter, staff, technology, and learning environment.
It is here that new designs for TYIs are most clearly visible. Familiar
physical and organizational forms of higher education are unlikely to be
responsive to the needs of students and the changing nature of society and its
lifeplaces (e.g., work, family, community).
Learning Partnerships
The link between higher-education
institutions and their communities takes
the form of learning partnerships among public and private sector
organizations. TYIs can no longer "go it alone"--they have neither the
resources nor the knowledge to be set apart from their surroundings. Instead of
the "ivory tower" of the past, higher-education institutions of the future will
be ever more closely integrated with their communities and will bear increasing
responsibilities for the quality of life of those who support and benefit from
its work.
Learning Staff and Staff Development
The changed perspective suggested
above mandates parallel development of
teachers, administrators, and support personnel ready to adapt TYIs to new
realities. Higher education will need to identify, train, and support leaders
who can shape curricula and student experience in forms indicated by
ever-changing learning expectations and processes.
Learning Environment
The driving force for higher education
has shifted from the
traditional--static--subject matters to a dynamic view of knowledge and its
use. Information technology has been and will continue to be a pivotal force in
this development; it has redefined the process of knowledge creation,
transmission, and application. Learning technology has become one of the major
considerations in any new design for the learning environment for TYIs. After
consideration of the design elements noted above, consideration should shift to
the physical and social environment of the institution. New designs will not be
constrained by architectural forms, nor will they be limited to traditional
educational practices; they will be motivated by the dynamic integration of
higher-education institutions with their students and communities. Learning
environments will include consideration of settings such as home, workplace,
community, and school.
Learning Finance
This element of the NDTYI process
concerns both the cost and revenues for
higher education. Key strategies concerning cost include cost containment,
improved efficiency, re-engineering, and alternative sources of services. On
the revenue side, strategies include institutional development, new products
and services, partnerships, and new markets.
Learning Celebration
The NDTYI process is integrated by the
cultural symbols and practices of
all those associated with the TYI. Learning experiences and their applications
are continually reinforced through celebrations whereby the community confirms
the relevance of the work of higher education.
While the design elements are presented
in linear, downward order, the process
also involves moving upward and among the design elements to ensure close
alignment and internal consistency and coherence. Close alignment of the design
elements is needed to realize quality and efficiency in the operation of the
TYI. (See NDTYI final report for further information on each of the design
elements and design specifications developed for each element.)
Benchmarking plays a central role in
NDTYI. It recognizes that many design
elements exist in other institutions and it is not always necessary to
"reinvent the wheel" in order to make productive changes in TYIs. Benchmarking
is "the process of identifying, understanding, and adapting outstanding
practices and processes from organizations anywhere in the world to help your
organization improve its performance" (American Productivity & Quality
Center, 1997, p. 1). The key words in this definition are "identifying,"
"understanding," and "adapting"; they set in motion a process to search for
excellent practices and processes, study them in detail, and adapt those best
suited to the TYI of concern.
The driving force motivating
benchmarking is a quest for quality and
feasibility in new designs. New ideas and practices do not guarantee the
success of a new design. Instead, the worth of any new design is measured by
the increment of quality it adds to the work of the TYI (Lewis & Smith,
1994). In this sense, benchmarking is a key component of the strategic thinking
that motivates the NDTYI process (Copa & Ammentorp, in press; Watson,
1993). Put another way, benchmarking gives tangible form and proven ways to
implement design concepts and helps to link new designs to the day-to-day
activities of students and staff in TYIs.
Benchmarking has another, more
immediate effect. It can point to specific
activities and processes which can be implemented to materially reduce cost and
increase quality. Benchmarking studies have been used to bring these benefits
to all aspects of organizational activity in higher education (Coate, 1990). As
benchmarking becomes a familiar activity, it can help all members of the TYI
community reflect on what they do and how their work can contribute to
increases in all aspects of organizational quality (Seymour, 1992).
In the NDTYI, benchmarking activities
focus on particular design elements.
That is, we set out to discover benchmark processes related to each of the
steps in the design process advocated in NDTYI. These processes were selected
using the design specifications associated with the design element in
question. In this way, the resulting benchmark studies preserve the integrity
of NDTYI and their discoveries can be readily implemented in a comprehensive
process of organizational change.
Information regarding each benchmarked
site was gathered from a number of
sources. These sources included interviews with key informants, observations
on-site, and materials gathered during site visits (e.g., brochures, articles,
and reports).
In the pages that follow, five benchmark
studies are presented in detail. They
deal, respectively, with the design elements of Learning Process, Learning
Partnerships, Learning Staff and Staff Development, Learning Technology, and
Learning Finance. Each study is organized to discuss the following:
- The rationale for selecting the benchmarked process in terms of the
design specifications associated with the design element in question.
- The objectives underlying the benchmarked process and how they are
defined and communicated in practice.
- The key features which make the benchmarked process unique and how
these are related to the design specifications.
- The impact realized by the benchmarked process.
- The future directions planned for the benchmarked process.
- The design implications or lessons learned that we see in the
benchmarked process.
- The contacts for further information about the benchmarked process.
The contacts include the author of the benchmark study report and contacts at
the site of the benchmarked process.
The learning process is at the center
of any new design for TYIs. In this
design element, the learner and her or his experience shape the design process.
The learning process is, at the same time, the design element most easily
controlled by the TYI. Faculty and staff have a wide range of options available
to formulate new designs for learning along with the professional authority to
implement their ideas. As a result, benchmark studies of the learning process
are especially helpful to those TYIs interested in making immediate and
significant changes in their organizations.
The design specifications described
in NDTYI served as the basis for selecting
the benchmark site relating to learning process. These specifications are shown
in Exhibit 1.
The Consortium for Workforce Education and Lifelong Learning (CWELL) at San
Diego Community College was selected for benchmarking because its conceptual
approach is unique, and the project incorporates many of the new design
specifications for learning process:
- Results in Learning Products which Improve the Community: Research
conducted by students at CWELL is focused on improving the practice of youth
and adult education, including developing more effective service delivery,
improving critical thinking skills, and literacy.
Exhibit 1
Design Specifications for the Learning Process
|
| *
| Aligns with the Learning Context, Signature, and Outcomes: Learning
process pays close attention to the design specifications for previous design
elements.
|
| *
| Results in Learning Products which Improve the Community:
Learning process produces products which are valued by the community external to
the institution.
|
| *
| Links to Internal and External Standards: Learning process
is responsive to the expectations of staff and the wider community (e.g., needed
to continue learning at other educational institutions, occupational skill
standards).
|
| *
| Applies Continuous Assessment To Improve Learning: Learning
process uses frequent and immediate assessment and feedback to improve the learning
experience.
|
| *
| Personalizes to the Needs and Prior Experiences of Each and Every
Learner: Learning process is tailored to the unique situation and
experiences of each learner with the learner at center of the planning process.
|
| *
| Provides Multiple Pathways To Reach Learning Outcomes:
Learning process provides several ways to learn the same thing.
|
| *
| Builds the Self-Esteem of Each Learner: Learning process is a
positive and energy producing experience for learners.
|
| *
| Is Managed by Learners in Consultation with Learning Staff: Learning
process is managed by the learners with guidance by staff.
|
| *
| Employs Collaborative Learning in Problem Solving: Learning process
involves working as a small group or team to solve problems.
|
| *
| Creates Strong Sense of Learning Community: Learning process builds
a close and caring relationship among learners.
|
| *
| Engages the Learner in Inquiry (Research) and Knowledge
Construction: Learning process involves students in the research and
development process and forming meaningful knowledge.
|
| *
| Links to Global Information Network: Learning process is tied to and
uses electronic information networks (e.g., Internet).
|
| *
| Guides by Experienced Navigators: Learning process is shaped by
knowledgeable staff who are very familiar with using information networks.
|
| *
| Uses Learning Projects Connected to the Needs of the Community: Learning
process uses real projects drawn from the needs of the community as a context
and content for learning.
|
|
- Employs Collaborative Learning in Problem Solving: Students
collaborate on research projects with other students, teachers, and educational
researchers. These research projects focus on learning, knowledge construction,
and cognitive processes.
- Creates a Strong Sense of a Learning Community: Researchers,
educators, and graduate students, as well as CWELL students, are involved in
continual research and education at CWELL. The learning community works
together on research issues that affect the education of students at CWELL.
- Engages the Learner in Inquiry (Research) and Knowledge Construction:
CWELL has a "student-as-researcher" program where adult students conduct and
report original research in the field of education.
The information provided in this report is based on the following: a two-day
site visit to San Diego Community College, August 11-12, 1997; person to person
interviews with William Armstrong, Director of Office of Research and Planning,
San Diego Community College District; Augustine Gallego, Chancellor, San Diego
Community College District; Barbara McDonald, Director of CWELL Action Research
Center, Mid-City Center; and Thomas Sticht, Coordinator for Applied Behavioral
and Cognitive Science, Inc.; and a review of the San Diego CWELL Project's
related materials.
The San Diego CWELL Project was developed from findings and recommendations of
the California Workforce Literacy Task Force, the Secretary's Commission on
Achieving Necessary Skills (SCANS), and research on the functional context
education learning process provided by Sticht, Armstrong, Hickey, and Caylor
(1987), in their study, Cast-off Youth: Policy and Training Methods from the
Military Experience.
The California State Legislature
created the California Workforce Literacy
Task Force in 1989. After a yearlong study of the educational system for
out-of-school youth and undereducated adults in California, the Task Force
noted that there were many different educational organizations offering basic
skills, vocational, and work-related education in the State of California. Over
800 million tax dollars were being spent on these educational endeavors, but
there was no system of accountability in place, no set standards, and little
evaluation information available. The minimal information that was available
indicated that students stayed in a program of study for an average length of
80 to 120 hours and made little, if any, improvements in learning as measured
by California's Comprehensive Adult Student Assessment System.
Another finding of the Task Force
was that although many of the youth and
adults being served tended to be those commonly referred to as "at risk,"
defined as "among the most difficult to educate and train," the majority of
administrators and teachers serving this population were not professionally
trained for this work. They determined that over 1,000 organizations were
providing adult literacy instruction, but most of the teaching was being
conducted by volunteers. They also noted that there were no programs in
California's university system where teachers could be educated and trained in
the best methods of instructing and serving the needs of California's
undereducated youth and adults.
According to The San Diego CWELL
Project Report of Progress (Sticht,
1994), the major findings of the Task Force found no programs anywhere in
California, or the rest of the nation, to prepare professional educators who
could do the following:
- Work with "at-risk" youth and adults to develop school-to-work programs that
integrate the teaching of vocational and academic skills into "workforce
education" for workplaces.
- Develop new technical training so that out-of-school, undereducated youth and
adults can save time and efficiently learn employability and technical skills
for jobs while mastering powerful cognitive skills.
- Develop family education programs that serve both children and adults at ages
across the lifespan, therefore truly engaging educators in "lifelong learning"
and the intergenerational transfer of values and skills.
- Serve populations in settings as diverse as the State correctional
facilities; city jails; Job Corps camps; adult basic and secondary education;
and multinational, high technology industries.
Based on these and other findings,
the California Workforce Literacy Task
Force (Sticht, 1995) recommended the following:
That the Legislature establish a network of field stations for
action research and evaluation on adult education in association with campuses
of the California State University and Community College system, oriented to
developing information about California's workforce skills needs, abilities of
the non-college bound workforce, and the development of improved methods of
education and training for non-college bound youth and adults; further that the
Legislature require the California State University and Community College
systems to establish a formal program to educate and train a cadre of adult
educators that can work with the spectrum of education, language, and learning
needs of California's undereducated youth and adults. (p. 3)
Although the California Legislature recognized and acknowledged the findings
of the Task Force, they did not allocate funds to
support the implementation of its recommendations.
The California Workforce Literacy
Task Force was formed and began studying the
system of education for out-of-school youth and undereducated adults in
California just prior to the formation in early 1990 of the Secretary of Labor
Elizabeth Dole's Commission on Achieving Necessary Skills (SCANS). The mission
for SCANS was to "define the necessary functional and enabling skills which
society must provide to every child by the age of sixteen." Thomas Sticht,
president and senior scientist of Applied Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences,
Inc., a nonprofit organization that conducts research and development leading
to improved methods of education and training for undereducated youth and
adults, was asked to serve as one of the SCANS commissioners. At SCANS' first
meeting, Sticht made a presentation on functional context education and its
application to preparing youth and adults with the basic skills needed for
work. After conducting studies of the cognitive science research literature
related to the importance of learning in context, SCANS staff held a meeting
with a number of cognitive scientists to determine the usefulness of the
functional context education concepts. Based on that research, the mission
statement for SCANS was drafted and stated "We believe that these skills are
best learned in context and especially in the context of realistic workplace
problems. Thus, the teaching of functional skills will require the most radical
change in educational content since the beginning of this century."
According to Sticht (1997b),
"functional context education is an approach to
education that is based upon a cognitive science theory of cognitive
development, learning, and instruction" (p. 1). Sticht identifies literacy as a
key component of functional context education because of the important role it
plays in all schooling and instruction. He believes the general thesis that
literacy is something one must "get" in one program, which is then "applied" in
another, is misleading. The argument of functional context education is that
literacy is developed while it is being applied. His research has shown that
students do not need to reach a "prerequisite" level of literacy before they
work on content skills. This is contrary to the more common belief that
literacy must be a separate program, which is then applied in another course of
study. Sticht (personal communication, August 11, 1997) has conducted intensive
research and his careful documentation supports the idea that for the large
numbers of youth and adults who read between the 5th- and 9th-grade levels,
literacy and content skills education can be integrated. With this theory,
there is no need for special "remedial" literacy programs to get students to
"prerequisite" levels of literacy before they are permitted to study the "real
thing."
Sticht not only served on SCANS, but
also served as chair of the California
Workforce Literacy Task Force. Functional context education and Sticht's
research findings from extensive studies of military training programs became
the basis for the SCANS recommendations, as well as for the recommendations
from the California Workforce Literacy Task Force.
CWELL was developed and has been
implemented over a six-year period. Officials
from the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation reviewed the California Workforce
Literacy Task Force's report in 1991. Upon completion of their review, a grant
was provided to the Applied Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences, Inc., and
President Thomas Sticht, to prepare a report showing how the Task Force's
recommendations could be implemented. CWELL was established through a second,
two-year grant from the Hewlett Foundation in 1992. The Lila Wallace Reader's
Digest Fund provided an additional three years of funding to CWELL with a focus
on research and development to better understand how English as a second
language (ESL) instruction could be integrated with instruction in vocational
education.
According to the CWELL Report of
Progress (Sticht, 1995),
The CWELL provides a working model of how the California State
University and California Community College systems can work together to meet
the recommendations of the California Workforce Literacy Task Force for
professional development and action research to improve the education and
training of California's out-of-school, undereducated youth and adults. The
CWELL is an innovative project to understand and improve adult education in a
local context. (p. 5)
According to Armstrong (personal
communication, August 12, 1997), a member of the Consortium, "The CWELL was
created as a qualitative project to influence the way people learn and teach,
not as a quantitative study to measure or produce data."
CWELL is an innovative project to
improve adult education in local contexts.
CWELL is a collaborative partnership between the San Diego Community College
District Continuing Education Division (SDCCD/CE), San Diego State University -
Department of Educational Technology (SDSU), and the Applied Behavioral and
Cognitive Sciences, Inc. These organizations are working together to meet the
needs of new immigrants and undereducated youth and adults for noncollege
credit education and training.
Each of the partners contributes to
the San Diego CWELL Project in a number of
ways. These contributions are presented below.
The San Diego Community College District Continuing Education Division
The SDCCD/CE provides the state adult
programs, including high school
completion, ESL, classes for older adults, job training/vocational classes,
business classes, classes for the disabled, parenting, child development, and
consumer and home economics classes. Adult education, continuing education,
night school, and community services are all part of SDCC/CE's commitment to
learning for a lifetime.
In order to implement the California Workforce Literacy Task Force's
recommendation to establish "field stations for action research," SDCCD/CE has
developed a field station called the CWELL Action Research Center (ARC). The
mission of ARC is "to research new methods for meeting the needs of youth and
adults for workforce education and lifelong learning." As part of their
commitment to making this part of the CWELL work, SDCCD/CE provides facilities
for the ARC, and part-time staff, including an ARC coordinator, Barbara
McDonald, research staff, and teachers who receive stipends for conducting
original research to improve instructional services. The CWELL ARC office is
located in the heart of San Diego's inner city at the Mid City Continuing
Education Center. There are four additional SDCCD/CE centers that serve the ARC
community.
The ARC community includes 212,800
people out of the total population of
approximately 2.5 million in the greater San Diego area. The ARC community is
comprised of students who attend classes at one of four sites. These include
the Centre City Skills Center, the Caesar Chavez Center, the Educational
Cultural Complex, and the Mid-City Center. The student population is ethnically
diverse with a large population of minorities, many of whom are refugees.
Overall, the ARC community is socially, educationally, and economically
depressed compared to the greater San Diego area.
San Diego State University - Department of Educational Technology
The College of Education, Department
of Educational Technology, San Diego
State University (SDSU) has developed the Workforce Education and Lifelong
Learning Specialist (WELLS) program as part of the Master of Arts in Education
graduate degree. The program is designed to implement the California Workforce
Literacy Task Force's recommendation for professional education for educators
of out-of-school youth and adults.
Applied Behavioral and Cognitive Sciences, Inc.
Thomas Sticht, cognitive psychologist,
serves as the San Diego CWELL
Project Coordinator. He provides advisory and technical services to both the
San Diego State University and the San Diego Community College District. His
role in the project is to assist with the development of the WELLS degree
program--the new Master of Arts Specialization in Workforce Education and
Lifelong Learning. He also teaches the introductory course in the program. For
the SDCCD/CE, Sticht provides technical advisory services to and works
part-time with the ARC director and staff to help design, conduct, and report
studies on workforce education and lifelong learning such as Family
Workplace Literacy Programs: A Note on the Intergenerational Transfer of
Literacy from Fathers to Children and Functional Context Education and
Adult Literacy: Historical Perspectives for Workforce Development. He also
tracks research findings from research and development centers throughout the
United States, as well as internationally, and shares these findings within the
ARCs and the WELLS graduate program.
ARC and WELLS have key features that establish the San Diego CWELL Project as
an exemplary site in regards to the learning process.
ARC has the following features:
- Resident and external research scientists with internationally recognized
expertise in cognitive science, educational psychology, testing, assessment,
evaluation, adult literacy, technical training, and the application of these
disciplines to the educational needs of youth and adults.
- Teacher-as-researcher program in which teachers and administrators
participate in the conducting and reporting of original grassroots research to
improve the practice of adult education in the ARC community.
- Adult student-as-researcher program in which adult students participate in
the conducting and reporting of original research projects to better understand
the need for, barriers to, and methods for adult education from the adult
learner's perspective. According to the CWELL 1992-1994 Report of Progress
(Sticht, 1994), the student research/writing project serves the following
purposes: it provides a forum for adult students to voice their opinions and
thoughts about the educational service delivery system in which they study, as
well as how education has affected them as students, adults, parents, and
citizens; it provides an opportunity for administrators, staff, researchers,
and teachers to gain insight into what their clients are thinking about the
current system and how more effective methods of service delivery may be
incorporated; and it provides an opportunity for students to conduct
educational research as a method of empowerment, information-seeking, and
improvement of critical thinking, analytical, and writing skills. Student
research and writing contests are the principle stimulus for encouraging
participation of adult students as researchers.
- Graduate students from the San Diego State University who are enrolled in the
new WELLS program participate in the activities of the ARC.
- A research dissemination program is available that includes the publication
and distribution of the Community Exchange newspaper three times each
year, conducting four Saturday seminars a year, and an annual conference on
important issues facing adult education.
- Research and development conducted within a coherent conceptual framework
office that includes the social basis of cognition; the human cognitive system;
a developmental model of literacy; a constructive, information processing
approach to teaching and learning; and the intergenerational transfer of
cognitive abilities and educational attitudes from parents to children.
- Research and development of scientists, teachers, adult students, and
graduate students working in the ARC orchestrated by the conceptual framework
to improve the participation of adults in education, achievement in and outside
the classroom, and the prevention of future learning and schooling problems of
children.
WELLS has the following features:
- A concentration in Educational Arts and Technology so that adult educators
will possess mastery of education theories, instructional design, interactive
computer, and telecommunications technologies for the design and delivery of
adult education. The WELLS program was established in response to the expanding
role that technology is and will be playing in providing education to
out-of-school youth and adults. Technology is a key to reaching populations in
diverse settings and at critical times when lives are in transition and access
to education and training is sought. WELLS students will be knowledgeable and
skilled in using a variety of technologies for education, including traditional
classrooms, lectures, and texts, but also computer-based interactive media and
television for distance learning. WELLS develops competence in working in teams
made up of various content specialists to analyze learning objectives; to
design, develop, and deliver education and training; and to evaluate learning
outcomes and program effectiveness.
- A command of cognitive science applied to the learning, education, and
training needs of youth and adults who are undereducated or in other ways in
need of special instructional methods and contents.
- An understanding of culture and human resource policies and practices,
including special emphasis on educational policy and practice implications of
cultural diversity in the adult population of the United States and the
diversity of settings in which adult education takes place.
- Participation by WELLS graduate students in work experience internships in
business and industry in a variety of settings to enhance the performance of
personnel through the diagnosis of performance problems; the development of job
aids; or the design, delivery, and evaluation of instructional programs for
adults.
- Development and maintenance by WELLS faculty and students of an electronic
network for communicating with ARC and other research and development centers
and labs around the world.
CWELL has served as a vehicle for the
development of a partnership and
collaboration between two major educational institutions, San Diego State
University and the San Diego Community College District. CWELL has helped break
down the barriers between these institutions, resulting in new opportunities
and relationships for students, staff, and administration and establishing a
new way of doing business.
The San Diego CWELL Project has
created ways to produce new knowledge. The
project has employed collaborative learning in problem solving and has engaged
the learner in inquiry and knowledge construction. This has been accomplished
through innovative research conducted by students, teachers, and cognitive
scientists. This research has been documented through journals, the
Community Exchange newspaper, seminars focused on teacher research, and
annual conferences.
As a result of information gathered
from ARC's students, teachers, and
cognitive scientists, three books are in the planning stages (B. A. McDonald,
personal communication, August 12, 1997). One book will focus on the potential
of journal writing as an educational tool; more than 2,000 pieces of writing
are presently being reviewed as part of this book. A second book will assess
the teacher-research process; this book will highlight 24 research projects
conducted by teachers. The research projects focus on student participation and
achievement. Examples of these research projects include Life History of ESL
Students, Factors Affecting the Achievement of ESL Students, and
Families Learning English Together. The third book will focus on the
monolinguistic nature of the Caesar Chavez Center, where the majority of ESL
students speak Spanish as their first language, compared to the multilinguistic
nature of the Mid-City Center, where as many as nineteen different languages
are present in the ESL classroom.
Through documentation of the San
Diego CWELL Project, a new concept of
learning process is illustrated. Teachers act as researchers and play a
significant role in their own staff development as they learn about their
students and design appropriate classroom activities and teaching methods. This
is contrary to traditional staff development where teachers attend seminars and
workshops conducted by outside experts.
An open entry/open exit policy for
noncredit courses that allows students "to
enter a class when there is a space available, learn what they want to learn,
and leave when they want to leave," has been identified by cognitive
scientists, administrators, and faculty of the CWELL as a challenge to the
educational process. This is a learning process managed by learners with
guidance by staff. Teachers have difficulty preparing their classroom
activities and spend much time remediating because student participation in the
classroom changes on a daily basis. Tracking students and their progress is
challenging under these conditions. While the open entry/open exit policy has
been implemented in education and training organizations across the nation,
there has been little evaluation of the instructional consequences of this
policy.
Due to lack of funds, the San Diego
CWELL Project will end as a focused project
in December 1997. This project has relied upon the generosity of private
foundations, and the current funding cycle will end with the calendar year.
According to Consortium members--Thomas Sticht, San Diego CWELL Project
Coordinator; Augustine Gallego, Chancellor of the San Diego Community College
District; Barbara McDonald, Director of the CWELL ARC; and William Armstrong,
Director of Office of Research and Planning, San Diego Community College
District--the San Diego CWELL Project has been successful.
The CWELL partners will sponsor
a conference in spring 1998 that, according
to Gallego (personal communication, August 11, 1997), will be a national
discussion on lifelong learning. This will be an opportunity to focus on the
role that community colleges, community college faculty and students, and the
surrounding community play in creating a lifelong learning environment. The
conference will look at ways to provide opportunities for each of the
stakeholders and participants to create a collaborative learning process that
will make classrooms action research centers. The intent of the conference is
to assess the San Diego CWELL Project and to look at how it can be developed
and taken to a larger scale in order to encourage every faculty member to be a
researcher and every student an involved learner in the classroom. This event
will also provide an opportunity to gather input from business and the
community in order to determine what they need from adult education programs.
Based on the study of the learning
process as represented in the San Diego
CWELL Project, the following design implications appear warranted:
- Learn in Teams: Students, working in study groups with the guidance of
teachers and community-based resource persons, can produce products and
services valued by the larger community and strategic to improving higher
education.
- Engage in Action Research: The learning experiences inherent in
producing the products and services noted above provide very authentic
opportunities to address the learning outcome recommended in NDTYI.
- Use Functional Context: The functional context of producing externally
valued products and services enhances the involvement and engagement of
learners and provides practice in knowledge construction, so much a part of the
information/knowledge age.
- Rely on Partnerships: Partnerships with other institutions of higher
education, government agencies and organizations, and the wider community can
serve to enhance the supporting infrastructure for learning process and
organization to reach high standards in learning outcomes.
- Incorporate Technology: Technology is very important to accessing,
synthesizing, and communicating information as part of the learning process.
Study Author
|
Reid Haglin, University of Minnesota Extension Service, St. Louis County,109A
|
| | | | |
Washburn Hall, 2305 E. 5th Street, Duluth, MN 55812, (218) 726-8705
|
Site Contact
|
Barbara McDonald, Director of CWELL Action Research Center, Mid-City Center,
|
| | | | |
5348 University Avenue, San Diego, CA 92105, (619) 265-3452
|
Partnerships are a major determinant of vitality for the TYI. They
provide access to new ideas and practices needed to keep the TYI up-to-date.
They also bring human and material resources to TYI programs. Partnerships can
take many forms, ranging from cooperative courses to complex research and
development agreements. They also involve many different individuals and
organizations which serve to enrich the offerings of the TYI, leverage the
TYI's resources, and provide synergies to all of the partners.
The design specifications described in NDTYI served as the basis for selecting
the benchmark site relating to learning partnership. The design specifications
for learning partnerships are shown in Exhibit 2.
Fox Valley Technical College (FVTC)
was selected for study in relation to
learning partnerships because it particularly focuses on the following NDTYI
design specifications:
- Enhances the Learning Experience: Partnerships at Fox Valley Technical
College add value to the learning experience in several ways such as increasing
available resources and providing linkages to the community.
- Provides Mutual Benefit: Partners at FVTC are both benefactors and
beneficiaries through the partnership activities. All of the partners have some
of their needs met through involvement in the partnership.
- Bridges Cultures: Through partnerships at FVTC an understanding
develops regarding the values, policies, and practice of all partners and ways
they can work together effectively.
- Leverages Resources/Results in Synergy: Partnerships at FVTC result in
additional resources/results for each partner. Although traditional funding
mechanisms might permit the institution to continue business as usual,
collaboration with outside partners increases both the quality and the quantity
of educational services.
- Impacts the Entire Community: Partnerships at FVTC reflect the
dynamics of community with its local, state, national, and international
dimensions.
Exhibit 2
Design Specifications for Learning Partnerships
|
| *
| Aligns with Learning Context, Signature, Outcomes, Process, and
Organization: Partnership characteristics follow from and reinforce the
design specifications for previous design elements.
|
| *
| Enhances the Learning Experience: Partnerships add value to the learning
experience, for example, by making it more authentic; providing opportunities
to integrate subject matter areas; ensuring access to up-to-date technology;
developing relationships with future coworkers; opening up new sources of
knowledge; and leading to smoother transition from education to work, family,
and community life.
|
| *
| Provides Mutual Benefit: Partners are both benefactors and beneficiaries
through the partnership activities. All of the partners have some of their
needs met.
|
| *
| Includes all Stakeholders: The portfolio of partnerships provides
opportunities for all of the key stakeholders to be involved and benefit from
learning experience. Assertive action ensures representation across age,
gender, socioeconomic, geographic, and cultural background.
|
| *
| Bridges Cultures: There is attention to developing an understanding of
the values, policies, and practices of all partners and ways they can work
together effectively.
|
| *
| Leverages Resources/Results in Synergy: Partnerships result in
additional resources/results for each partner or the same results for reduced
resources--one plus one adds up to more than two.
|
| *
| Provides Many Ways of Contributing: Partnership building is open and
encourages multiple ways of adding value to the learning experience such as
sharing risk, communicating standards, teaching and mentoring, providing
support services (e.g., child care, transportation, subsidized income, or
tutoring), giving equipment, and providing scholarships.
|
| *
| Builds Supporting Infrastructure: Partnership-related strategies focus
on sustaining alliances and the widespread responsibility to build new
partnerships when and where they are needed. Developing a supportive
infrastructure means opening up opportunities for good communications,
establishing trust, involving all staff, providing ongoing training on
partnerships, removing policies and practices that provide disincentives for
partnerships, engaging in continuous quality improvement of partnerships,
encouraging both formal and informal agreements, and ending partnerships
graciously.
|
| *
| Impacts the Entire Community: Partnerships reflect the dynamics of
community with its local, state, national, and international dimensions. There
is serious and strategic attention to stewardship of the community through
partnerships.
|
|
The benchmarking study of FVTC included a site visit over a two-day period of
July 21 and 22, 1997, and involved a comprehensive tour of all facilities on
the Appleton, Wisconsin campus. The visit included a tour of businesses and
industries that are located directly adjacent to the D. J. Bordini Conference
Center. Personal interviews were conducted on the campus with key personnel
which included the following persons: H. Victor Baldi, President; Martin Gentz,
Vice President of Instructional Services; and Virgil Noordyk, Economic
Development Manager.
Fox Valley Technical College has two
campuses and five regional centers which
serve a five-county geographic region in northeast Wisconsin. According to the
1990 census, the region has a population of approximately 381,000 people and is
home to approximately 10,500 businesses. Almost 90% of the businesses in the
service area employ less than twenty workers and only eighty employers have
more than 250 employees. In addition, there are 5,560 farms in the area. Thus,
the service area is nonmetropolitan and is more rural in respect to the larger
population centers in the state.
FVTC is one of sixteen postsecondary
educational districts in the state of
Wisconsin. Generally speaking, these individual regional education districts
receive approximately one-half of their annual budget revenue from local
government and less than 20% of their revenue from state aid. The balance of
their revenue comes from student tuition/fees, institutional revenue, and
miscellaneous revenue. FVTC generates approximately 15% of its operating
revenue from the institutional revenue category, which largely consists of
monies generated through contract revenue (i.e., customized training).
Considering the demographics of the
area and the fact that in 1995-1996 FVTC
customized training activities generated approximately 6 million dollars in
revenue, it is clear that partnerships are central to the financial health of
the college. According to FVTC's actual 1995-1996 budget figures, the program
fees (student tuition) budget category brought in slightly less than 5 million
dollars in revenue ($4,981,975) and approximately 8.1 million dollars in state
aid. Thus, customized training is an extremely important source of revenue to
FVTC.
FVTC is part of the fabric of the
community it serves. The college has formed
partnerships with employers, agencies, and other educational institutions (both
public and private) within the community, the state, and nationally.
FVTC (1997-1998a) is open and direct
in its commitment to building and
maintaining the community's workforce as expressed in the college's mission
statement:
The mission of Fox Valley Technical College is to help individuals
reach their potential by providing cost-effective education and training for
employment. We seek to build and maintain an effective and diverse work force
that supports the economic growth and stability of our communities. (p.
4)
The mission statement indicates that the college focuses onthe economic
well-being of the local community as a key ingredient in its
educational delivery plan. It further reinforces this commitment in the
document "Strategic Directions Through 2001." All four of the strategic
directions identified in this document are student focused; two of the four
strategic directions recognize internal and external customers, market
relevance, and the need to address unmet customer needs.
In addition, FVTC (1995-1996a) seeks
to "develop and expand its information
technology infrastructure to permit maximum linkages with its internal and
external customers." Partnerships are considered a necessary component of the
college.
FVTC has built its partnership base by implementing a series of successful
strategic plans focused on developing and maintaining partnerships. The FVTC
Strategic Business Plan for Economic Development Contract Services (1995-1997)
provides a five-year plan for contract services delivered by the college. The
strategic plan includes a general description and specific details of contract
services provided by the college. In addition, the college provides its
partners with a guarantee of quality in the contracted services it provides. If
agreed-upon client requirements are not met, services are redone at no charge
to the client.
The key features of FVTC partnerships are as follows:
- Involving traditional day school faculty in the delivery of customized
training. (Approximately 75% of the day school faculty teach customized
training courses.)
- Recognizing that customized training can enhance the college's operating
revenue (and then making it happen).
- Adhering to a master strategic plan focused on developing and maintaining
partnerships.
- Utilizing strong citizen advisory committees, including listening to and
implementing their ideas.
- Researching customers to find out what they need and want from the
college.
- Specially designed buildings (D. J. Bordini Conference Center in Appleton,
Wisconsin, and S. J. Spanbauer Center in Oshkosh, Wisconsin) on both campuses
that target specific industry training needs. The college has three such
centers to enhance educational delivery and communications capabilities.
- Perceiving students as customers.
- Committing to achievement of total customer satisfaction.
- Supporting administration that understands the importance and relevance of
customer training.
- Generating win/win situations between partners. (FVTC, 1995-1997)
FVTC (1995-1997) has a long history
of working together with a variety of
businesses within its service area and prides itself on its relationship with
business and industry. Thus, when the State of Wisconsin established a
commission to make policy recommendations on the development of a quality
workforce in the state, FVTC was off and running with its already
well-developed, industry-customized training program.
Among the college's quality and
productivity enhancement activities is its
partnership with the Quality/Productivity Resource Center (Q/PRC), a nonprofit
entity, that is housed at the D. J. Bordini Conference Center on the Appleton,
Wisconsin, campus. The Q/PRC controls and operates a specially designed media
resource area in the D. J. Bordini Conference Center. This resource area houses
a cutting edge collection of quality and productivity literature and other
resources. The resource center is available to Q/PRC members and also to the
staff and students of FVTC. The value and interest generated by the Q/PRC is
borne out in a 1993 survey of Training Director/Operations Managers at 435
companies querying them on their awareness and interest in the technical
assistance offerings of the college. The Q/PRC was the top-rated service (rated
#1 by 39% of the respondents) according to the survey (FVTC, 1995-1997, p.
41).
The Wisconsin Center for Industrial
Competitiveness - Northeast (WisCIC/NE) is
a joint collaboration between FVTC, other area technical colleges, Milwaukee
School of Engineering, Wisconsin Department of Development, and private
consultants. This particular "consortium provides comprehensive assessment
services and leadership to business and industry through a proactive network
designed to enhance productivity, competitiveness, and profitability" (FVTC,
1995-1997, p. 9). The focus remains on the college's continuing ability to form
partnerships and consortiums with a wide variety of companies, organizations,
miscellaneous industries, and other educational institutions that have the
common desire to improve their own organizations and help others while helping
themselves.
FVTC's formal entrance in August of
1996 into the Wisconsin Manufacturing
Extension Partnership (WMEP) is an expansion of its continued goal of providing
services to a larger audience. Previous partnerships with a variety of agencies
and industries had provided the college with a long list of capabilities (both
expertise and high technology equipment) that could be directly attributed to
the college's successful partnering efforts with business. WMEP is a
collaborative public-private partnership with the expressed interest of
promoting the competitiveness, strength, productivity, growth, and innovative
capabilities of Wisconsin's small and medium-sized manufacturers. The
affiliation with WMEP-Northeast continues to add both financial resources and
additional educational expertise to an already formidable array of services
(WMEP, 1996c).
The WMEP-Northeast consortium
consists of the following membership:
- Lakeshore Technical College, Cleveland, Wisconsin
- Mid State Technical College, Wisconsin Rapids, Wisconsin
- Moraine Park Technical College, Fond du Lac, Wisconsin
- Northeast Wisconsin Technical College, Green Bay, Wisconsin
- University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin
- University of Wisconsin, Green Bay, Wisconsin
- University of Wisconsin, Stevens Point, Wisconsin
- University of Wisconsin Extension
- Milwaukee School of Engineering
- Wisconsin Department of Development (WMEP, 1996b)
In addition, the headquarters for
the new consortium will be the D. J. Bordini
Conference Center located on FVTC's Appleton, Wisconsin, campus. A number of
services are available to small and medium-sized manufacturing firms through
WMEP. These services include simple assessments and benchmarking of current
operations, developing human resource programs, evaluating new technologies,
and working with client firms to develop and carry out manufacturing strategies
to improve efficiency.
WMEP is now part of a network of 60
National Institute of Standards and
Technology affiliated manufacturing extension centers in the United States
(WMEP, 1996c). The National Institute of Standards and Technology is connected
with the U.S. Department of Commerce. Thus, this recent partnership extends the
college's reach into 42 states and territories. In essence, this affiliation
further enhances the college's ability to make available a greater array of
services that are designed to be client-driven, and link small and medium-sized
companies needing assistance with public and private sources of expertise. This
effort is in keeping with the college's Board of Trustees policy related to
"Governance Commitment," which lists as one of six core values, "Collaborative
Partnerships."
FVTC (1995-1996a) has also developed
a number of other successful
partnerships, resulting in leveraged resources for the college and mutual
benefit for all partners. These partnerships include the following:
- Flexographic Press/Corrugated Printing Press Industry: Major
manufacturers of high tech, high speed printing presses have contributed
several million dollars of state-of-the-art mass production printing press
equipment to the college. This partnership is located in the D. J. Bordini
Conference Center in Appleton, Wisconsin, and it is probably one of the most
sophisticated two-year college training facilities in the nation.
- Indentured Apprentice: In the 1995-1996 school year, FVTC led the
state in indentured apprenticeship enrollments (approximately 10% of the entire
state's enrollment). This appears to be a direct result of the college's strong
relationship with the state's unions.
- Federal Grants: FVTC has received four million dollars in federal
grants from the U.S. Department of Justice. These grants include $1.2 million
for "Youth Focused Community Policing" and $750,000 to provide "nation wide
training to law enforcement and other professionals assigned to cases of
missing and exploited children" (p. 8).
In FVTC's (1995-1996a) case, its financial statement and annual report confirm
its success in delivering cost-effective training. In 1996, the Institute of
Higher Education at the University of Florida named FVTC as a finalist in their
Bellwether Awards Competition. The college was one of nine TYIs in the nation
to be nominated in the "planning, governance, and finance" category. Mentioned
specifically in regard to the award was a project/grant program that internally
funded "full-time faculty's creative projects for enhancing the
teaching/learning environment" (p. 9).
It becomes increasingly obvious that FVTC (1995-1996a) recognizes the entire
teacher-student learning relationship and places value on technology
innovation, the teacher, the facility, and the student. This is further
developed by the Board of Trustees in its policy related to "Governance
Commitment." In this commitment, the Board points out the following core
values: integrity, collaborative partnerships, innovation, continuous
improvement, customer focus, and diversity. True partnerships must be designed
in ways that all partners are winners as a result of the partnership.
Furthermore, the importance of partnerships and outside collaboration is very
apparent in the college's overall enrollment (FVTC, 1995-1996a). According to
enrollment figures released by the college, customized training/contracting has
produced an average of almost 400 FTEs on an annual basis each of the last five
years. In the 1995-1996 school year, FVTC produced more FTEs by contracting
than any other technical college in Wisconsin and more than doubled the revenue
generated ($6,004,251 to $2,782,882) by the next closest ranking technical
college in Wisconsin.
It is anticipated by the college leadership that FVTC (1997-1998b) will
continue to evolve its partnerships. In 1997-1998, the college plans on moving
into a shared facility with Lakeland College, which, in turn, contributes to
its expansion of partnerships within higher education. Continued participation
and new added ventures in interactive television (ITV) is an expanding area for
the college. For example, in 1997-1998, the college's commitment to K-12
School/College Alliance for Distance Education (KSCADE) fiber-optic leasing and
ITV classroom will continue the sharing of ITV among high schools. It is
apparent that the college will continue to find new business and industry
partnerships, but will also supplement these high profile and usually immediate
financial providers with other educational partners. FVTC is committed to the
pursuit of quality, both on the inside and as an educational partner and
provider to others.
Both public and private TYIs across the United States are faced with the
dilemma of how to best serve their respective community's needs. Our fast
changing economy dictates that the truly successful TYIs monitor their
communities to identify new challenges, opportunities, and potential new
partners. Business and industry has the ability to contribute needed resources
to TYIs. TYIs can contribute to meeting the needs of employers by providing
education for a quality workforce. Collaborative relationships between TYIs and
employers are important for the vitality of all partners and the community as a
whole.
The following design implications appear warranted on the basis of the
benchmarking study of learning partnerships at FVTC:
- Increase Revenues: Learning partnerships can provide a significant
source of funds to increase and/or stabilize the budget of a two-year
institution of higher education. Partnerships can produce a multiplier effect
for local, state, and federal public funds.
- Develop Community: Learning partnerships can be used to focus economic
and social development, create synergy among available assets, and reveal new
opportunities for communities (and institutions).
- Focus on Quality: Lasting learning partnerships are built by providing
high-quality, dependable educational services.
- Respond to Needs: Learning partnerships need to be client-driven, with
constant checking for satisfaction and quick response to changing
requirements.
- Build Infrastructure: Learning partnerships are based on good
communications, clear expectations, and trusting relationships. All of these
depend on having a supportive infrastructure with active informal information
networks, decentralized authority, and flexible organization.
- Involve All Staff: As more and more staff are involved in successful
partnerships, the use and benefits of partnerships become a part of the
institution's culture and way of day-to-day operation.
- Generate Mutual Benefit: Finding win-win relationships is a key to
sustaining lasting partnerships.
- Expand Geographic Boundaries: Learning partnerships that make use of
regional, state, national, and international opportunities can sometimes
significantly enhance the benefits of collaborating.
- Make a Part of Strategic Planning: Learning partnerships need to be
planned for in a serious and foresighted way. Many partnerships need a long
time to build into productive relationships. Institutional needs must be put on
a planning time horizon with partnership building.
Study Author
|
G. David Sayre, President, Perry and Sayre Associates, LLP, 8855 Kibirnie Terrace,
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| | | |
Brooklyn Park, MN 55443, (612) 493-9051
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Site Contact
|
Martin Gentz, Vice President of Instructional Services, Fox Valley Technical College,
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| | | | |
Appleton Campus, 1825 N. Bluemound Drive, P.O. Box 2277, Appleton, WI54913-2277, (920) 735-5600
|
The learning staff are central to the realization of the learning outcomes
which form the aims of NDTYI. Without an effective staff, there is little
chance of reaching the expectations for a new design. However, the challenge is
not only to select a highly qualified staff, but to keep a staff highly
qualified through staff development. Staff are interpreted broadly here to
include anyone making a contribution to the learning enterprise--instructors,
student services, support staff, administrators; full- and part-time; and on
and off campus.
The design specifications described in NDTYI served as the basis for selecting
the benchmark site relating to learning staff and staff development. The design
specifications are shown in Exhibit 3. The Miami-Dade Community College (M-DCC)
site was selected for study in relation to staff development because it
particularly focuses on the following NDTYI design specifications:
- Employs Continuous Quality Improvement: M-DCC has made a long-term
commitment to applying continuous quality improvement processes to the learning
experience with standards of excellence that are constantly updated,
performance being continually assessed, and rewards and recognition closely
linked to meeting standards.
- Continues To Learn: Staffing and staff development at M-DCC recognizes
the value of lifelong learning for all staff, views lifelong learning as a
shared responsibility of individual and institution, provides renewal
opportunities in multiple formats, and commits resources (e.g., time,
substitutes, and space) for staff development.
Exhibit 3
Design Specifications for Learning Staff and Staff Development
|
| *
| Aligns with Design Specifications for Learning Context, Signature, Outcomes,
Process, Organization, and Partnerships: Staffing and staff development pay
close attention to the design specifications for previous design elements.
|
| *
| Ensures that Each Learner Is Known and Served Very Well: Staffing and
staff development provide for the needed "wrap-around" support--academic,
social, psychological, and physical--needed by each learner in an integrated
fashion.
|
| *
| Manages Constructivist Learning: Staffing and staff development support
learning that produces learning products valued by the learner and wider
community, involves extensive project-based learning, integrates subject matter
areas, and use and closely connect community-based learning with school-based
learning.
|
| *
| Handles Just-in-Time Learning Design: Staffing and staff development are
flexible, innovative, and can effectively manage the design and execution of
learning experiences that are very responsive to the needs of learners and the
context in which learning is taking place.
|
| *
| Builds Learning Communities: Staffing and staff development attend to
the competencies needed to direct the development of strong learning
communities such as teamwork, understanding and valuing diversity, establishing
trust, balancing freedom and responsibility, and being supportive.
|
| *
| Operates as Information Navigator: Staffing and staff development give
priority to the competence of using information systems and guiding other to do
the same.
|
| *
| Includes Competence in Research and Service Functions: Staffing and
staff development include and integrate the educational functions of learning,
research, and service to enhance the learning experience and contribution to
community.
|
| *
| Employs Continuous Quality Improvement: Staffing and staff development
apply continuous quality improvement processes to the learning experience with
expectations of excellence that are constantly updated, performance being
continually assessed, and rewards and recognition closely linked to meeting
expectations.
|
| *
| Continues To Learn: Staffing and staff development recognize the value
of lifelong learning for all staff, views lifelong learning as a shared
responsibility of individual and institution, provide renewal opportunities in
multiple formats, and commit resources (e.g., time, substitutes, and space) for
staff development.
|
|
This benchmarking study was based on interviews and observations during a
two-day site visit during September 1997, and review of many written materials
including policy documents, annual reports, strategic plans, and marketing
brochures. Marie Nock, Director of College Training and Development and officed
on the Kendall Campus of
M-DCC, served as principal contact and informant.
I had the opportunity to interview several staff and faculty members on the
Kendall Campus as part of my visit.
The commitment to staff development at M-DCC began in the early 1970s with the
work of Carol Zion as its Director of the Office of Staff and Organizational
Development (she later provided national leadership in staff development as a
founder of the National Council for Staff, Program, and Organizational
Development). This chapter focuses on the special attention given to staff
development at M-DCC beginning in 1986 with initiation of the Teaching/Learning
Project which has since won several professional awards and widespread national
recognition for excellence (Loumos-Kennedy, 1996). From the start of the
project, the central commitment was to improve learning for all students and
the focus, while starting with faculty, soon moved to include all staff.
Description is provided of the development and recent operation of the
Miami-Dade Faculty, Staff, and Program Development Initiative and future plans,
the latter charting some bold new directions. Building and sustaining the
program and its new directions hold several lessons for designing and
implementing new designs for staffing and staff development.
Institutional Background
M-DCC opened in September 1960. It is a two-year, state-supported community
college with six campuses and many outreach centers. M-DCC is recognized
nationally as one of the largest and best community colleges in the United
States. The college is governed by a seven-member District Board of Trustees
and a college president. The president at this time is Eduardo J. Padron; the
president during the initiation and building of the Teaching/Learning Project
described in this study was Robert McCabe. During 1995-1996, enrollments for
credit students at M-DCC was 74,060 and for noncredit students was 50,569.
M-DCC offers the Associate of Arts Degree, Associate of Science Degree, and
Vocational Credit Certificates in Business, Technical, Allied Health, and
Public Service occupational areas.
The average age of students is 26 with more than 67% of students attending on
a part-time basis. In terms of ethnic mix, 17% of students during 1995-1996
were white, non-Hispanic; 22% were black non-Hispanic; 59% were Hispanic, and
2% were other. Given this mix of students, M-DCC enrolls the most Hispanic
students and the second largest number of black students of any college or
university in the United States. M-DCC graduated 5,268 student in the academic
year 1995-1996 and has awarded a total of 154,523 degrees since it opened.
With this student base, M-DCC employed 2,292 part-time and 3,526 full-time
people in 1995-1996. The faculty is made up of 807 full-time and 1,305
part-time employees. In terms of education, 94% of the full-time faculty hold
advance degrees and 21% have earned doctorate degrees (M-DCC, 1996).
This case study focuses on one of the M-DCC campuses, the Kendall Campus,
which is located in the southern part of Dade County and a suburb of Miami. The
Kendall Campus enrolled a total of 52,912 credit and noncredit students in
1995-1996. Over the time of the Faculty, Staff, and Program Development
Initiative reported in this study, the campus has made the most concerted
effort at building and sustaining the initiative of all of the M-DCC
campuses.
Process Background
The Faculty, Staff, and Program Development Initiative described in this
study started in June 1986 when then M-DCC President, Robert McCabe, delivered
a concept paper entitled, "Organizing M-DCC To Emphasize Faculty/Student
Performance," to a group of 120 faculty and administrators. The paper provides
an outline for a multi-year, institution-wide project with a rationale that was
centered as follows, "If we were to improve teaching and learning overall and
to encourage faculty to take a leadership role in the process, we would have to
provide information and support, capture and share the expertise of excellent
veteran faculty, raise the status of teaching as a profession, and reward the
type of performance we say we value." By late Fall 1986, the Teaching/ Learning
Project had a project director and a 26-member steering committee. In January,
1987, four subcommittees had been put in place with a focus on institutional
values, the teaching/leaning environment, faculty excellence, and new faculty.
A total of 38 M-DCC personnel were directly involved in the project.
During 1987-1988, the project focused on raising awareness, expanding
involvement, and realizing initial outcomes. Information on the project was
shared in several formats inside the college, to the wider community, and
nationally. Two new subcommittees of the steering committee were formed with a
focus on classroom feedback and learning to learn and faculty advancement,
bringing nearly 60 college personnel directly into involvement with the
project. External consultants were brought in to help with the work of the
steering committee and subcommittees. Products of the year included a statement
of institutional teaching/learning values to be included in all college
publications, a new orientation process for new faculty, availability of two
new graduate courses on teaching and learning (effective teaching and learning,
research in the classroom), two videotapes for faculty on exploring classroom
feedback and cultural differences in learning styles, and secured funding for
24 endowed teaching chairs.
In the third year of the project, 1988-1989, the project turned to action on
its recommendations and further involvement of college personnel. Four new
subcommittees were formed with a focus on part-time faculty, role of
administrators, support for faculty, and nonclassroom faculty--the project now
directly involved just over 100 personnel. Major outcomes of the year were a
Statement of Faculty Excellence and the Faculty Advancement Policies and
Procedures. The Statement of Faculty Excellence served to "provide a common
understanding of what it means to perform in an excellent manner at Miami-Dade
Community College" (M-DCC, n.d., a). The statement would be used as a
foundation for assessment of potential new faculty, annual performance reviews
of existing faculty, as a guide in the development and review of portfolios for
faculty tenure and promotion decisions, and for faculty to judge their own
performance and make decisions about professional goals and development. The
Faculty Advancement Policies and Procedures put the standards and their use
into operating policy. There was extensive involvement of the faculty in
putting the Faculty Advancement Policies and Procedures together and they were
passed by faculty referendum in April 1989. By June 1989, 33 endowed chairs had
been funded.
During the fourth year of the project, focus was on revising and fine-tuning
the work of previous years based on the experience of the first year of
implementation. A Collegewide Student Feedback Questionnaire was pilot tested
to collect information based on the Statement of Faculty Excellence. The fifth
year of the project, 1990-1991, brought 48 additional college personnel into
the project with the forming of two new subcommittees of the steering committee
with a focus on support staff involvement and administrator advancement. These
were major milestones as they brought representation of all personnel
categories of the colleges directly into the Teaching/Learning Project. Another
milestone during this year was passage by the faculty and college executive
committee of the Faculty Advancement Procedures which put the Faculty
Advancement Policies and Procedures into operation--the professional
development program envisioned for the Teaching/Learning Project had been
institutionalized. Two other milestones of the year were the completion of the
appointment of Teaching/Learning Center Project Directors at all campuses and
much more extensive pilot testing of a Student Feedback Questionnaire. The
charge to the Teaching and Learning Centers was as follows:
- Develop a core program, consistent collegewide, designed to implement the
outcomes of the Teaching/Learning Project.
- Continue to provide the traditional, campus-specified, staff and program
development opportunities.
- Offer support for instructional design, including classroom research and
expanded application of technology. (M-DCC, n.d., a)
During the sixth year, 1991-1992, focus was on implementing and revising the
Faculty Advancement Policies and Procedures. For the first time, college
decisions on performance review and tenure and advancement were made on the
basis of the new procedures. Twenty-five endowed chairs were awarded to faculty
members who were judged to be excellent performers by their peers. M-DCC was
the first community college in the nation to use the idea of endowed chairs to
recognize faculty performance. Each chair represented a contribution of $45,000
from individuals, businesses, and civic groups and was matched by $30,000 from
the State of Florida. Faculty receiving an endowed chair hold them for three
years and get a $7,500 award annually for their use. Also during 1991-1992, the
Statement of Administrator Excellence, parallel to that for faculty, was
adopted by the M-DCC Board of Trustees (M-DCC, n.d., b).
The seventh and eighth years of the Teaching/Learning Project, 1992-1994,
continued to focus on assessing the implementation of staffing and staff
development policies and procedures and moving closer to full
institutionalization. Several of the project's subcommittees stayed in place to
play a significant role in the troubleshooting, assessment, and revision
process. Milestones during this year included (1) approval of the Statement of
Support Staff Excellence (making a full set for all categories of college
personnel); (2) testing of an Administrator Feedback Questionnaire, similar in
purpose to the student feedback questionnaire for faculty; and (3) soliciting
comments for improvement of the new Faculty Advancement Policies and
Procedures. By the end of the year, accomplishments also included the first
doctoral degree awards for the joint University of Miami-Miami-Dade Community
College's doctoral program, voluntary participation of 78% of full-time faculty
and 59% of part-time faculty in the collegewide student feedback program, and
the award of the seventy-fourth endowed chair. The college was also awarded the
first Theodore M. Hesburgh Award for faculty development to enhance
undergraduate teaching by a national panel of higher education practitioners,
for the accomplishments of the Teaching/Learning Project. At this point, with
many of its products a part of the M-DCC culture, plans were being made to
phase out the Teaching/Learning Project and continue institutionalization of
its purposes and activities in other ways (M-DCC, n.d., c).
The objectives of the Faculty, Staff, and Program Development Initiative at
M-DCC, began as the Teaching/Learning Project, were explicit from the
beginning. The three objectives were as follows:
- To improve teaching and learning with focus on the increasing numbers and
needs of nontraditional students to provide them with a high-quality
education.
- To make teaching at the college a professionally rewarding career by
establishing high performance standards to challenge faculty and to enable them
to take pride in their accomplishments.
- To make teaching and learning the focal point of M-DCC's activities and
decisionmaking processes.
The key features of the initial phase of the M-DCC Faculty, Staff, and Program
Development Initiative, the Teaching/Learning Project, were (1) declaring
institutional values, (2) focusing on faculty excellence, (3) creating a
supportive teaching/learning environment, and (4) nurturing new faculty. While
several of the polices and procedures resulting from the Teaching/Learning
Project became collegewide operations, a new organizational entity, the
Teaching and Learning Center, was put in place on four of the campuses to
reflect the high priority of and to give special attention to faculty and staff
development. The center with the most intensive program of work emerged on the
Kendall Campus, the focus of this case study.
Teaching/Learning Project
The major features of the Teaching/Learning Project are described below.
Declaring Institutional Values
Early on a decision was made to ground the Teaching/Learning Project in a
set of institutional values focused on the importance of teaching and learning
to the college's success. The values that form this statement resulted from
extensive faculty and staff involvement and are as follows:
- Learning
- Change to meet educational needs and to improve learning
- Access while maintaining quality
- Diversity in order to broaden understanding and learning
- Individuals
- A systematic approach to decisionmaking
- The partnership with the community
Focusing on Faculty Excellence
The Statement on Faculty Excellence (M-DCC, 1990) serves as a base for the
features of the Faculty, Staff, and Program Development Initiative at M-DCC
focused on faculty. The Statement of Faculty Excellence defines the qualities
and characteristics of excellent faculty in four categories: (1) their own
motivation and their ability to motivate others, (2) their interpersonal
skills, (3) their knowledge base, and (4) their skill at applying that
knowledge. Two of the assumptions stated at the beginning of the statement make
it clear that definition of faculty excellence applies to all M-DCC faculty,
whether assigned primarily to classroom-based activities or nonclassroom
areas--they are all involved in teaching/learning and student success. The
qualities and characteristics noted under each of the four categories are as
follows:
Motivation
- Are dedicated to their profession in higher education and the community
college's philosophy as defined at M-DCC
- Are enthusiastic about their work
- Set challenging individual and collective performance goals for themselves
- Set challenging performance goals for students
- Are committed to education as a profession
- Project a positive attitude about the ability of students to learn
- Display behavior consistent with professional ethics
- Are concerned with many aspects of students as individuals, not just in their
role as learners
Interpersonal Skills
- Interact positively with students and with their colleagues
- Treat all individuals with respect
- Respect diverse talents
- Work collaboratively with colleagues
- Are available to students
- Listen attentively to what students say
- Are responsive to student needs
- Are fair in their evaluation of students
- Present ideas clearly
- Create a climate that is conducive to learning
Knowledge Base
- Have the intellectual skills requisite for superlative performance
- Are knowledgeable about their work areas and disciplines
- Are knowledgeable about how students learn
- Integrate current subject matter into their work
- Provide perspectives that include a respect for diverse views
- Do their work in a well-prepared and well-organized manner
Application of Knowledge Base
- Not only know their professional fields and established principles of
learning well, but they put these principles of learning into practice as they
carry out their responsibilities relating to the teaching and learning
process
- Provide students with alternative ways of learning
- Stimulate intellectual curiosity
- Encourage independent thinking
- Encourage students to be analytical listeners
- Provide cooperative learning opportunities for students
- Give constructive feedback to students promptly
- Give consideration to feedback from students and others
- Provide clear and substantial evidence that students have learned.
As noted above, the Statement of Faculty Excellence was put into operation
with the approval by faculty and administration of the Faculty Advancement
Policies and Procedures. The most recent edition of these policies and
procedures (M-DCC, 1994) states that they are "designed to encourage and
support the professional development of faculty members, to align the college's
reward system with professional performance as defined by the college's
Statement of Faculty Excellence, and to ensure consistency and equity in the
application of the policies and procedures" (p. i). The policies and procedures
address performance reviews; the performance portfolio; continuing contracts,
promotion, and endowed chairs; and a process to monitor and review the polices
and procedures. A set of philosophical concepts are set forth to provide
direction for developing policies and procedures relating to faculty
advancement. The guiding concepts are as follows:
- Polices and procedures will be geared toward support and development.
- The individual faculty member will be responsible for his or her own
advancement.
- Multiple sources of information will be relied on.
- Information will be obtained systematically.
- There will be consistent, equitable application of polices and procedures
from department to department and across campuses.
- Advancement will be based on performance, performance which has been judged
of value by the individuals who collectively make up the college.
- The decisionmaking process will be democratized.
- There will be checks and balances built into the system. (p. i)
Creating a Supportive Teaching/Learning Environment
Two of the major products of the Teaching/Learning Project seem to make
major contributions to creating a more supportive teaching and learning
environment at M-DCC. These are the approved statements of excellence for
support and administrative staff.
Statement of Support Staff Excellence
The introduction to the Statement of Support Staff Excellence (M-DCC, 1993)
notes,
No educational institution can hope to succeed in its mission to
provide high quality learning opportunities for its students without the total
commitment of all its personnel. . . . The critical role of faculty in the
teaching/learning relationship is obvious. Not nearly as obvious, perhaps, but
just as critical is the role played by support staff in the advancement of
student learning.
The assumptions listed as underlying the statement include the following:
- The intent of these statements is to encourage and enhance support staff
involvement in the teaching and learning process.
- The qualities and characteristics representative of excellence apply equally
to the four classifications of support staff (secretarial/clerical,
technical/paraprofessional, service/maintenance, and skilled craft).
- Excellent support staff at Miami-Dade Community College strive to improve the
quality of teaching and learning by recognizing students as the college's
priority and by responding in a positive manner to their needs.
The qualities and characteristics of excellent support staff are described in
five categories: (1) Motivation, (2) Professional Performance, (3)
Interpersonal Skills, (4) Knowledge Base, and (5) Leadership/Supervision. For
illustrative purposes only the statements relating to Knowledge Base are
presented here:
- Possess the knowledge and technical skill required for outstanding
performance
- Are knowledgeable about issues that impact teaching and learning
- Are knowledgeable about their work areas
- Are knowledgeable about college policies and procedures
Statement of Administrator and Professional Staff Excellence
The M-DCC Statement of Administrator and Professional Staff Excellence
(M-DCC, 1992) has a similar introduction and format to the statements for
support staff. The qualities and characteristics of excellent administrators
and professional staff are described in five categories: (1)
Leadership/Supervision Skills, (2) Professional Performance, (3) Interpersonal
Skills, (4) Motivation, and (5) Knowledge Base. For illustrative purposes, only
the statements relating to Leadership/Supervision Skills are presented here:
- Are leaders in their fields and are respected members of their administrative
units
- Recognize that the first constituency to be served is the M-DCC student and
make decisions accordingly
- Provide leadership for the development, implementation, and evaluation of the
teaching and learning process
- Actively seek the resources necessary to support institutional programs,
services, and goals
- Use power equitably and appropriately
- Accept responsibility for their own performance and, if they are supervisors,
also accept responsibility for the performance of their administrative units
- Exhibit positive behavior which they encourage in others
- Use leadership strategies that are appropriate for the situation
- Actively seek students and personnel who reflect the diversity of the
community and provide opportunities for their growth
- Respond to community needs and issues in ways that are consistent with
M-DCC's mission.
M-DCC is currently working on the feedback system for staff in supervisory
roles that will assist in improving the performance review process to help put
the statement of administrator and professional staff excellence into more
consistent and effective practice.
Nurturing New Faculty
The delivery of staff development for new faculty and staff takes the form
of orientation sessions and a mentoring program by veteran staff. Both full-
and part-time faculty are included in the program.
Teaching and Learning Centers
As a result of the Teaching/Learning Project, at one time four of the then
five campuses of M-DCC had an operating Center for Teaching and Learning with a
full-time director, an identifiable staff, and budget. However, by 1996-1997,
only two of the campuses had Centers for Teaching and Learning of this type in
place--Kendall and North. While a number of factors accounted for the
elimination of the centers on the other campuses, the primary cause was a state
cutback in fiscal resources. Campus administrators had to make hard decisions
on which programs and staff to cut on every campus. As will be apparent in the
following section on Future Directions, M-DCC is now moving to a collegewide
staff development strategy which will ensure more consistent service to each of
the campuses. The Teaching and Learning Center for the Kendall Campus, in
1996-1997 known as the Center for Faculty, Staff, and Program Development
(n.d., a), defined its mission as
a comprehensive resource for professional development and
performance excellence. The Center is a place where any employee with an idea
can receive support, guidance and access to a network of internal consultants
who can help the employee achieve campus goals and meet student needs. (p.
1)
The Center for Faculty, Staff, and Program Development
(n.d., b) on the Kendall Campus had the following goals for 1996-1997 as listed
in its 1996 Annual Report:
- To enhance the effectiveness of faculty, adjunct faculty, staff, and
administrators in dealing with students, faculty, and staff.
- To provide instructional design consultation and support for curriculum and
instructional development projects.
- To provide leadership resources and coordination for the campus's
comprehensive effort for faculty, staff, and program development.
- To promote new initiatives for program development.
- To provide leadership in the use of new delivery systems for instruction and
information (e.g., electronic forum, learning communities, distributed
learning, web pages, and service learning).
- To direct the services of the IBM Instructional Technology Center and the
Macintosh Multimedia Resources Center.
- To provide teacher effectiveness information, training, and support for
faculty.
- To coordinate the development of the Campus Master Plan for Integrating
Technology into the Curriculum.
- To identify and measure indicators of increased productivity in teacher
effectiveness as a result of using technology.
- To provide orientation experiences for new faculty, part-time faculty,
support staff, and administrators who are new to their roles.
- To provide training and support on identified areas of the faculty
advancement process for faculty, administrators, and committee members.
- To provide information, registration, and coordination for the University of
Miami course: Teaching, Learning, and Assessment in the Community College and
the Florida International University doctoral cohort.
- To prepare New Faculty Selection Committees to assume their role.
- To support the development and integration of instructional technology into
the curriculum by providing training, consultation, and support in the use of
computers, the Internet, videodisks, CD-ROMs, e-mail, and multimedia in the
teaching/leaning process.
- To provide process consultation/facilitation for campus/college groups.
To guide the planning and implementation of these goals, the Kendall Campus
Center had put in place a Center Advisory Committee which had the following
subcommittees:
- Academic Affairs Subcommittee
- Administrative Training Subcommittee
- Support Staff Training Subcommittee.
The center employed a staff of about 15 professional and support staff, of whom
five are full-time including the director. Some of the staffing was made up of
faculty who are on temporary or part-time leave from teaching positions to work
on projects in the center. The center had a budget of about $450,000 from
regular M-DCC funds and engaged in a wide variety of externally funded training
and development projects to enhance its size and funding.
The Kendall Campus Center described its services and resources in the
following categories:
- Workshops/Seminars
- Resource Information
- Travel
- Instructional Design and Development
- University of Miami and Florida International Courses/Programs
- Consultation
- Instructional Technology
Each of these categories of services and resources had a wide variety of
activities included.
The impact of the staff development program can be seen in the 1996 Annual
Report for the Center for Faculty, Staff, and Program Development on the
Kendall Campus. The report is organized by major "development goals." The goals
and illustrative accomplishments under each were as follows:
- To enhance the effectiveness of faculty, adjunct faculty, staff, and
administrators in dealing with students, faculty, and staff--211 workshops
conducted running the gamut from orientation for adjunct faculty, to team
building, to teaching and learning on-line, to basic first aid for security
officers; coordinating a Support Staff Day; planning 72 staff trips to
conferences, workshops, and seminars (41 out of the county); and producing a
Technology Resource Handbook.
- To provide instructional design consultation and support for curriculum and
institutional development projects--16 curriculum and instructional development
projects were supported addressing topics such as International Relations
Course Web Pages, Revision of Experiencing Art, Song Writing and Music
Composition (Interactive CAI), Historical Architectural Survey (CD-ROM), and a
Visual Plant Database (Interactive Videodisk).
- To provide leadership, resources, and coordination for the campus's
comprehensive effort for faculty, staff, and program development--leadership
was provided by accomplishments such as instituting new programs that promote
distance learning, promoting the expansion of departmental and faculty web
pages, and coordinating the Campus Future Search Conference, "2001: Kendall
Campus."
- To promote new initiatives for program development, ten technology practicums
were sponsored for a wide range of departments with descriptions such as
computerized conversion of course lecture notes; produced a video atlas and
video disc, using Course Builder software package to develop a tutorial;
developed interactive practice tests; and designed and developed a web site.
- To provide leadership in the use of new delivery systems for
instruction--emphasis during the year was on use of the Internet and web-based
learning.
- To direct the services of the IBM Instructional Technology Center and the
Macintosh Multimedia Resource Center--provided many beginning and intermediate
workshops on software such as WordPerfect, Excel, PowerPoint, and ToolBook;
increased use of open labs (total sign-ins numbered 519); provided
individualized help; set up student orientations; managed the campus web
server, and conducted training for area K-12 school staff.
- To provide teacher effectiveness information, training, and support for
faculty--provided wide variety of workshops for full- and part-time faculty on
topics such as active learning strategies, learning styles, diversity issues on
campus, and master teacher seminar.
- To provide support for the development of the Campus Master Plan for
Integrating Technology into the Curriculum--served on several of the committees
working on this plan.
- To identify and measure indicators of increased productivity in teaching
effectiveness as a result of using technology--gathered student feedback on
several of the learning projects making use of technology.
- To provide orientation experiences for new faculty, part-time faculty,
support staff, and administrators new to their roles--held orientation sessions
for groups such as adjunct faculty, new department chairs, and new student
assistants.
- To provide training and support on identified areas of the faculty
advancement process for faculty, administrators, and committee
members--training sessions were provided on topics such as portfolio
development for continuing contracts, promotion, and endowed chairs for those
preparing portfolios and those doing the reviews.
- To provide information, registration, and coordination for the University of
Miami course, Workshop in Education: Teaching and Learning in the Community
College and the Florida International University doctoral cohort--the UM course
was not offered because there were very few new faculty; a new FIU doctoral
cohort was started.
- To prepare selection committees to assume their roles--no new faculty were
hired and so no selection committees for faculty needed training; provided
training for an administrative selection committee.
- To support the integration of instructional technology into the curriculum by
providing training, consultation, and support in the use of computers,
videodisks, and multimedia in the teaching/learning process--in addition to
workshops already noted, provided individual help to nearly 150 individuals on
topics such as authoring and presentation, scanning, video editing, and web
authoring.
- To provide process consultation/facilitation for campus/college
groups--provided assistance to a wide variety of committees and groups.
- To schedule the use of the Conference Center by the campus and
college--scheduled a total of 614 events involving 13,344 people.
Major new directions have been set forth for the M-DCC Faculty, Staff, and
Program Development Initiative for implementation during 1997-1998. The new
directions were developed by a Human Resource Development Reengineering Team in
light of the profound impact on the college of dwindling resources, a changing
work environment, rapidly evolving technology, demands of external
stakeholders, and changing workforce needs. The work of the Reengineering Team
focusing on the human resources of the college, and described in a report
entitled "Recommendations for Training and Performance Management," included
assessing current practices relating to training, supervisory training, and
performance appraisal of professional and staff personnel; reviewing public and
private sector programs; Internet searches; and obtaining feedback from
one-to-one interview, town hall meetings, and focus groups of faculty, staff,
and administrators. The recommended future directions for training and
performance management at M-DCC are as follows:
Recommendations on Training
- Establish collegewide and campus training priorities annually
- Institute a formal training program for employees, full- and part-time,
driven by the college's mission, vision, values, and goals.
- Establish core training curricula to address required performance
standards.
- Retain autonomy for individual campuses in addressing their unique training
needs.
- Ensure collegewide access, consistency, equity, and quality of training for
full-time, part-time, and District personnel of all six campuses.
- Initiate a required training program in effective supervision for all
supervisors through the level of executive management.
- Allocate funds equitably to support training programs.
- Evaluate the effectiveness of training based on trainee's ability to transfer
the learning to the workplace.
Recommendations on Performance Management
- Adopt a standard process for managing the performance of support staff and
professionals. The process will have three phases: (1) setting performance
expectations, (2) coaching throughout the year, and (3) performance
appraisal.
- Institute a consistent, prescribed performance appraisal process for support
staff.
- Institute a consistent, prescribed performance appraisal process for
professional staff.
The recommendations about training address major concerns regarding best use of
the state mandated two percent of budget that must be spent on staff and
program development (about $1.8 million for M-DCC in 1996-1997), substantial
current variation in training and development efforts among the campuses, and
needs for a systematic process to access training needs at an institutional
level and match training with college priorities. As regards performance
management, the recommendations address the concerns about formation and
consistency in the performance management process for support and professional
staff.
Some important implications can be gleaned from the M-DCC staff development
program journey for designing, staffing, and staff development. Based on this
case study and a prior study of the M-DCC staff development initiative
(Loumos-Kennedy, 1996), the following implications are evident:
- Administrative Backing: There is no substitute for support from top
administration of a TYI for staff development initiatives. They play a key role
in securing adequate resources and encouraging participation.
- Focus on Learning: The staff development initiative cannot, in the
end, be grounded in or operated for the self-serving benefits of staff. The
staff development initiative must have its impetus and continued justification
and accountability in effects on learning.
- Support Individual Development: The staff development initiative must
be responsive and in tune with the individual development needs and plans of
each and every staff member. The learning expectations, process, and
organization must fit the specific context and situation of the individual
staff member.
- Include All Staff: The staff development initiative must include
attention and focus to all of the staff who affect a particular topical area
related to student learning. The initiative, to be effective, will need to
consider attention to faculty (full- and part-time), support staff, and
administrators.
- Align with Organizational Goals: The staff development initiative must
be directly responsive and productive in terms of the institution's needs and
goals, both short- and long-term. With a shortage of resources, all initiatives
will and should stand the test of relative contribution to organizational
mission and plans.
- Build a System: The staff development initiative must be thought about
and designed in a comprehensive fashion so the components can be mutually
reinforcing. That is, the initiative must align with organizational goals,
address clear and accepted standards of good performance, respond to
individuals needs, be reinforced by performance review, and be compensated for
in reward systems.
- Support with Resources: The staff development effort must have
adequate resources to deliver what is planned and promised. Staff development,
as with student learning, takes resources on a regular and dependable budgeting
cycle.
- Use Participative Decisionmaking: The benefits of directly involving
those who will be the target and beneficiaries of staff development in all
components of the staff development system cannot be underestimated. Most staff
development initiatives are voluntary, and even if they are not, learning is an
individual matter; for staff development initiatives to have the desired
effects, the participants must be supportive, which comes, in part, with
participation in deciding what and how staff development will occur.
- Account for Results: The staff development effort must develop a
deserved reputation for quality through careful planning, continuously
monitoring impact, and quickly making needed changes.
- Make Long-Term Commitment: Improving an institution through staff
development does not occur quickly. Rather, it requires a commitment of many
years to put effective systems into place, remove disincentives, reach a
critical mass of staff, and support programmatic change.
Study Director
George Copa, Professor, Department of Work, Community, and Family Education,
|
| | | |
University of Minnesota, St. Paul, MN, (612) 624-9284
|
Site Contacts
Marty Jenrette, District Director of College Training and Development and Project
|
| | | | |
Implementation, Miami-Dade Community College, (305) 237-3775
|
Marie Nock, Director of College Training and Development, Miami-Dade Community
|
| | | | |
College, (305) 237-2258
|
Among the barriers to major change is a lack of constructive models for the
learning environment. Within U.S. higher education, innovation in systems
development has been stalled as design revolves around concepts and processes
that have been reworked for decades, if not centuries. Trapped in a continuing
cycle of duplication, the higher education system is recognized as being
roughly equivalent to the aging infrastructure of the facilities that encase
it. Rigid and inflexible, the system is cracking under the impact of now
turbulent forces imposed by global economic and demographic realignment, a
communications revolution, the re-valuation of knowledge, and an expanded
public to serve.
New Designs for the Two-Year Institution of Higher Education provides a
structured analysis of design criteria for institutional environments as they
might look in the 21st century. Linked to the design specifications identified
by NDTYI, the exemplary processes identified in this chapter provide a
benchmark for institutions or systems addressing technology as a critical
component of institutional design and improvement.
Site selection is core to the benchmarking process. The design specifications
described in NDTYI guided the site selection process. Specifications identified
for the learning environment in NDTYI (Copa & Ammentorp, in press) are
shown in Exhibit 4.
Exhibit 4
Design Specifications for Learning Environment
|
| *
| Aligns with Learning Context, Signature, Outcomes, Process, Organization,
Partnerships, and Staffing: Learning environment pays close attention to
the design specifications for previous design elements.
|
| *
| Includes Multiple Settings: Learning environment includes consideration
of all possible settings which can support the desired learning experiences. It
includes, but is not limited to, school buildings.
|
| *
| Dissolves Borders Among Learning Settings: Learning environment makes
strong and visible connections among learning settings.
|
| *
| Develops a Coherent Network of Learning Settings: Learning environment
is made up of a carefully constructed, yet dynamic and constantly changing,
pattern of settings needed for effective learning experiences.
|
| *
| Adapts Quickly to the Needs of the Learning Experience: Learning
environment can accommodate a variety of learning experiences in the same space
and time.
|
| *
| Provides a Sense of Learner Identity: Learning environment gives
learners a sense of identity, sometimes associated with place but increasingly
with the learning signature and with what is learned and how it is done.
|
| *
| Enhances Social Connectivity and Feeling of Community Among Learners and
Staff: Learning environment encourages and supports close and sustained
interaction among learners and between learners and staff central to a feeling
of community.
|
| *
| Responds to Differences in Learners: Learning environment is responsive
to the needs of learners who vary in age, socioeconomic status, cultural
background, prior learning experiences, full-time versus part-time status, and
learning style.
|
| *
| Provides for Both General and Specialized Study: Learning environment
provides the settings conducive to development of general and specialized
competence in order to reach learning outcomes.
|
| *
| Enhances Informal Learning: Learning environment supports and encourages
informal learning and the interaction and mutual benefits of informal and
formal learning.
|
|
As a component of the learning environment, technology design features are
imbedded in the design specifications of the learning environment. They reflect
those broad assumptions that will support institutional viability as change
continues to redefine work, family, and community life. The design
specifications for technology in the learning environment suggest the
following:
- Learning work-spaces will expand to include home, work, community, and
worldwide settings.
- Multiple means of access to learning, information, and support need to be
provided.
- Connectivity that supports collaborative and work-group learning is
essential.
- "On demand" support and guidance for technology systems is a requirement.
- Learning enterprises and systems of enterprises must be designed with the
capacity to change and be upgraded quickly and effectively.
Identification of an appropriate site was accomplished through a process of
scanning to identify institutions that are recognized for a developed
technology environment; review of Internet and printed summaries of
institutional comparisons; and finally contacting specific campuses through
phone interviews, printed materials, and web sites.
To facilitate breakthrough modeling and application of NDTYI relating to the
element of learning environment, the Higher Education and Advanced Technology
(HEAT) Center at Lowry: A Colorado Community College and Occupational Education
System Innovation was chosen as a benchmark site because of its exemplary
practices in the area of technology in the learning environment. Practices
presented are limited intentionally to provide focus on technology in the
learning environment.
The request for the HEAT Center to participate as a benchmark institution for
NDTYI reflects the strong link between specifications established for an
effective redesign of institutional learning environments and institutional
practice at the HEAT Center. From the perspective of technology, the HEAT
Center drew particular attention through its state-of-the-art Education
Technology Training Center and its partnering with Lucent Technologies to
design technology into the entire community being re-created on the former
Lowry Air Force Base.
The following are a more comprehensive listing of the practices performed at
the HEAT Center that have been recognized for contributing to excellence in a
technology-enhanced learning environment:
- Integrated site-based and distributed learning
- Focused educational objectives limited to specific themes or enterprises
- Primary emphasis on applications of knowledge that make learning
meaningful
- Designed access and articulations that support lifelong learning
- Vertically integrated delivery within related industries through centers of
excellence
- Advanced instructional technology utilization
- Organized formal alliances with educational and industry partners
This benchmarking study was based on a two-day site visit in August 1997,
personal interviews with the HEAT Center's leadership, a review of
institutional documents, and follow-up confirmation of information with site
representatives.
The HEAT Center is a developing education center housed on the site of the
former Lowry Air Force Base. The campus occupies 154 acres of land centrally
located to Denver and the adjoining metropolitan area. Through public
conveyance, the land and approximately 1,000,000 square feet of classroom,
laboratory, dormitory, and auxiliary space was transferred to the Colorado
State Board for Community Colleges and Occupational Education in 1994. While in
a continuing process of renovation and expansion, the HEAT Center at Lowry now
is the site for the delivery of programs offered by six participating community
colleges. The HEAT Center at Lowry also provides training and assistance
through private sector alliances and affiliated baccalaureate and graduate
colleges and universities.
The HEAT Center's (1997) mission is "to develop a technology environment of
facilities, laboratories, models, demonstrations, and business opportunities
undergirded by open systems of telecommunications and information networking
for virtual teaching and learning on-site, and through the utilization of
cyber-technologies in Colorado, throughout the nation and internationally" (p.
1). This mission links technology with teaching and learning as critical
components of the center.
What the mission does not convey is the intensity of commitment toward
becoming responsive to the needs of workforce preparation that has been
demonstrated by leadership of the Colorado Community Colleges and Occupation
Education System (CCCOES) and the HEAT Center. Benchmarking against the German
Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft (FhG), Japan's KOHSETSUSHI, and Singapore's system of
total enterprise development has provided a reference for defining technologies
to be more than computers. Technologies are viewed as innovative and dynamic
applications of mathematics and science. The commitment to both learners and
communities is that education provides access to those technologies in an
integrated, multidisciplinary format that will prepare individuals to
contribute to the economic competitiveness of Colorado and to the well-being of
multiple communities. The rationale, articulated in the HEAT Center Master
Plan, supports the following objective:
In Colorado, manufacturing and exports continue to increase in
importance along with information networks and telecommunications. It is within
the sophisticated technologies and systems that drive these industries that the
human resource factor becomes so critical to the competitive posture of the
individual companies and the industry as a whole. (Goodwin, 1994, p.
2)
While the demand for applied technology-based training is
expanding, barriers persist. The more recent and the more sophisticated
technologies become, the more expensive it is to capitalize real work
experiences and to maintain instructional competencies in those technologies.
For Colorado, the HEAT Center at Lowry addresses a need to expand system
capacity, a desire to maintain the integrity of existing community campuses,
and a requirement of leveraging resources if advanced technology programming is
to be developed. Functioning as a broker of facilities and integrated programs,
the HEAT Center facilitates delivery of related programs from multiple
community colleges. The HEAT Center provides facilities and equipment that are
shared among the programs while each individual community college continues to
"own" its program. Administratively and financially, the home-base college
benefits of program enrollment are maintained. Subsequently, the HEAT Center is
financially supported through facility lease arrangements with the individual
colleges and administrative support from CCCOES. Student services, admissions,
and marketing are shared enterprises between the HEAT Center and participating
colleges. The result is a cooperative system of educational delivery that
utilizes the dual strengths of localized campuses and centralized resource
management.
The HEAT Center concept leverages resource management beyond the community
college system. Major benefits for students, the workforce, and CCCOES are
being created through private sector alliances and through affiliations with
advanced degree colleges and universities. Moving beyond traditional custom
training, the HEAT Center provides an environment that blends research and
development, research and application, and economic development. Utilizing
state-of-the-art equipment--both industry sponsored and publicly funded--the
HEAT Center at Lowry brings the resources of graduate-level research, industry
applications, and management into a synergistic new model for cooperation. By
design, staff development and student learning are enhanced through an
environment of interchange between individuals representing diverse
perspectives and skill levels. Potentially, facilities are utilized
concurrently by commercial professionals, higher education faculty, industry
researchers, students, and Colorado education systems management. The result is
a real work environment that supports excellence in learning while operating as
a regenerative system for maintaining curriculum relevance and staff
development.
The HEAT Center at Lowry is not a college. It is a work-space that is shared.
Unlike the traditional model for higher education, the HEAT Center is a
location that is managed as a focused learning environment. The economic and
political viability of the center is dependent upon the strength of the
relationships that link the location to multiple support systems, and funding
is enhanced from strategic sharing rather than from autonomy. Evidence of
impact surfaces through recognizing the six community colleges that are
participating in the academic program offerings of the HEAT Center. The HEAT
Center also houses the Colorado Electronic Community College, is a delivery
site for the Western Governors University (a consortium of higher education
institutions), and has established alliances with five public or private
universities. While students are enrolled within a single college, they benefit
from the integrated resources of all of the colleges.
An assumption for this benchmark study is that environment influences learning.
Technology as a component of learning environment is viewed as being a major
driver for impacting learning. There appear to be at least three objectives for
technology-enhanced learning environments as demonstrated at the HEAT Center.
These include learner responsiveness, learning effectiveness, and economic
benefit to learners and stakeholders:
- Learner responsiveness is facilitated through expanded learner choices. As
indicated in the specifications of the learning environment, anytime, anywhere,
collaborative learning has been identified as a critical component of new
learning environments. Self-paced learning is responsive to individual needs.
Expanded access within and across borders is supported through digital
technology. And new communities of learners are developed as geographical
boundaries are eliminated. Customers simply have more choice in a
technology-rich environment.
- Learning effectiveness can be enhanced through the utilization of technology.
Through increased options for collaboration and communication, interactive data
presentation, self-directed discovery, simulations, and electronically mediated
graphical presentation the learning environment expands. Assessment, support,
and delivery are integrated into single source management directed by
learners.
- Economic benefit is less tangible. Technology is expensive. If evaluated only
from costs of initial delivery, technology appears to be an economic black
hole. However, the objective of the HEAT Center is to maintain the
competitiveness of the Colorado workforce. The HEAT Center Master Plan
identifies the goal for CCCOES to "become the catalyst to create a national
model that addresses how public/private collaboration can effect an affordable
accommodation of facilitating and maintaining a `world-class' work force"
(Goodwin, 1994, p. 15).
Table 1 provides a guide to the benchmarked design specifications and links
them to associated key process features. The table separates key features that
relate to physical technologies and features that essentially are describing
systemic relationships. The key process features resemble the hardware/software
relationships of computer systems. As the key features are implemented, the
distinction between technologies and associated applications blend into a
learning environment that meets the specifications outlined in NDTYI. Following
the table, the individual features are demonstrated through description of
associated initiatives of the HEAT Center.
Table 1
Comparison of NDTYI Learning Environment Specifications
and HEAT Center Initiatives
| Learning Environment Specification
| Key Features of
Designed Technology Environment
| HEAT Center
Initiatives Referenced
|
| Includes multiple settings
| Integrates site-based and
virtual instructional
environments
| HEAT Center at Lowry
shared campus
|
Develops a coherent
network of learning settings
| Supports collaborative
meaningful learning
experiences
| Colorado Venture Center:
Colorado Advanced
Photonics Technology
Center
|
| Enhances informal learning
| Supports user proficiency
and independence
| Education Technology
Training Center
|
Provides for general and
specialized study
| Accommodates requirements
of an "enterprise" or theme-
focused community of
learners
| Rocky Mountain
Manufacturing Academy
|
Dissolves borders among
learning settings
| Facilitates lifelong access to
system benefits from multi-
locations and levels of
experience
| Academic Articulation:
Transformations
|
Adapts quickly to needs of
learning experience
| Accommodates redesign
| Multiple ownership of
programs: Industry
Alliances
|
Integrates Site-Based and Virtual Instructional Environments
Colorado provides students with a combination of sophisticated on-site
technical training facilities and electronically delivered program options
through the HEAT Center that can be accessed from home, work, or beyond. The
blend is intentional and focused. Students continuously operate in multiple
environments throughout the learning process. While enrolled in a college of
choice, students also utilize the resources of the HEAT Center to access
education focused on applications of specific technologies. As part of the HEAT
Center experience, students are interacting with communities both larger and
smaller. They become part of learning workgroups in design or application
projects. They enroll as a member of a cohort of individuals comprising a
program. And, they have individual study choices via electronically facilitated
learning options, industry internships, or multimedia instruction.
Concurrently, they are also participating in much larger communities as members
of specific industry clusters, the community college system, and Colorado
higher education.
To facilitate the delivery of virtual instruction, the center, through a
private/public alliance with Lucent Technologies, is designing and implementing
a cutting edge optical electronic infrastructure development project that will
be used to showcase communications technology and connectivity. The project is
part of a plan for integrating a "digital city" concept for a developing
residential and business community across the former Lowry base.
Supports Collaborative Meaningful Learning Experiences
There are multiple centers or academies at the HEAT Center that are serving
as integrators for related programs. The Rocky Mountain Manufacturing Academy,
the Colorado Advanced Photonics Technology Center, the Education Technology
Training Center, and the Colorado Venture Centers are referenced in this
report. These centers are models for building educationally effective
utilization of technology infrastructure.
The Colorado Venture Centers are focused on commercializing research and
development. Unlike a business incubator program that supports business
expansion or business start-up based on proven technologies, the Colorado
Venture Centers support development of innovation. For example, Sangamo
Biosciences, Inc., was initially located at the HEAT Center through a
relationship with the Colorado Venture Centers. The objective was to
commercialize DNA sequencing technology. With Sangamo on site at the HEAT
Center, biotechnology students who were enrolled through the Community College
of Aurora were utilized as interns in this leading edge environment. Faculty
members were allowed early access to industry research and development
information, and students and faculty both had the opportunity to utilize the
benefits of real work learning experiences. The experiences were based both on
the connectedness of the information infrastructure, and the connectedness of
linking industry, research, technology, economic development, and education
together.
The Colorado Advanced Photonics Technology Center is a second model of the
connections being established across industry, research, technology, economic
development, and education. A strategic alliance has been created that will
link the Colorado Advanced Technology Institute, the University of Colorado,
Colorado State University, Pueblo Community College, Meadowlark Optical, and
other industry partners. Again, the alliance is narrowly focused on a specific
technology and it is highly integrated vertically from research to application
and manufacturing. That focus generates support for capital-intensive
technology investments such as the pilot production line for miniature liquid
crystal display devices that is being created on the HEAT Center campus.
Supports User Proficiency and Independence
Support for technology has been elevated to a crisis level for many
institutions and workplaces. Each industry is immersed in its own translation
of the same story. There are limited numbers of individuals competent to
support the continuing changes of information technology and other advanced
applications of technology. Yet the pressure is unrelenting to adopt the
technologies. From installation to operation, people have to be upgraded
continuously.
The Education Technology Training Center (ETTC) is one contribution to the
solution. A showcase renovation project at the HEAT Center campus, the ETTC
[p]rovides state of the art technology and expertise to educators
and others who wish to implement technology for the improvement of instruction.
[The] Center users learn to employ and create video, CD-ROM, Internet,
video-conferencing, cable, multi-media, and other present and future technology
products to provide a richer and more interactive curriculum with unlimited
access potential for learners. (Colorado Electronic Community College,
n.d.)
Housing ETTC on the HEAT Center campus brings students,
faculty members, support personnel, and administration in contact with
practicing professionals. Commercial developers are encouraged to lease time at
the facility rather than to be permanently located there. The result is a
continuing influx of skills and expertise that is shared with the professional
staff operating the center, the student assistants, and the faculty.
The benchmark practice of significance at ETTC is the high level of commitment
to training for and modeling of technologies. Support for technologies does not
imply repair and maintenance--though that should not be ignored. Support
includes building competence at all levels and providing a continuing resource
for relearning and adopting new technologies. Through the physical location of
the ETTC and the capacity for electronic distribution from that center, support
can be provided and sustained.
Accommodates Requirements of an "Enterprise" or Theme-Focused Community of
Learners
The HEAT Center at Lowry is focused on teaching and supporting applications
of advanced technologies in the areas of biotechnology, advanced manufacturing,
and information/communication technologies. The HEAT Center, by design, is
focusing on providing education for individuals who will fill the role of
becoming a techno-professional. A techno-professional is defined as
[a] multi-disciplinarian who enhances innovation
resulting from advances in technology and communications; supports research
and application of emerging technology, interfaces with the design
team, assumes for production, and provides ongoing technical
assistance. (Goodwin, Roe, & Malbrough, 1991, as cited in HEAT Center,
1997, p. 1)
Access has most frequently been defined for
education in terms of broadness. Community colleges in particular have operated
in the "do anything for everyone" environment of a local service provider. The
perspective of creating access in a narrow slice that extends vertically to
include students from the secondary level through graduate level of education
and beyond for industry upskilling has only begun to emerge as the model for
excellence and competitive advantage. While not serving everyone, the HEAT
Center expands access to a diverse set of learners from across traditionally
unlinked systems.
The Rocky Mountain Manufacturing Academy (RMMA) is the most integrated and
developed of the partnerships located at the HEAT Center. Focused on the need
for techno-professionals to support Colorado's advanced manufacturing, RMMA is
utilizing resources made available through the closure of the Lowry base and
the downsizing of U.S. military operations. Accessing precision machining
equipment from the Department of Energy/Rock Flats, precision metrology
laboratory equipment from the Lowry Air Force Base, and additional resources
provided by industry partners and the Colorado legislature, RMMA brings "all
facets of manufacturing together" (Richardson, 1997, p. 38a). The result is a
shared site manufacturing education center that provides training in advanced
machining, precision measurement (metrology), automation/robotics, welding
(precision joining), photonics and vacuums (lasers), and CAD/CAM. The equipment
utilization is maximized as it brings industry workers, student technicians,
student engineers, and faculty members together at one location. And all
students encounter manufacturing as a system of integrated relationships.
Facilitate Lifelong Access to System Benefits from Multi-Locations and
Levels of Experience
Focused educational goals have allowed the HEAT Center to influence
academic programming within defined disciplines. While it is not new to develop
articulation agreements between two- and four-year institutions, the integrated
access concept of the center provides students with benefits. As the Executive
Director of the HEAT Center described,
The benefit is to make students successful. Through quick and easy
transitions, students can migrate from a two-year manufacturing curriculum into
an applied engineering program. Or, a student that is not being successful in
engineering is allowed to stop out with a two-year degree or transfer down into
a related less aggressive academic program. (Goodwin, personal communication,
August, 1997)
Expanding even beyond the systems of higher
education into the community, success is being supported by creating pathways
into technology with secondary institutions or through a program such as the
Transformations program. Transformations is a fourteen-week, hands-on program
teaching fundamentals of applied mathematics, science, and computers, with a
focus on preparing women for success in technology-based studies. The center
has become a central hub for multiple systems of education and in that role
facilitates development of new collaborations.
Accommodates Redesign
The context of a technology learning environment is driven by three-month
product cycles, virtual environments that can be re-created on demand, and
internationally competitive distributed learning technologies. Times and
technologies are continuously changing. Designing the learning environment for
technological change requires that flexibility and responsiveness be integrated
into the technology and into the systems managing the technology.
The creation of the HEAT Center at Lowry is identified as an innovation of
CCCOES. The HEAT Center provides a model for funding and maintaining
environments for advanced technology training. It also provides a model for
flexibility in educational institutions. The ability to build integrated
programming that is focused and responsive has been demonstrated. Now the
challenge will be to maintain the position of being cutting edge.
Two unique design factors that contribute to the flexible responsiveness of
the campus are (1) the separation of program ownership and delivery and (2)
strong industry alliances. The multiple ownership of programs being delivered
at the HEAT Center provides a new point of assessment. Specific
alliances/academies at the center provide continuing feedback on the validity
of each contributing program. Program ownership becomes secondary to issues of
the alliance; most important among them is to maintain quality in technology
education. The second design factor is the influence of continuously bringing
industry representatives in the learning environment. The onsite utilization of
facilities has already generated beneficial arrangements for the college. For
example, Miller has agreed to place current model welders at the facilities on
the HEAT campus. This is not a one time gift, but, rather, a revolving loan of
equipment that will put only current models in the lab so that Miller can train
its sales force and consultants there. The result is a shared benefit for both
the HEAT Center and Miller.
Technology is fundamentally changing learning through shifting control from the
instructor to the learner. The acknowledgment of that reality allows
institutions to focus on design that supports the learner first. Integrating
dynamic systems and technologies to facilitate learning is required. The HEAT
Center at Lowry is a world class model for that design.
Although learning environment has been defined historically as one setting, in
the future, it will be more appropriately described as multiple locations.
Learning will shift from a one level, one discipline, one instructor campus
experience to a complex web of linked experiences. Defined as a "meta-settings
web" within NDTYI, a model emerges where each student occupies a unique web of
learning settings that expands around the individual. Moving across the support
of the web of settings, the student manipulates personal assets in the midst of
multiple communities--each contributing to the learning process. The model
provides a visual demonstration of how control of learning is shifting from the
instructional provider to the learner. For learners, influence on the system is
rapidly expanding as more than one option becomes available.
The resulting impact on design shifts primary attention to connectivity as
opposed to isolation. For institutions, the emerging challenge is not keeping
the competition out. The challenge is keeping the students in. Competition will
not be defined by geographical boundaries or institutional similarity, but,
instead, by student satisfaction. TYIs will no longer be competing primarily
with the community college next door. Primary competition will be defined by
those national or global entities that provide the best value as perceived by
students and stakeholders. In creating that environment, technology becomes the
core resource for competitiveness.
The HEAT Center has demonstrated that the concept of a centralized investment
in technologies for education is a viable, efficient use of resources.
Investment in technology learning environments is costly. Intensive use of that
environment builds support for operations. For education that means sharing
technology resources among multiple programs, a concept that is central to
operations of the HEAT Center at Lowry. Distributed programs using centralized
advanced technologies leverages investment in equipment, allows for integrated
programs of learning, centralizes industry resources, and increases access to
excellence in instruction. What initially may be viewed as primarily an
economic requirement also turns out to be a strong benefit educationally.
The Master Plan for the HEAT Center identifies the following five strategic
objectives:
- Quality
- Opportunity
- Cooperation
- Commitment
- Investment
Through these strategic objectives, the HEAT Center proposes to address
curricula and instruction, access, educational effectiveness, articulation,
resource utilization, and competitiveness. Linked to technology, the
environment being established reflects the learning environment specifications
identified in New Designs for Two-Year Institutions of Higher Education.
The result is an anticipated head count of more than 10,000 individuals
enrolled by the year 2006. And, more importantly, Colorado will be prepared to
become increasingly competitive in the areas of applied biotechnology, advanced
manufacturing, technology, and the telecommunications industry.
A benchmark summary is identified in the HEAT Center's (1997) Annual
Summary. For Colorado, the learning environment will be technology oriented
and will incorporate technology into the learning process now and into the
future:
Colorado's new technology learning environment will be defined by a
strong application component for rapid response to private sector need for a
workforce with knowledge and skills to apply sophisticated and
interdisciplinary technology for competitive production and services. With the
Knowledge Era and the Information Age forcing continuous learning for all
career paths and jobs, the HEAT Center at Lowry will be a primary Colorado
technology resource for access of new knowledge, information, and applications.
(p. 1)
Based on the findings of the benchmarking study of the learning environment
with a special focus on learning technology, the following implications for the
design of TYIs appear warranted:
- Model Use of Technology in Learning: One of the most powerful
pedagogical strategies is teaching by example. The NDTYI design specifications
for learning outcomes point clearly to technological competence as a learning
expectation important to work, community, and family roles and
responsibilities.
- Form Strategic Alliances: Learning technology should facilitate
linking learning and community development and help offset the costs of
technology through mutual benefits and shared costs. Alliances need to balance
retaining the advantages of local presence and identity with more centralized
resource strategies assuring affordability.
- Market Locally, Nationally, and Internationally: Using learning
technology provides the opportunity to ignore geographic boundaries.
- Use a Broad Meaning of Technology: Technology is more than computers.
A broad array of tools and equipment form the meaning of technology in the
broader society and a similar conception is needed in the educational
institution.
- Plan a Regenerative System: The challenge regarding leaning technology
is how to keep it up-to-date along with keeping the curriculum and staff
competence up-to-date. Planning for learning technology must focus on
regeneration and sustainability over the long term.
- Present an Invisible Infrastructure: To be most effective, the
agreements, networks, policies, procedures, and information systems
undergirding the alliances needed to take advantage of technology in learning
should be invisible to the learner. The learner should not have to worry about
where to register for a learning experience, who to pay, and how the experience
relates to a similar experience obtained in a different way.
- Link Learning and Community Development: Part of sustaining
regenerativity, meeting the specifications for the desired learning process,
and reaching promised learning outcomes is closely linking learning with
community development. Technology provides a means to enhance these linkages in
powerful ways.
- Organize into a Network of Learning Enterprises: Small, focused, and
responsive learning units contribute in significant ways to building learning
communities, building productive alliances, and achieving some of the benefits
of learning technology.
- Increase Access to Learning: Learning technology must significantly
improve access to learning in order to offset its costs.
- Support Learner Managed Learning: To be a feasible goal, personalizing
lifelong learning will mean that learners are skilled at managing their own
learning--technology can help make this possible.
- Enhance Connectivity: Technology can be used to link learners,
learning resources, and learning settings to increase the access to and quality
of learning the learning experience.
Study Author
|
Jan Doebbert, Dean of Technology, Alexandria Technical College, 1601 Jefferson Street,
|
| | |
Alexandria, MN 56308, (320) 762-4504
|
Site Contacts
|
Mary Ann Roe, Planning, Development & Special Projects, Higher Education and
|
| | | | |
Advanced Technology Center, 8880 E. 10th Place, Aurora, CO 80010, (303) 739-9680
|
|
Don E. Goodwin, Executive Director, Higher Education and Advanced Technology
|
| | | | |
Center, 8880 E. 10th Place, Aurora, CO 80010, (303) 739-9227
|
In order to remain viable, colleges must be financially sound. Small colleges,
in particular, have been dramatically affected by the reduction in the level of
public support for higher education that has taken place in the past several
years. They are required to offer the same level of services to their
constituents with significantly fewer resources. Small colleges are often held
to the same level of tuition increases regardless of their size or location.
These colleges are often located in rural communities and tend to be even more
sensitive to tuition increases due to their smaller and often less affluent
population base. It is essential that small colleges remain open and continue
to thrive. They are vitally important as points of access to higher education
and as centers of economic development. The purpose of this benchmarking study
is to identify and describe the innovative and creative financing methods used
by a small, public two-year college in an effort to remain viable and vigorous
into the 21st century.
The design specification for learning finance proposed in NDTYI (see Exhibit 5)
served as the basis for selecting Sauk Valley Community College (SVCC) located
in Dixon, Illinois, as the site for this study. The financial process at Sauk
Valley was found to be particularly responsive to the following NDTYI design
specifications:
- Supports Reengineering and Innovative Options: The learning finance
process at SVCC encourages the flexibility, autonomy, and courage to experiment
with and redesign institutional processes.
- Allocates Resources Based on Value-Added: Learning finance at SVCC
ensures that resources get to the places in the institution which add the most
value in terms of learning signature and outcomes.
- Stabilizes Funding Patterns: At SVCC, learning finance provides a
continuous and dependable flow of resources with both a short- and long-term
view.
Exhibit 5
Design Specifications for Learning Finance
|
| *
| Aligns with Learning Context, Signature, Outcomes, Process, Organization,
Partnerships, Staff, and Environment: Learning finance pays close attention
to the design specifications for previous design elements.
|
| *
| Integrates Local, State, National, and International Goals, Planning, and
Resources: Learning finance brings together multiple sources of funds and
enhances flexibility in use of resources.
|
| *
| Links Risk, Responsibility, Performance, and Reward Everywhere: Learning
finance ensures constant accountability, closely relates performance to
rewards, and encourages entrepreneurship.
|
| *
| Supports Re-Engineering and Innovative Options: Learning finance
encourages the flexibility, autonomy, and courage to experiment with and
redesign institutional processes.
|
| *
| Uses Partnerships as a Standard Way of Doing Business: Learning finance
constantly reminds and reinforces attention to controlling costs and enhancing
revenues through partnerships.
|
| *
| Allocates Resources Based on Value-Added: Learning finance ensures that
resources get to the places in the institution which add the most value in
terms of learning signature and outcomes.
|
| *
| Stabilizes Funding Patterns: Learning finance provides a continuous and
dependable flow of resources with both a short- and long-term view.
|
|
In using these specifications as a guide to benchmarking TYIs, it is important
to take account of existing financial management standards and practices. Site
selection was a matter of combining the NDTYI design specifications with
published financial indicators as outlined below.
Recently, KPMG Peat Marwick LLP (1996) was engaged by the U.S. Department of
Education to conduct a financial ratio analysis project, the purpose of which
was to develop a methodology to be used as an initial screening device to
identify financially troubled colleges. The methodology that they developed
takes into account an institution's financial condition, its organizational
structure and mission, and the accounting and reporting requirements to which
it is subject. Their final recommendation was to use three ratios to assess a
college's financial position. For the purposes of this study, I calculated two
of these ratios for small, public two-year colleges throughout the country in
order to identify those colleges that appear to be the most financially viable.
The ratios that I calculated were the primary reserve ratio, which measures
fund balance as a percentage of total expenditures, and the net income ratio,
which measures net income as a percentage of total revenue. Accumulated net
income, or fund balance, provides additional resources that allow an
organization to maintain a stable funding pattern--one of the NDTYI design
specifications for learning finance. I did not calculate the viability ratio
because it involves the measurement of plant indebtedness, which many of the
colleges do not have. One of the weaknesses of Peat Marwick's financial
analysis ratio project is that it does not take into account expenditures per
student, which is often negatively correlated with the fund balance of a
college. Based on the value of the above ratios, a threshold factor determined
by Peat Marwick was assigned to each college, which was then weighted 90% to
the primary reserve ratio and 10% to the net income ratio, to arrive at a
product, the sum of which was used to assign each college to a category, with
category I being the most financially sound and category IV being the least
financially sound institutions. I obtained the financial information necessary
to compute these ratios from the most recent Integrated Postsecondary Education
Data System (IPEDS) report available from the U.S. Department of Education
(1994).
The following case study is based on information obtained during an interview
with Jami Bradley, Vice President of Administrative Services of SVCC, on August
7, 1997. SVCC was built during the late 1960s and the first classes were held
during the 1970-1971 academic year. It was built without an administrative
wing, with the intention to add it at a later date. This wing has not been
built and there have been no major building projects at the college since its
original construction.
The State of Illinois has a Board of Higher Education, the IBHE, which
oversees both two- and four-year institutions. In addition, Illinois also has a
Community College Board, the ICCB, which is involved only with TYIs. Illinois
is divided into 39 districts, each served by a community college, although some
colleges have more than one campus. Students are assigned to districts based on
their place of residence. As a result, there is little competition for
students. If students would like to enroll in a program that is not offered at
the college located in their district, they are allowed to attend another
college, however, the college in their district is required to reimburse the
college in which they are enrolled. Illinois community colleges cannot own and
operate dormitories; however, some colleges have built dormitories on adjacent
land that are managed by a third party.
SVCC's closest four-year competitors are Northern Illinois University located
in DeKalb and Western Illinois University located in Macomb. There are also
private four-year institutions located in Rockford and Galesburg. A number of
area students also attend Southern Illinois University or institutions located
in Chicago, which is approximately two hours from Dixon.
The college has had three presidents. The current president has been in his
position for ten years. There are three vice presidents, one each in the areas
of instructional services, student services, and administrative services, with
directors of each functional area. This structure has remained fairly stable
over the last several years. The only exception is that academic programs had
historically been led by faculty who served as chairpersons, but are currently
being led by deans who function solely in an administrative capacity.
The college has approximately 20 full-time and four part-time administrators;
60 full-time and 30 part-time faculty; and 60 full-time and 15 part-time
professional, clerical, and maintenance staff. Only the faculty are unionized.
The college has auxiliary bookstore and childcare operations. Its food service
is operated by an independent contractor. It has a credit-based unit of
instruction and is organized on a semester basis with two summer sessions, one
intensive two-week session, and a regular ten-week session. There is an
increasing amount of interest in year-round instruction due to welfare
reform.
There are approximately 15,000 full-time equivalent students enrolled at the
college with a headcount of approximately 2,700 and 45,000 credit hours. SVCC
is one of the smallest community colleges in the state. Enrollment has been
fairly stable. It spiked in 1993-1994 with the economic recession, but has now
returned to normal. One recent change which affected enrollment was the break
in the relationship between the college and the state correctional facility
located in Dixon, which occurred the year prior to the change in the federal
law which caused inmates to be ineligible for Pell grants.
Illinois community colleges are required to participate in a program review
process by the IBHE and ICCB (Sauk Valley Community College, 1997). Each
department within each college is evaluated on a revolving five-year basis. The
financial process used by the college needs to support reaching a positive
response to the following review criteria:
| 1. | |
| Occupational Instructional Programs
|
- Is there a need for the program area based on trends in enrollments,
completions, job placement, and labor market demand?
- Is the program cost effective? How was this determined?
- List strengths of the program.
- List weaknesses of the program.
- List quality improvements recommended for the program as a result of the
review.
- (Optional) Describe any unique innovations recently implemented for this
program area.
- Provide the prefix and number of each curricula within this CIP and indicate
its status: (1) continued with minor improvements, (2) significantly modified,
(3) discontinued, or (4) scheduled for further review in the coming year.
- Is there a need for the discipline based on trends in enrollments and
retention? Please explain any adverse trends.
- Is the program cost effective? How was this determined?
- Are all courses in the discipline articulated to satisfy general education or
major field requirements? Explain exceptions.
- List quality improvements recommended for the discipline as a result of the
review.
- (Optional) Describe any unique innovations recently implemented for this
discipline.
- Based on the program review, will the college (1) continue the discipline
with minor improvements, (2) continue the discipline with major modifications,
(3) discontinue the discipline as of a certain date, or (4) other (explain)?
| 3. | |
| Academic and Support Programs
|
- Based on student participation, is there demand for the programs listed
above? Please explain any low participation trends.
- Are the units cost effective? How was this determined?
- List quality improvements recommended for these programs as a result of the
review.
- (Optional) Describe any unique innovations recently implemented for these
program areas.
| 4. | |
| Overall Academic Productivity
|
- Did the college examine its scope of offerings in relation to institutional
size, mission, and available resources? If so, what conclusions were
reached?
- Did the college examine the use of staffing patterns and instructor teaching
qualifications in regard to program cost and quality? If so, what conclusions
were reached?
- Did the college examine faculty workloads? What conclusions were reached?
- Did the college examine its academic calendar in relation to the effective
use of students and faculty time, facilities, and institutional resources? What
conclusions were reached?
- Did the college evaluate its faculty development policies to ensure that they
effectively and efficiently support scholarship and faculty renewal goals? What
conclusions were reached?
- Did the college examine trends in resource commitments to academic support
functions and technologies? What conclusions were reached?
- Has the college examined its organizational structure and processes to ensure
that resource sharing is being accomplished? What conclusions were reached?
| 5. | |
| Administrative Productivity
|
- Are all administrative units and functions central to the college's mission?
If not, please explain.
- If administrative expenditures per student are significantly above or below
the peer group average, please provide a brief analysis of the reasons.
- Is there redundancy of functions within or across administrative or academic
units? If so, please identify the areas.
- Summarize the steps the college will take to improve the efficiency of
operations.
| 6. | |
| Public Service Productivity
|
- Has the college evaluated its public service offerings in light of its
overall mission and institutional, regional, and statewide priorities? If so,
what changes, if any, are being made as a result?
- Are all of the college's public service functions self-supporting? If not,
please explain.
- Is there redundancy of public service functions within the college and/or
community? Please identify the areas.
- Has the college examined the quality of its public service offerings? If so,
are any being eliminated as a result?
| 7. | |
| Each new initiative identified as a result of this process is summarized,
along with the current year and the projected five-year dollars and the source
of the funds that must be invested in order to accomplish the stated goal. If
initiatives are being eliminated, the current year and projected five-year
dollars and the area to which those funds will be reallocated must be
stated.
|
| 8. | |
| The Productivity Quality Process (PQP) also requires a special focus for
Occupational Program Reviews which encompass the following:
|
- Colleges with programs in which the number of graduate respondents exceeds
10, the average unemployment rate is more than the state average (5.1%), and
over one-fourth of the graduates are employed in an unrelated field should
closely examine these programs through the program review process, develop
relevant recommendations, and take appropriate actions to either strengthen or
discontinue them.
- Programs in which more than one-third of Associate in Applied Science
graduates are enrolled for further study in a related field should examine the
extent of articulation currently existing and assess whether efforts are
sufficient. Findings should be indicated as either a strength or a
recommendation in summary reports.
- Colleges with programs in which graduates' overall program component
satisfaction rates were less than 3.9 on a five-point scale are asked to review
the results of the graduate ratings to see if there are particular components
that may be problematic as they perform their fiscal year program reviews.
Findings should be reflected in recommendations for program improvements in
summary reports.
- Colleges with occupational survey response rates of less than 50% are asked
to give special attention to increasing these rates for the coming year. These
colleges should provide a brief update on their efforts to increase response
rates in their program review reports.
Priority statements based on the college's strategic plan must be annually
updated in the PQP and a plan to strengthen the linkages and to integrate
planning, budgeting, program approval, and program review around collegewide
priorities must be detailed.
In addition, faculty roles and responsibilities, to include faculty
development, reward and incentive systems, and the breadth of faculty
contributions; and enhancements in the use of educational technology, to
include enabling activities, delivery and instruction enhancements, and
community partnerships, is described. The PQP also contains an Executive
Summary which includes the processes followed, the level of involvement, the
priorities addressed, and the key decisions made during the year. It is
concluded with a review of the key improvements in undergraduate education made
at SVCC during the last five years and the plans that will be implemented
within the next year to enhance undergraduate education.
In addition to the comprehensive document described above, each division of
the college (i.e., instructional services, student services, and administrative
services) prepares an annual report which details the accomplishments and
activities of its component departments.
The following design features stand out in characterizing learning finance at
SVCC:
Stable Funding
Tuition is determined by each community college in Illinois, with a minimum
rate set by the IBHE. For the 1997-1998 academic year, tuition at SVCC is $44
per semester credit, which includes a $3 activity fee used for such activities
as student government, the student newspaper, fine arts activities such as
theater and choir, and athletics (five men's and women's athletic activities),
and a $2 technology fee. Revenue from the technology fee can be carried over
from year to year.
Before the tuition rate is set each year, the Vice President of Administrative
Services surveys other community colleges in the state. Statewide, the proposed
1997-1998 tuition rates range from $31 to $54 per semester credit, with an
average of $42. This includes fees that range from zero to $7.50.
Since 1967, tuition has increased from $10 per semester credit to its current
$44. The average increase per year was 5.2%, although there were many years
without any increases and a few with very large increases, for example, 25% in
1983 and 27.6% in 1993. The current Vice President of Administrative Services
favors small incremental tuition increases each year rather than very large
periodic increases.
In Illinois, community college districts levy property taxes. The general
guideline is that colleges should be funded approximately one-third each by
local taxes, state grants, and tuition and fees. In 1997-1998, SVCC plans to
receive 37% of its funding from local taxes, 33% from state grants, 28% from
tuition and fees, and the remaining 2% from sources such as facility rental and
investment revenue. The college receives a small amount of federal funds such
as Perkins funds, which are included as part of state funds since they flow
through the state educational agency. IBHE is also beginning to implement a
system of performance-based funding. At the current time, approximately 2% of
each college's state funding is determined by its performance measured against
predetermined goals.
The college has traditionally maintained a large fund balance, due in part to
its conservative administration and governing board. The fund balance is viewed
as a reserve that can be used in times of fiscal crisis and as an alternative
funding source due to the revenue that is earned from its investment. In 1995,
the operating fund balance was as high as $2.2 million, at which time the
governing board approved the college's request to "spend it down" on
technology-related expenditures. The 1997 unaudited fund balance is $1.1
million. The Vice President of Administrative Services anticipates that it will
level off at this point and stated that the board would not allow it to fall
below $1.0 million. Other recent changes which have affected the college's fund
balance are the decisions to become self-insured, which has saved an estimated
$1.2 million per year, and to install a generator to produce electricity for
the campus. In addition, the college has had turnover in its Chief Financial
Officer position. The individual who held this position since the college's
inception left in 1991 and was replaced by an individual who remained for only
three years. In 1994, the current CFO was promoted from her position as
Business Manager.
Alternative Funding Sources
SVCC is currently in the process of hiring a Director of Grants, Planning,
and Institutional Research. This individual will be responsible for pursuing
alternative sources of funding. In addition, the college has a Corporate and
Community Services department, encompassing contract training and community
education, which is active in soliciting new business.
SVCC has an active foundation that provides money for scholarships and
equipment. It has a separate governing board and is led by the Director of
College Relations. It participates in annual fundraising activities and has
recently undertaken two successful endowment challenge grants.
Accountability in Financial Management
In March of each year, the Vice President of Administrative Services
distributes documentation that must be completed by the Deans or Directors and
channeled through the Vice Presidents for initial budget requests. These
requests are accumulated and combined for initial review by the Vice President
of Administrative Services, who then returns them to the departments with
guidelines for modification. When they are returned, the Vice President of
Administrative Services makes the final adjustments with input from the
President and other Vice Presidents. The final budget is presented to the Board
of Trustees by the President for two "readings" before it is adopted, usually
in June or July of each year.
Requests for expenditures are approved by the Deans or Directors and Vice
Presidents, who are held accountable for the budgets in their respective areas
of authority. There is some flexibility in that overexpenditures in one
department may be offset by underexpenditures in another, as long as the total
expenditures remain within the approved budget. Each grant obtained by the
college has its own administrator, who is responsible for the financial
management of the grant. The Vice President of Administrative Services is
responsible only for expenditures in her area of authority (i.e., the business
office, personnel services, building and grounds, and the bookstore). However,
she is informed of all equipment purchases in excess of $500 so that those
purchases are included in the fixed assets of the college. Purchases over
$10,000 must be approved by the Board of Trustees.
All computer-related purchases are approved by the Information Systems
department in order to maintain an integrated, compatible information
management system. To date, the college has purchased its computers rather than
leasing them. Since the college leases its telephone system and its copiers,
the decision to purchase its computers has been made in an effort to equalize
its lease payments with its equipment purchases.
Each college in Illinois has its own information system for financial
reporting; however, each must provide a detailed report to the IBHE on a
quarterly basis using a centrally determined chart of accounts. In addition,
each college must provide program reviews and salary and unit cost studies to
the IBHE on an annual basis. Unit cost studies report costs and enrollments by
area and are used to determine statewide average unit costs which, in turn, are
used in the allocation process.
Recognize Value of Human Resources
Salaries and fringe benefits comprise approximately 75% of the college's
total budget and are determined prior to the budget being developed. As stated
previously, only the faculty are unionized; however, they take the lead in
determining salary increases and changes in fringe benefits. All employees of
the college receive the same percentage increase each year. Leave policies are
very liberal with 13 paid holidays, 11 sick days, 3 personal days, and vacation
which increases each year to a maximum of four weeks per year.
The college has a competitive fringe benefit package; however, only full-time
employees are eligible to participate. In 1995, for the first time, employees
were required to pay for a portion (25%) of their dependent health care
premium. There is a three-tiered premium, with different rates for single
coverage, single plus one coverage, and family coverage. There is also a $200
deductible per year with an out-of-pocket maximum of $1,700. Dental insurance
is not offered. Life insurance equal to the employee's annual salary and
short-term disability insurance are provided at no cost to the employee and
employees have an option to purchase additional life and long-term disability
insurance.
The college offers a tuition reimbursement program in which employees and
their dependents may take courses at SVCC at no cost. Full-time employees and
their dependents may take courses at other institutions and have tuition of up
to $150 per credit waived up to a maximum of 12 credits per year. In addition,
the college offers a computer purchase program in which it purchases computers
for its employees' personal use and allows the employee to reimburse the
college over a period of two years with no interest through payroll deduction.
Partnerships
The college has many shared programs with other two-year colleges. It is a
member of a distance learning network that includes approximately ten
institutions and is headquartered at Western Illinois University in Macomb.
Western Illinois University also offers a Board of Governors program at SVCC,
which is an individualized program that allows students to earn a four-year
degree. Mount St. Clair and National Lewis, which are private colleges, also
offer four-year degrees on the SVCC campus. Illinois is currently in the
process of developing a statewide articulation agreement to facilitate the
transfer of credits between institutions.
The college also partners with area school districts in such areas as distance
learning, Tech Prep, and School-to-Work initiatives. It participates in an
Honors Credit in Escrow program as well. This program provides an opportunity
for academically talented high school juniors to earn one full semester of
college credit before their freshman year in college. It consists of five
general education courses starting in the summer after the student's junior
year in high school and continuing through the summer following the student's
senior year. Fifteen credits are earned and are guaranteed to transfer to
four-year colleges. The credits are held "in escrow" for the student until he
or she graduates from high school, at which time they are transferred to a
four-year institution or applied toward a degree at SVCC.
SVCC has formed a partnership with General Electric in which faculty travel to
General Electric and provide training to its employees. General Electric
provides the college with some equipment in exchange for training for their
employees. Through its Corporate and Community Services department, the college
has established many relationships with business and industry.
The effective design of SVCC's financial structure is evident not only in its
strong financial ratios, but also in more visible features. Upon approaching
SVCC, you are struck by the immenseness of its grounds and its
impeccably-maintained facilities. A walk through the building provides evidence
of the college's recent and significant investments in technology. Computer and
scientific laboratories are numerous, equipment is current and well-maintained,
and interactive television (ITV) classrooms are prevalent.
SVCC also has an effective program review process which ensures that resources
are allocated in areas that add the most value to the college. For example,
occupational programs in which the average unemployment rate is greater than
the state average and in which over one-fourth of the graduates are employed in
an unrelated field must be carefully scrutinized and appropriate action taken
to either strengthen or discontinue them. If they are discontinued, the areas
to which the funds from those programs are reallocated must be delineated in
the program review report. The resources provided from this reallocation of
funds support re-engineering and innovation in an environment of continuous
improvement.
SVCC will be confronting a number of challenges in the near future, including
the following:
Change in Funding Sources
At the state level, there will be a number of legislative changes related
to taxation. Illinois currently has a 3% income tax. The remainder of the
state's education budget is funded through property taxes. There is going to be
a shift away from reliance on property taxes to a greater emphasis on income
taxes. There is currently a cap of 5% on the increase in the amount of revenue
that a district can receive from property tax revenues from year to year.
Building Construction
At the college level, there is an increasing need for more sections of
classes with fewer students in each in order to meet the demand for flexible
scheduling. A number of classrooms have been converted to computer labs and
distance learning classrooms, creating the need for additional classrooms. In
addition, an increasing number of contract training and community education
classes has created the need for additional classroom space. When combined with
a desire to complete the planned administrative wing, it is likely that a
building project will be considered in the near future.
There are a number of factors in the Illinois system of higher education which
affect the fund balances of its colleges. One is its use of districts, which
assigns students based on their place of residence and greatly reduces
competition among colleges. Another is its combination of centralized and
decentralized governance structures. One example is the IBHE, which is
decentralized by the ICCB. Tuition is determined by each college, but must be
within guidelines set by the state. Still another example is the ability of
each college to use its own management information system with a requirement
for detailed quarterly reporting using a centralized chart of accounts
structure.
At the college level, SVCC also has a number of characteristics that affect
its individual fund balance. The most pervasive characteristic is the
conservative nature of its governing board and administration, although it
appears that these individuals are not adverse to change or risk as illustrated
by their decision to become self-insured. One of the criticisms inherent with
an unusually large fund balance is that, in order to build such a fund balance,
it is often necessary to restrict expenditures per student. SVCC has made a
conscious decision to spend its fund balance down to a predetermined level in
order to increase its level of technology, which will directly impact its
students. The college utilizes a participative budgeting process and holds its
administrators accountable for financial decisions. Intensive planning and
review processes are also undertaken by college constituents in an effort to
enhance its productivity and efficiency. The college does not appear to
actively solicit alternative sources of funding or to enter into partnerships,
possibly because it does not feel a need to do so. However, if there are
significant changes in the tax structure in Illinois and/or if the college
undertakes a building project in order to increase classroom and administrative
space as predicted, these sources of funding will become increasingly
important.
In summary, it is apparent that SVCC's financial strength is not an accident.
It is a result of a number of factors which have interacted to create a
uniquely successful, financially strong two-year institution of higher education.
Study Author
|
Kathy Hefty, Business Manager, Pine Technical College, 1000 4th Street, Pine City, MN
|
| | 55063, (320) 629-6764
|
Site Contact
|
Jani Bradley, Vice President of Administrative Services, Sauk Valley Community College,
|
| | | |
173 Illinois Route 2, Dixon, IL 61021, (815) 288-5511
|
Two-year institutions which plan to use benchmark processes to facilitate
change are faced with significant choices. They must select features
exemplified in the benchmark processes that have a high potential for
cost-effective quality improvement. If these choices are to be successful, they
must represent an integrated perspective on the work of the TYI--a perspective
which puts the learning process at the center of organizational change.
The design process described in NDTYI provides a helpful framework for
assessing the utility and value of benchmarked processes. Each of the design
specifications can be viewed as a standard against which the potential
contributions of a benchmark can be evaluated. By reviewing these
specifications for each design element, the TYI can make informed
decisions concerning organizational change and innovation. Benchmark decisions,
as viewed through the lens of NDTYI, take all design elements into
account. However, the focus of the decision is on the learning process, the
learning outcomes it sets out to achieve, and the learning organization that
supports learning and links its results to the community.
In the NDTYI final report, these design elements are arranged in a
three-dimensional space as shown on the next page (Copa & Ammentorp, in
press). Each TYI has a location in the "space" of Figure 2 which defines the
current configuration of learning process, learning outcomes, and learning
organization. From this point of view, a benchmark opportunity represents a
movement of the TYI from one point in "space" to another.
Figure 2
Positioning the Educational Organization
To evaluate a benchmark opportunity, it is necessary to consider how it
positions the TYI on each axis of Figure 2. This means that each axis must be
dimensioned so that features of the benchmark can be located appropriately. In
the following discussion, we take four of the benchmark studies in this report
(all except Learning Staff and Staff Development) and chart their position in
our three-dimensional "space."
Benchmark Learning Outcomes
Although none of the four studies was directed at the learning outcomes
design element, each made explicit references to outcomes either in the form of
student learning, community benefits, or organizational vitality. These
outcomes fall along the dimension shown below:
| Subject | Basic Skills | Team | Knowledge | Comprehensive
|
|
| Matter | Development | Building | Production | Functioning
|
At the left-hand end of this continuum, the TYI would focus its learning
outcomes on the various subject matters taught. At the right-hand end, outcomes
would be related to the comprehensive functioning of the learner. In using this
continuum, it is important to note that there are no special values assigned to
positions--a TYI can be effective at any of the points--so long as the outcomes
are at the center of the learning process and supported by an appropriate
learning organization. Program/organizational locations are determined by the
following definitions:
- Subject Matter: Curricula founded on the subject matter erect barriers
that prevent the integration of knowledge needed by students. These curricula
also foster the academic-vocational division found in many colleges (Lewis,
1994).
- Basic Skills Development: These skills are drawn from studies of the
workplace and projections of future occupational demand. They lend precision to
educational outcomes and draw the academy into the world of work (SCANS,
1992).
- Team Building: Outcomes associated with team functioning and the role
of the individual in organizations adds a social dimension to the educational
agenda. Such outcomes are expressive of life in global organizations where
collaborative action is the only effective way to deal with complexity.
- Knowledge Production: Modern organizations are increasingly dependent
on creating and applying new knowledge. Individuals at all levels of the
organization require knowledge production competencies that build on a
foundation of basic skills and team participation (Gibbons et al., 1994).
- Comprehensive Functioning: These outcomes recognize the social context
of work and the realities of organizational, family, and community life. They
focus on the competencies needed for life in a complex, global society
(Hart-Landsberg, 1992).
The four benchmarked processes described in this report are located on this
continuum in respect to how each sees learning outcomes. The coding scheme used
is as follows: CWELL = Consortium for Workforce Education and Lifelong
Learning; FVTC = Fox Valley Technical College; HEAT = Higher Education and
Advanced Technology Center; SVCC = Sauk Valley Community College.
| Subject | SVCC | CWELL | Comprehensive
|
|
|
| Matter | FVTC | HEAT | Functioning
|
These locations are selected based on observations recorded in the four
benchmark studies as follows:
- CWELL: The research orientation of CWELL is clearly documented in the
benchmark study. In fact, the central purpose of this program is to generate
new approaches to education and to include students in knowledge production
(McDonald, Huie, & Sticht, 1995).
- FVTC: Fox Valley Technical College strives for learning outcomes that
are located between basic skills and team building. This reflects the strong
emphasis on training defined by the many learning partnerships between the
college and area businesses.
- HEAT: The significant benchmark observation here is, "From a student
perspective, the HEAT Center provides the WEB . . . (where) . . . the student
operates in multiple environments continuously during the learning process."
This facilitates outcomes at the comprehensive functioning level.
- SVCC: The PQP Report concerning college programs shows a strong
disciplinary emphasis and program evaluation is focused on traditionally
defined measures of academic productivity. These point to learning outcomes on
the subject matter end of this continuum (Sauk Valley Community College,
1997).
Benchmarking Learning Process
The learning process is dimensioned on the continuum shown below:
| Instruction | Work-Based Learning
| Team Learning | Goal Directed Learning
| Construction
|
|
|
Here, the range of options suggests alternative approaches to teaching and
learning. Again, there is no "best location"; the TYI must find the point best
suited to the learning outcomes it has selected according to these
definitions:
- Instruction: Lectures and other didactic teaching practices are at the
center of instruction-based learning processes. These approaches grow
out of the subject matters to define the traditional academy.
- Work-Based Learning: On-the-job training, apprenticeships, and the
like are used to give the student a hands-on learning experience. It is a key
component of School-to-Work models an important step in "unfreezing"
instructional systems (Bragg, Hamm, & Trinkle, 1995).
- Team Learning: Collaboration is an emerging theme in all aspects of
organizational life. It is no less so in learning where team efforts have been
shown to be highly effective in improving student engagement in the learning
process and in connecting learning to the external environment (Mathews,
1994).
- Goal Directed Learning: For the individual student to become adept at
directing her or his own learning, each needs to develop a goal and a plan for
its attainment. Goal directed learning articulates the goals of the student
with the objectives of the college (Ram & Leake, 1995).
- Construction: All of the above learning modalities come together as
students work in teams, pursuing their personal goals through collective
construction of products and new knowledge. The shift in learning from
instruction to construction is the fundamental change proposed in the NDTYI
model (Harel & Papert, 1993).
In our four benchmark studies we find evidence to suggest the positions shown
below:
| Instruction | SVCC | | HEAT | | Construction
|
|
|
| | | FVTC | | CWELL
|
- CWELL: New knowledge is being constructed in this program for
students, teachers, and university educators. This approach is the focus of the
conference planned for the spring of 1998 where the results of CWELL are to be
shared with those interested in lifelong learning.
- FVTC: This college is definitely work-centered in its learning
partnerships. It uses both work-based learning and team learning as it strives
to meet the needs of business and industry.
- HEAT: The center promotes goal directed learning. As Goodwin (1997)
states,
The benefit is to make students successful. Through quick and easy
transitions, students migrate from a two-year manufacturing curriculum into an
applied engineering program. Or, a student that is not being successful in
engineering is allowed to stop out with a two-year degree or transfer down to a
related, less-aggressive academic program.
- SVCC:
Teaching and learning at SVCC lie somewhere between instruction and work-based
learning. This reflects the college's academic mission as well as its link to
the world of work
Benchmarking the Learning Organization
The learning organization element of NDTYI was not directly under
examination in the four benchmark studies in this paper. Nevertheless, it is
possible to array the findings of these studies on the following organization
continuum:
| Collegiate | Academic-Vocational | Team | Enterprise | Learning
|
|
|
| | Integration | | | Organization
|
These concepts are defined as follows:
- Collegiate: This is a pattern of organization based on subject matter
where organizational units are derived from the curriculum--it is a mirror to
the model of the traditional academy (Eaton, 1994).
- Academic-Vocational Integration: Here we have an evolution of the
collegiate mode of organization that essentially builds alliances across the
traditional divisions in TYIs. It is a softening of familiar organizational
schema to permit the formation of new fields of study and/or programs (Grubb
& Kraskouskas, 1992).
- Team: In moving to this model, the college draws students and staff
into affinity groups where common interests take the place of individual goals
and traditional organization structure. Teams build learning communities that
cut across inter- and intra-institutional boundaries (Smith & Hunter,
1988).
- Enterprise: As teams take full responsibility for educational inputs
and outcomes, they become enterprises. These entities rise and fall in response
to changes in the environment, market demand, and evolution of knowledge
(Alfred & Carter, 1995).
- Learning Organization: All members of the organization and their
various enterprises enter into dynamic relationships which foster learning for
students and for the organization (Senge, 1990).
The four benchmark studies take the positions shown below:
| Collegiate | | HEAT | FVTC | | Learning
|
|
|
| | SVCC | | | CWELL | Organization
|
The rationale for each college's location is as follows:
- CWELL: Due to the research emphasis of CWELL, it exemplifies the
learning organization--experimentation and innovation are the driving forces
which define organization structure and operations.
- FVTC: In its approach to customized training, FVTC is following the
enterprise model where each "tub is on its own bottom."
- HEAT: The center attempts academic and vocational integration as it
links college programs and business/industry activities.
- SVCC: The college is structured around academic disciplines and has a
parallel administrative organization that is very much in the collegiate model.
The above studies and their locations in the TYI "space" show that there is no
preferred location for the TYI of the future. In fact, we see SVCC and the San
Diego CWELL Project at the opposite "corners" of Figure 2. And, both of these
benchmarks are quite successful. What this tells us is that any TYI looking to
benchmark studies has the option to consider which features (if any) of the
benchmark it wishes to implement.
Our analysis of these studies has not, however, shown the TYI how to
make decisions about new ideas and/or processes. What we have done is to create
a set of concepts and exemplars which can be used to contrast benchmarks with
the present state of affairs in the TYI (Alfred & Carter, 1995). Thus, we
have the ingredients for thoughtful consideration of alternative paradigms for
the TYI (Barr, 1993; Boggs, 1993). And, through the process of benchmarking,
the TYI might be able to ensure its future vitality (Commission on Innovation,
1993).
The above benchmark studies also illustrate the interrelationships or
synergies among the design elements. For instance, the focus on staff and staff
development at Miami-Dade Community College influenced, especially, how
finances were spent, and also the learning process and the learning outcomes.
And the focus on the learning environment at the Higher Education and Advanced
Technology Center at Lowry specifically affected the partnerships that were
formed, the learning process, and the learning outcomes. These studies indicate
that change in one design element will have an influence on all of the other
design elements. The design elements need to work in concert with each other
for the institution to be viable in the 21st century.
Another implication of the studies in this report is that in order to
implement and maintain innovative designs in TYIs, support for the new designs
is needed from a number of fronts. It is important to receive support from
within the institution--administration, staff, and students. Equally important
is community support. Connections to the community and support from the
community allow TYIs to leverage resources; keep abreast of changes in work,
family, and community; and provide relevant learning experiences for
students.
The benchmark studies presented here show how external changes can guide
organizational transformation in a positive direction. That is, change is being
viewed as a "friend" rather than an "enemy" to be resisted. And, by responding
thoughtfully and sensitively to changes, the organization is improving at being
true to its learning signature. At the same time, the benchmark studies
illustrate the power of synergy to leverage resources and organizational
improvements. For example, attention to partnerships brings staff development
opportunities at the same time as important contributions to improving the
learning process and sharing learning finance.
The important point to remember is that benchmarking is only the starting
point for organizational change. It opens the door to considering something
other than "business as usual" by showing the TYI how other institutions serve
their stakeholders in unique ways. Benchmarking marks the baseline for
authentic change in that it defines processes that "work." They are not
exercises in "what might be"; they are real activities that deliver outcomes
demanded by students and the larger community.
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