HIGHLINE COMMUNITY COLLEGE

COMMUNITY COLLEGE DISTRICT 9

                                       

 

MINUTES OF BOARD OF TRUSTEES’ MEETING

 

                                                           January 17, 2008

 

 

STUDY SESSION

 

Executive Session

Executive Session was held from 8:05 am to 9:00 am for the purposes of discussion of the performance of a public employee.  The Executive Session continued from 9:00 am for the purpose of discussion on real estate issues.  The Executive Session adjourned at 9:18 am.

 

The Study Session continued at 9:18 am and the following topics were discussed:  

 

Student Rights and Responsibilities /Code of Ethics

Marketing Update

Legislative Update

Update on MaST

Commission Visits

Capital Project Requests

Burien City Council Presentation

 

Study Session adjourned at 10:10 am.

                                                           

 

MEETING

 

Call to Order

Karen Vander Ark, Chair, called the meeting to order at 10:20 a.m.

 

Roll Call

Members Present:                              Karen Vander Ark

                                                            Rita Creighton

                                                            Elizabeth Chen

                                                            Mike Regeimbal

                                                           

It was noted that all members were present except for Dr. Davila.  Dr. Davila arrived at

10:25 am.

 

Attorney General Representative:       Derek Edwards

 

 

 

 

Approval of Minutes

The minutes of the Regular Meeting of the Board of Trustees on December 13, 2007 and the minutes of the Special Board of Trustees Meeting of December 3, 2007 were approved.

 

Correspondence

 

Jack Bermingham introduced Jack Kniskern.  Mr. Kniskern is a former Trustee of Highline Community College and expressed his pleasure at attending the meeting and being able to host Zhao Lan.  Zhao Lan, is a program coordinator at the Yangzhou Foreign Affairs Office.  She will be working with Highline for the next few months and assisting our collaborations with Yangzhou through the Title VI project, and will be identifying young persons who have an interest in creating a website to further these collaborations.  Zhao Lan spoke of her appreciation to Dr. Bermingham, Jack Kniskern, and to the Sister Cities of Kent Association who have been instrumental in supporting this exchange opportunity.  Ms. Lan indicated that there have been thirteen rounds of exchange programs which serve to highlight what she called the “golden triangle” of government, business, and educational institutions.  She said that the government helps to lay the foundation of the relationship; that business is needed to prosper, and that education is needed to elevate.

 

Standing Reports

 

Associated Students of Highline Community College

Student Body President, Steven Simpkins reported.

 

  • Steven Simpkins expressed that there have been numerous projects and activities to talk about at Highline recently.  He mentioned that last week Dena Dillon put on an excellent presentation on domestic violence and this week the documentary, “Boys of Baraka” has been shown in preparation for the week of activities for the celebration of the life of Martin Luther King, Jr.
  • Today will have the first session of the International program honoring our Indonesian students.  The next session will honor those students from South Africa.
  • Student Leadership has been approached by the Tutoring Center for some help in refurnishing.  This will be discussed in the next meeting along with helping with the MaST program. 
  • Student Leadership has an idea for a new website which would be created for buying and selling textbooks and could be a big help to a lot of students.
  • There’s lots of excitement this month with the activities around MLK week, and in February there will be the Hip Hop Summit and other events for Black History Month, one of which will be the author, Sophia Stewart.
  • PTK will be presenting their quarterly Voice Infusion on January 31st which will run from 11:00 am until 1:00 pm featuring “The Untold Story of Immigration to America.”

 

Karen Vander Ark announced that Steve will be joining the visit to the Trustees Association for Community and Technical Colleges next week in Olympia and everyone was looking forward to his participation.

 

 

Washington Public Employees Association

Lydia Bracco reported.

 

  • The Highline Brown Bag lunch was held yesterday.
  • Lydia reminded everyone that Lobby Day would be held Monday, January 21st in Olympia.  She attended this event last year.
  • $1,037.00 was the final figure for the donation to the Des Moines Food Bank and 398 lbs. of food were delivered.
  • Lydia also introduced Amy Lanser, the new job representative for WPEA.

 

 

Faculty Senate

Ruth Frickle reported.

 

  • Ruth Frickle said the Faculty Senate had met on January 16th, and explained cap changes so that the faculty senate would be informed of changes that would include college wide outcomes now.
  • Some of the Professional/Technical classes can now be included toward an AA degree.
  • Two alternates were identified for the discipline committee in order to meet the requirements of the WAC.
  • Future meetings will be scheduled to discuss the question of whether College 100 should be a required course.
  • On February 7-8, Ruth will be attending the Faculty Association meeting at Olympic College in Bremerton.

 

Update on Presidential Search Process

Karen Vander Ark asked Rita Creighton to give an update on the presidential search process.

 

Rita said the ads did go out on the presidential search in the Chronicle, the Community College Times, and we also have an ad in Colors magazine, as well.  She said they were delighted that the ad was in the same issue that contains a wonderful article on Highline. There is a link to that article on the website for those who have not read it.  Rita wanted to report that they have already received some inquiries and actually some applications.  So they are moving ahead with that.  The timeline is ahead. The committee that was Board-approved met on December lst, and that was spent with the consulting firm and also to have everyone understand the procedures that they will be following.  Meetings have been set up on February 1, February 21st, and March 17th, and the meeting of the 17th will be for the entire search committee.  Rita explained it was an interesting initial meeting on December lst just to get to meet everybody that was on the committee.  She has been telling them that next to the Maytag repair man, they are going to be the loneliest people that ever had a job. The process is a little different than people might expect.  Sometimes when you are on a search committee the expectation is that you are going to get together and then you will go through volumes of paperwork and then sit and talk about the merits of each person all through the interviews etc.  This process is a little different. She said that individuals that serve on the committee were chosen to represent various groups on campus so that there would be a good representation of everyone. She expressed her delight with the individuals that were put forward.  She said they are all very unique in their views and will bring different perspectives.  The one thing they all brought forward was a great passion for Highline, and a great love of this institution.  She felt that was true for those from the campus community and also from outside.

 

Rita also said that for the work they will be doing, after signing a confidentiality agreement, it will require that they will take all the materials, and bring them to their home or their place of business, and go over them individually.  They will not converse with other members of the group; they will not converse with the people they represent.  They will truly be coming to this as unique, individual contributors and each one will come back after they will have done all of their reading, all of their rating of their scores and that will be presented at those meetings.  Rita added that each of those meetings will be designed to whittle down the numbers so that hopefully at the last meeting they will come out with about 6 people that they will be interviewing and perhaps the site visits.  She wanted to explain that this was a little different process than what most people might expect.  She said that everyone should be proud of the people who are representing the groups. She added that if you are part of the faculty and you have one of those four members that you expect to come back to a faculty meeting and perhaps hash out what happened at the presidential search, they won’t be able to do that. 

 

Rita added that having said that, there is room for individual input all along the way.  She said they will have a website for every turn, and will welcome any kind of independent communications, from individuals within the college campus or outside.  She explained they will be looking very diligently to come up with exactly the right fit for Highline Community College at the end of the search. 

 

Rita was asked to offer comments on questions from the last Board meeting.  She spoke of the questions which asked for participation by subgroups or in some fashion with individuals other than the Board members on both the interview process and/or perhaps visits. She said that happens in the process that was outlined in the contract that was signed with the consultants.  She said that they do indeed hold the contract, and the consultant works for the Board of Trustees.  She said that they have put some calls in to see how this process has worked at some of the other colleges that have used this consulting firm, and the feedback they have gotten is that it works very well and people have been pleased with this process and the independent thought that it brings rather than a big group think procedure. 

 

Rita said that they are going to take a look at that and see if they can get some ideas from the consultant as to how they might be more inclusive without negating the Board’s responsibility and right to be the final deciders on this decision, and hopefully bring something back at the next meeting.  She said that they do have time, and are just at the beginning of this. There will be public forums, so there will be opportunities for individuals to see the finalists but if they can work them into the interview process, or the visit process they will look at that. 

 

Report on Martin Luther King, Jr. Week

 

Yoshiko Harden-Abe and Natasha Burrowes were introduced by Dr. Bermingham to present the Board Report on Martin Luther King, Jr. Week activities.  Yoshiko explained that the general policy of the program for this event centered around “celebration through education.”  Their concept is that this focus helps to see the issues through the education lens, and for student leadership to grow it is very helpful to have supportive faculty.  She added that is also very helpful to have a partnership between Multicultural Services and the Student Programs Center for Leadership.  This partnership has served as a bridge to infuse multicultural efforts into all that we are doing at Highline, and is all encompassing and inclusive of partnerships with Women’s Programs, Access Services, Movie Fridays, and The Blend.

 

Natasha Burrowes said that the week’s activities had received good coverage in the Post Intelligencer and that HCC has the most extensive celebration of Martin Luther King Jr. Week in Washington State.  Committee members included Darryl Brice, Meg Ryan, Yoshiko Harden-Abe, Josh Magallanes, Isaac Cameron, and Amanda Williams Lewis.  This year the event holds a political theme and members of the local community are starting to attend.  Natasha added that this should not be a day off, but a day on. 

She also offered some highlights on what the week’s activities had in store such as Dr. Ball’s presentation on Hip Hop and Dr. Lipsitz’s lecture on “The Urgency of Now.”  The lecture on Wednesday will be by Dolores Huerta, who is an American icon in historic legislation for Farm Workers.  She expressed how proud that everyone can be that Highline has chosen to supply the funding to bring these individuals to the campus.  As a last note, she urged everyone to see the film, “Boys of Baraka” and to see the mural in the Leadership Resource Room which will be the center of a discussion on youth activism on Friday.  She also reminded everyone of Unity through Diversity Week which will be held on Highline’s campus during April 28 through May 2.

 

 

AREA REPORTS

 

General Administration

Larry Yok reported.

 

  • Larry said that Highline is moving forward with the Washington State Quality Award.  Tonya Benton has completed all of the requirements for Level A.  Lots of data is being assembled that will be helpful in many areas.  The application is to be submitted in September, 2008.  The Award itself is not expected to be the end product, but it is a process that allows for analysis on how your operations are handled.  It is generally a process improvement process.
  • Mike Regeimbal asked if Larry anticipated any recommendations from this submission and Larry replied that would not be the outcome.  He said that often it requires six or seven applications before the final application outcome is achieved.

 

Student Services

Toni Castro reported.

 

  • Toni Castro expressed her thanks to all who went through the revision process for the Student Rights and Responsibilities Code.  She especially wished to offer her thanks to Derek Edwards who assisted in legal areas. 
  • Workshops will be conducted in March to review the new revision areas with Instruction Cabinet and other leadership groups.
  • Toni attended a retreat on January 4th with 45 student leaders at the Island Wood Retreat Center which was very inspiring.  They looked at the role of compassion and hope in service-led organizations.
  • Jonathan Brown will be on Sabbatical for Winter Quarter while he is working on his doctoral degree at the University of Washington.  The Student Services manual is being revised, and Jonathan Brown will be tying this revision into his doctoral work.
  • Toni reported on a student success story of Grace Mukiri who came from Kenya in 2005.  She was active in the Honors Program.  She graduated last spring with a 3.8 grade point average and is going to PLU to obtain her Bachelor of Science degree in Nursing.  She was invited to join the top one percent of students who were nominated to participate in an international student travel experience.  She will be going to South Africa and working with other students in a variety of fields. The trip will be from May 26 to June 8.  Grace has said that Highline will always remain in her heart.  Toni expressed that these stories are really the heartbeat of our institution.

 

Instruction

Marie Zimmerman reported.

 

  • Marie highlighted the work underway on the Gateway Center.  She explained this is keeping everyone challenged, but also energized.  BuRRST has come forth with support and HCC is gearing up to be ready before the funding comes in around July 1.
  • Last month José Ramón Fernández-Peña visited here from San Francisco and last week Jack Bermingham and Alice Madsen visited him at his location so we had a lot to draw on for this Center. 
  • Marie expressed her thanks to Jeff Wagnitz for stepping in to assist with duties during the first week of the Quarter while she was away.
  • Enrollment for Winter Quarter 2008 is higher than in 2007 and 2006.
  • We are seeing significant increases in ABE and we are also higher in the Professional/Technical areas, but she did not see a shift away from one area to any other area.
  • Marie wished to highlight Susan Landgraf in the Arts and Humanities division.  She teaches journalism and is also a poet.  She submitted some of her work last year to the Pacific Writer’s Association and is one of eight finalists in the competition.  Susan has accepted a three month residency on the island of Flores in the Azores and will also be an exchange faculty member to China this spring.

 

Institutional Advancement

Lisa Skari reported.

 

  • Lisa said the MaST project is now two-thirds of the way there.
  • The Campus campaign goal was $50,000 and we are already at $30,000.  Lisa said that Bob Maplestone has done a great job on this campaign.
  • Lisa reminded everyone of the upcoming Breeder’s Theatre performances that will be held from January 18 to February 3.  Proceeds for the performance on January 30th will be donated to the scholarship fund.

 

Highline College Education Association

Ruth Windhover reported.

 

  • Ruth expressed her thanks for accommodating her later schedule.
  • Regarding the concerns of the HCEA leadership, she hoped that their recommendations would be implemented into the presidential search process.  Ruth added that this will give various groups an ownership in the process and would also be an advantage to the next president.
  • Ruth spoke of the Legislative issues such as inadequate funding for Running Start and concerns relating to this issue which would most likely be a hard sell.
  • Regarding salaries within the global challenge states, Washington is 7th down from the top in terms of faculty compensation. This will lead to a serious concern in recruitment of the types of faculty needed at Highline. 

 

President’s Remarks

 

Dr. Bermingham remarked that the State Board has put forth requests for funding issues, most of which did not get mentioned in the Governor’s budget.  Running Start, which was started around 1993, is a tremendous program, but over the years the funding has become more and more marginal.  Right now, the gap is a little over $3,000 per FTE.  Dr. Bermingham indicated that if the 800 FTE times $3,000 were annualized it becomes apparent how much funding that Highline is missing. The estimate statewide is about $35 million.  Dr. Bermingham also said that the Trustees will be briefed next week in their conversation with the Legislature on these issues.  Other issues that will take focus for the community colleges are the funding gap for the Worker Retraining Program, the $1.5 Million request for the Digital Library System, and the reauthorization of the Gardner/Evans/Lock Higher Education bonds.

 

Dr. Bermingham indicated that the College was very excited to have had such success in the Federal Budget.  He expressed his thanks to Senator Cantwell who took the lead in the E4 Small Business Development Center which had an earmark of $454,000 and will be speaking with SKCEDI on beneficial ways to use this funding.  Senator McDermott’s support also assisted in the appropriation of USAID funding support for programs in South Africa and Namibia.

 

Yoshiko Harden-Abe and Natasha Burrowes were commended by Dr. Bermingham for their efforts in putting together the program for Martin Luther King, Jr. Week.  This program has had great success at the College and many of these programs have helped enhance the core values at our institution.  He also gave his thanks to Toni for her fine work that is outlined in the article in the Colors NW magazine.

 

Unscheduled business

 

Cheryl Carino-Burr from Educational Planning/Advising spoke to the Board of Trustees.  She indicated she had concerns over the presidential search process during the last meeting; however Trustee Rita Creighton’s remarks during today’s meeting had answered her questions.

 

New Business

None.

 

Adjournment

The meeting was adjourned at 11:38 a.m.

 

Next  Regularly Scheduled Meeting of the Board of Trustees

The next regularly scheduled meeting of the Board of Trustees will be on February 14, 2008.

 

 

 

 

 

                                                                                                                                               

Karen Vander Ark, Chair                                             Jack Bermingham, Interim Secretary