Academic Calendar

Over the past year, I’ve received many inquiries regarding the College’s Academic Calendar. One of the most frequent inquiries is if the College could schedule its spring break at the same time as the local school districts to provide faculty and students with school children an opportunity to have a week together for vacations or other activities. Although I no longer have school age children, I certainly understand the convenience of having spring break the same week. In response to these inquiries, I asked the Academic Calendar Committee and the Council of Academic and Student Affairs (CASA) to evaluate the pros and cons of changing the dates for the 2009 spring break from March 9 – 13 to the area school districts’ spring break of April 13 – 17. They determined that leaving spring break in the middle of the semester was a more valuable and academically sound decision. The College began scheduling spring break at the mid-point of the semester a few years ago as a response to student and faculty concern that an April spring break was only a few weeks before the end of the semester, and that a mid-semester break more closely aligned with higher education calendar models.

In addition, there is no guarantee that all public and private schools in our service area will schedule spring break the exact same week every year; therefore, changing the calendar would not address everyone’s needs. Spring break, of course, is just one of the many concerns that you have shared with me. Other concerns include the desire for a fall break, to close the College for Easter Monday or Friday, not use annual leave during winter break, to have more workdays at the beginning of the semesters, etc. As you can imagine, there are many constraints that must be considered when scheduling the academic calendar such as: number of minutes of classroom instruction, number of faculty non-work days in the 39 and 13 week agreements, state holidays, etc. Faculty who have challenges with the scheduling of spring break should work with their academic associate vice president to determine possible options.

The Academic Calendar Committee will meet soon to begin planning the 2009-2010 Academic Calendar. If you have suggestions, please feel free to contact one of the following Committee members: Susan Feemster, Gina Misle, Jacquelyn Nesbitt, Al Sanderlin, Laura Sturgis, Marc Tarplee, or Mark Ulseth. If you wish to be involved in the planning of the academic calendar, please contact Jacquelyn Nesbitt.

I appreciate your input and hope you will continue to provide suggestions to me and others. I am sincere about working with you to help make YTC the best place possible to work. At the same time, I want us to balance that with learning and economic development. I don't think it would be right for me to only consider my definition of what that means so please continue to provide your perspective. When possible dig a little deeper to see why things are the way they are and when real constraints exist, how we can work within them, while considering the impact on our total organization and our stakeholders.

New Phone System

During the fall focus group sessions, many of you mentioned the need to update technology on campus and specifically phones. Well, good news! We are in the process of replacing the College’s current phone system with VOIP, or Voice Over Internet Protocol. VOIP is a method of taking analog audio signals (like what we currently hear when we talk on the phone) and turning them into digital data that can be transmitted over the internet. What this means for us is that we will receive new phones with features that most of us have on our home phones like voice mail, caller ID, and call waiting. Yes, the brown phones are history! There are a number of additional features that can be utilized with this system and information will be provided when installation is complete and everyone is comfortable with the initial set-up.

Phones were installed in ST-Building on February 26, and B-Building is scheduled for installation this Friday, March 21. Our plans are to install phones in one or two buildings per week, depending on size, with installation complete by the end of May. During each building installation, representatives from Comporium will be on campus to provide assistance with set up and to offer training on how to use various services. As Telephone Services Coordinator, Debbie Bailey will also serve as system administrator for the VOIP system.

Area Commission Planning Meeting

For those who were off last week, welcome back. I hope you enjoyed your time off. For those of you who did not take off please make plans for some vacation time in the near future.

I apologize for not posting any updates in a few weeks. Last minute preparations for the Area Commission Planning Meeting were overwhelming. The Planning Meeting was held over two full days, with nine of the ten Commission members in attendance. We presented pertinent information related to the six planning themes that were identified from the faculty/staff focus group sessions: student success, programming, partnerships, campus environment, branding, and organizational development. Our discussions focused primarily on student success and how the other themes support our efforts to help students achieve their goals.

We introduced the future concept of building a 55,000 sq ft allied health facility. The allied health sector is growing rapidly and there is great demand for us to expand our programming and provide facilities to meet those needs. Adding an allied health facility to our campus would free up space in A and C buildings for new and expanding programs.

The potential for a major partnership with the Rock Hill School District was discussed. The school district is evaluating a possible location for a fourth high school. One of three ideas they are exploring is locating a non-comprehensive high school on our College campus. This option is very similar to the Early College concept where students could simultaneously earn both a high school diploma and an associate degree. Opportunity exists for all or part of the programs at the Applied Technology Center to relocate to the College campus, which would provide additional space on the Northwestern campus. The new high school could potentially accommodate as many as 1200 students or be designed for mostly grades 11 and 12 and be as small as 500. There is no date certain but if both administrations and governing boards agree this could become a reality by 2012.

I believe Commission members were engaged and appreciated the time spent covering the major opportunities and challenges ahead. I am very grateful to our Commission members for their support. I am also very appreciative of the hard work by many individuals who helped us prepare for the meeting.