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.
1 comment:
The high school connection sounds interesting. In the past year or so my Spanish classes have had some very hard-working and motivated students who were also in high school (mostly home-schoolers, so far).
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