Board Report - September, 2005

Report from Lane Community College President Mary Spilde
To the Lane Community College Board of Education
September 14, 2005

Good evening and welcome to fall term 2005. I am really excited about the start of the new academic year. I hope everyone had time this summer to rest and renew. I spent two wonderful weeks with my family in Scotland and just returned from Oaxaca, Mexico, where I took two weeks of my six-week sabbatical re-learning Spanish. I wanted to thank the board for the allowing me to have a “mini-sabbatical,” short though it was.

There are a couple of people I would like to introduce to the board. First, I would like to introduce Dr. Pam Farmer. Pam joined the college in July as manager of Professional and Organizational Development for the college. This is the last piece of the restructuring that the board authorized four years ago. Given the many changes that Lane is facing, and the fact that Lane is a learning college, it is critical that we have the capacity to develop the staff and the organization, and Pam will be working on that. Welcome, Pam. Also, I would like to introduce Jennifer Steele. She is Marie’s new assistant, replacing Terry Caron. She comes to us with a wealth of community college experience and will be leading a number of projects in Marie’s area. Welcome, Jennifer.

Our thoughts are with Stan Taylor, faculty member and LCCEA bargaining chair. His father passed away unexpectedly. Also, Glenna Clemmons, nursing faculty, had a stroke and the prognosis does not look good. She is in our thoughts.

This seems like old news now, but the legislature did finally end up giving community colleges just under $428 million through the formula. Bond authority was provided for some capital projects, but it was very scaled back. Lane will be okay for this year, but the last budget projections show a deficit for 2007. We have not updated our projections but will do so for the October meeting. We are still closing out last year and want to wait for more accurate ending fund balance figures before we develop new projections.

Speaking of budget, I would like to introduce Ms. Mary Otley, the Benton County Finance Director. Ms. Otley is a Government Finance Officers Association (GFOA) representative and is here to make an award presentation. I would like to commend Marie Matsen and her staff for their great work that resulted in this award. You are aware that Lane has been working very hard for the past four years to make our budget more transparent, and this is a signal that we are making progress on that issue. The award notes that we were judged by an impartial panel “to meet the high standards of the program including a constructive ‘spirit of full disclosure’ to clearly communicate its financial story.”

All of us are very concerned about the plight of those affected by Hurricane Katrina. The board members received an e-mail from me suggesting that we provide free tuition for a certain number of community college students that have been displaced. Beyond that, I think it makes sense to work with the organizations that are set up to give aid in these situations, like the American Red Cross. The American Association of Community Colleges (AACC) has set up a fund that we can donate to that will help community colleges in the affected areas. I received the following e-mail from Dr. Walter Bumphus, Chancellor of the Louisiana Community Colleges:

‘Mary, thanks for this very thoughtful email. We are back at work in Baton Rouge after several days of power outages. As you are aware, our New Orleans area campuses were severely damaged. It has been great to hear from friends, so please know how much I appreciate this email. As you would suspect, we are still assessing damages, and as soon as our assessments are complete, we will get the word out to our sister institutions about things that would be of assistance. Again, thanks for your nice email, Mary. It really means a great deal during these difficult times.’

I am sure that Marie will talk about the KLCC campaign that is just about to begin, but I wanted you to know that the most recent Arbitron ratings show KLCC serving a very high number and proportion of listeners. They do not allow us to publicly give specifics, but just imagine if we had more listeners than anyone else in a given age group. Not saying that we have, but just think how great it would be.

I wanted to give you an update on enrollment for last year. Total FTE declined in 2004-05 by 4.9 percent (525.85 fewer total FTE). Credit FTE declined in 2004-05 by 3.6 percent (305.26 fewer credit FTE). Non-Credit FTE declined in 2004-05 by 10.4 percent (220.59 fewer credit FTE). Of course, we are working very hard on increasing enrollment this year.

I had the opportunity to attend the American Community College Trustees (ACCT) conference with Paul Holman, Susie Johnston, Tracy Simms, and Donna Zmolek last week. I went to some very interesting sessions on Learning Communities, Governance, and Formula-Based Collective Bargaining. Patrick and I also made a presentation on our College Governance System. There must have been between 50-75 people in attendance, which I found very surprising given the fact that it was at the end of the conference. Susie and Paul may want to share their experience during board comments.

The Oregon Community College Association has organized a board member training for September 29-30. Mike Rose has the registration forms. I think it will be an opportunity to have good training as well as meet other Oregon board members.

I want to remind you about in-service next Tuesday, September 20. We will have the all-staff gathering beginning at 8 am in the Center for Meeting and Learning. I hope you will all be able to attend.

I am looking forward to another great year at Lane.