2018

Today’s employers know that skilled workers don’t grow on trees. Sometimes, you have to grow your own talent.

With rapid advances in technology, job titles like Smartphone Application Developer and Patient Care Technician simply didn’t exist a decade ago, so qualified candidates are few.

Employers scrambling to find workers with the right stuff often turn to Norwalk Community College (NCC) in Norwalk, Connecticut. That’s because NCC tracks industry trends and readily deploys associate degree and certificate programs to produce workers who can hit the ground running.

Employers serve on the college’s academic advisory boards and inform curriculum development and program outcomes. “By linking directly with employers, NCC identifies workforce shortages, now and down the road, and tailors solutions,” said NCC President David L. Levinson.

According to the 2013 McKinsey and Company report, Breaking the U.S. Growth Impasse, “Business leaders can give the U.S. economy a shot in the arm by pursuing innovative public/private partnerships and developing human capital through education and workforce training.”

Partnering with health care employers helps identify job opportunities for allied health graduates.

NCC leads dozens of collaborative relationships that position students for success and boost the economy. For example, the college’s growing veterinary partnership has been good for students, vets, and pets. According to program coordinator and assistant professor Anne C. Hermans, “NCC’s veterinary technicians program was established in response to an overwhelming demand for trained and credentialed veterinary technicians from area practices of all different sizes and types—small and large animals, exotics, specialty practice, general practice, and emergency and referral practice.”

Vet Tech program students work in the field as techs-in-training.

The Vet Tech degree program was launched in fall 2015. Fifty percent of its first- and second-year students are already working in the field as techs-in-training. According to Hermans, virtually all the students who graduated with the first class in May 2017 have been “extensively recruited” and received jobs offers prior to graduation.

NCC has partnerships with many health care employers and nonprofit agencies, noted Kathleen Fries, NCC’s former Director of Nursing and Allied Health and a Certified Nurse Educator. These employers provide valuable counsel on worker shortages and career pathways.

Last June, NCC launched a series of homecare training programs for immigrants in collaboration with Building One Community. These programs prepare immigrants to provide home care for the elderly. Building One offers English language instruction for participants and NCC offers certificate programs in First Aid/CPR, Homemaker Companion, and Home Health Aide. The program’s first graduates will be hired quickly because many are native Spanish or Creole speakers and reflect the cultural makeup of the community, said Fries.

The home care industry is one of the fastest-growing sectors of the American economy. “Allied health workers are all high-need positions at the associate or certificate level because of the aging population,” Fries said.

NCC’s associate degree program in Medical Office Management has a strong relationship with Stamford Health Medical Group, which hires graduates to manage the clinical and administrative aspects of running a medical practice.

NCC is working with IBM to prime the talent pipeline even earlier than in college. In 2014, NCC established the Norwalk Early College Academy (NECA) with IBM and Norwalk Public Schools. This Pathways to Technology program prepares students in grades 9-12 for entry-level IT jobs and offers ongoing mentoring relationships with IBM executives. Students can earn a high school diploma and no-cost NCC associate degree in STEM fields within six years.

“NECA is a great example of NCC meeting industry needs,” said Tom Duffy, chairman of the NCC Computer Science department. “IBM provided a skills assessment that identified jobs going unfilled. We then developed two A.A.S. degrees intended to teach those skills: Mobile Programming and Software Engineering.” According to Duffy, graduates will be able to “work anywhere,” as these skills are needed by virtually every company.

Following the lean years of the recession, people are once again spending money on dining out and traveling. “The job market is robust for the hospitality industry in the Stamford/Bridgeport labor market,” said Thomas Failla, Director of Hospitality Management and Culinary Arts. “Positions have increased from 26,000 to over 42,000 in the industry, which includes hotels, restaurants, and foodservice operations.”

 Culinary arts students have promising career prospects in the post-recession economy.

Employers from restaurants, country clubs, catering establishments, and hotels serve on NCC’s Advisory Board and send their own employees to the college for additional training. “Thirty-five to 40 percent of our students are adults who either work in the industry or are re-skilling in the industry,” he noted.

It’s never too early for students to start thinking about career prospects, said Kiran Somaya, Director of the NCC Center for Career Development. She noted that employers today are interested in grooming students and would rather connect with them as early as the first semester than wait until after graduation.

Throughout the year, employers are invited to campus to help students write résumés and cover letters, do mock interviews, and prepare elevator speeches. Students also get advice on salaries commanded by different majors and the importance of doing volunteer service or an internship.

“The idea is to get students to meet with employers not in a setting where they are nervous and asking for a job, but to understand how they should prepare for a career and what jobs are out there,” Somaya said. “Employers today want to see the whole student…. They’re not just interested in the academic part.”

Madeline Barillo

Marketing and Public Relations Director at Norwalk Community College in Norwalk, Connecticut

To view the full version of this article, visit www.league.org/node/17719.

For the past two years, Midland College (MC) has been designing and implementing a pathways model with clear, educationally coherent program maps that are aligned for program completion, quality credentials, workforce skills, and transferability for baccalaureate and graduate degrees. As a result of MC’s efforts, the college has been recognized as a leader in the Texas Success Center’s Texas Pathways initiative, and the MC developmental math program has been named as exemplar in its efforts to redesign curriculum for the new pathways approach.

Statistics indicate that nationwide, only 9.5 percent of students entering a two-year college will graduate within three years. According to the Midland College Office of Institutional Research, the average time for MC students to earn an associate degree is 3.6 years and 80 semester credit hours.

Table 1 depicts graduation rates and certificate completion rates in 2014-2015 for students who began their higher education studies at MC.

The longer it takes students to graduate, the more it costs students and the taxpayers who subsidize them. An extra semester of college costs Midland College students almost $1,500.

Spending money isn’t the only consequence of running the clock. The longer it takes students to graduate, the more life gets in the way. As the calendar turns, students find their lives increasingly taken over by jobs, relationships, marriages, children, and mortgages. For too many students, the end results are a few years of courses and no degrees, resulting in poor wages and unrewarding careers.

In a time when only about half of today’s college students in the U.S. graduate and when our nation faces a skills gap that holds us back and threatens our future, we need strategies that will enable students to attain higher education goals and successful careers.

“Approximately two years ago, we saw the need to redesign processes so that students have a clear direction and path in their higher education goals,” explained MC President Steve Thomas. “We decided it was time for game changer strategies that will permanently send completion rates upward. We did extensive research as to how we could best empower our students for this goal attainment. Employee teams have been researching and planning these strategies through a program titled Guided Pathways to Success.”

As a result, the college restructured all its programs of study into eight major areas of interest from which students can choose a degree path. Thomas noted that the restructuring is a cultural shift for the college and has even prompted the development of the Support Our Students (SOS) network. The SOS project is employee driven and provides counseling, mentoring, and financial support to students.

Guided pathways decrease time to completion, thus helping students achieve their goals.

“The new pathways model has forced us to look at and refine not only instructional components, but also systems and services, such as advising, Web services, admission, financial aid, and business office operations,” stated Thomas.

By building highly structured degree plans as pathways to on-time graduation, MC will place every student on the road to success. Students at Midland College are no longer considered unclassified, undeclared, or general studies majors. All students now know the way forward to graduation, and semester-by-semester plans are laid out for every student. As part of the new Guided Pathways to Success initiative, Midland College is serving as a state leader in the development of new math curriculum for community colleges. As one of nine partner community colleges in a project coordinated through the Charles A. Dana Center at The University of Texas, the college designed a systemic approach to improving student success and completion in developmental math courses. The resulting curriculum developed by MC math faculty supports student career goals by implementing processes, strategies, and structures built around mathematics pathways. MC’s cutting-edge curriculum has laid the foundation for statewide implementation of the curriculum at other Texas community colleges.

MC Executive Vice President Richard Jolly said, “MC math faculty have worked diligently to develop practical math applications that focus on math for specific careers. Our outstanding math faculty teach these courses in a fun and engaging format. The result is that students who previously had to take as many as three developmental math classes are now able to score high enough on college entrance exams after completing just one semester of the new math curriculum.”

While the college is still early in its implementation of the new pathways system, preliminary reports indicate that Midland College’s completion rates are improving. According to the MC Registrar’s Office and as indicated in Table 2, the college had an increase of 16.5 percent in the number of certificates, associate degrees, and core completions from 2015 to 2016.

“We are certainly attributing this outcome to the collegewide pathways approach to instruction and advising, which includes assigned Pathways Advisors and collaborative and intentional processes for offering courses, registering students for classes, and auditing degree plans,” said Midland College Dean of Enrollment Management Liz Zenteno. “This method has created a focused and intentional review of students’ coursework for their pathways, which has resulted in more students completing credentials.”

Rebecca C. Bell

Dean of Community Relations and Special Events at Midland College in Midland, Texas

To view the full version of this article, visit www.league.org/node/17645.

It was supposed to be about developing the leaders of tomorrow. That was the intent when the San Diego Community College District laid the groundwork for a series of Leadership Academies serving faculty, staff, and administrators in 2009. The academies, however, have been building more than leaders. The program also has helped hundreds of employees—ranging from groundskeepers to academic department heads—network with each other and build lasting working relationships in a sprawling district that includes three college campuses and San Diego Continuing Education, as well as support services and district headquarters.

They have opened silos and exposed staff members to how other departments operate, the challenges they confront, and the solutions they discover. The result: Employees at the San Diego Community College District have become an even stronger family. 

SDCCD Leadership Academies serve faculty, staff, and administrators across the district.

The Leadership Academy series—which includes the Management Leadership Development Academy, the Supervisory Leadership Development Academy, the Classified Leadership Development Academy, and the Faculty Leadership Development Academy—is a key element in the district’s expansive Professional Development Program. Leadership development has long been a top priority of the district’s Board of Trustees, and district Chancellor Constance M. Carroll spearheaded the program to meet the district’s strategic plan goal of establishing professional development opportunities and resources to anyone interested in building leadership skills, taking on a committee assignment, or embarking on a management trajectory.

More than 475 participants have taken part in the Leadership Academies since the fall of 2009, and many more employees have participated in the independent workshops, seminars, mentorship program, and other features within the overall Professional Development Program.

“The San Diego Community College District’s Professional Development Program is designed to build the leadership skills and capabilities of the San Diego Community College District management, faculty, and staff, as part of a succession planning model,” Chancellor Carroll said. “A steadily growing network of Leadership Academy graduates has demonstrated the success of this program, which has provided them with both techniques for working efficiently and effectively, as well as being able to relate to all levels of staff in a collegial and productive manner.”

Building Tomorrow’s Leaders

The Classified Leadership Development Academy has sparked intense interest, largely due to the wide array of participants. The 27 participants in the class of 2016 included dispatchers with the college police department, a student services technician at San Diego Mesa College, an accounting technician at San Diego City College, a groundskeeper/ gardener at Facilities Services, and a Web designer at the district’s headquarters, among others. 

“The academy gave me greater perspective and allowed me to see how my job and my responsibilities are having an impact on students throughout the district,” said Jessica Lee, who has been with the district for 17 years, the past five as a senior secretary in Instructional Services. “It really emphasized connecting with our counterparts at the different colleges and continuing education.”

More than 475 SDCCD employees have participated in leadership academies since 2009.

Such sentiments are common, says Erin Milligan Hill, the college district’s Director of Employment and Professional Development, who oversees the academies. “One of the most beneficial things people say they get out of the program is the networking,” she said. “They learn what other people are doing. They attain a new respect and awareness about the challenges and opportunities their colleagues face, and it puts them on a level of energy and enthusiasm where they want to learn and contribute even more.”

The academy for classified employees includes five half-day modules and two catered, brown-bag lunch discussions about the four self-guided study assignments. The Classified Academy is open to classified employees and others with an interest in gaining a foundational knowledge about the district, serving a lead role on a committee or project assignment, or who aspire to serve as a supervisor. Modules cover the following topics: leadership perspective, which includes personal awareness, key leadership characteristics, and understanding personal leadership style, in addition to an overview of the shared governance protocol in the district; cultural sensitivity and diversity, which covers working effectively across differences, the impact of structural and implicit biases, and understanding the essence of diversity, inclusion, and equity; self-management, which includes skills for effective communication under stress, and conflict management; time management, which includes tools to set priorities and get things done, and strategies for keeping your workspace and email organized; and career planning, which includes setting goals, having conversations with your manager, and recognizing factors that can set you off course. Professional facilitators are brought in to lead courses and discussions. 

Still Growing

The most recent addition to the Professional Development Program is the Faculty Leadership Development Academy, which was launched in the spring of 2016. The focus: to assist faculty in developing the understanding and insight about the skills, knowledge, and abilities necessary to serve in leadership roles such as committee or department chairs, deans, or vice presidents. 

Future goals call for a Leadership Academy Alumni Event with keynote speakers and enhanced networking opportunities, in addition to an Advanced Leadership Development Academy with guest speakers from other college districts and regional organizations. Also on the drawing board is an Action Reflection Learning Team program, which will include graduates from the Leadership Academies and mentors who will team up to actively engage in research and projects of interest to the Chancellor’s Cabinet. 

The intention is that every participant in any part of the Professional Development Program, and what they gain for themselves as well as bring back to the workplace and their colleagues, may be considered a positive long-term return on investment from the program.

Stephanie Bulger

Vice Chancellor, Instructional Services, of the San Diego Community College District in California

To view the full version of this article, visit www.league.org/node/17566.

A Selection of League Projects, Initiatives, and Events Over Five Decade

Richard and Linda Riegelman Awards
For Excellence in Public Health and Health Navigation Education in Community Colleges

Anne Arundel Community College, Maryland

Health Communications Enhancement to Existing Associate of Science in Public Health

Montgomery County Community College, Pennsylvania 

Expansion of Existing Associate of Science in Public Health to

First Responders: Emergency Medical Technicians

Palo Alto College, Texas

Development of Associate of Arts, Public Health

________________________________________________________________________

Terry O’Banion Student Technology Awards

Student Developer Champion

Ethan P. Pawelski, Southwestern Michigan College

Student Technology Champions

Emilie C. Robertson, Anne Arundel Community College

Michael Vazquez, Moraine Valley Community College

________________________________________________________________________

Educational Testing Service O’Banion Prize

Josh Wyner 

Vice President, Aspen Institute, and Executive Director, College Excellence Program

________________________________________________________________________

John & Suanne Roueche Excellence Awards

Excellence in Community College Teaching and Leadership

Congratulations to this year’s 458 faculty, staff, and administrator award recipients!

Visit www.league.org/node/18164 to access the Excellence Awards Program, which includes recipient names.

The cost of higher education is rising at an alarming rate, with course materials and textbooks seeing some of the most dramatic increases. Along with increased costs, fewer students are buying textbooks and course materials. A 2011 survey by the U.S. Public Interest Research Group, as reported by Molly Redden in The Chronicle of Higher Education, found that 70 percent of students had not purchased a textbook because of the price. Of these, 78 percent believed they would perform worse in class as a result. Although instructors expect students to use course materials for their classes, many do not. This can greatly impact student success.

To address this challenge, the Maricopa County Community College District (MCCCD) launched the Maricopa Millions Project to support use of open educational resources (OER) –  teaching, learning, and research resources that are copyright-free or have been released under a copyright license that permits others to reuse, revise, remix, and redistribute them. OER range from full courses, modules, and syllabi to class and lab activities, homework assignments, and quizzes, plus many more resources contained in digital media collections from around the world.

The goal of Maricopa Millions is to radically decrease student costs by offering no-cost or low-cost options for course materials. No-cost courses have no additional cost to the student beyond fees associated with tuition, and low-cost courses have required course materials that are under $40. These costs may be associated with printing of required OER materials, copyrights for textbooks, online homework/quizzing systems, or similar facets of OER use. When OER are used, 100 percent of students have access to their course materials on the first day of class and whenever needed.

When Maricopa Millions was launched in 2012, the ultimate goal was to save MCCCD students $5 million in five years. This process was supported by a white paper written by a small group of faculty convened to investigate OER. It led to creation of an OER Steering Team of administration, faculty, and academic services and IT staff. The team developed a strategic plan which included outreach and education on OER through conference attendance and an internal grant program to encourage the adoption, curation, creation, and use of OER by faculty.

To accomplish the five-year goal, the following outcomes were established:

• As a district, join the Community College Consortium for Open Educational Resources (CCCOER), whose mission is to expand access to education by promoting awareness and adoption of open educational resources.

• Create an OER support team/strategic team to carry out the initiatives of the OER project.

• Determine the current state and build awareness of OER in MCCCD.

• Create MCCCD OER standards and guidelines for development and reuse.

• Conduct a pilot project that integrates OER into the highest enrollment courses and their prerequisite courses to serve as a model that can be adapted for other curriculum.

• Develop methodology and conduct ongoing assessment of effectiveness and impact of the OER Project.

• Support the integration and sustainability of OER across the curriculum.

• Maintain current and establish new connections with national OER initiatives/groups.

Within three years, OER reached its goal of $5 million in student savings in course materials through no-cost and low-cost (including OER) course materials. Now in the fifth year of the project, Maricopa Millions has surpassed $10 million savings (see Figure 1). All materials for the program can be found at the Maricopa Millions website, https://maricopa.instructure.com/courses/811971.

In 2014, MCCCD became the first college system to allow students to search for no-cost and low-cost course materials, including OER, through the student information system. Our 2016-2017 goal was to increase student awareness of OER throughout the district, continue to quantify student impact of these resources, and develop a plan to institutionalize the project beyond the initial five-year scope.

With only one semester left in the five-year project, MCCCD has saved students $10,256,000. This number is calculated through an average textbook cost of $100, a common cost used in OER that factors in buy-backs and rentals, and a very conservative class size of 20 students per class. The grant has funded 21 OER course development projects.

A Brief Introduction to the Community College Innovation Accelerator

Managing and maturing innovation can lead to significant and lasting transformation in community colleges, resulting in agile institutions that implement multiple types of innovation in an intentional, coordinated fashion continuously over time. Higher education institutions fall within a broad spectrum of innovation maturity ranging from non-existent to transformative (see graphic), with a majority falling somewhere between non-existent and emerging. Few mature their innovation beyond the emerging point, which we refer to as the “innovation valley of death,” largely because they lack systematized innovation management and execution.

We believe innovation can be matured and even accelerated. Colleges can close the gap between innovation aspiration and execution and reach their greatest potential by:

• Pushing on key levers;

• Capitalizing on institutional priorities;

• Developing scalable tools and resources; and

• Re-thinking competency and capacity building.

Connecting change efforts to innovation acceleration can be supported by making the most of strategic insights from innovative industries such as health care, finance, and information technology, and from transformational higher education institutions and leaders.

To that end, the League for Innovation in the Community College and The Collaboratory have come together to develop and implement a multi-year Community College Innovation Accelerator (CCIA). The CCIA builds and accelerates the capacity of community college administrators, faculty, and staff to successfully manage innovation and effectively execute change to support reform efforts, create value at scale, and ultimately achieve improved, equitable student outcomes. We believe these changes can shift the institution at least one stage beyond emerging on the innovation maturity spectrum within three years.

Catalytic Levers for Accelerating Innovation

The CCIA triggers three key catalytic levers with the greatest impact for widescale, enduring change in community colleges:

• Lever I—Demonstrate. The Demonstrate lever moves institutions and leaders from being tactical to transformational, accelerating their change efforts through the “innovation valley of death.” The strategies and components in this lever build the next generation of institutions and leaders with capacities to manage and execute innovation effectively. Lever I includes activities such as appointing a Chief Innovation Architect and developing and executing an Innovation Blueprint.

• Lever II—Amplify. At the heart of the Amplify lever are strategic communications and building networks at scale. Amplify strategies include capturing and assessing the dynamics of managing and maturing innovation, and networking with like-minded community colleges to share blueprints, execution plans, and overall learnings.

• Lever III—Advocate. The Advocate lever creates enabling conditions for real and meaningful policy changes that foster and accelerate higher education innovation. To ensure innovation practices are sustained and scaled, the Advocate strategy is focused on educating the next generation of higher education policy entrepreneurs to explore higher education innovations, reform efforts, policies, barriers, and high-impact innovation opportunities.

The League, in partnership with The Collaboratory, is promoting and pushing these levers in the community college field.

The future of education is up for grabs. It is changing on virtually every dimension that matters—the design of schools, the role of faculty, and above all, the learning experience. These changes are inevitable because a tsunami of new technologies is driving profound shifts in education fundamentals—the relationship between teachers and the taught, the location and timing of educational activities, and the very definition of what it means to learn. They are also inevitable because today’s rising generation was born into a world of turmoil that demands the ability to design one’s life with an eye to personal as well as professional fulfillment.

Looming over all of us is an employability landscape disrupted by new technologies, new patterns of demand, and new economic models. Inevitably, this leads to the desire to acquire new innovative and entrepreneurial capacities that allow learners to design their jobs, their careers, and their lives. And this is a desire not only of the young but of adults who will increasingly rely on new just-in-time learning experiences to improve their economic and social mobility. It may be said that the learning continuum is now based more on need than age. This calls into question the very definition of what it means to be a student. The magnitude of these disruptions forces a reassessment of the purpose of education and our expectations of it.

Such pressures on traditional education are part of a larger context; we are living in what I call the Age of Innovation. Worldwide, both societies and enterprises understand that their future depends on innovation mastery. Forward-thinking educational institutions also appreciate the need to innovate—regarding their processes, their value proposition, and their approach to innovation itself. Innovating education also requires institutions to educate for innovation—to help their students cultivate the ability to generate new ideas, develop and realize value from them, and thrive in uncertainty.

So What for Community Colleges?

For community colleges, the challenges are clear and the opportunities are compelling. With a smart strategy in hand, they could turn the current turmoil in education to their advantage, to reposition themselves in a shifting competitive and fiscal landscape. Some of these advantages include:

• Experimentation—The ability to experiment free of the kind of crushing legacy thinking that emphasizes precedent over “what could be.”

• Flexibility—Scheduling flexibility to insert new learning experiences coupled with curriculum flexibility that anticipates the trend towards modularity in the form of bite-sized learning experiences and non-credit co-curricular tracks.

• Regional development relevance—The potential (and the perceived role) of driving regional economic and social development within a coherent narrative of how community colleges enable the building of innovation and entrepreneurial capacity. This requires the ability to engage with local community, employers, secondary schools, and four-year learning institutions, as well as local community and employers. From a learning perspective, there is an ongoing opportunity to link local economic and social development themes with pedagogy through internships, innovation competitions, and more.

• Learning that fits students—Relevance for people who want just-in-time learning arcs, such as returning veterans and returnees to the workforce who want to prepare for career engagement or to start a venture of their own.

Innovating Community Colleges

Going forward, community colleges must reaffirm their relevance to students, faculty, and the community. These challenges all require the ability to innovate for their resolution. Innovation happens when multiple conditions are present. Here are a half-dozen:

1. A compelling vision of a desired future that motivates the desire for change and that is fueled by a sense of urgency;

2. A narrative that translates the vision into engagement;

3. An organizational culture that supports responsible risk-taking and experimentation;

4. An approach to rewarding and retaining talent;

5. Processes for generating, developing, and realizing value from ideas developing; and

6. Leaders who understand their role in orchestrating an innovation agenda.

Experience shows that innovation is hard work. Yet nothing could be more important in setting the future agenda for the community college movement.

At least half of community college faculty say their institution is doing a good job in five areas supporting improvement of student completion rates, according to a survey conducted for the League for Innovation’s Faculty Voices Project and fielded by Public Agenda. The fall 2017 survey was conducted among U.S. community college faculty to gain insight into faculty perceptions about efforts at their colleges to increase the percentage of students who complete. Completion was defined in the survey as students who “earn a certificate or degree or transfer.” Of the 1,179 respondents, 782 were full-time and 397 were part-time community college faculty.

The graphs on these pages illustrate responses to questions about how well faculty think their college is doing in:

a. engaging faculty in decision making around completion efforts;

b. planning thoroughly for successful implementation of completion efforts;

c. supporting coordination and collaboration among completion efforts;

d. providing sufficient time and resources for full implementation and evaluation of impact; and

e. adequately preparing faculty to fulfill their roles in completion efforts.

In all cases, half or slightly more than half of the total number of respondents indicated their college was doing a “very good job” or “somewhat good job.” 

Complete information about the survey and methodology, as well as topline data for all survey items, is available at www.league.org/node/18137. Responses reported here are from QE4a-4e.

How well do you think your college does at: 

a. Including faculty in decisions about how to increase the percentage of students who earn a certificate or degree or transfer?

b. Planning the support and resources that are needed to ensure that initiatives to increase the percentage of students who earn a certificate or degree or transfer are implemented successfully?

c. Ensuring that all the initiatives to increase the percentage of students who complete are coordinated and work together?

d. Ensuring that initiatives to increase the percentage of students who complete are supported long enough to have an impact?

e. Ensuring that faculty are prepared to efficiently carry out initiatives to increase the percentage of students who complete?

A Conversation Between Terry O’Banion and Rufus Glasper

Ask Terry O’Banion to identify the most important work the League for Innovation has done in its 50 years and he leads with helping community colleges become “national leaders in information technology” before revealing his top choice: leadership development. 

O’Banion shared stories of the League’s history, including initiatives in community college leadership, during a conversation with League President and CEO, Rufus Glasper, early this year. The former and current CEOs met at the organization’s office in Chandler, Arizona, to launch the League’s fiftieth anniversary celebration. 

Founded in 1968 by B. Lamar Johnson, the League for Innovation in the Community College started as a group of 12 community college presidents at institutions that, according to O’Banion, Johnson had identified “as among the most innovative colleges in the country.” O’Banion, who served as League President and CEO for 23 years, described how, in a decade when the number of community colleges doubled, Johnson studied innovation at two-year institutions and wrote about it in his seminal book, Islands of Innovation. 

In O’Banion’s words, “the League was established, really, on the interest in innovation.” Members “saw themselves as leading innovation, and they did not want to get into policy and politics” so they focused on “innovations around projects, programs, and practices.” That, O’Banion explained, became “the stamp of the League for Innovation.” Bringing the conversation forward a half-century, Glasper noted that the League for Innovation “today is still focused on the historical aspects of [its] foundation, but we are finding that there are many other players in the space.” He mentioned that organizations like Achieving the Dream and the Aspen Institute were “not around during the time that the League was being developed,” and described how the League is now having conversations with these and other organizations about ways to collaborate. 

Glasper explained that a “major strategic planning initiative” is now under way so the board of directors and staff can “focus in on the new…opportunities and challenges that are coming our way as we look at education today, and, specifically, the disinvestment and funding and…new models we need to focus on.” 

The conversation has changed, he continued, “because our environment is changing,” but he clarified that the League’s “mission of catalyzing innovation is still number one and we continue to move in that direction.”

Addressing major changes in the League over fifty years, O’Banion talked about how in the 1960s and 1970s, few women or minorities held community college presidencies. The League was seen “by many people in community college work as…an old boys network.” 

O’Banion wrote a paper, “An Elitist Organization of Egalitarian Institutions,” to address this issue with the League board. Eventually, the 12-member board expanded to 20 members, and the auxiliary Alliance for Community College Innovation was formed to extend membership beyond the board of directors. O’Banion believes these efforts had a positive effect, making the League “a much more egalitarian organization.”

Paralleling conversations about expanding League membership, the organization turned its attention to broader issues surrounding a lack of diversity in community college leadership. After consulting for the American Council on Education’s Women in Leadership initiative, O’Banion envisioned a similar program for women in community colleges: “The League sponsored a national week-long institute for women leaders,” which led to “a training institute for women that we called Leaders for the 80s…. There were 50 women community college presidents at that time.” 

With FIPSE grants and support from League colleges, O’Banion continued, “we were able to start that program slowly…and now there are…400, or maybe more, women community college presidents.” According to O’Banion, Leaders for the 80s “became the National Institute for Leadership Development (NILD) and…the training ground for women in community colleges.” 

Partnering with John Roueche, then at the University of Texas at Austin, O’Banion said the League received Kellogg Foundation support:

to start leadership development for diversity. We had…the Expanding Leadership Diversity Program…and we started a national conference called Leadership 2000. We started … Leadership Abstracts, which is still going, [and] so leadership became a major effort of the League and continues to be one of [its] primary commitments.

When the conversation moved to current challenges and issues facing community colleges, Glasper said, “Quite frankly, I still believe that access is an issue. So many of our students do not find an opportunity to come to our colleges.” He continued: 

I think one of our challenges is being recognized as a comprehensive community college system that today transfers a significant number of students to our public universities. But we also put many students to work. We’ve…demonstrated that we can take students that have…the desire for education to start at a community college, and if they desire can move into a four-year institution over time, but that’s a tough message.

Glasper also repeated the challenge of the “disinvestment in community college over time” as a major issue that has been “quite devastating” to colleges that have experienced it.

Despite these and other challenges, Glasper said of the League:

We are finding ways to continue to advance and we’re bringing in more support from different venues than we’ve done in the past, with different organizations, with different community-based groups, and…the ecosystem is helping us to look at support for community colleges differently than we did some 50 years ago.

Looking to the future, Glasper revisited the access and funding issues: “When we look at our three-legged stool of property taxes, state aid, and tuition, [and at] the notion of access, increasing tuition, disinvestment, we need to look at other options.” 

He discussed pathways and dual enrollment, advising that “we need to be more deliberate about where students can go,” and that pathways can reduce the time it takes to get there. He added that dual enrollment offers “new avenues for students to begin a community college program sooner, go to our colleges, transfer to a university [or move into] the workplace.” 

Focusing on the workforce, Glasper explained, “the future of the community colleges are that livable-wage jobs are in our space,” citing graduates of technical programs who move into those jobs.

Referencing the League’s expanded membership, Glasper said the League needs to use “the new institutions, the changing leadership, to think about…the space that we can continue to prosper in.” Corporate partnerships, he suggested, are natural in that space since board and Alliance colleges can help answer common questions about products and services: “Does it work and under what conditions does it work?” And, they can do so in an “environment that is safe…where risk taking is acceptable and…welcomed.”

“The League for the future, in my mind,” Glasper said, “is continuing to stay relevant, is continuing to be adaptable, to be fluid, to be engaging, and to be a voice.” He spoke of the sometime lost voices of leadership: “So many times, you are finding that you don’t have the voice that you would like to…because of the positions that you might have.” He referenced the League’s Executive Leadership Institute as a place “to be very open about how you not only survive, but you thrive as a leader.” Glasper merged the themes of innovation, service to students, and leadership, confirming that: 

The League for Innovation moving forward will continue to have innovation as its mantra. We will continue to define it in a way that supports our increasing needs for our students and in a way that we encourage others to follow into the leadership roles…because we need strong leaders in the community college movement. We need dedication, we need those who are willing to set community colleges as a priority.

Nearing the end of the conversation, O’Banion connected past and future: 

The League…under the direction of B. Lamar Johnson really had a good idea to keep the focus on [innovation] under which they could do many, many things, and I think the League will continue to prosper and always be on the cutting edge because you keep the focus on innovation.

This article features highlights of a conversation between Terry O’Banion and Rufus Glasper held on January 30, 2018. Visit www.league.org/50years for more information.

Cynthia Wilson

Vice President for Learning and Chief Impact Officer, League for Innovation in the Community College