Change in Community Colleges

1. Change in Community Colleges Joe Offermann Ryan Smith August 15, 2005

2. The Emerging Role of Markets • Without the skills and knowledge a student has gained attached to them, a grade in a class or a degree in a program is increasingly losing its value.

3. 4 Changes • Accountability • Learning • Funding • Working

4. Accountability: External Premise • Accountability gamut: • Trust (1901-1960’s) • Self-regulation (1960’s) • Bureaucratic rules (1970’s – current) • Performance funding (1980’s – current) • Government incentives (1990’s – current) • Markets (2000 – current) • Accountability is based on the premise that something is wrong with education.

5. Accountability: Internal Response High LEVEL OF INTEREST Medium Low Courtesy: Gloria Rogers, Rose-Hulman

6. Accountability: Solution • Publish statements about achieving stated goals, preferably on websites • Require internal performance reports on the results of academic units and programs progress towards meeting stated goals

7. Learning: Problem Assumption– people learn by committing facts to memory and repeating them later on a test or exam. Reality – learning is constructed over time and is multi-dimensional.

8. Learning: Problem • Assumption – grades accurately reflect what students have learned in a class. • Reality – grades say little to nothing about learning.

9. Learning: Problem

10. Learning: Problem • Assumption– lecturing is the best way to convey information. • Reality – in classes that are primarily based on lecture, students learn much more from each other than from the instructor.

11. Learning: Problem • JJC students are generally satisfied, but state their program of study contributes relatively little to their learning.

12. Percent of students who indicated the contribution was “major”

13. Percent of students who indicated the contribution was “major”

14. Percent of students who agreed with the following statements

15. Learning: Problem • JJC embraces policies whose intent is to help students, but may actually impede their progress. • Grading policies, esp. withdrawals • General education • Avoidance of math courses

16. Learning: Solution • Articulated, public, and evaluated learning outcomes through assessment. • Assess general education because those are the skills employers are really looking for.

17. Funding: Problem • Shift from guaranteed sources based on enrollment to: • Market sources • Performance based sources • State incentives for performance • Targeted grants and funding • Fundraising/Private funding

18. Funding: Problem Personally, I like the University. They give us money and facilities. We didn’t have to produce anything. You’ve never been out of college. You don’t know what its like out there. I’ve worked in the private sector. They expect results. ~Dr. Raymond Stantz, professional Ghostbuster

19. Funding: Problem • Community colleges that rely on old funding models will find themselves with less resources. • Funding and accountability are linked.

20. Working: Problem • Many still hold outdated notions about how people and contemporary organizations work.

21. Working: Problem • What has changed? – Historical • People are paid for what they do. • Work is based on time (9 to 5). • Work is done in an office. • Organizations are geographically fixed. • Regional competition. • Like-minded people are homogenously organized by function or project. • Technical expertise is consulted out. • Authoritative autocrats create centralized structures and get things done by creating conflict and chaos, in the process destroying possibilities for change.

22. Working: Problem • What has changed? – Contemporary • People are paid for what they know. • Work is based on competencies, regardless of how long it takes to get done. • Work is not dependent on a location. • Networks are more relevant than geography. • Global competition. • Diverse people are heterogenously organized by specialty or expertise. • People are expected to be self-sufficient. • Negotiators and advocates create decentralized structures and get things done by acting as servants and creators of possibilities.

23. Working: Solution • Share what you know – webify. • Plan for productivity. • Reduce complexity & eliminate confusion. • Deal with chaos by making control of information an option, not a requirement. • Embrace globalism & diversity. • Create exclusive small work groups based on expertise, not roles. Be exclusive in the short-term, but inclusive in the long-term. • Hire the right people; get rid of the wrong ones. • Foster self-reliance through professional development and trust.

24. Learning, Accountability, Funding, & Working: Summary • Accountability – In God we trust…. all others bring evidence. • Learning – We know we’re good, but the assumption is there is little evidence to prove it. • Funding – From guarantees to market-based incentives. • Working – Pay people for what they know and how productive they are, not for what they do.