|
Southeast Arkansas College |
Chapter Seven |
|
1999-2000
NCA Self-Study for |
During October of 1999, various constituents of the College including administration, faculty, and staff; the General Advisory Council and Program Advisory Committees composed of community leaders; Board of Trustees members; and selected student leaders completed a comprehensive self-study questionnaire. There were 108 respondents to the survey. The following survey results pertained to the College's ability to continue to accomplish its Purposes and strengthen its educational effectiveness.
| 64% | believe the College has a current resource base--financial, physical and human--that positions the College for the future. (10%-No, 26%-Uncertain) |
| 82% | believe the College is effective in its planning processes necessary to the institution's continuance. (7%-No, 10%-Uncertain) |
| 73% | believe the College's resources are effectively organized and allocated to support its future growth and development. (11%-No, 16%-Uncertain) |
| 80% | agree with College plans for growth and development. (6%-No, 14%-Uncertain) |
| 48% | believe the College should pursue a local sales tax or millage to meet the long-term financial requirements necessary to accomplish its Purposes. (27%-No, 25%-Uncertain) |
| 92% | believe the College's low student tuition is important in ensuring access to higher education for all of our citizens. (5%-No, 4%-Uncertain) |
| 51% | believe the College should place more emphasis on off-campus distance learning opportunities, i.e., telecourses, Internet courses, and two-way interactive video courses. (24%-No, 24%-Uncertain) |
| 50% | believe the College should expand its course offerings on the McGehee Campus of Great Rivers Vocational-Technical School. (12%-No, 37%-Uncertain) |
Based upon these results and follow-up deliberations within the College, the faculty and staff focused the self-study process on highlighting accomplishments and acknowledging areas for improvement. Creating research opportunities and action plans to address the challenges facing Southeast Arkansas College became the primary emphasis of the self-study.
Sustained enrollment growth and program expansion have placed demands on Southeast Arkansas College's administration, faculty, and staff to adapt to continuous change. This escalation challenged the Institution's potential to strengthen its educational and institutional effectiveness. Monitoring and amending short- and long-range goals along with allocating and reallocating resources to meet the needs of students, the Institution, and the community has required diligent teamwork and Vision on the part of all employed at the College. As indicated by 1999-2000 NCA Self-Study surveys, the College has, nonetheless, maintained and enhanced the community's confidence in its programs and services. Continuing the growth and success of the College will depend on decision-making processes, which thus far, have been sufficient.
To assure educational effectiveness for Southeast Arkansas College a comprehensive set of goals and plans are in place. These goals and plans reflect Southeast Arkansas College's stated Mission, Purposes, and Values, as well as its Vision for the Future. Locally initiated plans, planning processes, and assessment activities have included:
The College has developed a comprehensive planning and continuous improvement process, which includes an Assessment Plan and an Operational Plan. The College is commended for deploying a systematic planning process.
Southeast Arkansas College has an established planning process (Systematic Planning for the Future) that provides annual goals and objectives categorized by division and leads to the accomplishment of long-range strategic themes. The College has also developed a multi-phase Facilities Master Plan to outline campus expansion projects. These documents constitute a sound foundation for long-range strategic planning; however, the College has not fully instituted a comprehensive, long-range plan to include fiscal, academic, human, and physical needs. Both the 1995 NCA Evaluation Team and the Arkansas Quality Awards team recommended this area for improvement. The 1999-2000 NCA Self-Study verified the need for a comprehensive, integrated plan related to the College's long-term strategies.
The College's current planning process, while adequate, lacks collaboration from the full faculty and staff and lacks a unified focus. The College has identified 20 Purposes or Primary Goals that, when satisfied, fulfill the College's Mission. The annual operating goals and objectives address these purposes. The 1999-2000 operating plan enumerated 156 measurable objectives. Additionally, the College strives to accomplish annual goals and objectives arising from the Facilities Master Plan and the Assessment Plan for Student Academic Achievement and Institutional Effectiveness.
Internal and external constituents of the College expressed a need for greater opportunities to participate in the strategic planning process. An NCA Criterion-Referenced Survey administered to faculty and staff in January of 2000 indicated:
| 67% | believe the College's decision-making processes show tested capability of responding effectively to anticipated and unanticipated challenges to the Institution. |
| 84% | believe the College has plans, as well as ongoing, effective, planning processes necessary to the Institution's continuance. |
In developing an effective, collaborative, long-range, strategic plan, this apparent incongruity must be addressed. The College Council spearheads the current planning process. This council is composed of members from most areas of the internal constituency; however, strategic planning is only one of the College Council's tasks. The following recommendations would enable the College to more clearly develop and implement a legitimate, long-range strategic plan that is inclusive of all areas. It is recommended that the College study and provide a recommendation regarding the need for a Strategic Planning Committee separate from the existing College Council. This approach allows an all-inclusive group to have input in and take ownership of the planning process resulting in greater responsibility for implementing the plan. It is further recommended that the College study and provide a recommendation through the College Council, which would simplify the College's Statements of Purpose or Primary Goals. Additionally, it is recommended that the College organize and make available in the College Library all documents related to planning and operations.
The Southeast Arkansas College Assessment Plan of Student Academic Achievement and Institutional Effectiveness proposes the demonstration of institutional effectiveness by utilizing appropriate measures and verifying outcomes related to meeting the Mission and Purposes of the institution. Current core indicators of institutional effectiveness are listed in the Systematic Planning for the Future document. These indicators focus only on student development and achievement which, although integral elements of institutional focus, do not comprehensively evaluate institutional effectiveness. A broader scope of indicators must be defined, continuously evaluated, and integrated into planning processes in order to determine if Southeast Arkansas College consistently meets its Mission and satisfactorily serves its customers.
The central requirements for NCA accreditation and for recipients of the Malcolm Baldrige National Quality Award operationally define and establish an evaluative model for measuring institutional effectiveness. One such model was developed in 1992 for the Wisconsin Technical College System, which provides 17 core indicators that respond to internal and external accountability demands, North Central Association accreditation requirements, and federal and state reporting requirements. Southeast Arkansas College's adoption of a similar model is evidence of the institution's interest in continuous quality improvement. Integrating the institutional research process, NCA Academic Quality Improvement Project, and the Arkansas Quality Award initiative would strengthen the College's procedures for measuring institutional effectiveness.
Indicators of institutional effectiveness (See Appendix D) emphasize student achievement and satisfaction, employer (customer) satisfaction, organizational quality and climate, and public perception and satisfaction with Southeast Arkansas College. Preliminary research indicates that the College has the technological capacity to track performance related to these indicators using the People Oriented Information System for Education (POISE) centralized database software.
Results from the Criteria for Accreditation Survey administered to faculty and staff in January of 2000, indicate that:
|
67% |
believe the Institution's structured assessment processes are continuous, involve a variety of constituencies, and provide a meaningful and useful contribution to institutional planning processes. |
Implementing a consistently applied model for evaluating institutional effectiveness will strengthen the link between the College's assessment, planning, and decision-making processes. The employment in January of 2000 of an institutional research officer will benefit the assessment process. The dissemination of feedback regarding institutional effectiveness is a critical task. An effective institutional research process will address selecting appropriate measures to effectively evaluate identified indicators, assessing each indicator in a consistent and readily accessible manner to identify trends and opportunities for improvement, and disseminating results to all constituents in a timely manner for planning and decision-making purposes. Feedback should be integrated into planning at every level of decision making. The full utilization of the POISE student information system purchased in the spring of 1999 will be an essential tool in extracting data for planning and decision making. The College is commended for employing an institutional research officer and acquiring the computer resources to conduct comprehensive institutional research.
Assessment of the College's use of its financial resources is an on-going process. The College has policies and procedures governing the establishment of fiscal priorities, the budgeting process, and allocation of resources that result in prudent use of available funds. Input from faculty and staff is sought as the administration develops long-range biennial budget requests to provide for the day-to-day operation of the College and its future growth and development. The budget process is dynamic and involves many internal and external reviews. Such fiscal responsibility is necessary to secure adequate funding to support the continued growth of the Institution.
Southeast Arkansas College inherited the oldest physical plant and smallest campus acreage of all the new two-year colleges. The Institution's physical resources have steadily expanded and improved since being chartered in 1991. The completion of the Advanced/Emerging Technologies Building in the fall of 2001 will conclude Phase One of the Facilities Master Plan II. The College's Facilities Master Plan II has been developed following a thorough assessment of the existing physical resources and trends in enrollment and program growth. Facilities Master Plan II focuses on providing learning environments and supportive resources to sustain existing programs and to allow the flexibility to support new program development and growth. An immediate challenge before the College is to plan for continued expansion of physical resources that meet the current trends in increased enrollment. (Copies of the Southeast Arkansas College Facilities Master Plan I and II are available for review in the Resource Room.)
Southeast Arkansas College's human resources are an essential component in the accomplishment of its Mission and goals. The College's human resources provide the basis of professionalism, support, and stability from which the College can reach its fullest potential. These resources, both external and internal, include the community, students, advisory committees, the Board of Trustees, administrative and professional staff, classified staff, and faculty. A description of these positions and employee qualifications is available for review in the Resource Room.
State funding for the College is based on student full-time equivalent enrollment. To fortify the College's fiscal resources, Southeast Arkansas College should continue to use the marketing strategy designed with J. M. Lord & Associates to ensure the growth in full-time students. A copy of the marketing plan is available for review in the Resource Room.
The College's target market is based on three factors: (1) the need for a trained employment base to supply the service area's current business and industry constituents, (2) the College's role in attracting new businesses to the community, and (3) the need for access to affordable higher education to improve the relatively low educational attainment level of the general population. Projections by the U.S. Bureau of Labor (1999) indicated that the greatest educational need lies between a high school diploma and a bachelor's degree. Therefore, individuals are more likely to seek the educational programs available at an affordable two-year institution such as Southeast Arkansas College. According to the Student Satisfaction Survey (1999), 57.9% of the respondents stated a need for admission counseling to decide on their educational goals.
The College's identified market segments include:
Southeast Arkansas College has addressed employer needs for advanced curricula and specialized training by developing several new programs within the last four years. Technical degree programs remain the predominant enrollment choice of the College's student base, particularly for non-traditional students. The College is keenly interested in attracting students directly out of high school and projects a realistic market share of 10% growth in this population within the next three years. This would require aggressive recruiting and a commitment by the College to employ a suitable person to assist in this endeavor. The objective of Southeast Arkansas College's marketing plan is to enroll the maximum number of students possible and position the College as the premier educational and training center for its service area. To further serve the College's constituents, and to address the College's Mission, the self-study committee determined the need to offer non-credit short courses appealing to community interests. A review of previous schedules verified a general lack of avocation courses. It is recommended that the College study its role in providing community education and avocation courses.
Arkansas Department of Higher Education Productivity Measures
In May of 1996, the Arkansas Department of Higher Education announced funding disbursements allocated through the legislated Productivity Funding program. The State distributed $5 million among the 32 state-supported colleges and universities. The State employed only eight of the 16 measures originally identified by the program. Southeast Arkansas College received the highest achievement level on four of the eight measures. This accomplishment garnered the College the prestige of being among only four state institutions to attain this degree of productivity. However, since the State tied Productivity Funding to enrollment, the College's award was ranked 24th out of the 32 awards. The State abandoned this model of incentive funding and is currently researching alternative formulas.
Southeast Arkansas College has demonstrated its commitment to deploy and strengthen existing planning processes to assure educational effectiveness. The College's strengths include the ability to adapt to institutional change and enrollment growth and the commitment to develop effective and efficient means to plan for the future. Continual assessments of the planning approach, educational attainment, and institutional effectiveness is crucial to ensure that the College will sustain its current growth pattern. Recommendations have been made to implement new or modified procedures to meet the challenges presented by outdated or inadequate current practices in strategic planning, institutional research, and marketing. Specific recommendations to focus on these three vital areas will allow the College to develop more clearly defined, long-range planning, evaluation, and decision-making approaches.
The College is commended for:
Challenges and Opportunities for Improvement
It is recommended that the College: