Community College Leadership Commons^™

Student And Faculty Engagement And Support In A Pandemic, Ericka Hackman

Instructional Leadership Abstracts

It’s been seven long months since our world was turned upside down with the onslaught of COVID-19. We all remember clearly the chaos of March 2020 transforming our in-person, on-campus instruction to remote models; frantically securing technology for students, faculty, and staff to work remotely and standing up phone and videoconference operations for all of our support and administrative services. Our campus faculty and staff worked incredibly hard to pivot teaching and learning to support students’ successful completion of the Spring 2020 semester. I think many of us thought it was a pipedream to get to Commencement and actually graduate …

Students On The Spectrum, Kristin Mallory, Dana Burnside

Instructional Leadership Abstracts

changed many aspects of our lives this year. Things we’ve taken for granted in the past are now different, and we’re being forced to become comfortable with ways of doing things that are unfamiliar, and often initially uncomfortable. Last week, I had an issue with my Verizon bill and had to call customer service. I understood that because of COVID-19, customer service representatives were working from home, and wait times would be considerably longer. The wait was long. It was almost an hour long, whereas in the past connecting to a representative might have taken 10 minutes. I felt impatient; …

G.R.A.C.E. Under Pressure, Kimberly Lowry

Instructional Leadership Abstracts

As we welcome faculty, staff and students back to campus and implement the first weeks of classes and activities, we do so while facing one of the greatest challenges higher education has ever seen. The COVID-19 pandemic has completely disrupted nearly every aspect of how we teach, how we serve students and how students attend college. In just five short months, we have re-examined and adjusted all that we had relied upon in our professional and personal lives. And yet, we will come together, continue adjusting, and focus on how best to ensure we take care of one another while …

Experiencing The Loss Of A Colleague, Jeff Hess

Instructional Leadership Abstracts

Last month’s Instructional Leadership Abstract featured my colleague, Dr. Shawnda Navarro Floyd’s discussion about responding to trauma in our educational practice. A poignant part of that conversation concerns unexpected tragedies that take the lives of colleagues at our institutions. This is a difficult topic to write about but also vital as we navigate the COVID pandemic. I teach a business communication class, and towards the end of the term, I share 10 Things Extraordinary People Say Every Day (Haden, 2013). I talk with each class about words they say at work. When I share the saying, “I love you,” the …

Responding To Trauma In Our Educational Practice, Shawnda Navarro Floyd

Instructional Leadership Abstracts

COVID-19 thrust most higher education institutions into 100% online learning during the Spring of 2020 with a ready or not approach. Despite the many obstacles faculty and students faced, the end result was a valiant effort that afforded students the opportunity to continue to access education in the face of many uncertainties. With the initial rush to move coursework online behind them, academic administrators turned toward planning for the future. What should learning look like long term while working through COVID-19? How do we adequately support full and part-time faculty and staff? Should learning be kept online indefinitely? If there …

Community College Case Study On Early Alert, Karen Reynolds

Instructional Leadership Abstracts

We are happy to share the findings of Dr. Reynold’s research, first published in the May 2018 Instructional Leadership Abstract. Mid Valley Community College (MVCC), a pseudonym, is an example of a community college early alert system that has had some great success. The faculty at MVCC voted to implement the use of early alert report by all faculty in 2016-2017 as part of their 5-year strategic plan. While MVCC may not have had 100% participation in the early alert report, they did find that a majority of faculty participated, and an increase in referrals in the 2016-2017 academic year, …

Annual Planning For Academic Leaders, Josh Baker

Instructional Leadership Abstracts

Annual Planning for Academic Leaders Have the days of the Academic Master Plan gone by the wayside? It seems like yesterday that we were all excited to craft these guiding documents that had the exciting acronyms of AMP (our future is electrifying!) or MAP (our guide to our destination!). But were they ever used? Somewhere in my file cabinet is a pristine copy of a MAP that was created several years before I arrived. A consultant guided the creation of this document that was hundreds of pages long, and it has done nothing but accumulate dust.

If not a MAP, …

Health Education In Rural Areas, Jody Tomanek

Instructional Leadership Abstracts

Healthcare in the United States has been on the forefront of people’s minds for the last decade. In rural areas of our country this is even more prominent. The cost of healthcare is only a small piece of the puzzle. Rural areas of our country also must worry about access to healthcare, and quality healthcare. It is not uncommon in rural Nebraska for people to travel more than an hour to have access to quality healthcare. This is something I see everyday from two different perspectives. As the Vice President for Academic Affairs at a small rural community college in …