Conferencing

I am sitting in the “Program for Presidents and Board Members” at the Higher Learning Commission’s Annual Conference. Over 200 fellow presidents are listening to challenging and provocative presentations on the future of higher education. Terry Hartle from ACE told us that the goals of federal education policy are changing from access to access AND completion. He also shared the signal that gainful employment is gaining ground, especially with respect to community colleges, as a measure of success. He highlighted the new White House College Scorecard that makes public college performance. We heard from Felice Nudelman on the coming MOOCS wave and how to surf it. Sylvia Manning asked us to engage on what form the federal higher ed reauthorization act should take.

City Colleges of Chicago are ahead of the curve with respect to access and completion. The Chancellor has made these goals explicit since she started, and we are tracking and actively working to improve our completion rates. We are on track with gainful employment as we implement our College to Careers initiative.

MOOCS present a disruptive force to all of higher education. Felice Nudelman said they are in version 1.0, still working to figure out what viable business models may look like. How do students obtain credentials through MOOCS that schools and employers will accept as valid signals of content or knowledge mastery? We have work to do regarding the reconcilement of our Center for Distance Learning offerings to the emerging MOOCS model. At the same time, we should work with industry partners to understand what mix of online and classroom instruction will meet their needs as we prepare our students for jobs. On the academic side, I see many more discussions with our transfer institutions as we jointly work through how to incorporate MOOCS courses into our students’ education path.

Finally, there was much discussion of Reauthorization of the Higher Education Act. We can expect increased focus on completion and retention. Member of Congress will want completion rates to trigger accreditation actions. Student learning outcomes will receive increased focus. “Academically Adrift” is getting a lot of visibility in Washington, D.C. A meme gaining ground on Capitol Hill is that students are not learning much because they are not working hard. Affordability and student debt is also a major point of discussion. Transparency, based on an assumption that institutions are not providing enough information to families, will prompt discussion on what additional information we ought to provide. Much of these efforts will take hold through changes to what accreditation is charged to accomplish.

The one thing clear from these discussions is that change is coming at us fast. It is likely to be disruptive to all aspects of our operating model. It will require more transparency, accountability, and creativity. Felice Nudelman offered advice I took to heart. Figure out what your sacrosanct core is, and then work through how to deliver on that core. That may require radical rethinking of models for delivery, but these changes should enrich student learning.

Follow Me

I attended the last of the American Council of Education’s Institute for New Presidents last Saturday. We covered a number of worthwhile topics. I found the one on social media valuable. President Ángel Cabrera of George Mason University shared how he uses Twitter to connect with faculty, staff, students and alumni.

While I can’t hope to devote the energy President Cabrera has invested in tweeting over 8,000 times, he inspired me. I decided to start my Twitter account. I have been live for a few days now. You can follow me @DonLaackman.

Same As It Ever Was

I experienced multi-dimensional déjà vu this past Thursday as I joined the Wright team at the Q Center in St. Charles, Illinois, for our AQIP Strategy Forum. AQIP is the Academic Quality Improvement Plan pathway for accreditation Wilbur Wright College follows under the guidance of the Higher Learning Commission.

The first dimension of vu came when driving into the Center. I started my Accenture career by spending three weeks at what was formerly known as the Center for Professional Education, owned by Arthur Andersen & Co. The firm required every new hire in the firm to spend three weeks learning the methodology employed on client engagements. My class of 60 was the first to host more non-US attendees than US students. The experience was intense and exhilarating. It was my first extended interaction with teams  from Venezuela, Brazil, Argentina, Spain, Japan, the United Kingdom and Australia. The firm imprinted its unique culture on every new hire throughout the world, not least by living up to its up-or-out creed. If you did not complete the case project (I believe it was some COBOL program controlling a shoe factory) over the three weeks, you were not welcome back in your home office. I remember the entire class rallying around Bob, the only person not finished with the case by Week Three, Day 4, before the traditional end-of-case celebration. We dragged Bob across the finish line, learning the value of teamwork along the way.

I spent 1-2 weeks each year at St. Charles for most of my 23 years. After the AA&Co meltdown, the facility became the Q Center, and they started to accept other companies for conferences and training. Yet even with the change in ownership and attendees, the Q Center retained much of its cultural feel. Perhaps it is the tiny hotel rooms (you can literally touch both walls of the narrow end of the room with your arms outstretched), its remoteness, and the changeless cafeteria ambiance that combine to make it a unique place. My arrival on campus brought back floods of memories, and it felt a little strange to be there in a new role, with a new organization.

The second dimension of vu was brought on by the subject matter. AQIP was influenced greatly by the Malcolm Baldridge Award, instituted by the National Institute of Standards and Technology, to combat the rising tide of Japanese competitiveness brought on by its industrial embrace of the quality principles espoused by Joseph Juran and W. Edwards Deming. Accenture spent a time pursuing the Baldridge Award. It is a comprehensive effort, not unlike preparing for an accreditation visit, that forces an organization to assess and document its adherence to continuous quality improvement. Like with many accreditation visits, the Chicago office received new carpet and a fresh coat of paint in preparation for the visit of the Baldridge examiners. As the Wright team reviewed our areas for improvement, identified strategies, and sketched out fish bone diagrams for root-cause analysis, I experienced a vu-like vertigo. David Byrne’s refrain started pounding in my head.

My third vu came about while working with the team, made up of faculty, staff and administrators from Wright College. Most were new to me. Yet, as we worked on our project, it was as if we had worked together for years. We wrestled with how to increase engagement of faculty and staff. We brainstormed about projects. We opened up about what was working and what wasn’t. This team cared about helping Wright become a better college. All of them are busy with their day jobs, yet they took three days from their schedules to come together and work on this effort. It was inspiring and gratifying. Great institutions are made by great people, people who care enough to see what needs to change and work to change it. Same as it ever was.

Harold’s Got Numbers

“If you’ve got numbers, show ‘em.” Stephan James, former Chief Operating Officer of Accenture, would offer this bon mot to partners at the firm to encourage us to showcase good results.

Harold’s got numbers.

I have reported here on our challenges in serving students well during registration. We had a humbling Fall experience with registration. One survey showed that 20% of the students who entered our building to register left in frustration without enrolling at Harold Washington College. This was an improvement from right before my start at the College, when 33% of our students thought their registration experience was far below their expectations (on a five-point scale where far exceeded is the best and far below the worst.)

In response, we launched a “Registration Re-Think.” We gathered employees from various disciplines to re-think every aspect of registration. As a result, we implemented a number of changes to the process. We revamped our website to guide students from the start based on where they were starting from – new to college, new to CCC but with some previous experience, students who have already attained a bachelor’s degree or higher, and our returning students. We then aligned our internal processes with the web site so that every student entering the college received a color-coded page reflecting their status.

We set up a welcome center right off of our lobby to help direct students correctly. We implemented interventions to help those students who were feeling particularly stressed during registration. Our employees started wearing name badges so that students could readily find who worked for the College. We set deadlines that we stuck to on when we would accept new students, and directed those students who arrived after the deadline to one of our sister colleges, who had more classes available for our students. Administrators pitched in, rotating welcome desk duty and learning first-hand the challenges our clerical and professional employees face during registration.

The results are in. Students’ satisfaction with HWC’s registration processes has dramatically improved. Sixty-two percent of our students said that registration far exceeded or exceeded their expectations. Only six percent said that registration was below or far below their expectations. These results place us firmly in the middle of satisfaction results of the City Colleges. Even more gratifying is the volume of positive comments from students, especially returning students, who commented on how they wish registration had been like this when they started with us.

We are not complacent. Summer and Fall registration quickly approaches, and Fall registration  is a particularly challenging time. I want more of our students feeling that their registration experience far exceeds their expectations, but we will have to continue to improve to make that happen. We tried some things that didn’t work, like extending our Thursday evening hours to accommodate working students. We gathered feedback from everyone involved, and we are in the process of implementing further changes to improve our students’ experiences.

Until then, I want to thank the staff and faculty at HWC who delivered these results. This was a team effort, and the team demonstrated excellence.

Spare Time

What do faculty members at HWC do in their spare time?

Apparently, a number of them are making great art.

One of the pleasures of my job is to have an art gallery immediately outside my HWC office. The current exhibition of HWC faculty art is not to be missed. Every two years, we show off what our faculty have created. It is worth a trek up to the 11th floor to take a look.

The exhibit features works from the following artists:

Artists: Alberto Aguilar, Michelle Bolinger, Stephanie Burke, Heather Coffey, Rose Divita, Paula Martinez, Turtel Onli, Jane Regan, Richard Repasky, Galina Shevchenko, Jessica Taylor Caponigro, Ivanhoe Tejeda, Vassilen Vasevski, Rafael E. Vera, and Marjorie Woodruff.

We are hosting a reception in the President’s Gallery tomorrow (Thursday) January 17 at 11:30 – 1:00 p.m. and 5:30 – 7:30 p.m. Please swing by to rub elbows and get the inside scoop from our faculty on their artistic works.

 

I Miss School

The winter break was everything I had hoped it would be. A few friends have asked, “Did you snorkel?” “Did you take a helicopter ride?” “Did you parasail?”

Other than enjoying tropical breezes, almost uninterrupted sun, and the occasional hike through gorgeous natural scenery in Hawai’i, I did not tackle adventure on this vacation.

My family still reminds me of the vacation we spent in the Caribbean. I rented a Hobie Cat and took the family out into the harbor. It took us about 10 minutes to sail from the beach to the mouth of the harbor. The prevailing winds were out of the harbor, and sailing back into the wind would require more sailing skill than I possessed. At that point, I turned to my children, then around 10 and 12, and asked them to sail us back to the beach, into the wind.  My wife and I had made sure they had a couple of sailing lessons in a small harbor off of Lake Michigan. I assumed the two hours they spent in 8 foot Sunfish sailboats had prepared them for the open seas. They both looked at me with a mixture of fear and incomprehension, and my wife started yelling at me, thinking for some reason that since I had engineered this entire fiasco and sailed us almost out of the safety of the harbor, I had some idea on how to get us back safely. Four hours later (after embarrassingly running into a 40-foot sailboat moored on one side of the harbor while the horrified owners tried to wave us away with their hands), we returned to land. My family does not do adventure with me.

I spent my time reading. I read on the plane, on the beach, by the pool, in my room, everywhere I could. I tore through 3 1/2 books. It was glorious. I had not spent so much dedicated time reading since graduate school. I read Rabindranath Tagore’s The Home and the World, a gift from a friend. I balanced this fictional account of Bangladeshi independence in the 1920′s with Katherine Boo’s Behind the Beautiful Forevers: Life, Death, and Hope in a Mumbai Undercity. The contrast between the lives of early-2oth century Bangladeshi aristocracy and present-day residents of a slum smashed up against the Mumbai airport filled out my developing sense of India, building on my knowledge  from a visit to Bangalore in 2007 and Rohinton Mistry’s A Fine Balance, one of my favorite novels and a magical telling of the life of an Indian family set in 1975. I also read Neal Stephenson’s Reamde. I have long been a fan of Stephenson, and Reamde fit the bill for action-packed narco/terrorist/hacker/survivalist interactions. Plenty of mayhem and chaos round out the unalloyed fun. It was a great vacation read.

As for the 1/2 book of the 3 1/2 I read while on vacation, I am now about 5/7′s of the way through Andrew Solomon’s Far From the Tree. This book has gripped me like no other in a long time. It makes me want to be back in school, reading this book, showing up for class with my inline notes and yellow highlighting, ready to debate with classmates the implications of medical technological advances on the Deaf or Down Syndrome communities. As my wife will attest, I babble to every friend I know about the urgency of them reading this book. I love Solomon’s writing, and his construct for looking at children and families with special abilities is changing how I look at the world.

What I learned on winter vacation is that if you want a fun read, read Reamde. If you want to expand your understanding of the Indian Sub-continent, go with the trilogy mentioned above. If you want to change your life, read Far From the Tree. 

Assessment

One of our HWC Operating Plan priorities for FY2013 is Assessment. HWC has long had a strong culture of assessment. In our 2008 accreditation visit, HLC lauded HWC’s faculty-driven assessment processes. This year, I wanted to expand and improve our assessment capabilities. We are investing in faculty release time to take part on the Assessment Committee. The committee is leading efforts to publish earlier assessment findings so that faculty can decide whether to use the findings in their teaching, as well as expanding survey and assessment efforts college-wide and at the department level.

Good news, then, this week from Mike Heathfield, who reports:

I just wanted to let you know we have had a spectacular assessment week where 1,489 students participated in the survey – 49% of them on campus and 51% off campus.   This is the largest student sample we have ever managed ourselves.  Around 55 faculty were involved in this major effort.  30% of the students participating also left comments for us.  I have read them all and they provide fascinating additional data.  More on this soon.

Final numbers will settle down over the next few days and we plan on getting some results back out to students and faculty before the end of semester.

Many thanks to the faculty who helped with the great result. Special mention goes to Jeff Swigart of the Math Department, who was the logistical manager behind all of this.  He has done a brilliant job, all while bonding with a new baby at home.

Down the Shore

Please donate.

This morning, Sandy got personal.

I spent many summers down the Jersey shore. My mother would ship me off to Sea Isle City to live with my grandparents for a few weeks in the summer. Our evenings were spent eating dinner, followed by saying the Rosary. Baba and Nana would alternate prayers, starting with the Apostle’s Creed, then the Our Father, three Hail Marys, followed by the Glory Be prayer, then the decades. Black beads with silver links wrapped around wrinkled age-spotted hands. Comfort in the ritual.

After the Rosary, we settled in to watch TV with a bowl of ice cream before bed. “Sea Hunt” was a Baba favorite. I would then lay in bed, listening to their conversation. It was years before I realized that their discussions about the problems with the Wolfs next door had to do with their neighbors and not some gray beasts I could never seem to find during our walks to the beach each day.

The beach. I spent hours, days, playing on the beach. Sand castles and swimming. Sand-encrusted italian hoagies washed down with cold Coca-Colas. Lollie the collie, the neighborhood dog who drifted from house to house, owned by no one and everyone, would join us on our beach blanket. Sometimes, Baba and I would walk along the shore. He would point out interesting sites, including the empty lots and damaged boardwalks left from the fury of Hurricanes Donna and Esther.

After Hurricane Sandy hit, I surfed the net looking for stories. I knew my beloved Jersey Shore was hit hard. News was spotty Tuesday and Wednesday, as power outages delayed reporters’ ability to provide pictures. Then, this morning, as I visited my old hometown paper, I was shocked to see a picture of my cousin, Donna, being hugged by President Obama.

Donna extended the childhood dream life of living on the Jersey shore into a lifelong avocation. She owns a marina in Brigantine, just across the bridge from Sea Isle City. Donna’s Facebook profile is filled with pictures of her and colleagues hauling big fish from deep sea charters, and sunny days sitting in the stern of boats cruising the Atlantic. She lives a happy, joyful life living on the Jersey shore.

All devastated. When you click on the link to the picture of President Obama and Donna, you can see the pain etched into her face. Her Facebook post this morning at 4 am said, “I can’t stop crying.” Donna is a strong woman. Hurricane Sandy kicked her ass. Donna does not need a hand out. She needs a hand up.

Please donate.

For Better and Worse

A friend recently asked if I write the entries on Don’s Desk by myself. I thought the quality of writing itself would attest to the lack of any editorial guidance. To remove any doubt, I write these entries by myself. In retrospect, many of the posts would benefit from a strong editorial hand.

This week, I made the jump to the big time, following the Chancellor and a few other CCC Presidents (health and TDL) in an ongoing discussion about College to Careers at CCC on the Huffington Post website. In my post, I talked about the role of CCC in helping entrepreneurs through the 10,000 Small Businesses program we host at HWC.

I say ‘big time’ because while I have blogged for 18 months now, the first time my Mother commented on a post was when it appeared on the Huffington Post. Don’s Desk just does not have the same cachet as Arianna Huffington’s media empire.

How fortunate, then, that my Huffington post entry was ably assisted by Nikole Muzzy, our marketing/PR lead at the College. As Nikole and I have worked together, she has learned ‘my voice’ and has played a valuable behind-the-scenes role in helping through a number of public appearances, both virtual and physical. I am grateful for her guidance and strong editorial hand. The HuffPost piece is evidence of her talent.

Don’s Desk, however, remains hands-off to anyone but me. For better and worse.

Tough Call

I at times ask myself whether what we do matters. Do we really change students’ lives? Do we put them on a new path, increase the slope of their trajectory forward, or transform the way they think about the world?

I have much anecdotal evidence that this is the case. Students return to tell us how well HWC did in preparing them for their university careers. An alum recently came to my office, almost in tears, so thankful that we had provided career placement training to help her interview successfully with Allscripts and get a job.

But what does the data say, and what about what we do makes a difference?

Paul Tough recently published a book, “How Children Succeed,” that gives credit for student success to their ability to develop grit. As explained in a Joe Nocera article about Tough’s book:

Rather, tapping into a great deal of recent research, Tough writes that the most important things to develop in students are “noncognitive skills,” which Tough labels as “character.” Many of the people who have done the research or are running the programs that Tough admires have different ways of expressing those skills. But they are essentially character traits that are necessary to succeed not just in school, but in life. Jeff Nelson, who runs a program in partnership with 23 Chicago high schools called OneGoal, which works to improve student achievement and helps students get into college, describes these traits as “resilience, integrity, resourcefulness, professionalism and ambition.” “They are the linchpin of what we do,” Nelson told me. Nelson calls them “leadership skills.” Tough uses the word “grit” a lot.

What I find most encouraging, as outlined in the NYTimes review of Tough’s book, is that these non-cognitive skills can be taught later in life. Tough is focusing on the high school year, but I am hopeful based on this research that the college years may matter as well. Reflecting on my experience as a college student, the lessons I took away from my college education that helped me be successful was a belief that if I wrestled with a problem long enough and hard enough, I would be rewarded with an answer. While I can’t tell you the content of the many papers I wrote so many years ago, I can vividly recall the late nights surrounded by source material typing out a ten-page paper.

I am adding “How Children Succeed” to my reading list. Not such a Tough call, after all.