Faculty Council Names Standing Committee Chairs; Adopts Strategic Approach to Advocate for Current Emerging Faculty Concerns in One College Environment

The DCCFA Faculty Council met via video conference Thursday, June 4, 2020, to inaugurate the new Council term and to discuss a number of pressing issues that faculty across the District have raised in recent days and hours. The June 4 meeting minutes are located at this link.

DCCFA Standing Committee Chairs Named

In order to take a strategic approach to issues that are shared by faculty at many or all of the seven colleges, and in accordance with the DCCFA Bylaws, the Council prioritized the naming of its members as ex officio chairs to the seven standing committees of the DCCFA, as follows:

Budget & Finance: Keith Baker (North Lake)

Communications: Wade Hyde (El Centro)

Convention Planning: Ryan Pettengill (Mountain View)

Instructional Goals and Academic Freedom: Jennifer Hudson-Allen (Brookhaven)

Membership: Tommy Thompson (Cedar Valley)

Political Information: Matt Hinckley (Eastfield)

Welfare and Benefits: Carlos Martinez (Richland)

The Council members all agreed to submit to the respective committee chairs, the names of the members from their respective campuses, who have been elected to serve on these seven DCCFA committees.

Council Approach to Instruction in the One College Model

In past years, the Faculty Council met monthly with the seven academic vice presidents, in a group called The Instructional Leadership Team (TILT). Over time TILT also included several District Office personnel who helped to manage curriculum and other instructional issues at the District level. In Spring 2020, the instructional vice presidents indicated they wished to disband TILT, as instruction for the combined Dallas College would soon be supported by a Provost supervising seven Vice Provosts, each of whom would support a “School of” organized around a particular Guided Pathway. The dissolving of TILT therefore has left a gap in the structural means by which the Council effectively can represent faculty interests in discussions about instructional matters across the District. Consequently, the Council today agreed that it intends to establish a precedent to meet with the current Interim Provost, Dr. Linda Braddy, and continue that practice when the new Provost is named. President Ryan Pettengill agreed to take the initiative to that effect. In the meantime, though, the Council is aware of the numerous issues and concerns that are being raised by our members all across the District.

Enrollment Management Practices

The Council agrees that it supports a District-wide approach to enrollment management practices, particularly during a time when we are all teaching online and campus distinctions are, by necessity, in many cases becoming less apparent. However, the Council also believes that “one size fits all” approaches are not appropriate. For instance, the Council takes very seriously faculty concerns over decisions that are being made to combine sections, stack/bundle sections (or not), and/or cancel and move students to sections offered by other instructors at other campuses. The Council also agrees that not all academic disciplines – or even courses within a given discipline – should have the same enrollment thresholds to “make.” Certain courses in certain disciplines, such as studio art courses, some journalism courses, private music lessons, and co-ops and internships, among many others, need to be handled more like many CTE courses, where individualized instruction is the foundation of the particular student experience. In addition, different courses in various CTE disciplines also are different, where lab safety and industry accreditation concerns must prevail. Likewise, developmental studies and ESOL courses must consider that students need additional individual attention. In all cases, therefore, the Council maintains that faculty subject matter experts must be consulted before deans or the current academic vice presidents, make unilateral decisions to cancel or combine sections.

Because these enrollment management decisions are being made absent faculty subject matter expert input in many programs and disciplines across the District, the Council agreed to address this on a District-wide, systemic basis. First, President Ryan Pettengill intends to engage with District senior leadership to make the case for additional faculty empowerment in enrollment management decisions. Second, the entire Council will press these concerns when we next meet with the Chancellor on June 12. Third, the two Council members on the Rapid Response Team, Carlos Martinez and Wade Hyde, will continue to articulate these concerns with the Provost during the numerous times the RRT meets each week.

Working across the District with Colleagues in our Disciplines

The Council agrees that, along with enrollment management decisions, many other issues require the attention of faculty subject matter experts. As such, the Council strongly advises all DCCCD faculty – not just the individual campus curriculum committee reps, but all faculty in a given program or discipline – to engage with their colleagues in the same discipline/program at the other campuses. There are many issues where consistency and uniformity is appropriate, and in those cases the Council believes the faculty subject matter experts must make those determinations. At the same time, there are instances where the same course is used by different programs at different campuses serving different cohorts of students to be trained for different jobs or careers in different industries. Again, in those cases, it is faculty subject matter experts who need to articulate the reasons for those differences. The greater the cooperation and agreement within disciplines and programs across the District, the easier it is for the Faculty Council to represent those interests broadly when we advocate on our members’ collective behalf.

Faculty Professional Development

The Council agrees with previous work done by previous Councils, specifically, that faculty professional development is, first, separate and different from training required by federal, state, or local laws (such as FERPA, ADA, Title IX, etc.), and second, consists of two broad categories: advancing pedagogy and/or advancing or maintaining subject matter expertise and/or professional certification or licensure. The Council also agrees with the principle that professional development that improves us as teachers and/or advances our subject matter expertise, ought to count toward advancement on the faculty salary range scale, from Range 1 to 2 and from Range 2 to 3. The Council intends to continue to make these arguments as task forces and advisory committees are formed regarding faculty professional development.

Dual Credit

The Council also agrees that a District-wide, systemic approach is needed to deal with Dual Credit issues and concerns, in keeping with the recommendations issued in the faculty-generated Dual Credit Report that the Council delivered to Dr. May earlier this year. Until all dual credit operations and reporting relationships are centralized under one leader at District Office, we anticipate that issues and concerns will continue to arise. Consequently, the Council agreed that Jennifer Hudson-Allen, who both will chair the DCCFA Instructional Goals and Academic Freedom Committee and also serves on numerous District-wide dual credit committees, would represent the Council in advancing faculty concerns about Dual Credit at the District level. As such, Jennifer is representing emerging faculty concerns regarding the “dual credit facilitators” that have been requested to be added to many summer courses. Jennifer will investigate this particular request in more detail and report back to the Council.

Committee and Task Force Membership

The Council discussed the ongoing concern that many faculty feel they are being left out of conversations that are culminating in decisions that affect teaching and learning. Many faculty have expertise in particular areas, often outside of their teaching field, and are willing to help the District advance our shared interest in these areas. Recognizing that the District is moving at a quicker pace than even in recent years, and especially compared to a decade ago, the Council agreed to prepare and maintain a shared spreadsheet of areas where we anticipate work needing to be done, and within each a list of faculty who have particular experiences or expertise in those areas. Therefore, the Council encourages members who have an interest in a particular area, to reach out to their respective faculty association president, to say, “I’d like to serve on a task force or committee that might be formed on (this issue).”

Communications

The Council also discussed the desire for all faculty at all campuses to have equal access to information. Consequently, the Council agreed that, while Jennifer Hudson-Allen would take Council meeting minutes in her capacity as Secretary, and while Wade Hyde would take the lead on overall Communications strategies as the chair of the DCCFA Communications committee, Matt Hinckley would take the lead in writing posts to publish to the Advance Blog, that the respective Council members could also separately send to their members via email. Until a new DCCFA.org web site is published, and as faculty still become accustomed to the Faculty One Stop site on SharePoint, the Advance Blog will be the primary means by which the Council broadly communicates its work with the membership at large.

What's Ahead

The Council next plans to meet at 12 noon Friday, June 12, before its monthly meeting with Chancellor May at 2 p.m. The Council also remains in constant contact with one another via email and group text messaging, ensuring that we are able to respond as quickly and thoroughly as possible to emerging concerns, while leveraging and sharing the diverse array of expertise, experiences, and interests that each of us individually brings to the Council.

Your Climate Survey Responses Pay Off; Return Week Meetings Modified Based on Faculty Input

The DCCFA Faculty Council takes seriously the input and suggestions received from all members.

One of the most recurring themes from direct input, as well as from answers to questions on the biennial faculty climate survey, is that Return Week leaves faculty feeling worn out rather than invigorated for the new academic year.

While it is extremely unlikely that the District will stop conducting Conference Day during Return Week, we do have some good news to bring to faculty. The annual Wednesday “curriculum workshop” that in recent years had convened at Richland College, for all program coordinators, lead faculty, and deans to attend, has been canceled. Indeed, faculty across the District have told the Council personally, and through the climate survey, that they thought the information presented at the "curriculum workshop" could be shared with faculty both more broadly and in a way that wouldn't require travel to another DCCCD college or location on a second day during Return Week.

Instead, the CTE and general education curriculum meetings will be conducted during the afternoon breakout sessions at the annual District Conference Day on Friday, August 24. Separate sessions tailored for new faculty, and for seasoned faculty, will be offered. In addition, discipline and program committees will be invited to schedule lunch meetings during District Conference Day, for which tables will be reserved and for which faculty may register during the Conference Day registration process.

While the faculty council still will continue pushing for Conference Day to be scheduled on Monday rather than Friday - if it must be scheduled during Return Week at all - we still believe that condensing the curriculum workshop into Conference Day is a much more efficient and effective use of faculty time.

New Core Curriculum Review Committee Formed to Study Proposed Changes to 090 Component Area Option, and Proposal to Remove Non-Science Major Science Courses from the Associate of Science Degree

At the October 16 meeting of The Instructional Leadership Team (TILT), the Academic Vice Presidents and the Faculty Council agreed to re-convene the Core Curriculum Review Committee (CCRC) to study a proposal to revise the 090 Component Area Option of the Core Curriculum, and a proposal to remove “Non-Science Major” science courses from the Associate of Science degrees, in response to the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board removing courses from the DCCCD Core beginning in Fall 2018.

Specifically, the THECB has expired Math 2342 and Math 2442 from the ACGM, and thus those courses must be removed. Second, and more significantly, the THECB has mandated that first year foreign language courses and sign language courses may not be included in the DCCCD Core Curriculum. This effectively means that, absent changes, students entering the DCCCD in Fall 2018 or thereafter would only be able to take a Speech class (SPCH 1311, 1315, or 1321) and a Physical Education course (PHED 1164), to complete the 090 Component Area Option of the DCCCD Core.   Of the 15,894 DCCCD college students who completed the Core Curriculum in 2014, 2015 and 2016 academic years, only 3,251 (20%) completed the Core with a Speech course—80% of the students took other courses that are now not able to be used to meet Core 2014 requirements in Fall, 2018 and later catalogs.  With the only option to complete the Core with Speech and Physical Education, it is projected that many fewer students would choose to complete the DCCCD Core and thus complete an Associate degree. Despite the data above, it could also mean that students will opt to compete the Core with us, using the only courses available to them in SPCH and PHED. This would push course need beyond our capacity.

Given these two possibilities, TILT agreed that the CCRC would be co-chaired by Shawnda Floyd, Vice President of Instruction at North Lake College, and Matt Hinckley, President of the Eastfield College Faculty Association. Floyd has served as a member of CCSST from 2014-2016 and has extensive experience working with the Guided Pathways initiative whose work will inform the CCRC. Hinckley co-chaired the Core Curriculum Steering Team from 2011 to 2014, and the Core Curriculum Review Committee from 2013 to 2015, and also has worked with Guided Pathways.

In keeping with the process and membership standards set by previous CCRCs, the CCRC will be composed of one faculty member from each of the nine Learning Categories of the DCCCD Core, plus one faculty member from each of the pre-Core disciplines of Learning Framework, Computer Literacy, ESOL, Developmental English, and Developmental Math. The CCRC will also add additional STEM, Allied Health, and CTE faculty to form a subcommittee to study the recommendation for the change to the AS degree. Faculty will be invited to participate by the co-chairs, and will be chosen to ensure a broad and diverse spectrum of perspectives, disciplines, longevity, ethnicities, and that all seven colleges, are represented. The co-chairs will use technology to ensure that faculty commitment to this initiative is not overly burdensome or time-consuming. To augment the knowledge base available to the CCRC, the CCRC will also include the following individuals: Nancy Faris, District Director of Academic and Student Records; Anna Mays, Associate Vice Chancellor for Educational Policy; Joyce Williams, Associate Vice Chancellor for Workforce Education, Meredithe Greer, District Director, Curriculum Management; Don Perry, Executive Director, Compliance & Policy Formation & THECB Liaison; a Core Objective Assessment expert from one college; and an instructional dean with significant Core Curriculum experience from one college. Executive Vice Chancellor Justin Lonon will serve as ex-officio to the CCRC.

 

Charges to the CCRC:

The CCRC will be charged to:

1.            De-emphasize concerns over individual disciplines, colleges, and enrollment patterns, in favor of a global and network approach focused on student success and preparing students to succeed in transfer and in the workforce, to take a broad view of the organic whole of the Core Curriculum to develop, and provide opportunities to assess the student attainment of, the six Core Objectives (critical thinking, communication, empirical and quantitative skills, teamwork, social responsibility, and personal responsibility);

2.            Review research materials provided by the District Office for Educational Policy, including 60x30 Goals, and the Guided Pathways initiatives;

3.            Review foundational, philosophical, and historical documents and perspectives for the 2009 and 2014 Core Curricula and Core Revision process, including relevant AAC&U principles for general education learning and assessment.

4.            Review THECB requirements for the Texas Core Curriculum and study emerging trends from the THECB and other public Texas community colleges and universities.

5.            Conduct information gathering efforts electronically from discipline committees and faculty at all seven colleges to obtain broad stakeholder input, and consider input from major Dallas County employers provided through the Office of Workforce Education;

6.            Provide a set of recommendations for the 090 Component Area Option, and the inclusion or exclusion of non-science major science courses from the AS degree prior to January 29, 2018, for the Vice Presidents Council and Chancellors Staff to review and approve in advance of submission to THECB for possible adoption in the 2018-2019 DCCCD catalog. The CCRC is not to recommend any changes to any of the Foundational Component Areas of the Core.

In the coming days, CCRC Co-chairs Shawnda Floyd and Matt Hinckley will work to identify and recruit a broad and representative sample of faculty, with no less than two and no more than four faculty from each college, to populate the CCRC. The CCRC tentatively will convene for a first meeting on or around December 1, 2017, and a second meeting on or around January 19, 2018. Stakeholder District discipline committees should expect to receive charges in early December. Questions can be directed to Anna Mays, Shawnda Floyd, or Matt Hinckley . Academic Vice Presidents also can provide background information to their respective faculty.

Additional Information on EQUIP/StraighterLine Experimental Project

DCCCD Associate Vice Chancellor of Educational Policy Anna Mays and Brookhaven College President Thom Chesney provided this information to the Sept. 19 meeting of the Chancellors Staff.

EDIT FROM TUESDAY, SEPT. 20: See this link from the U.S. Department of Education, and this story from the Chronicle of Higher Education.

Through the U.S. Department of Education’s Educational Quality through Innovative Partnerships (EQUIP) experiment, the Secretary of the Department of Education will provide a limited waiver of the financial aid requirements, under the Higher Education Act of 1965, that an ineligible institution or organization cannot provide 50 percent or more of a title IV-eligible educational program, and that an eligible program must be provided by a participating institution. For this experiment the Secretary will also waive, as needed, other requirements related to the minimum timeframes for eligible programs and the timeframe and method of calculating a student’s academic progress.

The last decade has seen the emergence of innovations in technology, pedagogy and business models both within and outside of the accredited higher education sector. By creating a pathway to financial aid for students desiring to access programs offered by “non-traditional” providers, goals such as increased equity and access, more flexible and personalized learning and the reduction of costs can be achieved.

The EQUIP Experimental Site Initiative was announced on 10/20/15 and DCCCD was invited to apply.  Dr. May, Dr. Figueroa and all DCCCD College Presidents agreed that the intent to apply be submitted to the Department of Education (12/15), with all College Presidents notifying SACSCOC of the intent to apply (3/16), and the final application was submitted in April, 2016.  DCCCD College Presidents were notified of their acceptance to participate in the Experimental Site Initiative 8/16/16.

Dallas County Community College District (DCCCD) and StraighterLine (SL), monitored by the Council for Higher Education Accreditation’s (CHEA) Quality Platform, will jointly partner to offer students a pathway to complete two popular Associate degrees:  Associate in Science (Business Concentration) and Associate in Arts (Criminal Justice Concentration).

Through the EQUIP Experimental Site program, students will be able to use Pell Grants and eligible federal loans to pay for the programs. With joint and independent marketing efforts from DCCCD and StraighterLine, it is expected that 600 students a year will enroll in the program by the end of the experimental period, starting in Summer or Fall, 2017.  As a veteran quality assurance entity, CHEA’s Quality Platform will evaluate the program for input quality and outcome performance, including student learning outcomes and cost effectiveness.

DCCCD, StraighterLine and CHEA have worked independently to successfully serve adult learners for years. With over 20,000 students taking online courses per year, DCCCD is one of the best-known, most experienced, and highly regarded providers of online programs in the 2-year sector. StraighterLine has pioneered the low-cost alternative provider market for credit-bearing online courses, offering high-quality general education courses to students at prices dramatically lower than those charged by most colleges. StraighterLine will enroll nearly 20,000 students in the 2015-2016 academic year and offers a full general education catalog (~60 courses) of high-quality, well-supported, self-paced online courses. StraighterLine has direct articulation agreements with nearly 100 regionally accredited colleges (including DCCCD) and courses are recommended through the American Council on Education Credit Evaluation Service for transfer of credit.  CHEA has overseen accreditation efforts and has already implemented a review process for alternative learning provider Quality Platform.

For the EQUIP project, DCCCD will let students earn up to 75% of their degree through the completion of StraighterLine courses.  Students will be able to enroll in StraighterLine’s 3 or 4 credit courses for $99 per credit during a 16-week term. This price includes all necessary textbooks, lab kits, proctoring services, support fees and other fees (excluding any costs for devices). It is expected that most students will choose to take at least 2 courses (six credits) thereby qualifying the student for at least half-time Pell eligibility. It is further expected that students will be able to add additional courses to their course load mid-semester should the student complete their initial courses before the end of the term. Upon completion of 75% of a program, the student will transfer their credits to DCCCD and enroll in DCCCD’s courses at standard DCCCD prices.