********************************************* DISCLAIMER: THIS CART FILE WAS PRODUCED FOR COMMUNICATION ACCESS AS AN ADA ACCOMMODATION AND MAY NOT BE 100% VERBATIM. THIS IS A DRAFT FILE AND HAS NOT BEEN PROOFREAD. IT IS SCAN-EDITED ONLY, AS PER CART INDUSTRY STANDARDS, AND MAY CONTAIN SOME PHONETICALLY REPRESENTED WORDS, INCORRECT SPELLINGS, TRANSMISSION ERRORS, AND STENOTYPE SYMBOLS OR NONSENSICAL WORDS. THIS IS NOT A LEGAL DOCUMENT AND MAY CONTAIN COPYRIGHTED, PRIVILEGED OR CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION. THIS FILE SHALL NOT BE DISCLOSED IN ANY FORM (WRITTEN OR ELECTRONIC) AS A VERBATIM TRANSCRIPT OR POSTED TO ANY WEBSITE OR PUBLIC FORUM OR SHARED WITHOUT THE EXPRESS WRITTEN CONSENT OF THE HIRING PARTY AND/OR THE CART PROVIDER. THIS IS NOT AN OFFICIAL TRANSCRIPT AND SHOULD NOT BE RELIED UPON FOR PURPOSES OF VERBATIM CITATION. ********************************************* October 6, 2021 Governing Board... >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Good evening, and welcome to the October 6, 2021 regular Governing Board meeting of the Pima Community College District. Our first order of business is our roll call. Mr. Silvyn, if you could please read the role. >> MR. JEFF SILVYN: Catherine Ripley? >> MS. CATHERINE RIPLEY: Present. >> MR. JEFF SILVYN: Dr. Hay? >> DR. MEREDITH HAY: Here. >> MR. JEFF SILVYN: Maria Garcia? >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: Present. >> MR. JEFF SILVYN: Luis Gonzales? >> MR. LUIS GONZALES: Here. >> MR. JEFF SILVYN: Demion Clinco? >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: I am here. >> MR. JEFF SILVYN: All members are present. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much. Our next item is 1.3, our public comment and call to the audience. The Pima Community College Governing Board welcomes comments on issues within the jurisdiction of the college. Generally the total time for the public comment will be limited to 45 minutes, and comments will be limited to 3 minutes per individual. These times may be modified by the board chair or board. Individuals sharing comments are expected to communicate with decorum and respect. Individuals who engage in disorderly conduct or use divisive or insulting language may have their time reduced or concluded by the board chair. At the conclusion of public comment, individual board members may respond to criticism made by those who addressed the board, may ask staff to review a matter, or may ask that the matter be put on a future agenda. Members of the board, however, may not discuss or take legal action on matters raised during the public comment unless matters are properly noticed for discussion and legal action. Finally, be advised that internal college processes are available to students and employees for communication. First this evening is Russell Schmidt. >> Are you able to see me? >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: No, but we can hear you. >> Doesn't look like I have an option to turn on a camera. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Okay. Can you give the presentation without that, or... >> I can. I can. I will go ahead and get started. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you. >> Members of the board and Chancellor Lambert, my name is Russ Schmidt and I'm the program director for respiratory care at Pima Community College. It's a privilege to talk to you tonight about the program, a program I made add which is a workforce program that has existed at the college since its founding in 1969. Our program has consistently turned out highly skilled, professionally trained respiratory therapist graduates over the years. Recently the program received a 2020 Distinguished Registered Respiratory Therapist Credentialing Success Award from the Commission on Accreditation for Respiratory Care. This award signifies at least 90% of the graduates achieved the highest credential granted by the National Board For Respiratory Care. On average, the respiratory care program will graduate about 25 students annually. Typically half of those graduates will become nationally credentialed, state licensed, and hired into our local community usually within the first three months following graduation. Most will work at one of the many corporate hospital systems throughout Southern Arizona. Others will work in Phoenix or out of state. Some will continue on to physician assistant school or even medical school. The COVID-19 pandemic has presented many challenges to the program, the move to online curriculum, implementing personal protective equipment protocols, and access to off-campus clinical experiences, just to name a few. However, our program has persevered over the last 19 months, being the only program within its division to maintain uninterrupted clinical opportunities for the students. This was only possible due to our strong community partnerships with the clinical sites. Tonight I'd like to introduce to you two individuals who shared a valued part of our respiratory care program legacy. First is Katalina Zimdars, a registered respiratory therapist and 2020 graduate from our program. Recently Katalina was featured in the spring issue of Pima Community College Career Focus, where she told her story about her experience with COVID-19 patients during the pandemic. With Katalina, that story still continues to this day. Additionally, you'll hear from Maria Rodriguez, director of respiratory care services, at Tucson Medical Center. Maria has been closely associated with the program at many levels. First as a clinical instructor, then as a lab instructor, and finally as our interim director of clinical education most recently. Maria is a vital community partner supporting our students with a wide variety of clinical opportunities as we in turn support her with a diversified pool of respiratory care employee candidates. At this time it's my pleasure to introduce first Katalina Zimdars who is going to tell us a little bit about her story of resilience in the respiratory care field. >> KATALINA ZIMDARS: Hello. Thank you, Russ. Hello, everyone. Yes, it's been quite the year. I graduated in May last year and passed my boards around May. And I did everything, all my paperwork to work in Cornerstone. I was hired July 21st. During that time, I literally was thrown into the fire. Honestly I didn't know at the time. Now I understand what it's like. I was prepared definitely for what it was coming. I was taught many things you do. We go through bronchoscopies and intubations and vents. I never thought I was going to be in my first year to have the experience that I have right now. During the pandemic I saw many cases. We ended up this year doing from, I do, how I can say, like everything, bronchoscopies to chest tubes, pleural effusions. I could be one day doing a neb and the next day I manage a (indiscernible) patient. I had the pleasure to have my first intubation on this year too. I don't think I can be more thankful for the program. Is incredible, like how things will click through patient and patient and case to case. It has been amazing. It's been really busy now. You know, when the first wave passed, it is strange not to be going, going, going, going. The support that we receive every day from the family patients, from everybody, even the students that come and train with us, it's amazing. I never thought that we were so important, and we are extremely important. There is nothing we cannot manage in emergency. Everybody in emergency needs a respiratory therapist. We all need to breathe. It is amazing. My experience has been just unbelievable. I had, like I said, in a year I have, I don't know how to say, like years and years of experience of many people. I'm really, really thankful for Russ and Elma (phonetic) and Maria. I use it all. I use everything. Everything that you guys taught me I apply it. So thank you so much. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much. Maria Rodriguez? >> MARIA RODRIGUEZ: Yes. So thank you again so much for having me. As Russ had said, I did have the pleasure of being a part of the PCC respiratory therapy program for almost four-and-a-half years, so I do feel like I know the program and what it provides to the students inside and out. I can say personally, and being in this leadership position at Tucson Medical Center, the landscape of respiratory therapists has changed drastically. But the value and the need for respiratory therapists has only exponentially increased. In reflecting on what I would say at the meeting, I reflected on the students we graduated four years ago and compared them to the, gosh, the handful that I just hired that have graduated this past year. I can say that they haven't skipped a beat. They are the critical thinkers, they have the experience, knowledge, the guidance and instruction to pass their boards, be critical-thinking respiratory therapists but also really valuable employees. What happened in the last two years mimics and mirrors what is happening to us in the hospital. The stopping and going, adjustment. But that hasn't really stopped or stifled the level of therapists I really have been able to add to my team. It's been really wonderful. Because I know how hard the program at PCC, as a whole, I know how much the struggle that you all had, but the respiratory therapy program specifically did not stop and really pushed these students forward. That experience they had in their clinicals really translated to the employees that we have now. I am, as Russ had said, we are able to have students and provide them experiences in pulmonary function labs, and our bronchoscopies, we are looking at expanding that and are able to do super-dimensional, getting first- and second-stage lung cancer. We're a Beacon-level ICU, level 3 NICU, and have a NICU transport team, half of which are respiratory therapists and some are actually PCC graduates. It's really been wonderful to be able to have all those experiences and all those different levels of therapists to be able to teach them at the bedside. We are first and foremost a community hospital, so we have a lot more say, such engagement with the community. So it is a struggle and it's a sentiment I know isn't just me or other hospitals in Tucson but throughout the United States, really trying to find and gain more therapists in the workforce. The last two years has really pushed them, some into early retirement, some reconsidering healthcare, some quitting altogether or pursuing travel jobs. It really leaves a hole for us. I can say too that in the past I think we worried about our students and clinicals, and if they got enough attention and if they would be brought, included and taken along with those experiences, and now I can say that we really highly value the relationship and the presence of the students and the instructors and PCC's program to help support us in times of need and helping us get creative with how we can hire. I'm so proud to be able to put PCC, have it on my résumé, but to continue that relationship and is something I'm going to continue to lean on as we build up our workforce again. Thank you so much for the opportunity to talk to you all tonight. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much, Ms. Rodriguez. I think I speak for the board when I say thank you for the work you have done throughout this pandemic. This entire program, the pandemic has brought into focus how urgent our healthcare providers are and how important our programs are to deliver quality healthcare to our community, and respiratory therapy is no exception. Thank you for everything you have done. Thank you for sharing your experience with the program with us. We really appreciate it. >> MARIA RODRIGUEZ: Thank you. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Next we have Makyla Hays. >> MAKYLA HAYS: Hello. Good evening, board members, colleagues and guests. I would like to take this time to point out a few facts related to the contract proposal for the chancellor in tonight's agenda, and why PCCEA is concerned about this proposal and the big picture and the trends of expenses here at Pima. First, this proposal includes two additional days of leave for the chancellor. This extension of the chancellor's leave to now almost 10 weeks per year amounts to an additional raise that is not in line with what employees were given. We question why this is being asked at this time and only for the chancellor. Second, we recognize that the proposed contract reflects the 2% increase plus $1,000 that all employees were given last year. However, I'd like to point out that should you accept the proposal in front of you, the chancellor will be making a base salary of 17%, or $50,000, more than in 2014/2015 while salaries for faculty and most employees have only risen 7% in that same time. Please note that even before the increase in this contract amendment, the chancellor's base salary this past year was already an increase of 14.5% over 2014/2015, double the percentage increase that faculty have seen in that same time. Given that inflation has risen about 11% since 2014, effectively faculty and employee salaries have lost buying power while the chancellor's salary has not only kept up with inflation but actually surpassed it. PCCEA has chosen 2014/15 as the comparison year as this was the last year employees received a step increase from the board. This is just one example of the trend PCCEA has been highlighting on behalf of the faculty in regards to the prioritization of administrative salaries over faculty and staff salaries, and brings me to the next point I'd like to bring forward. PCCEA remains concerned about the direction of the classification and compensation study. The faculty on the steering committee for the study are currently bringing a list of specific concerns through internal channels and are waiting for answers to the questions that have been raised. There are some larger budget trends regarding allocation of spending that have not been acknowledged just yet. For example, almost $6 million in total spending has been redirected away from faculty and adjunct faculty to other areas of the college. We'd like to request a full discussion to be had between PCCEA, Faculty Senate, staff, and administration where we can share our concerns and have an in-depth discussion regarding the budget as a whole. Finally, in my public comment last month, I made a request that I felt would improve communication and transparency between employees and administration and the board. I have met with administration and we are exploring ideas how to improve communication and accountability for addressing concerns brought forward by employees to the board. We will report back with something more concrete in the coming month or two. Thank you for your consideration. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much. Makyla, we really appreciate your thoughts on these topics. Chancellor Lambert, if it would be possible to meet with the PCCEA about their concerns about the total budget and maybe report back to us, that would be I think useful as we begin to explore the budget. >> DR. LEE LAMBERT: That's no problem to do that. Dave Bea continues to do that with the entire college, so we'd be glad to do that. >> DR. LEE LAMBERT: Okay. Thank you very much. Finally we have Chris Tober. >> CHRIS TOBER: Good evening, gentlemen. I have a first question to begin with. I recognize that the latitude we have for a speech is about 3 minutes. Mine is about 3.5 minutes. I'm hoping you give me that latitude to say what I have to say. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Mr. Tober, you are already about 20 seconds into your time. >> CHRIS TOBER: I understand. Let me start. Okay. I am Christopher Tober. I've lived in Tucson my entire life. I am president of a small minority-owned business called Advanced Controls Corporation. I am a taxpayer in Pima County and a strong supporter of PCC's educational mission. ACC employees between 40 and 50 full-time personnel as a controls contractor. Due to the nature of my business, there is an appearance of a personal and business conflict with the Trane IGA or investment grade audit. Those who support the IGA will undoubtedly point to that fact. However, it is also apparent that in the issue I'm addressing, Trane Corporation also has a conflict. It is their goal to wrest building automation work from a local contractor over the course of the contract. So, yes, they have an obvious vested interest in this outcome. In review of the financial data within the IGA, I have identified several inaccuracies. Trane is offering BAS replacement costs at approximately $5 per square foot. As a comparison, Advanced Controls replaced the CSI system at the Desert Vista Pueblo site at an installed cost of $3.50 per square foot, which included subbed mechanical work. Trane's proposed operational and maintenance savings of $250,000 per year has raised questions compounded by claiming these savings for 10 years. This needs to be evaluated. Trane is asking for $7.2 million to replace the BAS system, which includes removing 450,000 of recently completed BAS work at the six central plants. Advanced Controls projects the remaining BAS retrofit work totals $2 million based on square footage. Advanced Controls has been contracted and completed BAS work by Pima for $1.3 million since 2018. BAS savings for this retrofit are also undocumented. How is that possible? As a concerned taxpayer in this community, these two issues require clarification. No. 1, will a qualified independent third-party firm be hired to conduct a full audit on the costs and savings including the operational savings? I'm aware that Pima has hired GLHN Engineering to conduct an audit. The contract however does not include a full-scale audit. No. 2, will the same entity confirm the actual BAS retrofit work already completed and compare this work to Trane's offering? As a lifelong Tucsonan, I have been fortunate to have served on the boards at St. Elizabeth Ann Seton, Immaculate Heart, and Salpointe Catholic High Schools. I am also a lifelong member of the Tucson Conquistadores, whose attributes are well known in this community. I bring these highlights into perspective, because I firmly believe in the education process. Education is the core of personal success, and the community needs to support the efforts of PCC. It is with the same passion that I have the same concerns with this proposal. All indications, as already presented by several groups and PCC facilities, concur that the financial benefits are being overstated and unsupported. I'm concerned that Pima will be subject to years of deficit financing, information that has already been presented to the board. I strongly urge the Governing Board to understand the pluses and minuses of this offering and insist on unbiased data to make informed decisions. To conclude, and as a taxpayer in District 1, I plan on discussing this matter more thoroughly with the supervisor in my district, District 1 Supervisor Cat Ripley. I encourage all concerned citizens to reach out to the supervisor that represents their district and see what direction they are leaning. Their decision on this topic could have a profound financial impact to the taxpayers in our community over the next 20 years. I thank you for your time in this matter. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much, Mr. Tober. We are in receipt of your letter which we have supplied to our chief legal counsel. And we also have, as you mentioned, have an independent engineering firm looking into this. That report is going to be provided to the board and will be discussed in an upcoming meeting. Thank you very much. >> CHRIS TOBER: Thank you. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Next is remarks by the Governing Board. Let's begin with Ms. Ripley. >> MS. CATHERINE RIPLEY: Thank you very much for all of the speakers for coming forth and for all of their issues and concerns. I would like to just take this opportunity to say a couple things. First of all, we have been doing a lot of work behind the scenes, for all those listening. As you know, there is a lot of moving parts in overseeing a community college of this size. There is a lot of work. A lot of the visual work that everyone has seen to include the beam signing ceremony with the new applied sciences center of excellence, the opening this summer of the automotive center, all of those things are very visual, but I want to emphasize how much behind-the-scenes work has been done in other areas as well. For instance, I want to give kudos to all the people involved with adult basic education. A lot of what we do here is to get Associate's degrees and to get people into colleges and to get them certified in the workforce, but a big piece that I love and am proud of in Pima Community College is the adult basic education department. Another thing I'm proud of and I want to give kudos to is the veterans center and all involved with Davis-Monthan Air Force Base and the relationship we have with them to include certifying all of the Air Force paramedics, which I had the pleasure of attending one of their graduations, a couple of them. Refugee education program, in case you haven't read the newsletters, there is a lot happening behind the scenes. The creativity of the athletic department to fund-raise online to be able to support athletics, it is important. It's not just another extracurricular activity. As a mom, I can attest to the fact that athletics at colleges, at schools is very important. Kudos for their creativity. The forgiveness of the debt. A lot of the students chose not to do that, but of the ones that did, I think it meant a lot. It meant a lot to give them a break this year because of COVID, all of that stuff that's been happening, in addition to Pima Foundation. I want to give kudos to the $167,000+ in scholarship monies to our students, that's extraordinary. Every little bit that we can do to help our students, it goes a long way. The successful FAFSA kickoff was another example of what's happening behind the scenes. The other thing, I appreciate so much the first speakers and the respiratory therapy department that they are involved with. I really look forward to another center of excellence happening in West Campus dedicated to all of the healthcare careers. I think it's really important, especially now. It's an example that Pima Community College is rolling with the changes. Yes, we need automotive workers and applied sciences, but now more than ever, educators and healthcare workers. So I'm really looking forward to that. There is a lot of vision and a lot of things that are happening. There are a lot of moving parts. Again, the worker bees get all of the credit, but I also want to give kudos to our chancellor for overseeing so many different moving parts to make five campuses work and keep us afloat, and not just afloat but running, during COVID. We are not over. COVID hasn't been over. Sorry for taking so much time here, but I really wanted to give credit where it's due, and go, team, go. I'm very proud to be representing District 1. Thank you. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Ms. Garcia? >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: Well, I'm not going to say nothing because I believe Ms. Ripley said it all. Thank you so much for the information. Great job. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Mr. Gonzales? >> MR. LUIS GONZALES: The same as well too. I do want to say, as Ms. Ripley and Ms. Garcia mentioned, I think there is a lot that's been happening at Pima. But more important, as I mentioned, Ms. Ripley mentioned the GED program, I was honored to see the graduation ceremony at West Campus a couple of days ago. I think it's great in reference to talking about providing opportunities, opportunities in reference through Pima that has to offer with those students that got their GED out there. I think it was an excellent ceremony, but it was challenging in reference to our present time with COVID and addressing or trying to talk to the audience where there is no audience there. I think it went well, and I really repeat again and reiterate the best of luck to all those students that were acknowledged and got their GED. But more important, too, as I said that night, their graduation is not only for the one self. It's for the family. But more important to the community. Demonstrates to the community that Pima can be involved and involved at all levels not only through the Pima Community College but also the efforts and extension and hopefully go to the four-year institution. That's all I wanted to say. And as mentioned, I'm very proud of all the students and young people and especially the high school students that are also taking advantage of the dual credit programs too. I know those are going to be our future students as well too. There is a lot to offer through Pima, and we need to continue supporting them through our faculty and staff and the administration. That's all I can say. Thank you. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you. Dr. Hay? >> DR. MEREDITH HAY: Yeah, I will just take a few moments. I want to echo what Ms. Ripley mentioned in terms of all the amazing advancements that have happened in Pima College over the last few years. And just to remind the audience and some of our newer board members, we have come a long way since four years ago when we were on the verge of losing our accreditation. Quite frankly, the advances we have made and the advances this college has made, the faculty, the staff, the senior leadership, that happens, all those things that Ms. Ripley mentioned, all the great advances in our centers of excellence, our strong relationships I think with the state in terms of supporting some of our facilities, is because of the senior leadership. It's because quite frankly of one person, Lee Lambert, who has built an amazing team, brought them together in a time of unprecedented challenges, and we are still moving forward. It's just amazing what he has done. I want to publicly make sure that everyone listening appreciates the extraordinary job that Lee Lambert has done. This is not a job that just anybody off the street can do. It's actually very, very hard work, and he has put together an extraordinary team, and the faculty have also been extraordinary, but the tenor and the tone and how you move a college forward is set from the very top. That's from Dr. Lambert, and I want to thank him for his efforts and championing Pima Community College and championing economic development for the county. Thank you. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much, Dr. Hay. I would echo of course the same thing. The last year has been, last year and a half since COVID started, has been extraordinarily challenging. Despite those challenges, this institution has risen to continue to advance these remarkable initiatives that are really preparing our region not just for recovery but for the future. It is a collective effort from everybody at every level of the institution, but as Dr. Hay noted, Chancellor Lambert sets the tone and has set a vision for this institution that has created a transformational participation from the business community, from the philanthropic community, and it is remarkable to be so close to watch all of the effort and energy that goes into each and every program and decision, because it's really always about serving our students and impacting and improving our community. I'm incredibly grateful for your work and your team, Chancellor Lambert. Everybody in the institution, faculty, the staff, the work that everyone does is just profound and it's really making a difference in the lives of Tucsonans and Pima County residents. Thank you so much for that. With that, we will move on to reports. First is our administrative report, 2.1, initiatives to increase student persistence and retention by Dr. Dolores Duran-Cerda. >> DR. DOLORES DURAN-CERDA: Thank you so much. Chairman Clinco, members of the board, Chancellor Lambert, colleagues and guests. It gives me great pleasure to share with you the work that Pima College has done in regards to persistence and retention. Last month, Dr. Doré presented on enrollment, and today I will be presenting on persistence and retention, which are very much intertwined and they directly relate to each other. I have also invited members of my team in case there are specific questions that they can chime in and answer, as well. I'd like to thank them and all of academic affairs for their hard work, leadership, and dedication to student success. For my presentation, I would like to paint a picture of persistence and retention for you, provide some background information, context, and also data. I will explain how enrollment, persistence, and retention tie to each other, and also share what Pima has been doing and what our future plans are in regards to those. As we all know, for the past 19 months, hard to believe it's been 19 months, we had a global pandemic, we have had economic upheaval, and there's been social unrest where we need to address equity and social justice. We have had a sandsdemic. The chancellor has talked a lot about the birth dearth. And the Emsi report has explained that there are three major factors that have accelerated the people shortage. There has been record numbers of baby boomers who left the market in 2020. Millions are of prime age workers and many of them are women that left the market. Also men have been leaving the labor force and opting for part-time instead of full-time work for several decades. Also, the U.S. experienced the lowest birth rate in the nation's history. In addition, we have competition in our backyard. Aside from the three state universities, there is Southern New Hampshire, Grand Canyon, Pima Medical Institute, University of Phoenix, for example. Another issue is there are greater expectations from our community and from our state, and from the country, really. People are now questioning the value of a college degree. We need to understand the expectations from students and employers as well. The McKinsey report has talked about the great attrition. Because of the pandemic, a record number of employees are quitting their jobs because of the pandemic and what impacts it had on them. So we have always worked hard to grow enrollment, retain and graduate students. However, we need to add to that, and that is understanding the student and employer expectations. We need to improve academic program and workforce alignment. We need to address the skills gap, because we are seeing the labor market trends. We need to focus on that, as well: The market demographics, market prioritizations, and also public policy impacts. All of this needs to be done through an equity lens. We want to focus more than ever on the completion of our students that they complete their studies. We continue to focus on our learners, our students. I have always said, you have heard me say that Pima College needs to be a student-ready institution and not expect that our students be college-ready. Those days are gone. We need to understand who our students are, what their needs are, and remove those barriers to student success as we have been through the Breaking Student Barriers task force. We need to support an equitable education for everyone to get a good job, to have a wage that helps their families succeed and support. That's why our mission, we have done our fulfillment framework. Our mission is empower every learner every day for every goal. I'm going to share my screen now for my presentation. One moment, please. So for the next slide, strategic plan and the short-term SEMP. We approved our strategic plan, and there are two main institutional goals. One is to increase completer counts by 6,000 by 2024-'25. But currently our completers right now in 2021 are 2,700. So we have a huge way, a long ways to go. Also, our other goal is to double the completer counts of Hispanic or Latino, American Indian, Alaska Native and Black and African American learners by '24/'25. This is all intertwined with the Achieve60 and Achieve60 Pima County initiative. It's all intertwined in the strategic plan. These are very ambitious goals, but they are needed as we seek to transform our community through affordable education. We reiterate the college's commitment to diversity, equity, and inclusion, and we need to better serve our underrepresented students, in particular, our African American students. These are ambitious goals, as I said. Are they realistic, given the current resources that we have? We will need to revisit and reassess these goals to make sure that we can get there. And with this presentation, I'm going to provide some ideas and share what we have done to get us to those goals. Last month Dr. Doré presented on enrollment and the short-term SEMP. This is also aligned with the strategic plan, the mission fulfillment framework, the chancellor's goals, the educational and facilities master plans, the diversity, equity, and inclusion plan, as well. It's a one-year institutional plan to help identify, recruit, enroll, retain, and graduate students. This is very important for us. These graphs are going to show you the persistence and retention rates that are currently at the college. Just to reiterate and refresh your memory, retention rates are fall to fall. Persistence rates are fall to spring. If we focus on the persistence rates, for the fall 2020 Pima College students are at 63.50. This is a little below from the fall 2019 year at 65.37. Also, if you look at fall 2018, we were at 66.31. Fall 2021 will not be available until the spring of '22. But we see that there are pockets of increased persistence as evidenced by automotive mechanics and their certificate that was at 32.31% in fall of 2018, and in 2020, 66.67. So there was a significant increase. For retention for all Pima students in 2020, it was 41.62, which is a little below the 2018/'19 at 45.67, and 2017/'18 at 44.72. So our retention rates are aligned based on the IPEDS data 2020 with the state average, 57% of full-time students are retained, and 38% of the part-time students statewide. So using the IPEDS data for the State of Arizona, Pima's retention rate is 59% of full-time students in 2020, whereas the state average for community college is 57%. Pima's retention rate is 40% for part-time students in 2020, whereas the state average for community colleges is 38%. So overall, in taking into account COVID, our rates have not shown a significant decline. Many of our efforts that were put in place before COVID and initiatives since have really helped maintain these rates. So that's the good news. We expect that as we come out of the pandemic, these initiatives, as well as our continued efforts to fuel the increase in persistence and retention, will continue. Reviewing and analyzing segregated data is very important as we secure our interventions with our students that are mostly the underrepresented populations, and this way we can achieve economic mobility. Some of these initiatives are guided pathways, centers of excellence, student engagement, dual enrollment, and also to reduce our DFW grades. These are just examples. I wanted to share one particular example with you where there are indications of increased retention even during global pandemic. This is Computer Information Systems' AAS degrees. They were at 39.53% in 2018/'19 and 47.10% in 2019/2020. While based on the evidence that some of the programs have actually increased their persistence and retention even during COVID, data also suggests that we need to improve and use this opportunity to make programs more relevant, to expand, create new programs, that will economically empower our graduates in these times. In the area also of persistence, it's also increased and one example is through automotive mechanics certificate. The difference between fall 2017, it was at 38.33%, and in 2020 it grew to 66.67%. These are all positive things. But with persistence and retention, we have some strategies that academic affairs and the entire college, in collaboration with all units, we are implementing some recommendations from the education master plan. We're creating relevant curriculum that aligns with the centers of excellence and increasing retention efforts in student engagement. We continue to work with faculty collaboratively to focus on equity-mind and inclusive teaching practices through the work of the Teaching and Learning Center. I'd like to now highlight some of these strategies in persistence and retention, as you can see in the image here. For scheduling, we are adopting best practices in scheduling. We're being very strategic based on data and of course the student needs. We have had student forums, student surveys, and they have told us what they prefer as far as scheduling is concerned. Before, a couple years ago, Pima had varying start times. For example, at West Campus there were 69 starting times. At Desert Vista, 51. Downtown Campus, 58 starting times. We have streamlined that. We are also offering more classes outside of the 10 to 12 period, so we are offering more in the morning and also in the evenings and weekends. This spring we are also having a little bit more of the face-to-face classes because our students are saying they prefer that high touch, student engagement with their faculty, so we are incorporating about 55% face-to-face classes for the spring semester. Of course we have plan B and plan C if COVID gets worse. Also using Ad Astra analytics to optimize offerings. This predicts the student demand for courses based on historical data. For our institutional transformation, guided pathways, as you can see in the image with the different arrows, these are initiatives helping us get to the institutional goals that I mentioned earlier on. Guided pathways, which aligns with the strategic plan, we continue to refine and scale up guided pathways through pathways for transfer, pathways for workforce, and making sure that our certificates are stackable and don't stand alone. We are creating systems to support retention and persistence efforts to track the students' mastery of learning outcomes that lead to credentials. Marketing is also working very hard with us and promoting guided pathways and also targeting our community by sending materials through the mail, because we understand for families, especially for parents, it's good for them to receive regular mail rather than using the social media. These materials will be bilingual, as well. Centers of excellence, we are revamping our programs, such as automotive, welding, and journalism to reflect 21st Century skills. We have seen increase in enrollment in Applied Technology. The head count has increased by 117%, fall 2020. Also, information technology and cybersecurity enrollment has increased. It's up 6.19% in the fall. And then also hospitality leadership enrollment is up 31.49% in the fall, as well. Academic affairs is also looking at curriculum program viability and the 21st Century skills. Working with workforce, you have probably heard we have been launching the promotion of the Fast Track microcredentials. In three weeks we had 400 inquiries. I think it's next week that information technology and cybersecurity Fast Track will be starting. As I said, we are revamping curriculum using 21st Century skills. As a refresher, that includes critical thinking, empathy, collaboration, digital influence, self-awareness. These are things that employers are looking for out of our students. Another item that we need to look at carefully with our faculty is redefining liberal arts. It's our bread and butter of this institution, definitely. But we need to look at it and how do we incorporate the 21st Century skills? How do we incorporate and make it relevant for our students going into either transferring or to the workforce? My background, my own academic background, is in the liberal arts. Liberal arts are very important. They help us understand who we are, our identity, culture, society, art, preserving the past while learning how to navigate in the present, providing us with the appropriate tools to imagine the future with equity and empathy. We need to make it current so that our employers are looking at our students to hire. Liberal arts are key. We can do both. So in addition to that, the HLC has talked about, has redone, revised their standards and acting on our findings with program review and program viability. That means that we have to look carefully at our classes that are consistently low-enrolled and we need to make sure our programs are relevant, as I stated. Another item that we are working on is transfer rates and partnerships. For example, we had a meeting yesterday with Banner University Medicine with their leadership team. We are creating those, strengthening those partnerships so our students can work at these hospitals, for example, but they were saying that the message really should be not only for the health professions, but hospitals have finance employees, they have IT, they have culinary, plumbing, and so all of these areas we can have our students go into in hospitals, as well. Today we met with Catholic University leadership as well and were talking about partnering more with, for example, in addition to business but also nursing and cybersecurity. These are very vivid. We have had recent talks with the U of A and how we can perhaps do co-branding and make sure, perhaps students that didn't quite get into admission to the U of A but very close, they can start classes at Pima and then continue at the U of A but guaranteed admittance to the University. We are having those conversations as well. Student engagement is very key and we work closely with student affairs leadership team. Student Life, student clubs, our faculty are advisors to student club organizations. Pima Connect Early Alert tool is key for retention as well. We have seen 10% increases in courses that participated in Early Alert. Also faculty advising. In fact, Faculty Senate and administrative meeting as well as the Faculty Senate meeting last Friday, we had robust a conversation about how faculty advising is important to retention. So they will be compiling all of the different strategies that they are using and thinking of additional ones to help our students with retention, so we are very excited about that. We also have embedded tutoring and embedded librarians. I wanted to show you another slide here about multiple measures just to give you some information about this. As you can see, the success of multiple measures, gateway math successes by 68.9% from 2015 to '19. For our Latinx students, 17- to 19-year-olds, the number of completers increased greatly by 200% in gateway math. So we see that these strategies are working for our students. Back to the previous slide. Dual enrollment has been a great success. James Palacios has done an outstanding job. We have tripled the number of classes to teach dual enrollment. We have increased the number of schools that have hosted dual enrollment courses by 22%. Now we are going to be focusing on reaching those students, making sure that those students continue at Pima College. Other initiatives are the AACU OER Institute. Pima's team has identified the goal of reducing the costs of textbooks at least by 10%. Also, the team is developing a series of strategies that will help this endeavor for zero-cost texts and low-cost texts and providing professional development for OER. The Gardner Institute, student success and retention academy, we have a Pima team working on that as well. The Gardner Institute focuses and champions equity and social justice and wants to advance retention practices such as race and family income that are no longer the best predictor of student success in higher education. The team wants to focus on the part-time students, how we can better serve our part-time students and increase the retention rates. We have equitable grading initiatives going on. The deans are focusing with their department heads on DFW grades, taking a deeper dive. We called it the wildly important goal for deans, the WIG. Data tells us what is and what was, and using data we can implement and act and create creativity about how we can address these DFW rates for our students to increase their retention and completion. The UN sustainable development goals open pedagogy fellowship, that's another initiative that was started by a faculty member. This is going to provide several faculty members, about 14 of them, to participate in the fellowship where they have the opportunity to learn about and apply OER and open pedagogy to social justice. This is where students, this is kind of reversing the classroom where the students are creating the content for the classes and helping to teach. I'd like to share just a couple, I know I'm running out of time, of retention examples by divisions, and you can see them listed there. I'd like to thank the deans and the faculty who have worked very hard on persistence and retention strategies and recruitment. For example, in applied technology, program advisors follow up with the learners when they are nearing their degree completion. The applied technology program partners with community groups, workforce and high schools, youth programs, for example. Business administration, I will give one example, they have developed and condensed courses to eight weeks. This format will help support student retention and completion. I believe they have created a Fast Track or will be creating one on data analytics, which is much needed right now. In communications, several disciplines within the division now use OER to support students and to minimize costs. Health professions, they use a case management faculty advising model to support students through their educational path in Pima. In math, there are embedded tutors and support coaches available within the math courses to support student success. Also, there is co-requisite support. In the humanities, social sciences and education division, the postdegree teacher certification program created a social media campaign to recruit students and help address the teacher shortage in Arizona. They have included faculty from several disciplines supporting the food pantry. Also, there has been diversification of the curriculum to include African-American and Asian-American studies and a grant proposal to the National Endowment of the Humanities to develop curriculum in border culture studies. The arts have numerous exhibits and performances that I hope all of us can attend and support, highlighted showcase of various digital media platforms and PCC arts to support recruitment to students. The sciences, they have community and high school outreach and events that are represented by faculty who support the recruitment efforts and career advising. PimaOnline, they have redesigned the orientation on online learning to better support online and virtual learners, specifically now that we went into this mode where students were not familiar with this modality. Also, online success coaches are assigned to courses to support the reduction of online versus nononline success gaps. So you can see the divisions have been working very hard on these efforts, as well. So with retention, we must be creative and innovative, and it will be key to require more flexible schedules, for example, perhaps even more self-paced courses. Boot camps, mentorship programs, childcare assistance as we are talking about childcare, the improvement also of social opportunities for students. We must recognize that attracting and keeping nontraditional students will be key. We need to work and continue working on reskilling and upskilling that alignment. In addition, other things to consider, we should be creating pathways that extend into the high schools, align general education pathways to each campus while being strategic with the 200-level courses. Building HyFlex classrooms, having childcare for our students, and also a new initiative with climate change. These efforts with climate change are system-wide and we will be needing to make this also a priority for the college and also for our community. Last month, Board Member Garcia asked about Tucson zip codes. So I hope this will help provide some information for you. The zip codes that you see there highlighted, there are seven of them. These demonstrate the lowest per capita income and highest poverty rates. What the college will be doing now is looking at how we can research in potential ways that Pima can be of service to these communities. We want to explore, for example, taking mobile units to the communities, such as automotive or HVAC. There has been talk about doing teledentistry, as well. So, Board Member Garcia and board members, if you want other details about the zip codes, please let me know. Happy to share that with you. So students, they must know that they are being supported. They need to feel that sense of belonging, of being at Pima as a family. They need to feel socially connected. They need to know that we care. We need to create also a culture of inquiry and use our data. As I said, data demonstrates what is and what was. But what matters is that we act, that we do plan and act. In higher education, sometimes we like to talk a lot, and the implementation takes a little bit longer, but we need to accelerate what we need to do to serve our students in our community. That urgency is here and we need to adapt now. Pima can help our community, our students, and economic mobility for the families. I'd like to end with a quote from representative John Lewis. "When you see something that is not right, not fair, not just, you have a moral obligation, a mission and a mandate to stand up, to speak up, and speak out and get in the way, get in trouble, good trouble, necessary trouble." So let's get into good trouble for the sake of our students and of our community. (Speaking Spanish.) Thank you. Are there any questions? >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much, Dr. Duran-Cerda. Looks like Dr. Hay has a question and Ms. Garcia. >> DR. MEREDITH HAY: Yes. So I just want to take a moment to thank the provost for this extraordinary presentation. You know, as you all know, I am a little bit familiar with what she does as a job, and it is extraordinary, Dolores, what you have pulled together, and your team and how much -- I mean, there must have been 200 action items that you have worked on over the last four years, and the progress has been extraordinary. I implore my board members who don't maybe spend their life thinking about retention and persistence to really meet with Dolores and meet with the chancellor and understand the depth of commitment, the depth of work needed to pull off what the provost has just articulated. I think probably that Pima Community College is leading the way in the nation in terms of these efforts in persistence and retention and it doesn't come by accident. Pay attention, Board Members. This is huge. What she has just articulated is probably a template for how to be a successful community college moving forward in these times. I congratulate her and I congratulate the chancellor and the entire team for the extraordinary work that has gone on for the last four years to pull all this off and continue to strive, continue to make these efforts, and never stop working, never stop struggling. You are absolutely right about invoking John Lewis. We have just begun, but we have gotten this far because of the hard work of the provost and her team and the deans and the faculty and the leadership, quite frankly, of Chancellor Lambert, and I thank you all for everything you have done. Thank you. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you, Dr. Hay. Well said. Ms. Garcia? >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: Provost Dolores, a couple of things that I would like to see on the graph -- I think you have done a great job in identifying these areas of improvement. But I think some of the things, and I could be wrong, but some of the things I think are lacking are even though you show persistence and retention as being pretty much leveling and keeping things, but you need to really identify it by programs and enrollment, you know, by program. Also, I would like to -- a trend line maybe? And then, in addition to that, I'd like to see within the last four years what has the budget been for these initiatives and what is it going to be now? I think that would be helpful. >> DR. DOLORES DURAN-CERDA: Okay. We can pull that together for you. >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: Thank you. Great job. >> MS. CATHERINE RIPLEY: Provost Duran-Cerda, thank you very much for not only some great data and a wonderful plan, but very beautifully articulated. I appreciate that a lot. I know a lot of work went into that, and it also goes hand in hand and it dovetails so beautifully with the last presentation from last board meeting that Dr. Doré provided to us. This is really the foundation of what we, as board members, need to be supporting and doing. It is concentration on retention but also recruitment and enrollment and follow-through. Retention not just one year but the whole life cycle of a student. Thank you so much for articulating that. I'm glad you quoted John Lewis, as well, because I think this is the time, and I'm sure you worked on this for the last three years even before COVID, but this is the time for bold measures based on what's been happening even before COVID. So it's timely. I look forward to seeing this implemented and executed and seeing it through to fruition. I know it's ongoing, never-ending, so I thank you for that. Beautifully done. Thank you. >> DR. DOLORES DURAN-CERDA: Thank you. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Ms. Garcia? Another question? >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: No. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Your hand was still raised. >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: Let me take it off. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Provost Duran-Cerda, I also just want to articulate my gratitude for all of the work. You know, I think Dr. Hay is absolutely right. You're creating an innovative roadmap that is both invigorated and also visionary. There is no solution, there is no silver bullet to resolve this in a single action. This multi-pronged, innovative approach is really a movement in the right direction. Thank you for sharing with us more in depth the way all these different initiatives we have been hearing about coalesce together. We really appreciate the hard work. Thank you very much. >> DR. DOLORES DURAN-CERDA: Thank you all for your comments and your support. It's a team effort. We wouldn't be able to do this without your support, as well. I'm just grateful for the leadership at the college and chancellor and our academic affairs, the deans, the faculty, everybody. It's a collective effort, and we care about our students and our community and it shows through the work that we do. Thank you. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Well said. We are all on this ship together. Thank you. Next we have our reports by representatives to the board, 2.2. Our first representative is our student report from Collin Bryant. Mr. Bryant? >> COLLIN BRYANT: Hello, Chair Clinco, Chancellor Lambert, Governing Board members, faculty, fellow students, guests. I'd like to give myself a brief introduction. I'm Collin Bryant. This is my second year here virtually at Pima Community College. Right now I am finishing up my AGEC-S certificate, and I'm looking to transfer to NAU to complete a chemistry degree. I'm a liaison for our Phi Theta Kappa chapter Alpha Beta Chi, and I'm also the Governing Board representative for Student Senate. I'm looking forward to becoming familiar with our Governing Board, and I'm excited for the experience I will gain from this position. I'd like to let you all know that this year's group of student senators is something special. We are a tight-knit group of students from several different areas of study. We have kept in touch with each other on a near daily basis since April and we even held virtual meetings during the summer to get up to speed on what is expected in our newfound positions. As a result, we have been well prepared to share what we believe can improve the college. The initiative in this group is like I have never seen before, and it's largely what makes me so proud to call myself a student senator. There is a lot we want to get done this year. First off, because Student Senate does meet during the summer, I strongly recommend that future student representatives be added to the agenda to report for September meetings. All summer I was under the impression that we were going to be reporting at the September meeting. Now, this change won't affect me or the rest of this year's Student Senate, but it will make it more efficient for future groups because they will be able to propose and get started on projects earlier in the year. Moving on, there is a pretty big on-campus issue that I'm pushing to get looked at by our Student Senate, and I'd like to bring it to the board's attention. At the Downtown Campus, as well as others, but specifically the Downtown Campus, there are dark areas that students have to walk through to get to their cars after their evening classes. Just by word of mouth, there have been several reports by many students feeling uncomfortable walking in the dark. Many are choosing to walk in groups. It would be immensely helpful to have better lighting around each campus, but again, specifically Downtown. As far as what Student Senate can do right now we are looking to giving surveys to students to gauge their comfort on campuses. We are looking to put together a team of volunteers to walk around campuses and map out the dark spots at night. This data from these two campaigns could be combined to rank which spots at which campuses need to be prioritized to get light. Another on-campus issue I'd like to bring up is lack of cell service at East Campus as well as the poor WiFi signal on other campuses. While I fear that the cell service may be out of the scope of what Student Senate can do, we can make up for that by pushing for an upgrade in our WiFi. The WiFi available to students is decent at best indoors, but if the student decides to work outside, the signal drops significantly. We'd like to get in touch with the IT department on each campus to express this concern and find a solution to the problem. That is all I have to report this evening. Thank you. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much, Mr. Bryant. Chancellor Lambert, I think each of these issues are actually very critical. One is a safety issue, one is an access issue, and one is a communications issue. Is there anything we can do to accelerate this and really look at these in a much more robust time frame to try to get them addressed? Particularly the WiFi issues, if we are having WiFi connectivity issues in our campus buildings, that's something we need to get fixed immediately. Is that something you could take a look at and report back to us at the next meeting? >> DR. LEE LAMBERT: So David, President Doré, is going to be meeting with the students I believe on Friday to better understand these concerns, to look at what we can do to address them. We appreciate that the students are bringing them forward so that we can make sure we are trying to meet those needs. As we move to a community policing model, hopefully more of that touchpoints can be factored in to providing that safe passage out to the parking lots and between buildings, et cetera. On the WiFi pieces, I will have Dave follow up with the students as well and see what we can do there. Cellphone may be a little more challenging, but with WiFi, we probably need to increase some of our locations and make sure that the current technology is keeping pace. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Okay. So if you could just report back to us next month sort of what the outcomes are, we'd really appreciate it. Thank you again, Mr. Bryant, for bringing these issues forward. I think they are of concern to the whole institution. Next report is adjunct faculty report with Sean Mendoza. Mr. Mendoza, you are up. >> SEAN MENDOZA: Chairman Clinco, Chancellor Lambert, members of the board, honored guests. As you may have read from my board report, a number of exciting events are occurring this month. Of those submitted in this month's board report, there is one item in particular I wanted to update you on today. As you may know, the college is engaged in a classification and compensation study. Unfortunately the adjunct faculty will not be a group included in this study. After speaking with administration, I have been told that the current study focuses specifically on full-time employees similar to the Fox Lawson study some 20 years ago, back when I was a young lad. Given the changes that the college and the world has undergone since that time, I'd ask the college consider future studies to include our employee group when determining the impact of adjunct faculty on the institution's success and that of our students and the community. On a positive note, Dr. Bea has agreed to work with us to explore concepts like a tiered system or pro rata faculty mentioned by the chancellor and the college community in previous conditions. It's our hope that these initiatives will lead to the retention of high-performing, student-centered, and student-ready educators to our rights. Thank you, Dr. Bea, for your guidance, and we look forward to working with you in these exciting issues. As always, thank you for your time and support to the adjunct faculty. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much. If you could please report back to us how those conversations go and what the tiered program looks like, we'd like to know more. As we are getting the class and comp study, Chancellor Lambert, if you could report back to us if there are opportunities to include the adjunct faculty in the process? >> DR. LEE LAMBERT: Mr. Chair, we will make sure we address the adjunct pay issue. >> SEAN MENDOZA: Thank you. >> DR. LEE LAMBERT: It may be a little more challenging in terms of getting the kind of accurate data, but we will be able to come up with something that allows us to really especially benchmark against our regional market in terms of where adjunct faculty may have opportunities and options. So we'll look at that. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much. Our next report is faculty report from Denise Reilly. >> DENISE REILLY: Hi. Good evening. Thank you, Chairperson Clinco, members of the board, Chancellor Lambert, colleagues and guests. I'm Denise Reilly. I'm student success faculty under the division of college readiness and student success. Second report, no longer a newbie. A synopsis of what you got in the Faculty Senate report is we received a presentation about OER, and Dr. Duran-Cerda mentioned that earlier, and the future of the initiative at the college. We held officer elections for the 2020 year and more information will be forthcoming. We received typical reports including the president's report, recruitment and retention reports, which you have heard much about tonight. PCCEA, provost, and Governing Board report. Of note, the admin and Faculty Senate leadership meeting, most of the conversation centered around enrollment and retention efforts, as Dolores mentioned earlier this evening, academic and workforce planning, and updates related to the pandemic. I want to mention that discussion mainly centered around faculty pay and shared governance -- those were kind of the two main areas that were considered -- and the role of the faculty in the class and comp study. I know we have heard these words tonight several times tonight, the class and comp study. But we have a couple steering committee representatives, and there is definitely some questions around the transparency, inclusivity, these things were being raised in a greater, larger context. And so I want to mention this is a little bit strange because when I report to you, I have already submitted my Governing Board report a week and a half ago, so it's kind of off-center because what happens is we then have a regular Faculty Senate meeting and then a leadership meeting following that. So a lot has actually transpired since this report I made, and a lot of it really does have to do with the classification and compensation study, a lot has to deal with this uneasiness related to transparency, inclusivity, and equity around this. So I just want to bring this up, as this is something faculty is concerned about, it's something that you have heard over and over tonight, but it's something that probably will be discussed more extensively in the next report. We did have some faculty notable accomplishments, and I mentioned this last time, related to the Teaching and Learning Center and the UnTeaching and UnLearning Summit. I did mention last time there was a statement that Faculty Senate wanted to read to the board members, and I wanted to repeat the statement again to see if there are any questions or thoughts. I also want to encourage you, if at all possible, to attend either our November or December Faculty Senate meetings. Just the same way as any new employee is encouraged to attend a board meeting to see the lay of the land and how things go, I'd encourage any board members to attend one of our Faculty Senate meetings to just kind of check it out and see what that's like. I know you have busy schedules. I will read this statement one more time and just see if there are any questions from any board members or thoughts. Our statement goes, faculty senators are approached more frequently by our colleagues and constituents regarding employee pay at the college. We understand that finances are especially volatile given the depressed levels of enrollment college-wide and the ongoing pandemic. But faculty senators are concerned with the current allocation of funds. The Faculty Senate is interested in hearing from faculty colleagues on the classification and compensation faculty steering committee, having Faculty Senate officers collaborate during their administrative meetings with members of ELT, and exploring how faculty, staff, and administration can all work together on how to allocate funds in ways that will optimize academic excellence and student success. At this point, we have met, so since this statement, we have met with faculty steering committee representatives, we have met with the provost, vice provost, and chancellor. Then in our next month's report we will probably have a little bit more extensive information and follow-up on how these are transpiring, but I wanted to ask if the board had any questions or thoughts or comments on the statement this time. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Mr. Silvyn, could you provide a little bit of clarity? We can't get into a substantive conversation, but we could provide something, right? >> MR. JEFF SILVYN: So the compensation is not an agenda topic. There is clearly going to be discussions about compensation and the study result and budget obviously on future agendas, but for this evening, if a board member had a specific question or topic they would like addressed at a future meeting, I think it would be fine to mention that, but as you know, this isn't the right venue to have a dialogue about that at this point in time. There will be opportunities to do that on a different occasion. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: A couple of things, Denise, thank you so much for your presentation. I think by continuing to remind us of that position statement is very helpful. It keeps the topic really fresh and I think it keeps the board aware of the continuing concerns of the Faculty Senate. I think there really is value in that. I think the other important thing is you are the representative from the faculty, so we know that things have happened since the report was submitted, and you, of course, are more than welcome to share with us during this report those types of things. So I know you're new to the position and it's unusual because we have only known you in this online context. We really appreciate all the work you're doing to bring these issues forward. But definitely keep us up to date. You don't have to just give us verbatim what's in the report. You can give us the current events, and we know there has always been that timing. >> DENISE REILLY: Absolutely. No, thank you. I appreciate that. I just wanted to make you aware that there have been conversations had since then, so it's not just what's in the report, but we have been in communications and we have been told by executive leadership that we are working through this. I just wanted to make sure to clarify that so it doesn't seem like we are throwing this information out and nothing has happened since. We have actually had a couple meetings since. No, thank you. I appreciate that. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: We really appreciate it and again thank you for bringing the concerns and the issues forward. Our next report is Jeff Thies. Mr. Thies? You are up. >> JEFF THIES: Good evening, Chairperson Clinco, Chancellor Lambert, board members, students, colleagues and guests. I am Jeff Thies, dean of college readiness and student success. I'm providing the administrative report this evening. First I'd like it take a quick second to thank all of our Pima Community College tutors for all of the support they provide our students. It's a great persistence and retention strategy. It happens to be Tutor Appreciation Week. If you're on campus, stop by a learning center and thank a tutor. Tonight I'm going to share content from three areas. Arts division, communications division, and a portion of the equity in retention academy report. It will be finished and out soon. I'm going to start off with the equity report. I will reference two tables, so if you're out there in the listening world, I recommend downloading the report from the board agenda. To get started, the equity in retention academy team consisted of five Pima employees that worked through the summer and the first part of this fall to put together a plan to support equity in retention. The team utilized the Voluntary Framework of Accountability reports that are at our disposal, thanks to STAR, focusing on metrics that exist to measure the important milestones that are known to be leading indicators of completion. The first table provides indications of positive movement in several areas, as you would imagine based on the earlier report from the provost. Of note, the percentage of part-time, first time in college students that have earned at least six credits in the first semester, part-time cohort, which we know is about 70% of our population, that's a group we want to definitely be checking out. At least six credits in the first semester has increased to just under a quarter to over a third in the last four fall semesters that we have data for, a 50% increase. The number of students completing the math milestone has nearly tripled, a sign that the redesigned concepts we have been working through are supporting part-time students as well. Reviewing the same data with an equity lens, focused on our two largest student populations, we do still find several challenges, so there's plenty of good work to be done, so we want to get in good trouble moving forward. The good news is that the Latinx student population has made significant progress in the first three measures. Challenge is that the gap still exists. The positive is we are making great strides for our Latinx population. The challenge is there is still that gap between Latinx and the White population. American-Indian, Alaska Native, Black/African-American populations can also be provided and are provided in a larger chart. The challenge with those is it's a very small in for both of those. When you disaggregate to part-time, first time to college, the trend is much more roller-coastery because of the small number of students that fit those definitions. Communications and arts divisions, a lot going on. I won't be able to cover everything in the report. Again, please download the report. Read through the great work that's been going on. To spotlight a few, from the communications division, they have been working on a lot of curriculum upgrades. Creative writing, communication courses, academic and critical learning and reading, first year writing, literature, working to add OER to their D2L shell, open ed resources, making courses much cheaper from a textbook standpoint. They've been centering on inclusive and authentic learning environments, making sure to contextualize to the local region, Southwestern region and its environmental concerns. A lot of activity from the communications division from a curriculum standpoint and also from a community standpoint. The curiosity symposium is resuming virtually with monthly discussions touching on reading, writing, storytelling. Also, the division has reached out and it's continuing to reach out to local businesses and corporations like Geico to review the communications classes on-site. This would include micro- or mini-targeted classes that focus on their needs. Lastly, from the communications division, they are partnering with both the Pima County courthouse and our own health professions and biomedical sciences department on new course development. The noncredit partnership with the courthouse is in response to a direct community need and will focus on elements of our advanced professional communications course, writing 254. Arts has been very busy. Our dean of arts was featured on Kgun9, did a segment how Pima arts are back up providing live performances. We also had former Pima AFA student Vanessa Saavedra's 1810 to question mark piece was featured and also the cover art in Mexican Gallery exhibit Las Iluministas, also featured in Pink Collar Gallery in the United Kingdom. Other things from the arts division, Sela Garcia, a student and stage manager for Little Shop of Horrors, excited about that, has created videos to meet the cast. You can jump online and see the cast in anticipation of that production. The Art Gallery at the Downtown Campus opened several weeks ago with the exhibit Lockdown Year. The exhibit presents artwork created by Pima students during the year of COVID. It's a great quick walk-through upstairs in the CC building the next time you're at Downtown Campus. The Visual Arts Gallery at West Campus, Egress No. 2 exhibit opened featuring student artwork from spring 2021. A few other short pieces of information. Former dance student, Eva Schmidt, that name may sound familiar, makes the front page of the website, and it's a great story about her moving to New York. Proud mama there. Pima was featured in a KVOA segment. Pima Arts Department presented unique artwork to the Citizen Diplomacy Alliance's nonprofit executive director Pat Watson. The piece was created by Russian Paralympians that happened to visit Pima in 2019. Made of clay medals and a cholla cactus wood branch to symbolize the 2020 Paralympic Games and the Southern Arizona landscape. That concludes my report from the administrators. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much. We really appreciate it. Michael Lopez was having technical problems this evening, so he will not be giving a report. His written report is online. Next is the chancellor's report. Chancellor Lambert? >> DR. LEE LAMBERT: Good evening, everybody. I just want to thank everybody for the tremendous hard work and resiliency that everyone has shown throughout the past 19 months, and throughout all of that, Pima continues to do some amazing things. Today we have had a number of exciting events occur at the college and in the community. I want to highlight just a few and some other activities. This morning, I was asked to do a welcome address for the National Council on Workforce Education who held their national conference here in Tucson, Arizona. It was their first conference they have had in person since the pandemic, and I'm proud to say that our very own Dean Amanda Abens is on the board. During the afternoon session, Pima received an award of excellence from the NCWE for our work with the paramedics partnership with United States Air Force. So we have a lot to be proud of in terms of what we are doing, and it's being recognized all the way across the country. During that same event, Jamie Merisotis, if you don't know that name, he's the CEO of the Lumina Foundation. The Lumina Foundation is important to those of us in higher education. So I just want to read an excerpt from his latest book called Human Work. I think it reflects what the provost was talking about earlier, and it really is shaping the vision of the college, but we were doing all these things before he wrote this book. I just want you to put that in context. This combination of abilities, knowledge, and skills, which evolves throughout life is what we should be calling talent. What this means is that learning is the work and the highest purpose of work is that it leads to learning. In other words, work is learning. Learning is work. They happen together in the human work ecosystem. In the human work ecosystem, education and employment are tied together in unprecedented ways. Indeed they are merging into one activity. I share this, because when you listen to what Provost Duran-Cerda was saying earlier, we have to look at especially the liberal arts and we are going to put greater attention on liberal arts because that's the area of the college where we are seeing the most enrollment loss, and we've got to bring them up and make them more relevant to the reality of what you just heard me read. This isn't just coming from one of the preeminent thought leaders in the nation. You're seeing this coming from other preeminent thought leaders across the nation as well that this notion of workforce and liberal arts have to be more integrated. Ian can tell you, him and I are part of a group through MIT talking about the workforce relevance of the liberal arts. So I think what we are going to see going forward is just greater attention to help strengthen the liberal arts so that they remain relevant. I know we were in a student panel recently, and one of the students, we don't know if his is the exception or the rule but we're going to find out, he was not necessarily pleased with some of his experiences at Pima, and he said he can go to YouTube and get the same thing for free. Well, we have to take that seriously. I think that ties back to what we are hearing the larger conversation, that this notion of work and learning really fuse together, and I'm so excited because during the Catholic U ribbon cutting, President Garvey and his team were here, we are so excited about that partnership, but that partnership is really about the fusion of the work and learning components as we build this applied business program together, and we are so pleased that we have already launched that partnership. But the challenge has been it was launched during the pandemic, and so they were not able to be out in the high schools recruiting face-to-face, but all of that is changing now, as you know, so we explored other ways we can take these concepts and fuse them into other programmattic areas. You heard Dolores make reference to some of them. We are very excited about that. Just last week, David and I were in conversations with a very prominent person in our community who helped create the Center of Opportunity in partnership with the Gospel Rescue Mission. So we are going to be getting greater support to do some of the programming that you're seeing that is really in many ways tied to the micropathways that you have heard again the provost make reference to, Pima Fast Track. So you're going to see more of that as we go forward. I want to clarify something that the provost was also -- she shared with you the data of completion that was pandemic data. Prepandemic, our completion numbers were closer to 3,800 a year, so 3,800 to that 6,000 number, I just didn't want it to seem like it's way outside the possibility to get to 6,000. It's still a stretch from 3,800 to 6,000, but we are willing to stretch, to try to get there will, because our students need that from us, and so we are going to be doubling down our efforts. But this notion that she made reference to about the liberal arts are going to be essential to doing that, because that's the side of the college we've got to boost up and find new innovative ways. That was the other thing President Garvey noticed about the work at Pima. They were very impressed with the creativity, just our ingenuity and the fact that we really are moving things in a different way than what you see in more of a traditional higher education model. I will loop that back to our conversation with Banner. In that conversation, they were sharing areas where they were having some challenges in their own workplaces, and so financial literacy, computer literacy, resiliency were things they brought up. As we delved a little deeper into the financial literacy piece, they really highlighted employees need to understand the business model of healthcare better. I think that's also true about us in higher education, that our employees need to understand the business model of higher education better. We are looking to collaborate on something together, but we will do more internally at the college to help people understand what our business model is so that way folks have a better foundation for how the college operates as we go forward. Also, we are excited about San Diego. I know many of you will be there with us from the board. Demion is going to receive the Trustee of the Year for the Pacific Region, and Mays Imad is going to be receiving Faculty of the Year for the Pacific Region. They are both in consideration for the national award, so let's give them our best thoughts and hope that one or both of them receive that national award as Trustee of the Year and Faculty of the Year. We are so excited that we have two individuals. And just for history, Pima, over the last few years, we have had other individuals be nominated for CEO of the Year, for Diversity, Equity of the Year, both times Pacific Region and one time walking away with the national award. We are making a big difference. Aspen Institute has recognized Pima Community College as a top 150 community college in the country two times in a row. So these are things that we have to not lose context about. Yes, we have our challenges internally. Communications is always a challenge. I have never worked anyplace where it wasn't a challenge. But the key is that we continue to engage with each other. We do it civilly, respectfully, and then we can work through pieces. I have been at other places where we talk class comp. Class comp is a sensitive topic, and it always will be sensitive. There are always, and I said this in the beginning, there are people who will gain from that and some people who do not move anywhere from that and there are some people who will be negatively impacted by a class comp study. But there are systems that we put in place in order to mitigate against the group who would be negatively impacted by not negatively impacting them. The goal is, and that's where the committee comes in, we have to talk about these are the decision points, who do we move up first and by what percent to move them back into the range that makes their wages competitive. That's an important decision point. Siegel is not going to make that decision. So the committee is going to make recommendations around those kinds of decision points that will ultimately come to the board for the final decision. So I think that's been part of the confusion with class comp was when does the committee's role really kick in. And I will own that, because there should have been better clarity up front that this has been the research phase, a lot of data gathering that wasn't a lot for the committee to do in this phase. It's once the data is all gathered, now we can talk about how do we move that forward. Those are the decisions we have to make as an institution. But never lose sight, it's in the context of the overall budget, what can we devote to making salary adjustments accordingly. With all that said, I just want to emphasize we are doing so many great things, and we should never forget the positive things. It's easy to only focus on what's not being done, but if you look at things on balance, we are leading the way and that would not happen if people have not bought into the vision that we have set forth for the college. I will close with this. The City of Tucson just put out a press release. The City of Tucson and Pima Community College have received the Excellence in Economic Development Award by the International Economic Development Council. Again, another example of the great work we are doing in this community. Thank you, Mr. Chair. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much. >> DR. MEREDITH HAY: Hear, hear. Great work. If I was there, I'd be clapping. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: It's really impressive the work that's happening across the institution. Thank you for your leadership. Moving on, we have our information items. They are posted online. Next we have our consent agenda. They are posted online with all of the backup material. Is there a motion to adopt the consent agenda? >> DR. MEREDITH HAY: So moved. >> MS. CATHERINE RIPLEY: Second. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Any discussion? Hearing none, all in favor of the motion signify by saying aye? (Ayes.) >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you. Next we have our action items. First is the intergovernmental agreement between Housing and Urban Development, HUD, choice planning and action grant, City of Tucson, PCC, DO, and M&S. Mr. Silvyn, could you read the recommendation? >> MR. JEFF SILVYN: Yes, I'd be glad to, Mr. Chair. The chancellor recommends that the Governing Board authorize the chancellor or designee to execute an intergovernmental agreement for the Thrive in the 05 Choice Neighborhoods Planning and Action Grant Subaward from the City of Tucson's Department of Housing and Community Development funded by the United States Department of Housing and Urban Development. The subaward amount awarded to the college to complete the Tucson Inn neon sign restoration project is $25,000 for the performance period from October 1, 2021, through September 30, 2022. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Do I have a motion to adopt the recommendation? >> DR. MEREDITH HAY: So moved. >> MS. CATHERINE RIPLEY: Second. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Discussion? Ms. Garcia? >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: So I'd like to know, my understanding, and I don't know if I read it right, so we're going to contribute $10,000, the city will contribute 25 for the restoration, and from that point on we will continue to take on that maintenance ourselves, Pima will? >> DR. LEE LAMBERT: So the answer, you know, is yes, on a go-forward basis, it is our responsibility. Also, if you wouldn't mind, I actually asked Dr. David Doré to talk a little more about the Thrive in the 05 project so you can see it in its fuller context, if you'd like to hear that piece, and then the other piece, it is tied to our work with the Thrive in the 05. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Dr. Doré? Do you want to give that presentation? If there are follow-up questions we can get those answered. >> DR. DORÉ: Thank you, Chair Clinco, members of the board, Chancellor Lambert. Just a background, the Thrive in the 05 initiative, that was developed in 2018, and the real goal is to promote safety and well-being and really to empower and to ensure that all community members have access to education essentially and so forth. Provost Duran-Cerda, she cited that that zip code is one of the poorest zip codes in Pima County. So what we have done is we have partnered with the city, we have a joint position, and we are really taking a collective impact approach to really regenerating this area, trying to have really responsible development, which means those community members that are in that zip code, really trying to lift them up and find employment with them. We have done a lot of I think really innovative partnerships. We have really reached out to that community through this initiative. You're beginning to see that area come alive. The hope is that, you know, The Tucson House will receive the 30 million federal grant to restore that house. That's public housing for the City of Tucson. Half of the community members in The Tucson House are disabled. The other half are seniors. So one of the things that we have been doing as well as that outreach to the disabled community really to get them into our programs. Interestingly enough, these micropathways, the Fast Track initiative, has been very, very successful in the 05 area. That gives you a little bit of context of kind of what's going on in the initiative. What we have done also is we are partnering around crime prevention, so we've been working very, very closely with the Tucson Police Department to reduce crime in that area, as well. As many of you know, that has been a high crime area. It's in our best interest really to reduce crime around the Downtown Campus. We have been very involved with Parks & Rec. De Anza Park, across the street from the Downtown Campus, just installed a new dog park in that area. They have sand volleyball in there and really trying to make that more attractive to our students. Gives you a little bit of background. I'm more than happy to answer any questions. Then I sit on the steering committee, which is made up of Ward 3, a lot of business and nonprofits, and we are really the anchor in that whole neighborhood. >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: But how does a sign help that? >> DR. DORÉ: You know, again, I will give you my perspective, Board Member Garcia. That sign is falling apart, right? It looks really, really poor. I think one thing is the renovation of that sign, it really is I think a very high-profile change to that neighborhood and to Drachman. I think to have that sign lit up is going to dramatically change that area. We heard from our Student Senate rep today about some of the concerns, you know, legitimate concerns about Downtown Campus, and I think anything to make that area more vibrant and more safe will serve our students very, very well, from my perspective. >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: Well, I don't know. You know, I guess I look at the longevity of that sign and how much more is the college going to be paying for it. It's got to be an expensive maintenance. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Any other questions from any other board members? Okay. Hearing none, all in favor of the motion, signify by saying aye? (Ayes.) >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Opposed? >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: Opposed. >> MR. LUIS GONZALES: Opposed. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: The motion carries 3-2 with Ms. Garcia and Mr. Gonzales dissenting. Next item is the COVID vaccine incentive program for employers. We had a discussion in our executive session about some of the federal regulatory requirements that are coming. So at this point, I would move that we table this item for the November agenda or a future agenda, let's say to a future agenda, when there is a little more information in terms of what the federal government is going to be doing. Is there a second on that motion? >> DR. MEREDITH HAY: So moved. >> MS. CATHERINE RIPLEY: Second. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Discussion? So no other questions? Okay. All in favor of tabling to a future agenda, signify by saying aye? (Ayes.) >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Opposed? I think I heard everybody. It passes unanimously. 5.3, discussion of possible approval to extend the term of the chancellor's existing contract by one year. Again, we had some internal discussion during our executive session, so at this point I would recommend or make a motion that we table this to the November agenda. Is there a second on that motion? (Multiple seconds.) >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Any additional discussion? >> DR. MEREDITH HAY: I would, Mr. Chair, if I may, I would just like to state for the record that Chancellor Lambert has been an extraordinary leader in extraordinary times, and Pima County and the State of Arizona are grateful to him for everything he's done, and I want him to know that personally, and I want everybody in the audience to know that without Lee Lambert, Chancellor Lambert, we would not be in a position of strength that we are today. Thank you. >> MS. CATHERINE RIPLEY: Yes, thank you. I would just like to also add to Dr. Hay's comments. I think that the discussion really focused on the contract itself and has no reflection on Chancellor Lambert's performance, which has been, I agree, extraordinary during extraordinary times. I can't even imagine anyone else doing what he's done over the last 19 months, let alone the last eight years. So this is a technical discussion. Thank you. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Thank you very much. And again, I would concur with all of that. Thank you, Chancellor Lambert, for your extraordinary leadership. You have heard it throughout the evening, but all these major initiatives you have continued to drive and assure delivery on time, we really appreciate all of the things you have done for this community. Thank you. We have a motion on the table. Any other comments? All in favor, say aye? (Ayes.) >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Opposed? The motion passes unanimously. Request for future agenda items? Any future agenda items? >> MS. MARIA GARCIA: I don't know if this is appropriate, but are we ever going to have the assessment presented for the, what is it called, LGA, people doing the assessment on the Trane? >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Yes, we do plan to have a full robust conversation on that. Mr. Silvyn or Mr. Lambert, that hasn't been fully completed yet? I don't think, it hasn't been scheduled, but do we have any expectation in terms of time frame? And do we anticipate a special study session? Looks like a special study session, but do we have an expected time frame for that? I'm seeing nods. Mr. Silvyn? >> MR. JEFF SILVYN: I think Dr. Bea has his hand raised because he's the one who has been in the most direct communication with GLHN, who I think is the consultant being referred to, so he can probably provide the best estimate. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Dr. Bea? >> DR. DAVID BEA: Chairman Clinco, members of the board, Chancellor Lambert, colleagues and guests. GLHN notified us they are probably about a week away from their conclusions, so I'd expect that we can put together that presentation for the board within the next, I would say the next month because we have to take a look and make sure that it all makes sense what they have put together, and that they are going to join us in that presentation to help facilitate the conversation. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: We appreciate it. Thank you very much. Again, we hope it will address some of the issues that were outlined earlier in the call to the audience. >> DR. DAVID BEA: Absolutely will. >> MR. DEMION CLINCO: Ms. Garcia, I hope that resolves your question? I see you shaking your head yes. Anything else? Okay. With that, we are adjourned. Thank you, all. Be safe. Continue to wash your hands and wear masks. (Adjournment.) ********************************************* DISCLAIMER: THIS CART FILE WAS PRODUCED FOR COMMUNICATION ACCESS AS AN ADA ACCOMMODATION AND MAY NOT BE 100% VERBATIM. THIS IS A DRAFT FILE AND HAS NOT BEEN PROOFREAD. IT IS SCAN-EDITED ONLY, AS PER CART INDUSTRY STANDARDS, AND MAY CONTAIN SOME PHONETICALLY REPRESENTED WORDS, INCORRECT SPELLINGS, TRANSMISSION ERRORS, AND STENOTYPE SYMBOLS OR NONSENSICAL WORDS. THIS IS NOT A LEGAL DOCUMENT AND MAY CONTAIN COPYRIGHTED, PRIVILEGED OR CONFIDENTIAL INFORMATION. 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