CHANCELLOR’S C-DIRECT
August 23, 2017
Dear Colleagues:
Welcome to the 2017-2018 Academic Year and Fall Flex
Classes started on Monday marking the beginning of our 2017-2018 academic year. We held Flex activities last week. We started smoothly, with one Flex Coordinator passing the baton to another: Miriam to Cleavon. In the short time he had to prepare and with the help of Miriam, Cleavon did well.
President Bonilla and Trustee Handy were in attendance. Tenzin Seldon, our former graduate, did it again! She inspired the faculty and everyone to be up and ready to continue the great work of the community colleges. She made us all feel how important we are, but most of all, how important we are to the students we proudly serve. Veronica Neal, pictured, delivered some insightful remarks on equity practice. We intend to have her do some in-depth work with us on the issue of equity.
We recognized six outstanding faculty and staff members:
· Silvia Cortez – I selected her because the Academic Deans have praised her as one of the most reliable people for helping them solve technology challenges in their work. One can count on Silvia for assistance.
· Brenda Martinez – I selected her because several Trustees have expressed their appreciation for her and her outstanding work putting together the Board agenda, which is not always the easiest task. Brenda works long hours to support the Board and displays the highest level of professionalism and competence.
· Theresa Chan – She is a steady and quiet force in IT. One of the things I admire about her performance, for example, was her adept organization of a large group of Peralta employees who went to a conference in Las Vegas. Though I was concerned about productivity with so large a group, it was reported to me that she skillfully organized everyone in such a way that each attended all sessions and reported back to the group.
· Hoi Ko – He has done admirable work for our Aviation program. Despite many odds and many difficulties, he has remained a steady force to help students to succeed and to partner with industry.
· Esther Cheng – Not enough praise can be given for this professional. She commands respect and is most admired by students for her strict but caring attitude. She spent her own funds to buy supplies for the Aviation program. What is remarkable is that after receiving an airplane for the Program, she immediately asked for another one. The donor agreed and will fly the airplane to Oakland soon. This will be our first air-worthy plane in the Program.
· Raquel Wanzo – Her entire family came to see her receive the award. A former student of hers shared with VC Brown and me what support she gave while the student was at Laney in a dual enrollment class. She helped her become a proficient writer, and then continued to help the student with her writing while enrolled at UCLA. The student is now working for the Oakland Promise and is a great cheerleader for Peralta.
You can watch a video about the Chancellor’s Award winners here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3FfkZPFJCo&feature=youtu.be
Call with Google
At the MLK Freedom Center “report back” from the summer trip, Congresswoman Barbara Lee asked me to connect with Google to explore how Peralta (or Merritt) could exemplify the Howard West Campus idea. Josh Quigley, from her office, facilitated a conversation with a few folks from Google that resulted in Google engaging Howard University, by inviting select computer science faculty to spend time at Google for an exchange of ideas. Students were also selected to spend a full summer session at Google. The next steps for us are to:
· Provide information and data to the Google team about Peralta and Merritt students.
· Provide information about some of our faculty.
· Hold a meeting during the Congressional Black Caucus Convention with Howard University to discuss the potential of the Black Caucus working with Peralta.
· Establish how we all work together.
New Employee Orientation
A dozen or so new employees participated in the New Employee Orientation last week. This is an endeavor created by the Management Leadership Academy at Peralta (MLDAP). The former Academy cohort is handing the program to the new Academy. These Peralta employees are awesome. They want to transform the District. With consistency and enough support, we shall overcome.
Shortage of Teachers
During the Silicon Valley Leadership Education Summit, there was a workshop on the shortage of teachers. One of the facilitators was Mo Fong from Google. She is very aware of the issues and the movement pertaining to the shortage of teachers. Because she was a Math and Science teacher, as I was, I readily connected with her to discuss what we might do together. She shared some of the work Google is doing and connected me to an organization that is aiming to recruit 100,000 STEM teachers by 2021. The organization is called 100Kin10. We are scheduled to meet again soon.
Pipeline to Medicine Meeting
An organization former PCCD General Counsel Thuy Nguyen helped to start is now exploring ways to strengthen the pipeline of minority students into the medical profession. Debra Jones of WDCE, and I attended their last meeting. The organization is moving forward with the concept and will be calling for interest from Colleges. I intend to discuss this issue with our Presidents to see what we can do.
Peralta Foundation Discussion
The College Presidents and I met with Sbeydeh Viveros Walton (incoming Foundation Board President) and Susan Rosenthal (outgoing Board President) to discuss ideas to engage the Foundation Board in enhancing the relationship between the District and the Foundation. The meeting went well, and our goal is to dialog with the Board on a new approach and foster a tight relationship among the Foundation, the Colleges and the District. We will participate in a discussion with the Foundation Board on September 13.
IT Update
Submitted by Vice Chancellor Jason Cole
It has been a busy summer here in IT. We have made a lot of progress on several projects, with a lot more to come in the very near future. Here are some highlights from the last few months:
· We’ve migrated all faculty and staff email to Office365! Everyone now has a cloud account with his or her email. We will schedule additional training sessions in September and October on the new system.
· Canvas is live! We’ve completed the integration between PeopleSoft and Canvas, and the Fall pilot classes are live. Remember, only faculty who have completed the train the trainer workshops are piloting courses this fall. We will be opening the system to more participants for Spring courses.
· We migrated the Moodle server to Azure. The Fall 17 instance is up and running on Azure to provide a more robust server environment and improve stability.
· Non-credit courses are up and running. We can now accommodate non-credit courses in PeopleSoft. The online application for non-credit is available.
· Smart Classrooms at Laney- the first of the 65 new smart classrooms at Laney is complete with another 5 nearly done. Over the next few weeks, we will roll out the rest of the classrooms at about 2 per day. We will provide training for faculty on both the use of the equipment and instructional strategies to best leverage some of the features. Training will be available in September and at the October flex day. We’ve started planning for the next phase of deployment, and additional rooms at CoA and Merritt.
Looking ahead, we are moving forward on several projects including:
1. We are in the process of kicking off the single sign-on for everyone. We hope to have a prototype in the next 4-6 weeks.
2. We will release the PeopleSoft upgrade request for proposal (RFP) in the next week. Hopefully we will award the contract in early October. Our plan is to go live with the new system for FY 18/19.
3. BCC and CoA have agreed to pilot Starfish early alert for the spring semester. We’ve started the technical integration work. Planning and functional development with counselors and faculty will start in late September.
4. The full Office365 suite will be available to all faculty, staff and students in the next few weeks. We are lining up additional training and support for the full suite.
5. We’ve ordered the new circuits from CENIC to upgrade bandwidth at all the campuses and eliminate redundant circuits. We hope to have everything installed by the end of the calendar year.
District IT will continue to work to build a technology platform to enable student success across our colleges. We will provide a monthly update here in C-Direct as well as try to improve communication in other avenues.
Jowel
Jowel C. Laguerre, Ph.D.
Chancellor
“Waking your kids up for school the first day after a break is almost as much fun as birthing them was.”
Jenny McCarthy
“You're off to great places. Today is your first day! Your mountain is waiting, so get on your way!”
Dr. Seuss
“School bells are ringing loud and clear; vacation's over, school is here.”
Winifred C. Marshal
“The first day of school - The day when the countdown to the last day of school begins.” Unknown
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