Northern Virginia Community College Board Meeting

January 29, 2018 Minutes

CALL TO ORDER - Chairman of the Board

ROLL CALL - Lindsay Mills

Board: President Scott Ralls, Chair Todd Rowley, Dr. Kerstin Carlson Le Floch, Mr. Alvie Johnson, Mr. Jason Middough, Mr. Bruce Neilson, Ms. Rosie O’Neil, Mr. Rick Pearson, Ms. Zuzana Steen, Mr. Hong Xu, and Ms. Brenda Medrano-Frias.

College: Dr. Marsha Atkins, Ms. Charlotte Calobrisi, Ms. Martha Cardoza, Ms. Diana Cline, Ms. Ina Dimkova, Mr. Dan Dusseau, Dr. Margaret Emblom-Callahan, Dr. Charles Errico, Dr. George Gabriel, Mr. John Guszak, Dr. Pamela Hilbert, Ms. Barbara Hopkins, Ms. Corinne Hurst, Mr.

Dana Kauffman, Dr. Julie Leidig, Dr. Molly Lynch, Mr. Tom Mayhew, Ms. Lindsay Mills, Ms. Kristina Ogburn, Mr. Steve Patterson, Dr. Steve Sachs, Dr. Mel Schiavelli, Ms. Robyn Seabrook, Mr. Cory Thompson, Mr. William Turner, and Ms. Elizabeth Weatherly.

A.CONSENT AGENDA

  1. Approval of the November 13, 2017, Board MeetingMinutes

RECOMMENDATION: The Northern Virginia Community College approves the November 13, 2017, Board minutes as presented.

A motion was made by Mr. Pearson, seconded by Ms. O’Neil, to approve the November 13, 2017, Board meeting minutes. With no objections, the motion passed unanimously.

A motion was made by Mr. Pearson, seconded by Mr. Neilson, to approve the Consent Agenda. With no objections, the motion passed unanimously.

B.ACTIONITEMS

Academic Curriculum and Workforce Development Committee:

  1. 2017-2018 EmeritusNominations

RECOMMENDATION: The Northern Virginia Community College Board, through the Academic Curriculum and Workforce Development Committee, approves these 19 individuals to be awarded the 2018 distinction of Professor or Classified Emeritus:

Reva Savkar, Annandale Ruth Stanton, MEC

Robert Woodke, Annandale Robert Webb, Annandale Giulio Porta, Annandale Rassa Rassai, Annandale Geraldine Barnes, Annandale Jon Burton, Alexandria

Karen Sheble, Manassas Sheri David, Manassas Frankie Harris-Lyne, MEC

Ron Buchanan, Manassas/Alexandria Carmen Figueroa, Woodbridge

John Ehle, Jr., Annandale Carlene Mackereth, College Staff Diane Mickey, Woodbridge Eloise Newsome, Woodbridge Greg Perrier,Manassas

Julia Brown, College Staff

A motion was made by Mr. Johnson, seconded by Ms. O’Neil, to approve the 19 individuals presented to the Board to be awarded the 2018 distinction of Professor or Classified Emeritus. With no objections, the motion passed unanimously.

  1. Proposed Medical Laboratory Assistant Career StudiesCertificate

RECOMMENDATION: The Northern Virginia Community College Board has reviewed and approves the proposal to establish a new Medical Laboratory Assistant career studies certificate, to be effective September 2018.

A motion was made by Mr. Neilson, seconded by Mr. Xu, to approve the proposal to establish a new Medical Laboratory Assistant career studies certificate, to be effective September 2018. With no objections, the motion passed unanimously.

C.PRESENTATION – PresidentRalls

Seefeldt Building Flood

Dr. Ralls reported that the Woodbridge campus faces a number of challenges due to the recent flood at the Seefeldt Building on January 24, 2018 and continues to remain closed. He thanked the Woodbridge leadership and team, Emergency Management team, IT staff, the Budget staff, Dr. Hill and many others at NOVA for their heroic efforts, working around the clock to respond to this major incident. He introduced Chief of Police Dan Dusseau, to give an overview of the flood and the progress to date.

Chief Dusseau explained that on Wednesday, January 24, 2018, at approximately 9:30 a.m., a sprinkler pipe on the third floor of the Seefeldt Building separated causing water to rush throughout the building. Evacuations took place immediately and no injuries were reported. There was, however, significant damage to the first, second and third floors and, as a result, a decision was made to close the campus.

The Office of Emergency Management was on site at the time of the incident and helped facilitate the building evacuation. Facilities were notified, and a Command Post was established in the WAC Building. Power was restored almost immediately. At the same time, the Provost and campus leadership began the process of relocating 855 classes to five off-campus sites and moving multiple faculty and staff offices to other campus buildings. IT responded with 40 employees to implement the necessary technology infrastructures for the alternative classrooms and offices. Shuttle services are being considered to help move students to temporary classroom locations.

There is currently an Emergency Operations Center in place to coordinate and provide continuity of operations among the multiple teams. The Emergency Management team will do a walk around tomorrow to again assess the damage and look at possible causes for the flooding. The building is expected to be closed for approximately another 30 days.

Questions/Comments:

  • How much damage was done to IT equipment? Dr. Sachs reported that most of the sensitive IT equipment was off the ground, so most of the damage occurred with the networking equipment and the cabling.
  • How does the college manage instructional continuity? Dr. Schiavelli explained that Blackboard is used during emergencies (like weather) when the college is closed. Dr. Ralls explained that continuity plans are reviewedyearly.

  • Do we know why the pipe burst? Ms. Dimkova explained that at this juncture the official cause has yet to bedetermined.
  • How do we manage those students who do not leave the building during an emergency? Mr. Dusseau explained there are a limited number of police at each campus, but campus wardens are in place at every campus, and they are trained specifically to move students out of buildings during emergency situations. After every emergency, there are wrap-up sessions to look at what worked and what could beimproved.
  • Has the college done an overall risk assessment and, if so, when was the last one done? Is there a plan for emergencies that might affect multiple campuses? Mr. Dusseau explained that the Emergency Management team visits every campus tolook at their plans and drills take place every year. A drill was about to take place at the Seefeldt Building when the flood occurred.

Chair Rowley thanked everyone again with a “hats off to everyone,” as this is a monumental task.

NOVA’s Academic Restructuring Plan

Dr. Ralls began the reporting on the Academic Restructuring Plan by stating that a memo went out recently to all faculty and staff explaining the plan. He highlighted the fact that while NOVA is a singly accredited institution, it incorporates six campuses and centers, and the college is vulnerable when there is not commonality and consistency among the campuses. An example of this is when some universities have threatened to not accept courses from one campus due to course inconsistences.

The Board approved a six-year strategic plan in May of last year. Goals four and five were specific to the organization:

Goal 4: Develop effective processes and protocols for programmatic College-wide collective decisions that include consistent, accountable leadership and oversight of each academic program with designated “owners,” active advisory committees, clear student learning outcomes and assessments, and program reviews in all modalities of instruction.

Goal 5: Align NOVA’s organizational structures, position descriptions, and expectations for accountability with its overarching mission to support student engagement, learning, success and institutional effectiveness.

Soon after the passage of the strategic plan, work commenced over the summer and fall on a process to accomplish these goals, including extensive college-wide discussions.

The key principles of the plan include the following:

  • RevenueNeutral

  • No Job Losses
  • Strengthen Collective Decision Making/Accountability forDecisions
  • Program and Campus Facing Roles for Provosts andDeans
  • Respect Campus Identities/On-Campus ReportingStructures
  • Academic Decision Structure for allModalities

We have had successful Learning Councils that have completed their work in developing informed pathways. Program Councils will now be implemented to serve as primary collective programmatic decision-making bodies and represented by Faculty from each campus. The Councils will be coordinated by an Academic Dean and led by a Provost, each of whom will be assigned a portion of the curriculum. This body will be responsible for student success outcomes and programmatic reviews.

The Advisory Committees will continue with a comprehensive review to ensure their strength and to elevate their roles. The difference now is that we have guaranteed transfer partnerships and a Transfer Advisory Committee made up of guaranteed transfer partner designees. We will soon have Discipline-based Group that will replace the former clusters. The idea is that we will have transfer partner institutions that agree to designate lead faculty from their universities to work with our Advisory Councils on NOVA courses that should transfer to their institutions. This is uniquely NOVA and an important part movingforward.

We are shifting ELI which has remarkably been the center for distance learning at NOVA for 40 years. We want to honor our history, but move to a new, more reflective brand – to “NOVA OnLine.” We want to ensure that online courses are treated in the same manner as in-class courses. To accomplish this, the current ELI Associate Vice President will report through Dr. Schiavelli, our Chief Academic Officer, in order that all academic course decisions are implemented in the same manner. The overall ELI structure will remain the same.

In terms of roles, the Provosts will have both Program/Curriculum and Campus-facing responsibilities. They will have management structures that are broader than their campus roles. Academic Deans will have campus-focused structures, but in a more comprehensive plan that is consistent across campuses.

The biggest change is the shifting from Assistant to Associate Deans. Over 20 percent of our faculty are in Assistant Dean roles, faculty who reduce their course loads to assume some type of administrator responsibilities. However, these are not official positions and their roles and responsibilities vary greatly across the campuses and even within programs on campuses. To create consistency, we will have 12-month, full-time administrative Associate Deans, chosen internally from current faculty.

Goal 7 is the following:

To further develop NOVA’s IT and Cybersecurity programs to support regional job demand and position NOVA as the leading IT community college in the nation.

One of the overriding issues with IT is that programs change very rapidly. In order to be the top IT community college in the nation, we need to be able to move more rapidly. To do this, we will hire a Provost for Information Technology and Engineering Technology. This position will also compliment and coordinate with the Provost of Healthcare/MEC to begin to deliver healthcare programs across all the campuses.

Questions/Comments:

  • Does the campus Dean report to the campus Provost? Dr. Ralls stated each Dean has a program responsibility with a Provost to which they would report, but the campus responsibility would report to the campus’ Provost. Each campus would have 2 Academic Deans with the same campus responsibilities. The number of Associate Deans on each campus will vary due to the size of the campus, faculty and student body.

Dr. Ralls welcomed Dr. Marsha Atkins, the current Acting MEC Provost, from the Nursing & Surgical Technology Department and thanked her for assuming this responsibility, especially given that the Nursing Accreditation Team was arriving shortly to the MEC campus. The new MEC Provost, Dr. Nicole Reaves, arrives in April.

NOVA’s graduation speaker this year is NOVA alum, The Honorable Elizabeth Guzman, Member of the State House of Delegates, who will inspire our graduates. Guzman is the first Hispanic female immigrant in the Virginia legislature and one of the first Hispanic females in the State Legislature, along with Del. Hala Ayala.

Delegate Guzman immigrated to the United States from Peru as a 25-year-old single mother with a high school education. She worked three minimum-wage jobs to make ends meet. Eventually, in addition to her Associate degree from NOVA, Guzman went on to earn a Bachelor and two Master’s degrees. In addition to her recent election to represent the areas of southern Prince William County and parts of Fauquier County, Delegate Guzman is the Division Chief for the City of Alexandria’s Center for Adult Services.

D.CHAIRMANUPDATES

One of the things required of the Chair annually is to select two Board members to sit on the Foundation Board. This year, we had more than 2 on the Foundation Board from the NOVA Board. Mr. Neilson and Mr. Johnson have graciously offered to drop off which leaves Ms. McGarey and Ms. Steen who will be the representatives from the NOVA Board.

On the legislative side, Chair Rowley reported that he would be in Richmond to represent community colleges along with Dr. Ralls and Mr. Kauffman. Many of the Senators last year spoke more about community colleges than any other topic. It is therefore important for us to be there and to have our voices heard. Our Board members have also been very helpful in reaching out to our legislators. NOVA students were in Richmond last week as well and had opportunities to engage with legislators.

On Friday of this week the Governor Northam will be on the MEC campus for an official visit with the Dental Outreach team.

Amazon Web Services (AWS) has selected Northern Virginia and this benefits everyone. NOVA is now the East Coast provider of IT apprenticeships for AWS.

We continue to be a part of the “GO Virginia” discussions on the best use of funding by focusing on a larger impact on job ready skill sets and receptive employers. Mr. Rowley thanked Dr. Ralls for developing a funding plan. The GO Virginia Coalition was launched in 2015 by Virginia’s senior business leadership, with broad bipartisan support and collaboration among business, education and government.

Chair Rowley highlighted the need to show everyone how NOVA can succeed.

E.NEW/OTHERBUSINESS

Ms. O’Neil thanked Dr. Ralls, Dr. Haggray and Mr. Dana Kauffman for taking time to speak with Chair of the Arlington County Board, Katie Cristol.

F.ADJOURNMENT

Mr. Neilson made a motion, seconded by Mr. Xu, to adjourn the meeting at 6:18 p.m. With no objections, the motion passed unanimously.

College Recorder: Norie Flowers

Submitted by:

______

Mr. Todd RowleyDr. Scott Ralls

Chairman, Northern Virginia Community CollegeSecretary, Northern Virginia Community College