Goal I. Access To Higher Education
As part of the College Connections: Making Dreams a Reality project, advisors from Northeast Lakeview College, along with tax personnel, held a Financial Aid & Tax Preparation Workshop at Judson ISD’s Karen Wagner High School. Students participating in College Connections can attend the Saturday session and have their taxes done free and get assistance with their FAFSA online application.  The purpose of the session is to assist students with a timely completion of the FAFSA form so that students can enroll and complete their college classes as registered. A second session will be held at Judson High School in a few weeks.

Goal III. Workforce Development
The Workforce and Community Education division of Northeast Lakeview College is pleased to announce a new partnership and $30,000 award from Alamo WorkSource to support implementation of the first Career Readiness Certificate program in Central Texas. Based on WorkKeys, the pilot program will include web-based delivery of a curriculum in essential employability skills and will prepare job seekers to obtain a nationally recognized credential for jobs across most occupations. Houston Community College launched the first Career Readiness Certificate program in Texas last year, although forty-five states currently participate in the Career Readiness Certificate Consortium and more than 100,000 certificates have been issued nationwide.

Goal IV. Capacity To Serve
Northeast Lakeview College collected over 1,700 pounds of food for the San Antonio Food Bank, exceeding its goal of 1,000 pounds. The donations were part of a month-long food drive sponsored by the Office of Student Leadership & Activities and will go to assist needy families in and around the San Antonio area.

Goal V. Organizational Communication
Firstmark Credit Union donated $5,000 to the Lower Valley School District restoration project. It is anticipated that the building will be transported from its current location in Cibolo, TX to the new Northeast Lakeview College campus in the next few weeks.

Goal II. Student Support
Northwest Vista College hosted Gabriel Alegría's Afro-Peruvian Sextet, one of the most influential jazz groups in Peru on Thursday, February 14th. The event included a guest artist residency with NVC along with a benefit concert at the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center for earthquake relief in Peru. Two lecture demonstrations and master classes on Afro-Peruvian music and cultural history were presented at NVC.
 
“Gabriel Alegria’s music has a unique sound that honors the historical African sounds of coastal Peru and combines it with contemporary American jazz,” says Assistant Professor of Music, Dr. Katharine Cartwright, who is one of the main organizers of the event. The music of Dr. Alegria is part of the Black History Month celebrations at Northwest Vista, says Dr. Cartwright, because the “Afro-Peruvian movement roughly parallels our American Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s”.  

The artist residency, an inaugural event of Northwest Vista College's "Vis-à-vis" guest artist series, was made possible through a partnership between the department of Fine & Performing Arts at Northwest Vista College, the Guadalupe Cultural Arts Center, the Office of International Programs of the Alamo Community Colleges, Trinity University's Department of Communication, Jazz Peru Internacionál, and the Peruvian government's Ministry of Foreign Relations.

During January, meetings were held with the NVC faculty regarding proposed changes in the academic structure for NVC. These meetings were preceded by several months of thorough discussions. Based on the conversations with faculty and the feedback provided, a final determination for the academic structure was made. The structure includes the following positions: a Dean of Interdisciplinary Programs, Eight Chairs, Dean of Evening and Weekend Operations, and a Coordinator of Developmental Education to enable NVC to better serve the students. The plan involves the centralization of all Occ-Tech programs and maintains coordination of programs at the discipline level. This structure incorporates the addition of support staff for the academic area; although the precise composition of that support structure is under review.  The reorganization will be completed in time for the fall semester.

Goal IV. Capacity To Serve
Faculty Development Coordinator, William Keith, recently reported to the E-Team the results of the 2007 faculty development activities, which included programming specifically for new full-time faculty, special on-line sessions for adjunct faculty, and a wide variety of topics available to all faculty members.  Among the 2007 sessions conducted, subjects included Active and Cooperative Learning, Critical Thinking, Technology Usage, and Writing and Speaking Across the Curriculum.  Mr. Keith provided the following data regarding faculty participation: New Full-time Faculty Training – 11 Sessions, with a total of 223 participants (target was 165); Adjunct Faculty On-line Training – 23 participants enrolled, with 8 faculty members completing all sessions; and All Other Faculty Training – 21 Sessions, with a total of 610 participants (target was 462).
The faculty development action plan for the coming years will focus on modifying the on-line adjunct faculty training component, improving scheduling and calendar information to avoid conflicts with other events, and developing discipline specific cooperative learning training modules.  There will also be some required training (i.e. safety and ethics sessions) for all employees. 
Thanks to Mr. Keith and to all the others who have worked diligently to provide effective and educational professional development sessions for faculty.  Our continued learning and enhanced awareness is an instrumental piece in achieving NVC’s vision. By fostering a culture of learning among our employees, NVC, in turn, provides indispensable learning opportunities that benefit our diverse student population

Goal I. Access To Higher Education
Ann Bolton-Brownlee, Interim Lead Library Instruction Librarian; Sandra Hood, Academic Outreach and Automation Librarian; and Tina Mesa, Dean of Learning Resources, presented at the Achieving the Dream Strategy Institute in Atlanta, February 4 – 8. The librarians presented data that demonstrates how the library’s Information Research Certificate program has positively affected student success in higher education.

Goal II. Student Support
PAC’s Corporate and Community Education Division sponsored a Job Fair for graduates of the Medical Front Office Certification program at the Westside Education and Training Center, Feb. 8. Businesses participating in the job fair included University Hospital Health System, Toyota Medical Group, and Centro Med Clinics.

Goal III. Workforce Development
PAC’s Corporate and Community Education Division, and the Industrial Automation Department, have collaborated to offer Electrical Maintenance classes to select employees of the City of San Antonio. Currently, Electrical Maintenance Skills Upgrade training is underway for approximately70 city employees and plans are underway to schedule training for an additional 200 employees.

Goal IV. Capacity To Serve
Helen Kirk, Professor of Mathematics, made a presentation at South Texas College, Feb. 8. Her presentation was entitled, “The Peaks and Valleys of Curriculum Change: From modular instruction, self-paced instruction and other curriculum re-design.”

Goal V. Organizational Communication
The PAC library hosted a webcast entitled: “The Role of the Librarian in Combating Student Plagiarism,” Feb. 11. The webcast explored the role of the academic librarian in combating student plagiarism and the "culture of copy" that students inhabit.  The program examined why plagiarism poses problems for higher education professionals including academic librarians, why use of discipline-based approaches helps combat plagiarism effectively, and ways to design effective information literacy session assignments to help students understand how they can avoid plagiarism.

Goal I. Access To Higher Education
The Middle College Programs Director conducted tours at Southwest Campus for high school juniors and seniors from the Northside Independent School District’s Alternative High School, the San Antonio Youth Center; and Kennedy High School. In addition, College orientation for industrial and technical programs was conducted for 50 high school sophomores interested in participating in the Southwest Campus Exploratory Program.

The St. Philip’s College Health Sciences Division participated in the Health Professions Recruitment and Exposure Program (HPREP) on Saturday, February 9. The HPREP is a nationwide high school health science enrichment program of the Student National Medical Association (SNMA). The program focuses on recruiting African-American, Latino, and Native American high school students into careers in the health professions and sciences. Minority medical students, and community professionals (physicians, dentists, and scientists) conducted seminars and lectures that will introduce sophomore and junior high school HPREP participants to health issues that affect minority communities, i.e., diabetes, cardiovascular disease, etc. Presentations were also provided by representatives from Allied Health and Nursing to include discussion of educational opportunities at St. Philip’s College for those interested in pursuing a career in the health professions.

Goal II. Student Support
Names of three St. Philip’s College Vocational Nursing students have been submitted as potential recipient(s) for the San Antonio Women’s Federation Scholarship. The organization established a $3,000 scholarship payable per semester to a student attending the St. Philip’s College Vocational Nursing Program. The scholarship will apply to expenses related to books, tuition, lab fees, uniform costs, as well as the application fee for the National Council Licensing Exam for Practical Nursing (NCLEX-PN). The organization was established in1904 and strives to unite women’s clubs and kindred organizations in San Antonio and Bexar County to promote their common interest in education, citizenship, the home, the fine arts and the general welfare of the community. The student chosen will be recognized in a special presentation by the organization and will be forthcoming in the near future.

Members of the Business Information Solutions Department met with officials from the Computer Science Program at the University of Texas at San Antonio. UTSA has agreed to align the recently revised SPC Associate of Arts Degree in Computer Science with UTSA’s degree plan, which will result in a seamless transition for SPC students transferring to UTSA.

Goal III. Workforce Development
The Allied Construction Trades department continues to work with Texas workforce and industry partners to write and initiate a skills development fund grant.

Faculty of Tourism, Hospitality and Culinary Arts met with local developers and hotel owners to discuss business and industry partnerships and future facilities’ expansion.

Goal IV. Capacity To Serve
St. Philip’s College is participating in the upcoming District-wide Dell consolidated purchase. Representatives from the SPC Instructional Technology Division attended the District-wide planning meeting that included representatives from Dell. Orders will be placed in March for delivery in April. District-wide Information Technology representatives will meet in May to plan the purchase of equipment for all the new buildings that will be opening across the district between June and the end of August.

The Southwest Campus Allied Construction Trades Department is assisting in the development of a Westside community garden project, the Gardens of St. Therese, at the Basilica of the National Shrine of the Little Flower. Students in the Plumbing and Homebuilding Trades are helping to create a safe haven and green zone for seniors and children from the nearby community.

Student support at St. Philip’s College extends beyond academic support. Each week students visit the Equity Center to receive confidential services that are vital to their success as students. The Equity Center maintains a food bank to assist students and their families and has begun a spring food drive to help restock the food bank shelves. All members of the College community are invited to contribute items to the food bank.

Goal V. Organizational Communication
A special ceremony was held on February 8 to celebrate the placement of the final beam on top of the new Learning Resource Center/One Stop/Center for Health Professions. Faculty, staff, students and administrators scheduled to occupy the new building were invited to sign the final beam prior to it being lifted onto the building. This ceremony was sponsored by the prime contractor, Skanska.

Faculty in the SPC Fine Arts Department appeared on “Great Day SA,” on KENS-TV, Ch.5. The segment highlighted the upcoming 110th Anniversary of St. Philip’s College, SPC’s Schedule of Black History Month events, and the February 15 San Antonio premiere production of Paul Robeson, starring SPC faculty member Vincent Contrell (Hardy), accompanied by fellow faculty member, Joy Hague.

The SPC Web Master created a special Web banner for the SPC Home Page and a special Web site for the upcoming 110th anniversary celebration. College, district, and community members will be able to access information about the
anniversary celebration by visiting the following Web site: http://www.accd.edu/spc/ admin/pr/anniversary.aspx.

Goal II. Student Support
The San Antonio College Mathematics Department has shown success improving their students’ productive grade and completion rates. The department, working with colleagues from across the district, re-designed the curriculum based on student success data to create a College Algebra (Math 1314) course for STEM (Sciences, Technology & Math) students and a College Algebra course for non-STEM students. Initial results show a significant increase in students’ productive grade and completion rates. Students who took the non-STEM Algebra course in the Fall 2007 Semester showed a 10% increase in productive grade rate and an 11% increase in completion rate over students who took the regular Algebra course in the Fall 2006 Semester.

Congratulations to the San Antonio College Speech Team (Justin Blacklock, Chelsea McClure, Ojiyoma Pinnock, Matthew Perez, and Loretta DeLaTorre), who scored victories at the TCCSTA State Tournament and the TIFA/NHC Invitational Tournaments. At the TCCSTA, the team won Second Place in Individual Events Sweepstakes, with Justin Blacklock taking Top Speaker at the tournament, among many individual awards to team members. In the TIFA, they won the Team Award in Limited Entry Sweepstakes as well as individual awards.

The Corporation for National and Community Service named San Antonio College to the President’s Higher Education Community Service Honor Roll for exemplary service efforts and service to disadvantaged youth. (San Antonio College and St. Mary’s University were the only colleges in San Antonio to receive this award.) The Community Service Honor Roll is the highest federal recognition a school can achieve for its commitment to service-learning and civic engagement. Honorees were chosen based on criteria that include scope and innovativeness of service projects, percentage of student participation in service activities, incentives for service, and extent to which the school offers academic service-learning courses. Audrey Grams is the San Antonio College Service-Learning Coordinator. During the 12-month period judged for this award, SAC had a total of 1,718 students who performed 21,886 service- learning hours (or an estimated 24,385 of total community service hours that include non-service-learning activities of the college) from the summer 2006 through June 30, 2007. The rate of contribution was $410,800 for this period, using the $18.77 per hour rate. Some of the agencies served were Any Baby Can, Family Assistance Crisis Team, Salvation Army, SAMMinistries, San Antonio Parks & Recreation (including SA Missions and the Alamo), Travis Elementary, and San Antonio Food Bank.

Morgan Spurlock, whose 2004 feature film “Super Size Me” was the first documentary to break into the weekend box office top ten, spoke to a full house about his experiences as a director, author, and movie and TV producer at San Antonio College’s McAllister Auditorium this week. The previous day, screenings of his new film “What Would Jesus Buy?” was screened to a standing-room-only audience. While he was on campus, Spurlock toured the Longwith Radio-TV-Film Building and cut a promotional tape for the college’s KSYM radio station (the first community college radio station in Texas). San Antonio College’s Fine Arts and Cultural Events Series (FACES) Committee, chaired by Dean Alice Johnson, sponsored Spurlock’s appearance.

Dr. Tani D. Sanchez, of the Africana Studies Department at the University of Arizona, gave the Black History Month Lecture on “Exploring Race Through Science Fiction in the Matrix Trilogy” at McAllister Auditorium. Her lecture drew on politics, literature, history, media/art, and symbolism to argue for the presence of a hidden filmic narrative that aligns with African-American critical traditions. The talk was one of many Black History Month activities at the college, which also included this week a Gospel Show at the Loftin Student Center featuring NuDestiny with Chris Spivey of Austin and a Dating Game for students to win a date on Valentine’s Day.

Goal III. Workforce Development
Talks began with the Radio-TV-Film Department, the Texas Film Commission, and Drew Mayer-Oakes concerning the creation of short certificate courses for the local film industry to begin as early as this summer.

Goal IV. Capacity to Serve
Michael Conner, Assistant Professor or Architecture, and Jane Martin, Adjunct Instructor in Architecture, have a series of lectures posted on the McNay Art Museum website at http://www.mcnayart.org (see Architecture Lectures). These lectures were initially to be given at the museum but due to construction work they are will be posted online on the dates given: Thursday, Jan. 24, Art Museums as Temples, by Michael Connor; Thursday, Feb. 7, Beyond the Temple Walls, by Michael Connor, and Thursday, Feb. 21, Natural Structural Forms, Starchitecture, and Other Experiments, by Jane Martin.

The Department of Music and Humanities presented a faculty recital at McAllister Auditorium featuring composer and guitarist Peter Carey. The quartet played selections in a modern and traditional jazz vein and included bassist Jim Kalson, pianist Lou Cabaza, and drummer Michael Carey.

Goal V. Organizational Communication
The Radio-TV-Film Department’s Music Business Program, directed by Professor Fred Weiss, was the subject of a story in the publication 210-SA (see http://www.210sa.com/content/view/3594/). The articles explains that Weiss and his students started Courtland Records (myspace.com/courtlandrecords) during the fall 2006 semester, using funds Weiss received from an innovative teaching grant. As a result, the students get a real-world experience of the music business — organized into three groups: A&R (artist and repertoire) scouting and developing artists, marketing (promoting artists and events), and manufacturing (technical aspects of the label).

To help meet the need for patients throughout south Texas, San Antonio College hosted the South Texas Blood & Tissue Center’s Blood Drive, with a live broadcast by Power 106.7 radio station helping to promote the event.

For the second time, San Antonio College hosted, in collaboration with Texas Public Radio and Gemini Ink, Half Price Books, and Symphony Space, the program “Selected Shorts” at McAllister Auditorium, featuring a diverse trio of contemporary black authors in celebration of Black History Month.

San Antonio College partnered with the City of San Antonio to offer free tax filing services for SAC students, faculty and staff who qualify. The Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program is available at no charge to individuals and households earning $45,000 or less in the 2007 tax year.