President Schilling’s Board Report for November 12, 2019
The following is a report to members of the North Orange County Community College District Board of Trustees.
Presented by Cypress College President JoAnna Schilling, Ph.D.
on November 12, 2019
The college continues to be busy and engaged in serving students and employees. Below is just a sample of the many events taking place across our community as we head into the last third of the semester.
Our Career Center and CTE program took part in an innovative project the end of October called Headshot Happy Hour. Almost 400 students were provided with a professional headshot and assistance setting up a Linked In account. Thank you, Melissa Carpenter, Belinda Allan, Zola Aponte and the Career Center team for this great opportunity for career development.
Over 800 high school seniors arrived on campus on November 5 for our second annual Connect2Cypress event. Prospective students were welcomed with a 90 minute orientation to the campus, campus tours by meta major, attended a program fair in the Gateway Plaza, and were surprised by a flash mob dance created by dance instructor, Maha Afra and her dancers. Lunch was served by Habit Burger food trucks, and prospective and current students had the opportunity to visit the Majors2Careers Showcase presented by the Career Planning Center to learn about the career development process, explore majors offered at Cypress College, and have their resume critiqued. Thank you to Rick Rams, Paul de Dios, Flor Huerta and all our deans, counselors, and student services team for this excellent introduction to the Cypress Charger spirit!
The Cypress College Smoke Free Art Contest is now open. Students are invited to enter this campus contest answering the question “Why I Want a 100% Smoke Free Campus”. Submissions will be judged by the associated students and the winning entries will be displayed on campus and submitted to an all-Orange County panel for inclusion in a regional marketing campaign.
Cypress College has seen positive enrollment results from our Districtwide Future Built marketing efforts. Below is a snapshot of the increase in CTE enrollment in the last two years, likely due to this campaign.
| CTE ONLY | Fall 2017 | Fall 2018* | Fall 2019** | Overall since Mtg. began |
| Fall Enrollment | 9554 | 9899 | 11144 | |
| % change | 3.61% | 12.58% | 16.64% |
Also in CTE news, CTE Counselor Jane Jepson was recently named 2019 Counselor of the Year by the Orange County Career Education Community College Network. The award, given each year to counselors who excel in a number of areas related to student and career success, was presented at the 2019 OC Counselor Symposium on Thursday, November 7. Congratulations, Jane!
Also in the news is Auto Technology faculty, Russ Bacarella, who was honored on Wednesday at the 2019 SEMA (Specialty Equipment Marketing Association) Show Educator Breakfast. Russ was one of 3 finalists selected out of a nationwide nominated pool of instructors for the SEMA Educator of the Year. We are all extremely proud of Russ for earning this honor.
The college’s DEI Committee will be leading discussions in person on November 12 at 12:30-2 p.m. and November 14 at 11:30 a.m.-1 p.m. and online for our fall common book “White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard for White People to Talk About Racism”. This is the first in a series of equity initiatives on campus, and the goal of this campus wide effort is to create opportunities to discuss, challenge, and engage one another about issues facing our students and one other. Next up is From Equity Talk to Equity Walk, which will be held November 15 from 10 a.m. to 1 p.m. Please join us, if you can!
Veterans Day Week (November 4-7) in honor of our veterans and military-connected students and families, featured multiple events including a Green Zone Training for staff, A Housing Assistance and Support Session, Veterans BBQ luncheon, and a special Veterans Day Ceremony on November 7. We salute and thank all those who have served us keep our freedoms safe.
The District free speech open forum will be held at Cypress College will be held on Monday, November 18 at 2-3:30 p.m. in CCCPLX-216.
Dr. Schilling attended Assemblywoman Sharon Quirk-Silva’s Town Hall on Homelessness on November 5. Orange County Assembly members attended to hear presentations on housing and homelessness and Dr. Schilling spoke in public comments regarding the challenges community college students are facing and the need to properly fund student housing.
On Friday, November 1, Dr. Schilling was able to attend the OC Teacher of the Year Awards at the Disneyland Hotel, along with Dr. Schultz, Provost Purtell, Trustees McClanahan and Rodarte, and Dr. Li-Bugg. We were there to support and honor Cypress College English instructor, Alyssa Garman, as well as Fullerton’s Aline Gregorio, and NOCE’s Md Riffat Ahmed. Congratulations to all!
Cypress College is planning to move forward to implement an OCTA bus pass, similar to our sister college, Fullerton College. We thank Fullerton for leading the way on this important transportation issue. After surveying our students, there was overwhelming support for moving forward to support a slight fee increase to serve our students. Next steps are to take this increase proposal to our students for a vote. Our hope is to implement in spring 2020, if the students agree on the very small fee hike. We appreciate the efforts of Student Trustee, Ester Plavdjian and AS President, Presten Jimenez for their advocacy on behalf of our students.
The week of November 12-15 will be busy for our Health Sciences Division. Up first is the American Board of Funeral Service Education (ABFSE) accreditation visit for our Mortuary Science Program, which occurs November 12-15. Also that week is a cultural exchange with our Nursing Program and Japan’s Osaka-Jikei School of Health on November 13-15. We appreciate the work of Dean Rebecca Gomez, Jolena Grande, Nursing Director Teri Wheeler, Carmen Dominguez, and the HS staff and faculty for their efforts getting ready for both visits.
Drs. Schilling and Reiland will be presenting at Bakersfield College on November 15 at the statewide Intersegmental Education Conference on our work implementing Program Mapper and Program Finder. Cypress is currently the only college utilizing both programs, thanks to the leadership of Dr. Reiland. We will be sharing our experience to date on our Guided Pathways efforts and these software tools specifically.
The college’s Title V Kick Off event occurred on November 1 with over 100 students, staff and faculty in attendance. We spent an engaging morning sharing all the work currently occurring on campus in support of Guided Pathways, and enhancing the student experience. We also detailed how the grant will help support and fund the next generation of Guided Pathways 2.0.
That’s the Board Report from Cypress College. Buen Cypress!