With a recent visit from the Accrediting Commission for Community and Junior Colleges (ACCJC), the campus is following assessments as planned, Dr. Donald Averill, member of the ACCJC said Tuesday afternoon.
“(EC) should be proud of (itself) with getting things done,” Averill said.
According to the ACCJC Web site, EC has been in the “continued on warning” category since last June and has yet to be reaffirmed in its accreditation.
“If you look at the spring report of 2009, you end up with a 47 percent completion on SLO’s (student learning objectives) which is 600 courses out of 1,520 ” Averill said.
Averill also said there has been progress since the spring report and that the ACCJC has found initiatives that validated EC’s progress, but still are not completely comfortable with changing the campus’s status.
The college has nine recommendations to follow from the ACCJC as a part of the accreditation cycle, Francisco M. Arce, vice president of academic affairs, said.
“We have shown significant progress with our first and third assessments,” Arce said.
According to the campus accreditation release Standard I A/B: Institutional Mission and Effectiveness, the college is to publish an annual report of showing progress and accomplishments for the Strategic Initiatives.
The college is also required to reassess the program review models and the SLO assessment process after the current accreditation cycle is completed, among other things.
Another of the recommendation that EC has progressed in is Standard III: Resources where the college has to effectively use its human, physical, technology and financial resources to achieve its broad educational purposes, including stated student learning outcomes, and to improve institutional effectiveness.
“We have been validated on our progress within the past year with our planning and reviewing the campus, which is great to hear,” Arce said.
Averill also said that the commission has come across other campuses that have gotten through their assessments within six months and said that EC has the potential to do the same.
“There are good examples, some wonderful examples of what happened when EC went through the assessment and how the college used it for program planning, to allocate funds, add courses and change courses. EC is doing what it is expected to do, but needs to stay on target to sustain availability by 2012,” Averill said.
Within the next 10 days a confidential report will be given to administrators, stating what the campus has already done and what it needs to do as a part of the accreditation cycle.
“President Tom Fallo will receive the confidential report with factual query within two to three weeks and in January, we will know where we stand,” Arce said.