Community College Engineering Student Transfer

Yesterday I checked in via LinkedIn with a Holyoke Community College Engineering program
graduate who transferred to a nationally ranked top ten engineering university. The student is studying Electrical Engineering there and I asked how things were going. Here’s a screen shot of the response I got with identification information removed – including student name and the transfer university. Pretty cool!

The student compliments my two classes (Circuits 1 and Circuits 2) but there is so much more. Both classes are Calculus and Differential Equations based so the students need to really know their math stuff before I get them. The math, physics and chemistry instruction is  exceptional at Holyoke Community College – as it is at so many other community colleges in the country.  It is not just the STEM classes that prepare students for my classes though. To get their degree our students need to take additional courses including English Composition, History, Social Sciences and in some cases Business courses. These courses are critical, complementing the technical knowledge, skills and abilities gained in engineering courses, producing well-rounded professionals capable of addressing complex challenges with creativity, empathy, and ethical awareness.

 

I see it every day with students coming to my classes prepared to learn, solve problems, communicate and understand some pretty complex stuff. Amazing faculty doing amazing things in their classrooms makes it pretty easy for me to teach those classes.

We (community colleges) often face unjust criticism due to misconceptions. Despite offering quality education, we’re sometimes seen as inferior to four-year institutions. We provide valuable opportunities and options with smaller classes, dedicated faculty, and affordable tuition. And let's not forget transfer to four year institutions.

 

Thanks to the unnamed student – you certainly made the day!

Day 1 Fall 2020 Semester Remote

I spent much of the summer preparing for Day 1. I was not sure what to expect – sure we went remote in March for the second half of the spring semester but that was a little different. We all knew each other and the ice had been broken a long time before we started zooming…… 

The first day of a traditionally offered class is always the same - most of the students do not  know each other and they don't know the instructor. They don’t say too much and it is hard for the instructor to get any kind of feedback – positive or negative. Do they have any idea what the heck I’m talking about? I rely a lot on visual feedback when I’m in front of a class – Are they taking notes? Paying attention? Staring out the window or door? Looking at the clock? Looking at their phone? And sometimes just staring blankly into space? 

In some ways day 1 class zooming has not been much different. I noticed the majority (~75%) did not have their cameras on during the first class. Is that because they are shy? Doing something else like looking out the window, at their phone, etc? I’ve heard some faculty are requiring their students have their cameras on. I’m not going to do that. I am hoping to see them come on voluntarily as we get into the semester. 

I also noticed about the same percentage (and the same students) have their mics muted. I can understand that – I mute mine when I’m not talking. 

Conclusions – I don’t have any yet. It seems like a normal first day with a bit of a remote zoom twist. Our challenge as faculty has always been to get our students learning and that includes  engagement, working together, not being afraid to ask questions, smiling and laughing every once in a while and generally feeling comfortable. From my perspective so far so good!

“Returning” to Western Massachusetts

It’s been a bit of a roadtrip back but…… it is official…… I’m back! In 2014 I took an early retirement from Springfield Technical CommunityCollege and signed on as a part-time consulting Co Director for NationalScience Foundation Advanced Technological Education (NSF ATE) funded NationalCenter for Optics and Photonics Education (OP-TEC). OP-TEC with a main office in Waco, Texas and funded via University of Central Florida, had five years left before sunsetting. I ended up staying with OP-TEC as a consultant for about 3.5 years. Most of my work was done out of my home office in Massachusetts with monthly trips to Waco and the occasional trip to UCF in Orlando. The work was interesting and I enjoyed it but the Center was in the last year of funding - something referred to as "sunsetting" in the grant world and my time there was to be ending soon. I knew I needed to find a replacement, with a preference for something a little closer to home....

In November 2017 I applied for and was offered a visiting professor position at the University of Hartford College of Engineering, Technology and Architecture. I spent the last three amazing semesters there teaching a variety of electronics, electrical engineering and engineering design courses. The admins, faculty and especially the students were incredible and it felt so good being back in the classroom – teaching. So much fun to connect with students again after almost 20 years of academic and NSF grant administrative work. I am so impressed with the University of Hartford community – the way everyone pulls together to help each other out - respectful, hard working committed….. amazing. I had left teaching traditional age college students in 1998 and was not sure what to expect in 2018 – to say I was pleasantly surprised at Hartford is a huge understatement!

But those visiting professor gigs are temporary and don’t last long. This past spring I sadly realized my time at Hartford was coming to an end and I needed to start looking around again. So…. I applied for an Engineering Professor position at Holyoke Community College, interviewed and….. was offered the position. I start in September…. a little closer to home and also a lot closer to my parents home.

Leaving Hartford is breaking my heart - I’m really going to miss everyone there, especially the incredible students I had the opportunity to work with in my classes. No names because I’m sure I would end up leaving some out. Thanks to all of you who worked so hard in my classes – I’m jealous of you all with your work ethic and commitment to excellence along with the internship, career and academic opportunities you have already had or will have. If any of you are reading this please keep working hard and stay in touch. I look forward to following your careers.

Took the long way back to Western Mass via Waco, Orlando and Hartford but I’m back. Looking forward to reestablishing some of those past regional business and industry connections and working with the admins, faculty and especially students at HCC. And yes - you bet I’m hoping to establish some sort of a formal transfer/articulation agreement between HCC and Hartford.

ATETV.ORG - Thinking About A High Technology Career?

If you or someone you know is thinking about a career in a high technology field, you need to take a look at Advanced Technological Education Television (ATETV.ORG). There, you'll find a National Science Foundation funded Web-based video series and interactive network designed to connect students and professionals with careers in advanced technology. The series highlights ATE success stories from community colleges and ATE programs nationwide. Its outreach efforts -- at ATETV.org and on social networking sites like YouTube, Facebook and Twitter -- aim to connect employers in industry and government with the high-tech workforce of tomorrow.

Here's the third episode in the series, featuring how The College of the Mainland trains students on an industry-scale oil refinery and how schools are working to close the gender gap in biotechnology. Be sure to check this one out along with all the episodes on YouTube and grab them on iTunes.



A little more from the ATETV website....... globalization has changed the scope of our workforce, creating new opportunities and greater demand for workers in the fields of science and technology. In order to drive our economy forward, we must recruit, train and place technically skilled professionals to meet new demand.

How can you get involved and learn more - check out ATETV.ORG and your local community college!

Mike Q HI-TEC Educator Of The Year

Today I had the honor of presenting Mike Qaissaunee the HI-TEC Educator of the Year Award. HI-TEC is a national conference on advanced technical education where technical educators, counselors, industry professionals, and technicians can update their knowledge and skills. HI-TEC uniquely explores the convergence of scientific disciplines and technologies.

Here's the text from the presentation:

The HI-TEC Educator of the Year Award recognizes a community college educator for outstanding contributions to advanced technological education. Nominees for the award must have had a demonstrated impact on technology education on both a local and national level.

This year there were several excellent nominees and the decision was a difficult one. As you probably know, Michael Qaissaunee is this year’s awardee.

Many of you know Mike, an Associate Professor of Engineering and Technology at Brookdale Community College and founding director of the Mid-Atlantic Institute for Telecommunications Technologies . As Principal Investigator of this NSF project, Mike led the development and implementation of numerous courses related to wireless communications technologies. He’s also Co-Principal Investigator for the National Information and Communications Technologies Center in Massachusetts, serving as a subject matter expert in wireless communications and leading ICT Center's national dissemination efforts.

He’s been involved with many projects around the United States and in 2007 was selected as recipient of the Global Wireless Education Consortium (GWEC) Wireless Educator of the Year Award.

He is a national leader and expert (many refer to him as a Rock Star) promoting the adoption of new technologies and approaches to teaching and learning, including: blogs, audio and video podcasts, wikis, mobile computing and educational gaming and simulation. This includes workshops and keynote addresses in wireless, wireless security, iPhone programming, and Web 2.0.

Here’s some things you may not know about Mike:

His father Abdul was the first person from his village in Afghanistan to go beyond elementary school. The U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) brought him to the U.S. in the midst of his 11th-grade year. He graduated with honors from the University of Wyoming and returned to Kabul, where he headed the technology department at the technical high school he had left only two and half years earlier.

Three years later, USAID brought him back to America to study highway engineering. Barbara (Mike’s Mom who is here today) and Abdul met at the University of Illinois where she was completing her master's degree in library science. After Abdul completed his PhD, he and Barbara moved back to Afghanistan where he began working at Kabul University, eventually becoming Dean of the Engineering school.

In Afghanistan, his parents had three children--Mike is the middle child. In 1973 Barbara and Abdul moved their family from Afghanistan to Delaware where Abdul took a faculty position and Barbara worked as a librarian at Delaware State.

Both of Mike’s parents were a great inspiration and instilled great value on teaching and learning. Mike graduated from high school in Delaware at the top of his class and was accepted at a number of top engineering schools including MIT. He selected the University of Delaware for his Mechanical Engineering degrees.

Mike now lives in New Jersey with two other great inspirations - his wife Laura and daughter Haley.

I’ve had the honor of working and getting to know Mike for the past 6-7 years. He’s intelligent, honest, respectful, humble and has a great sense of humor. We’re pretty lucky to be working with him and his students are pretty lucky to be in his classes.

I can’t think of a more deserving person for this first HI-TEC Educator of the Year Award.

Please join me in congratulating Mike!

Some of the pictures from the conference are linked here.

Way to go Mike Q!!!!!!!

NBC's New Comedy - Community (College)

There's a new half-hour comedy about higher education...and lower expectations coming from Emmy Award-winning directors Joe and Anthony Russo to NBC this fall titled Community. The comedy is centered around the fictitious Greendale Community College. Here's an interesting quote from the NBC website describing the show:

It's been said that community college is a "halfway school" for losers, a self esteem workshop for newly divorced housewives, and a place where old people go to keep their minds active as they circle the drain of eternity. Well, at Greendale Community College...that's all true. Community focuses on a band of misfits, at the center of which is a fast-talkin' lawyer whose degree has been revoked (Joel McHale, The Soup). They form a study group and, in "Breakfast Club" fashion, end up learning a lot more about themselves than they do about their course work.

NBC is going all out with this show - they're even going to put together a Greendale Community College website that will introduce the show characters including: the student body, Dean Pelton, the faculty, etc. Here's a 4 minute promo you may find interesting.

What's the real story? Here's some current stats from the American Association of Community Colleges website (I've quoted these in the past).

Number and Type of Community Colleges: Total: 1,195 Public: 987 Independent: 177 Tribal: 31	Enrollment: Total: 11.5 million Enrolled full time: 41% Enrolled part time: 59%
Selected Demographics: Average age: 29 Women: 60% Men: 40% Minorities: 35% First generation to attend college: 39% Single parents: 17%	Percentages of Undergraduates: All U.S. undergraduates: 46% First-time freshmen: 41% Native American: 55% Asian/Pacific Islander: 46% Black: 46% Hispanic: 55%
Employment Status: Full-time students employed full time: 27% Full-time students employed part time: 50% Part-time students employed full time: 50% Part-time students employed part time: 33%

Sound familiar? Maybe your neighbor, your friend, your grandchild, maybe even you. Community colleges are wonderful, inexpensive places to get the first two years of a four year degree or learn a specific skilled technology.

I just don't get where this show is coming from. Is it tongue in cheek humor? We'll see and we'll see how long it lasts..... The series premieres Thursday, September 17th 9:30/8:30c.

Hey Amazon - When It Comes To That New Textbook Kindle - Don't Overlook Community Colleges!

Tomorrow, Amazon will be holding a press event at the Pace University New York City campus to announce a new version of the Kindle e-book reader with (according to the Wall Street Journal ) a larger screen and other features designed to appeal to periodical and academic textbook publishers.

A total of six excellent universities will be involved in this project according to the Wall Street Journal. They are Case Western, Pace, Princeton, Reed, Darden School at the University of Virginia, and Arizona State.

It's exciting to see this product coming but discouraging not to see a community college on the list. Why should a community college be included? Here's some interesting fast facts from the American Association of Community Colleges:

Number and Type of Colleges:
Number of Community Colleges in the US: 1,195
Total Student enrollment: 11.5 million
Average age: 29
Women: 60%
Men: 40%
Minorities: 35%
First generation to attend college: 39%

Community College Students Constitute the Following Percentages of Undergraduates:
All U.S. undergraduates: 46%
First-time freshmen: 41%
Native American: 55%
Asian/Pacific Islander: 46%
Black: 46%
Hispanic: 55%

With 46% of all undergraduate students attending community colleges in this country doesn't it make sense to have at least one on the list?

Tracking the Impact of eLearning at Community Colleges

The Instructional Technology Council (ITC) is an organization that provides leadership and professional development to its network of eLearning experts by advocating, collaborating, researching, and sharing exemplary, innovative practices and potential in learning technologies. The organization recently released a report titled 2008 Distance Education Survey Results: Tracking the Impact of eLearning at Community Colleges.

The report is a must read for faculty, administrators, technical staff, graduate students, anyone involved with distance education at any level - not just community colleges. Here's some of the key findings:

• Campuses reported an 11.3 percent increase for distance learning enrollments, while increases in overall campus enrollments averaged less than two percent -- 70 percent of the respondents stated student demand exceeds current distance learning course offerings.
• Many colleges have significantly increased their number of blended or hybrid and/or Web-enhanced or Web-assisted courses.
  
• Most colleges have rapidly expanded their student services and technology support services to meet accreditation expectations of “equivalency” with traditional face-to-face courses.
  
• Thirty-one percent of the campuses surveyed are considering switching from Blackboard/WebCT, which had seen a near monopoly in the past. The merger of Blackboard and WebCT has prompted a number of campuses to review their learning management system commitments.
• Administrators continue to identify finding and/or compensating adequate “support staff needed for training and technical assistance” as their greatest challenge. Workload issues are their greatest challenge related to faculty.
  
• Assessing student learning and performance in the distance education environment emerged as the greatest challenge for students in 2008.
  

The report was authored by Fred Lokken , Associate Dean for the Truckee Meadows Community College Web College.

A downloadable PDF of the 9 page report is linked here.

Don't Limit Access to Higher Education

My college president has written an excellent op-ed piece in BusinessWest, a Western Massachusetts news magazine. The piece discusses the critical importance of funding for public higher education and particularly for community colleges, in light of our current Massachusetts state budget crisis. Here the piece:

OPINION by IRA RUBENZAHL
President of Springfield Technical Community College (STCC) in Springfield, MA

By most accounts, we are now entering the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression. Nationally, the signs abound: the loss of home value, the meltdown in the stock market, the rise in unemployment, collapse of the credit markets, and a record $1 trillion federal deficit.

As these dramatic changes reverberate through the economy, a college education becomes ever-more important to secure a decent paying job and enter a stable career; studies show the link between higher levels of educational attainment and higher average salaries. Furthermore, certain associate degrees such as those in nursing, allied health, computer science, and manufacturing, pay much greater dividends because jobs in these fields are in high demand.

In this environment, individuals are facing hard choices about where to commit to spend their money. Where to go to college and how to pay for higher education ranks among a family’s most important decisions.

One may choose between public and private colleges, with elite private colleges now costing — without room and board — upwards of $40,000 per year. Within the public sector, there are three options: university campuses, state colleges, and community colleges. In Massachusetts, average student charges per year without room and board for these three segments are:

• $9,585 for the four UMass campuses;
• $6,400 for the nine state colleges; and
• $3,862 for the state’s 15 community colleges.

Since community colleges are the least expensive, they are becoming more and more popular as a way to stretch a family’s and student’s limited resources. And people are flocking to these local colleges. Fall 2008 figures show community colleges now dominate enrollment in the state with 89,000 students, compared with 46,928 at the four university campuses, and a total of 37,509 at the nine state college campuses.

This fall, community colleges statewide had an enrollment increase that averaged 5.3%, the largest jump of any segment. Although the Commonwealth’s community colleges offer only the first two years of a baccalaureate degree and a number of two-year career programs, the quality of instruction is superb. Consider that community colleges are teaching institutions with a focus on undergraduate students. Faculty are hired because of their knowledge and their ability to teach, not for research skills.

Springfield Technical Community College, for example, offers 60-plus career programs in business, health professions, computer science, and engineering technology. In addition, the college has a robust liberal arts curriculum leading to transfer to baccalaureate colleges throughout New England. Local private colleges — AIC, Elms, Bay Path, Western New England, and Springfield College — court STCC graduates through agreements that provide guaranteed scholarships for students with good grades.

Many STCC students also transfer to the public institutions, most notably UMass Amherst and Westfield State College.

So, for those worried about the economy and the future, community colleges continue to be the best deal in the state.

However, the current state budget deficit now threatens the accessibility and affordability of public higher education just when Massachusetts residents most need it.

Community colleges are the most lean and efficient segment of higher education, educating more students with less funding. They enroll more than half of public higher-education students, yet receive approximately one-quarter of state funding. Consequently, it will be more difficult for these institutions to absorb major funding cuts without affecting the quality of the education and resources so important to students and to our economic future.

Education is the economic driver for our state, producing the skilled and knowledgeable employees needed by business, schools, and industry — particularly the health care industry.

While cutting funding for education will save money in the very short term, it will represent a far greater loss for our citizens and our state.

Ira Rubenzahl is president of Springfield Technical Community College.

This article first appeared in BusinessWest Magazine, Springfield, Massachusetts and is directly linked here.

What Is An Agent Of Change?

When you manage people, you are in it together.
And because you are the leader, you own all the outcomes, good and bad.
- Jack Welch

With the coming presidential election we've been hearing the word change used a lot. It's nothing new - it just seems to be ratcheted up because we're dealing with some extra hot issues this round. So..... what is this change stuff all about? Jack and Suzy Welch have an interesting perspective. In the October 20, 2008 Business Week WelchWay column, they are asked the following question by Anil Kale from Pune, India:

What kind of person is a change agent?

Jack and Suzy's answer is an interesting one. They start by saying that true change agents must have a single critical trait - power. They say most questions they get about change come from people deep within their organizations who have a burning desire to improve things and are frustrated with the organizational inertia in their way. They have good ideas, passion, dedication and hunger to be change agents but worry they cannot be.

Jack and Suzy go on saying by and large, change is still made by people with some sort of authority. It's driven by managers who have a platform to advocate for a new direction and the ability to hire, promote, and reward those who embace it. Change agents must be leaders to be effective - unfortunately - not all leaders are change agents.

Here's three other traits (besides power) that Jack and Suzy say are essential:

1. True change agents see a future no one else does, and that vision won't let them rest. They don't lead change because it "makes sense" or because change is "necessary." They lead change because they believe their organization must get ahead of an approaching "discontinuity" in order to survive and win. Typically, they've risen through the ranks because they've seen around corners before, and they're recognized for what they are, serial visionaries.

2. Change agents have the courage to bet their careers. True change agents are willing to take bold action - and accept the consequences. They know that leading change can be messy, with few clear-cut answers about how events will play out.

3. Change agents have something about them that galvanizes teams and turns people on. Perhaps the biggest misconception about change agents is that they're Lone Ranger types. In fact, the most effective change agents have a fervent core of supporters, cultivated through intensity and caring.

What's the business award? According to Jack and Suzy - for some change agents, it's the organization's survival. But for many others, it's not nearly as dire. It's growth, and all the good things that come with it: more and better jobs, new products, global expansion, not to mention their byproducts - excitement and fun.

True change agents have power, vision, bravery and support - Jack and Suzy say these people are rare - from my perspective I would agree.

*****
Take a look at Jack and Suzy's Business Week piece here. You can also listen to a podcast titled True Change Agents, found on their website The Welch Way.

A Conversation with Computer Forensics Professor Paula Velluto

Bunker Hill Community College Professor Paula Velluto has received National Science Foundation funding to create a model computer forensics program. The project is a regional collaboration Middlesex Community College, Bristol Community College, Bunker Hill Community College, Northern Essex Community College and the University of Massachusetts Boston to meet the regional need of law enforcement for trained computer forensics (CF) technicians. The programs uniquely combine the disciplines of Information Technology (IT) and Criminal Justice (CJ) and are tailored to the needs of each institution.

The CFATE NSF project focuses on achieving three goals:

1. To create computer forensics programs that align with law enforcement, public safety, private industry and homeland security needs to ensure consistent, current and flexible training. CFATE works with local/regional law enforcement agencies and industries to determine the needed skill set. Faculty workshops are being conducted to facilitate integration of CJ and IT into courses and expedite curriculum development on a consortium wide basis. CF experts work with the colleges to ensure that materials are rich in real world content. UMass Boston is developing baccalaureate programs that accept community college graduates and provide them with career pathways. In addition, CFATE is developing stand-alone courses and programs for IT professionals and CJ practitioners.

2. To offer regional professional development opportunities for educators to develop expertise needed for teaching these programs. In addition to workshops on CJ and IT integration, extensive workshops on CF and the use of state-of-the-art software are being offered. Curriculum development workshops emphasize learner-centered pedagogy that give students needed skills. CF experts work individually with faculty and mentor them as they deliver CF courses.

3. To expand the capacity in the region to attract students from diverse backgrounds to CF programs at each institution and support them in gaining employment in related positions. CFATE is creating recruitment materials such as CDs, brochures, and interactive websites to reach local schools and local and regional community organizations. This is combined with targeted personal outreach to schools and organizations.

I've know Paula for many years and have always been so impressed with her technical knowledge, experience, vision and (especially) the way she works with her students. Paula is one of the best and last month I had the opportunity to interview her at the SAME-TEC 2008 Conference in Austin, TX.



You can get more information on the CFATE rogram at Bunker Hill Community College here. The project website at CFATE.ORG will also be up shortly.

*****
This is one of many interviews we did at SAME-TEC 2008 - there will be many more posted and you can get them different ways:

YouTube: Watch our YouTube Channel at: http://www.youtube.com/user/NatCtrTelecomTech

Streaming and Downloading: View streaming videos and download content using your web browser at: http://nctt.org/podcast

iTunes: If you have iTunes installed you can watch and listen to this one, watch and listen to others, and subscribe to our video and audio podcasts by following this link.

We're planning and looking forward to the SAME-TEC conference next year. Watch this blog and SAME-TEC.ORG for 2009 Conference information and updates.

Goodbye and Congrats to a Buddy

This is something I have been dreading writing because I knew it would eventually happen. Many of you that I’ve met at conferences/meetings/etc have also got to know Steve Budd, Springfield Technical Community College Assistant VP of Development. As a next step in his career Steve recently decided to begin his search for a presidency and – no surprise to anyone that knows him – he has been offered and has accepted the presidency position at the New Hampshire Community Technical College – Claremont. The Clarement press release is linked here. This was actually the first presidency Steve interviewed for – congrats to Steve and Claremont – you’ve really made a great choice!

I would classify Steve as a new breed of Community College leader – willing to take some risk and understanding that risk does not always result in success. Working closely with Steve over the last few years we’ve had our share of successes and failures. I‘ve always believed the signs of a person’s true character appear after failure and not success. I’m sure most would agree.

One of my favorite bloggers, marketer Seth Godin, recently published a couple of short blogs, one titled Toxic employees and the second titled Toxic bosses. In the Toxic bosses blog Seth finishes with the following line:

“Great marketers often have the unusual combination of humility and confidence. Toxic ones have neither”.

I'm going to take some liberty and change "marketers" to "presidents" in Seth's quote.

I get out a lot – meet a lot of faculty, administrators and yes – presidents of colleges. I’ve met good ones and not-so-good ones (of course in my opinion and.... no names!). I usually can judge pretty quick but have never really been able to put into words how. Seth’s words hit it on the head - "the unusual combination of humility and confidence". Among other positive characteristics Steve has this unusual combination.

Congratulations again - Steve and Claremont.