Area Report for Board of Trustees

The Institutional Advancement division is made up of the following groups: Communications and Marketing (CM), Outreach and Recruitment (OR), Grants and Government Relations (GGR), Foundation and Alumni Relations (FAR). IA is involved in many different areas on and off Highline’s campus, ranging from promoting our College at local high schools, assisting with writing grants for key programs and raising money for student support and special projects, or skillfully crafting advertisements to placement on or in wide array of medium such as busses, billboards and movie theaters.  Institutional Advancement is there to do just that: advance our institution. Our 2022-2023 reports to the board will focus on our goals and objectives identified in Institutional Effectiveness Reports (IE). The SBDC/StartZone and COE for Global Trade and Supply Chain Management also report through IA and updates on these programs and their goals will be shared periodically.

Core Theme 1: ACCESS, Reduce Barriers and close equity gaps to access for all community members

The Web Team/Communications and Marketing has been working on the college website, as described in the Student Success SMARTIE Goals. As work continues on the top-level site and three most visited sub-domains, Financial Aid, Admissions and Registration and Records, the team has also provided training and assistance to individuals departments such as Physics and Highline Promise Partnership. The Winter Quarter goal focuses on researching and identifying a Content Management System (CMS) platform to migrate the website to. The team has met with top two vendors on the WIPHE list.

Outreach and Recruitment has been hosting campus visits and providing tours by elementary, middle school and high school students. The team provided support for a High School Counselor Education event on February 7 and working with HSEAS on the High School Expo on April 13, 2023.

Core Theme 2: STUDENT LEARNING, Increase educational success, collaborate to improve

Foundation Scholarship program is working with AwardSpring (vendor), ITS and Financial Aid to provide single sign on capacity for the scholarship application. This will reduce steps for students because much of their student data will populate the application and will also provide scholarship staff increased ability to review student information when reviewing and making award decisions. The 2023-2024 application will be available in April-May 2023 and will include several new scholarships made possible by donors such as the SPEAA ACE scholarships for Aerospace and the Connell Family Scholarships for continuing students.

Core Theme 3: COMMUNITY PARTNERSHIPS, Create a more inclusive working environment and a more valued, visible relationship with communities we serve

Government Relations has spent significant time in Olympia, supporting Trustee activities such as Transforming Lives, faculty visits with legislators and co-hosting the legislative reception at Octapas Café on February 1 with Renton Tech and Green River College. The team also provided support for Trustees in Washington D.C. at the ACCT National Legislative Summit, February 5-8, including visits with elected officials such as Congressman Adam Smith and meetings with federal agency staff.

Communications and Marketing collaborated with the MaST Center and Foundry10 on a media release, news post and social media coverage. This was to share news of a new partnership and to increase awareness on a STEM-focused exhibit available to the greater community.

The Foundation team has been working with board members on Highline Legends (retired employee) centered event scheduled for Friday, May 12 as well as preparing for our annual signature event (formerly the spring gala) on Saturday, October 7 in Building 8. More information is to come about both events that we’re excited to share with the campus community.

As the Foundation has been engaging with our retired employees, it has been an incredible opportunity to learn from their experiences at Highline and keep in touch with them with events we hold on campus to strengthen our relationships. We look forward to continuing to build these relationships as we expand our programming and events.

Division Honors and Achievements

Dave Weber, HC Print Services Manager, is a member of ACUP+ (Association of College and University Printers + K-12). Dave serves on the ACUP+ Board of Directors as a Member at Large and is the board liaison to the Education Committee. Dave recently represented Highline College in Omaha, Nebraska at a Strategic Planning meeting at the end of January 2023.

Report submitted on Feb. 15, 2023 by Vice President of Institutional Advancement, Josh Gerstman