Area Report for Board of Trustees

Good day Trustees,

This is my first board letter in over 7 months, and as I write this, I am a bit saddened by our state of affairs nationally and its effect on higher education.  The recent Executive Orders and “Dear Colleague” letter have caused much stress and concern for our staff and students.

I want to assure everyone that we continue to uphold our values of equity and inclusion at all levels of the college.  Our programs and services continue to be open to any student – that will never change.   We are working with our AAG’s office to make sure we are in compliance with state law.  I’m confident our college will continue to provide services and  quality education to all who walk through our doors while continuing to support our staff and faulty.

On another note, thank you in advance for attending the Faculty Tenure Reception.  We will be joined by Dr. Rolita Ezeonu, our new incoming Interim Vice President of Academic Affairs.  I’m very happy to have her re-join the team and college.  Have a good week.

Information Technology Services

Core Theme 4: CULTURE & CAPACITY, Create capacity for meaningful strategic planning and institutional transformation through intentional development of employees, facilities, and systems that support student success and close equity gaps

• IT Services and Purchasing have completed the first phase of the upgrade to our printing and copying hardware and software across campus. Partnering with Canon, 33 new multi-function devices were installed across campus by the end of January, finishing ahead of the original schedule. Additionally, PaperCut print management software was implemented for all employees and students. Feedback on the new machines and software capabilities has been overwhelmingly positive.  We will now move on to phase 2, working to integrate stand-alone printers into the PaperCut system and reduce our printer device footprint where possible.
• Pat Daniels is participating in the pilot for the system-wide Process Alignment Work (PAW) effort. This cross-college task force is focussed on examining current processes which all colleges use ctcLink for, and agreeing on process alignment which will provide increased efficiencies for all colleges and SBCTC support in our shared system. The group will then make a recommendation to the ctcLink College Collaboration Group for final approval of any changes. The pilot project is examining college Travel and Expense processes and procedures.

Title IX

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

On January 9, 2025, a federal judge issued an order that vacated the 2024 Title IX Regulations that our campus implemented on August 1, 2024. This order had the effect of requiring our campus to revert to compliance with the Title IX Regulations issued in 2020. Effectively, this means that campus complaints of sexual harassment, sexual assault, dating violence, domestic violence, and stalking will be managed in the same way they were during the period from 2020-2024, using similar policies and procedures to those that were in place at that time. The 2020 Title IX Regulations have a fairly narrow application. They only address sexual harassment that falls within our education program and activity. With the exception of our Student Conduct Code, which requires we move through the rule change process with the Washington State Code Reviser’s Office, our procedures have been updated online to reflect these required changes. The Board of Trustees can expect a preliminary presentation of proposed student conduct code changes for emergency rule making at the March trustee meeting with a request for approval to file for emergency rule changes (CR103(e)) at the April meeting.

Highline College continues to maintain a broad mandate for employees to report known sexual misconduct to the Title IX office.

Although this does require changes to how our campus has managed our response to complaints of sexual harassment occurring within our education program or activities since August 2024, many of our current practices will continue, including:

• Clear definitions of the offenses noted above
• Written notice of the allegations and available resolution processes will be provided to the parties to a complaint (complainant and respondent)
• A presumption that a respondent is not responsible unless the evidence proves otherwise
• A resolution process that is equitable, transparent to the participants, and allows access to evidence prior to any final determination
• Reasonable and appropriate supportive measures for all parties
• Prompt notification of final determinations, in writing
• Emergency removal of respondents who are a danger to the community
• Sanctions that are commensurate with the severity of policy violations, considering the respondent’s prior disciplinary history and any aggravating or mitigating factors
• A team of well-trained Title IX professionals who are free from conflicts of interest or bias
• An appeal process for all findings

I encourage anyone with questions to utilize the Title IX – Reporting Sexual Harassment webpage or to contact the college’s Title IX Coordinator (Danielle Slota) at titleix@highline.edu. I would also like to express gratitude to our colleague Jordan Mellott who helped with the very fast turn around of website updates needed following the court order.

We look forward to discussing our proposed changes to the Student Conduct Code in March.

Report submitted by President John R. Mosby, Ph.D.