Welcome to March!  I hope all is well and wanted to update everyone on some recent events participated by the President’s Office.Our office as well as other staff and faculty throughout campus participated in a webinar presentation called “Introduction to Neurodiversity and Supports for Autistic Students in College” presented by Dr. Lucas Harrington from The Autism Center at the University of Washington. This presentation is especially important given the increasing number of neurodiverse students nationally and here at Highline College. This presentation is the first of a series that educates the campus on the characteristics and needs of students and how to best create a successful environment for them. Many thanks to Associate Dean Jenni Sandler and Julie Pollard, Director of Accessibility Resources for their leadership and organization in making this opportunity happen for the college.

Last week was our Literary Salon sponsored by the Arcturus and the Office of the President. This event provided a showcase for our amazing talented students to share their work. We had alums come back and present as well. In addition, staff, faculty and students were invited to read their work as well in an open-mic format. This is our 3^rd salon and I look forward to many more in the future. A special thank you to our Arcturus staff of students and faculty – wonderful event.

Our campus master plan presentation was held and well attended by the campus. This time allowed the campus to see what Highline will look like in the next decade or so. This presentation also provided an opportunity for comment and feedback and the master plan document begins to formalize. I look forward to presenting more information about the master plan during this month’s study session.

Lastly, I’ve been asked to present at the ASHIE (Alliance for Hispanic Serving Institution Educators) conference next week in San Francisco. There will be a group of staff and faculty attending with the hopes of connecting and learning how to best position the campus to be a Hispanic Serving Institution in the future.

Information Technology Services

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

• In cooperation with the Educational Technology team, we will be moving Canvas and Zoom logins to utilize Okta at the end of Winter quarter. Part of a long-term project to simplify logins for students and employees across all Highline systems, this will mean the same login process will be used for these tools as is used for Aviso and other smaller tools that have already been migrated.

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

• The ITS ctcLink PMO held three meetings to work with college subject matter experts to gather feedback and participate in an exercise to prioritize a total of 39 enhancement requests for ctcLink which have been submitted to the State Board, but not yet approved through ctcLink governance. This effort not only included Highline College, but was also part of a system-wide process in development through the ctcLink College Collaboration Group.
• Part of the ITS reorganization currently in progress has pulled several resources from the previous Data, Development, and Integrations team into the ctcLink/Business Analysis team.  This new, larger team is intended to increase our ability to guide process improvement and support more effective use of data in collaboration with Institutional Research.

Human Resources

The Human Resources team has been hard at work this month continuing their efforts in a variety of areas. We continue seeing success in filling open positions, with another 6 positions filled in the month of February. Our office and payroll staff have begun work updating and converting some of our temporary campus employees into permanent ones. This has presented to system challenges that our staff are successfully navigating. Overall, our team continues to work effectively and efficiently toward reaching department goals.

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

Our recruiters, Leslea Berg and JP Altamirano, have been working diligently with numerous screening committees to ensure we have diverse representation in our hiring pools. Although not always successful the first time through, their effort in locating new advertising spaces and thoughtful communications are increasing our pools of diverse applicants. As we continue to refine our processes and reach, we are hopeful to see positive results in the months to come.

We are also working to develop a recruitment handbook. This document will be our guide to ensure we are always focused and committed to fair and equitable hiring practices. It will outline the steps the Human Resources team takes from the initial request for staffing and job development through the job offer.

Division Honors and Achievements

Grace Kuhnly, Human Resources Consultant Assistant 1, recently ended her term as Emergency Building Coordinator for the Human Resources team and Building 12.  We want to express our appreciation for stepping up and prioritizing the safety of her colleagues while fulfilling that additional duty. JP Altamirano, Human Resources Consultant 2, will assume the role moving forward.

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