Area Report for Board of Trustees

Good afternoon Trustees and college community members,

Welcome to spring quarter 2024! I hope that you each had some time to do something that fills your individual cup during the days between quarters.

I am happy to share that as we kick off spring quarter enrollment numbers continue to improve. Thank you to the countless employees across campus who are participating in efforts to enroll and retain our highline students. Spring quarter we can look forward to all-campus budget forums, the recruitment of a new Executive Director for Human Resources, and of course – Commencement! Many thanks to Dra. Jimenez for chairing the search committee for our open Executive Director position. It is a heavy lift and you and your committee are appreciated.

I want to express a high level of gratitude for Highline’s stellar financial aid team as they continue to navigate the national changes to the FASFA process. This is a challenging time and your commitment to serving our students does not go unnoticed.

Wishing you all a wonderful quarter!

John

Information Technology Services

IT Services is supporting several new software implementations which are in early stages across the college, including tools to improve class scheduling to better meet student needs, connect students to internships and job opportunities, improve digital literacy, and provide electronic health record support for the Counseling center.  All of these projects involve multiple staff from across the IT Services division to support data integration, security, accessibility, and process impacts of these new systems.

We also continue to expand and improve our IT security and identity management by continuing to integrate more services in our Okta implementation, and implementing MFA requirements for more services, most recently for Canvas and Google Workspace for employees.  Highline also recently joined the Cybersecurity & Infrastructure Security Agency’s (CISA) Cyber-Hygiene program.  This Federally funded program adds an additional layer to our IT security toolset, offering our team greater insight into college systems that may be at risk from known vulnerabilities and need additional attention.

As the Academic Affairs AI Task Force works on pedagogical and integrity issues around Generative AI, ITS has begun to work on the extensive security, privacy, licensing, and other policy issues that GenAI brings. We are working with the task force to provide access to pilot users to GenAI tools provided by some of our current vendors, such as Microsoft and Google, as well as evaluate the feasibility of options from other providers.

At the system level, we continue to work with our colleagues at SBCTC and the other colleges to improve processes utilizing ctcLink across all areas through the ctcLink College Collaboration Group (cCCG) and Working Group.  As co-lead of the cCCG, Pat Daniels is working to help that group both prioritize requests for enhancements to the system, and align those requests with a parallel effort for process alignment across the colleges in order to increase our collective efficiency.  In a related effort, Pat is representing Highline and the IT Commission on a task force developing requirements for “Student Success” software that will provide supplementary functionality to ctcLink to support advising and Guided Pathways functions across the colleges.

Human Resources

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.

HR Operations: HR personnel have been working on correcting system data information based on Employment Security Department requirements.  The project will correct invalid or missing Standard Occupational Classification codes within ctcLink.

Recruitment:  HR recruiters continue to work through several faculty announcements.  We also began working with the screening committee for the Executive Director of Human Resources search.

Payroll: Payroll staff continue to cross-train staff within the department.  We have also been attending some external professional development courses with an emphasis on increasing Excel proficiency.

Benefits: The benefits team continues to work with state agencies to resolve outstanding system challenges since converting to Benefits 24/7.  Overall, the impacts to Highline staff and faculty have been minimal.

Mission Statement: As a South King County college striving for social justice, Highline College partners with global students as they envision, plan and achieve their educational and professional goals.