Area Report for Board of Trustees

It has been such a pleasure to be back at Highline College. Over the past three months, I’ve listened and observed. I’ve heard from so many in Academic Affairs and have seen strength and innovation in action. Alongside the fatigue, strain, and grief, I’ve witnessed incredible resolve, deep care for one another, and a fierce, unwavering commitment to our students and our shared mission.

I am honored to be here and truly look forward to more conversations and connection this summer and into the fall 2025.

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

• The Hub: Federal Way Higher Education Center offered its second Enrollment Lab on Tuesday, May 20^th, from 11am-1pm. In collaboration with staff from Retention and Completion Services, Pathway Advising, Workforce Pathways, Tech Support, Financial Aid, and CCIE Student Leaders, we provided registration support to new and current students.  Students also received assistance with questions about financial aid, setting up Highline accounts, resolving holds on their registration, etc.  This event was open house style, so students were able to stop in at any point during the two-hour timeframe.  The Hub will offer another Enrollment Lab this summer (possibly two) and will continue to do so each quarter.  These events are a wonderful collaboration between Academic Affairs and Student Services.  According to the demographic information collected at these labs, most participants are students of color, living in the Federal Way area or further south.
• The HOST department in collaboration with the Ukrainian Association of Washington State launched a bridge program Fall 2024. They started with a cohort of 15 students. The program is taught in both English and Ukrainian. Students receive materials in both languages and are encouraged to submit assignments in the language they feel most comfortable expressing themselves. Most began writing in Ukrainian and have gradually transitioned to English.  So far, 12 students have completed the Customer Service and HOST Specialist Certificates. The cohort has grown to 22, and all students plan to continue working toward their AAS in Hospitality and Tourism Management next year. Since many balance school with part-time jobs, most are on track to finish within 18–24 months.
• Increased enrollment in our BAS degrees for the 24-25 year by 13%
  • Have our largest cohort for our Elementary Education residency
  • Expanded Partnership with CWU to add an accounting emphasis to our BAS in Business Management.
• To address enrollment challenges, the Medical Assisting program, led by Diana Cacho, completed a program redesign which included moving the program to a cohort model. With the help of a Workforce Development Grant, managed by Part Time faculty member Cory Martin, enrollment has increased enough to add courses back into the upcoming schedule.

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

• Associate of Applied Science – Registered Nurse (AAS-RN) Program is wrapping up a four-year HEET grant project at the end of June. Outcomes from the four-year grant:
  • A Pre-Nursing Navigator position was created to support non-traditional students pursuing nursing degrees. Funding is still being sought to sustain this position as the grant concludes.
  • A Part-Time Nursing Program was developed to serve students needing a more flexible schedule. The part-time program will span 12 quarters (including summers), compared to the standard 6 quarters (excluding summers), reducing the credit load per quarter from 12–14 to 5–8 credits. Scheduled to launch in Fall 2025 with an initial cohort of 21 students.
• The Pure and Applied Sciences division held its annual awards ceremony on May 28th.
• Over the 24-25 academic year, the Workforce team coordinated DACUMs for our Criminal Justice, Paralegal, Human Services and BSTEC programs – 45 industry partners participated in these day-long events. As a result of these design a curriculum workshops; Criminal Justice has gone through a major curriculum and degree revision to align our program’s outcomes with the skills and knowledge industry needs; BSTEC and Human Services are in the process of conducting a curriculum review based on the DACUM reports in order to ensure our curriculum is meeting current industry standards.
• The Highline College Library is thrilled to announce the publication of In Our Own Words: Stories from Immigrant and Refugee Students, Volume 2, released online in May 2025.
• Last spring 2024 Dr. Amal Mahmoud, ELCAP faculty, and Karen Fernandez, a librarian, collected stories written by his students in his Level 4/5 ESOL classes. In these stories, students shared memorable trips they’ve taken, life experiences, and details about their lives as they practiced English writing skills. Deb Moore and Karen collaborated to publish the stories online through the Pressbooks platform.
• June 5th, the library celebrated the student authors at the book release party. Six ESOL student authors attended the event, four students read their stories, and all received copies of the books.

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

• A Career Fair was held on May 7th. This event was a collaboration between Career and Transfer and Workforce Outreach and Recruitment.  It has been a number of years since Highline hosted a career fair and it was a huge success! Over 250 students and 41 employers participated in the event.  Big kudos to our 15 volunteers and the planning team (Teresa, Fatima, Karen and Sinai) for pulling this amazing event off.  Also a Big thank you to Jumpin’ Jambalaya for donating five $20 gift cards for our scavenger hunt raffle prize winners. The scavenger hunt was a big success and really helped students engage with employers with specific conversation starters. A Big thank you to the Women’s Program for providing professional attire for our students so they have clothes for future job interviews. The planning team is very proud of how the event turned out and they are planning to do this on at least on a yearly basis. They also look forward to hosting a healthcare focused career fair in the Fall!
• The Computing Advisory Committee recommended an equipment refresh for the networking lab. Aaron Hayden (CIS/CSci faculty) conducted a survey with local employers to identify the networking equipment currently being used by industry. This equipment was purchased this spring with Perkins funds and will be installed by a bunch of excited, graduating AAS students over the summer.
• Catholic Community Services (CCS) and Highline College have successfully launched a new Case Management Certificate within the Human Services AAS degree. This certificate aims to equip frontline staff in housing and homeless services with the skills necessary for professional advancement and leadership roles. The certificate program, comprising 33 credits, is designed to honor the lived experiences of adult learners and provide them with opportunities to pursue higher education. Our first cohort has 13 students graduating this spring!
• This summer will be the 4^th year that the Continuing Education department will partner with Seattle Children’s Hospital to place 14 pre-nursing students from UW into our Nursing Assistant Certified program at no cost to the students. After completing the program, the students will be placed in temporary positions at Seattle Children’s Hospital, while continuing their education at UW. Nearly 40 students have completed the program in the past three years, with many now employed in permanent positions with Seattle Children’s Hospital.
• Over the past year, Highline College and Puget Sound Educational Service District (PSESD) have been meeting with paraeducators from Federal Way and Auburn school districts to build a cohort into our AA-DTA and our AAS in Paraeducator program, which will ladder into our BAS in Elementary Education program. We are planning for a cohort of 20 students to start summer quarter.
• In May, Susan Rich (Faculty, English) was a featured speaker and reader at the Mass Poetry Festival in Salem Massachusetts. Recent poems have been published in Ploughshares, Spring 2025; Molecule, Spring 2025; Sugared Water, Spring 2025, and Taking Liberties, the Cutthroat Anthology.
• Laura Soracco (faculty, English) presented at the Washington Librarian Association conference on Saturday, April 12 as part of a panel discussion. The session was titled: Creative Approaches to Delivering Information Literacy to Communities.

Core Theme 4: CULTURE & CAPACITY: Promote a campus culture which fosters equity and inclusivity supporting employee growth and development, and institutional capacity for transformation

• The Learning and Teaching and Center and Educational Technology rely on our strong partnerships with faculty to deliver professional development and support to our instructors. Our Faculty in Residence are full-time, tenured faculty who are granted ⅓ release to work as members of the department. We’d like to thank this year’s faculty in residence:
  • Rashmi Koushik, ELCAP, Learning and Teaching Center
  • Tarisa Matsumoto-Maxfield, English and DGS, Educational Technology
  • Stephanie Ojeda Ponce, English, Learning and Teaching Center
  • Laura Soracco, English, Educational Technology
  • Angel Steadman, ELCAP, Learning and Teaching Center
  • Jodi White, Education, Educational Technology
• Special thanks are due to Tarisa Matsumoto-Maxfield, English/DGS, who has served as the Faculty Director of the LTC, first teamed up with Aleya Dhanji, Physics, and then on her own, for the last two years. As she returns to teaching, we celebrate her contributions to our learning culture at Highline.

Report submitted by Interim Vice President of Academic Affairs, Dr. Rolita Ezeonu