Transcripts of September 20, 2011IPRC
(Not including evaluations of Food Services and Bookstore Comprehensive Draft reports-they are under their respective 2011 note section)
Stephanie: we need a Program Review writer like we used to have a Grant writer. I really believe they know their program, they just don’t know how to understand and write these reports
William: maybe anyone who gets Not-Satisfactory should participate in Program Review the next year so they have an understanding of how the process works and what they need to do.
James: I agree
William: James and I have a better understanding of the process and I think our report will be much better than last years
Stephanie: yes, so many are still struggling
Thea: one of the problems with having a Program Review writer is that the Program doesn’t write it. You might as well just have the administrator’s just write it because the whole point of program review is to get the programs thinking, “Where do we want to go and how are we going to get there?” Everybody woks together.
Stephanie: well, I mean take it like baking a cake. Get all the ingredients and then have someone just helps them (interrupted)
William: that’s what they do at Porterville College, I just found out today.
Stephanie: put it in the correct format
James: I totally see where you’re going, but what I did was just look at everyone who reserved an excellent and used it as a model
Stephanie: there are just some who just can’t write this kind of report without help
Thea: but while the administrator isn’t supposed to write it, they are supposed to assist
Stephanie: if they understand it
Thea: well, yeah. I don’t know what the answer is, but I know that part of what we have talked about is that we need to restructure our training where we give them concrete examples and not just “don’t do this:” but “ here’s an example of a good one and here’s an example of a bad one and here’s how you change it from a bad to a good. This is a common error” So if we do that in training, hopefully that will help them out.
Stephanie: for each program?
Thea: right
Deborah: I was really impressed with the meeting we had this morning with Counseling. I believe that page by page analysis and talking to them about what our comments were, were invaluable. Maybe instead of additional training of fun, we keep with the training schedule we have but we schedule these one on one, page by page discussions and have them come here and listen to us talk about their program review draft and then they can, well maybe they will understand it better.
William: was that meeting requested by the division or (interrupted)
Thea: no, we felt that there were so many issues, there was no way to put it in a letter. It would be just too cumbersome to do that. The issue is, there’s a couple of issues. First of all, it’s our time, it’s huge. I mean if we are each on three or four committees and we have to have three or four meetings where we can all go together and go over it. That hugely increases the time of the committee members. The other issues that I am beginning to have is that if you do it for one, then everyone wants it and then it’s’ where does it end? The other issue is and it has happened to both Cindy and I, this year and last year, they ask for help, you give them help and if they don’t get what they expect out of it, it’s then your fault. “We did what you said and we didn’t get an excellent”. I mean I had an email forma person who I read and gave them feedback on their annual update and I said “this plan is about SLO’s and it might belong under SLO’s and then right underneath it I said, expect if you had a previous plan that was in Effectiveness that was related to the SLO’s, it stays here. I gave them those exemptions and what I got back was, “Well, I moved it and we got dinged for it”. Because I said right in there, “If it’s a previous plan, leave it right here”. So they read the top, did it, without reading the rest of my instruction and then it became my fault. We went over this and they still didn’t do it correctly. The other thing that has happened more to Cindy then to me, because people tend to not bully me so much (we do get bullied), and so by having meetings, especially if only one member of the committee can come, their entire team shows up and is just blowing up the conversation and attacking the one member and that’s a bad situation. We want to help them but it is a fine line beyond which to go and it is hard to know where to make the cut off. We want to be fair but we have enough to do and we have enough of a target on our backs. I mean, frankly, that’s Cindy and my job to front the anger, not this committee’s job to front the anger, because you get that. You just do, it’s natural, try not to take it personally, their frustrated and they want to do a good job (most of the time) and it goes from there. But, my concern is that if we start having meetings then everyone will require it and then were looking at not only having to review and us talk about, then we have to meet with each of the programs and go over it.
Deborah: It seems that the ones that we think are in danger of not passing are the ones that we should spend time with, not everybody.
William: but I was going to say, had I not served on the committee and I just got the two memos, If counseling got it, I want a meeting to because I want someone to go over page by page like they did with them to get the same feedback because I want to get a good passing rate too. I wouldn’t know if I wasn’t on the committee if I was in danger of failing or not. I read this, I didn’t say much, and I think I’m okay but then I hear some of the others that we say are not fine.
Thea: then the whole issue again is: this review is designed to give them feedback and not designed to say, “You’re not going to pass”. So, it’s a tough call. One of the things that brought this up was that I got an email from Kathie requesting a meeting with the committee members who reviewed the library because they don’t understand the feedback from the letter. I thought the letter was very clear myself.
William: that was one of the things that we thought (interrupted)
Thea: I didn’t read it. I said I would shepherd the letter through because Cindy was gone. I didn’t read it. I got everyone’s feedback. I put the letter together. I sent it back out to those people. Everybody read it and thought it was okay. I mean it hit the highlights and I gave them concrete examples, here’s an issue and an example of that problem. So it’s unclear?
Deborah: I was just walking downstairs and they said they wanted to meet with the people who wrote it because they don’t understand where the comments fit with what they had written. They don’t know how to match the feedback with their narrative, etc.
Thea: okay. Well, I asked Christian since he called me to tell me he wouldn’t’ t be here and his response was that it was okay but it would be at my convenience and not theirs because we have other stuff to do. I just need the committee to think about this and unfortunately Cindy is out incommunicado so we can’t really get her feedback. I have concerns. Not because it is Library. I have concerns about going down the path of having meetings because then we will have to have meetings. We will have to at least offer it to everybody because it isn’t good enough to get a satisfactory, they will want an excellent and will want to know what it takes to get an excellent. Then what do we do? We either have to say we are only having meetings with people we don’t think are going to pass then our review becomes more of an actual review then a feedback.
Deborah: what if we just make two designations. You either pass or you don’t.
James: oh, I love that idea
Deborah: no excellent
James: because don’t you think the programs are well oiled pieces of machinery that have all of these functions in place to do all of this, aren’t they always going to get satisfactory after a while unless their overcome with massive obstacles and challenges or they find ways of (interrupted)
Thea: that’s a whole other discussion and I’m willing to have it but I can’t not answer that email so (pause). Counseling was read by Christian, William, and Cindy? No not Counseling, I’m talking about Library. I’m sorry.
William: yes that’s right and if schedule permits, I would be happy to meet with them. I’m not afraid to, I just want it to be equitable.
Thea: even before, we didn’t meet with PE. I just wrote a letter that was like five pages long, giving them that kind of feedback. I didn’t meet with them. It was the feedback that I had along with the other two people who read PE.
William: but what I am afraid of now is since the committee members had a meeting with counseling, in all fairness for Bookstore, Food Services, or whoever, should be able to have the same opportunity to say “hey we heard that you met with them and we would like the same opportunity”
Thea: right, then we need to make that statement and send it to everyone who has a comprehensive
William: I just feel like, well, I don’t know how that was initiated, one way or the other but (interrupted)
Deborah: it came from us
Thea: it came from us because we couldn’t figure out how to do a letter
Stephanie: you mentioned that last week, you said you thought it would be almost easier to sit down and talk to them then to write a letter out
William: but now we have a request from Kathie in the Library now and I believe we need to honor that request no matter how much people want or do not want to meet and then be scared that the other seven or eight programs will want to meet to.
Joni: you are kind of setting up precedence that if your running out of time and they will take pity on you and have a meeting with you and sit down with you and explain line by line what you need to do which is sort of rewarding the (interrupted)
Thea; right, exactly. Rewarding the last minute people who don’t get it done
James: our colleagues are not that manipulative are they?
Thea: oh, yes
James: really?
Thea. Yes
Stephanie: well it is the old saying, “ we did it once, now what are we going to do?” if it hadn’t been done, but since it has been done then it has to be continued this year and then say we are not doing it again.
William: maybe we should do them as they are requested, so (interrupted)
Nancy: we don’t advertise it, if they (interrupted)
(Inaudible, everyone talking at once)
Thea: it will get out. It absolutely will get out. It’s huge
Nancy: the other thing is that we don’t advertise it ourselves but we honor every request that comes to us
Thea: I understand that but here’s what will happen “ I get a not satisfactory and you didn’t tell me I could come in and you go over it line by line with me”
Joni: yeah, like those other people
William: you know, folks talk on this campus
Thea: absolutely
Stephanie: so your saying it’s already out there
William: it’sgoing to be out there if it isn’t already there
Thea: so what your saying is that we already screwed up and we shouldn’t have met with counseling and I tell you if we hadn’t met with counseling, there’s no way they would of met, they still might not.
Deborah: Library is probably in the same boat
William: and Food Service
Thea: I don’t know, I don’t know
James: well, Food Services is an easy meeting. Initiative. Do your work
William: no but if were protecting those who aren’t going to pass versus those who have a chance of passing, we extend them the leave or not. So we extend the courtesy to all of them but (interrupted)
James: didn’t you announce at the beginning of last year that this as a horrific year because everybody was up for a comprehensive. I think this is the worst year ever for those who don’t get it.
(Inaudible, everyone talking at once)
Deborah: they’ll get it
James: they’ll get it next time
Deborah: they’ll get it, they’ll learn what it means I mean it’s a square peg in a round hole and it’s very difficult for some people (interrupted)
James: I agree
William: let me also say from a consumer standpoint, let’s say we have all of these programs up for review and they submit their five year comprehensive and out of the ones this year, ¾ of them fail. Are we going to have a revolution again, (inaudible), pretty soon and now with the leadership I can really see that going really quick and can spark real quick because since Scroggins is gone, he was a very heavy handed person and we don’t have that right now and I can see that this will turn into a bloody bath.
(Inaudible, everyone talking at once)
William: and I take responsibility for some of that and I have since apologized for that but I can see if we have the majority of these folks fail, we are going to be in for some nice conversations later
Deborah: ask for help and we didn’t give them help
Thea: I understand that, all of that and I’m afraid we might be screwed this time because we helped counseling, but here’s the problem. Here’s the problem. At what point do we say, “you are professionals, get it done. If you can’t read a sentence and understand what that sentence says, how many times do we have to say, “Previous plans of Annual Updates?”. Almost no one does previous plans and it says very clearly, your previous plans. Not some narrative. What was your plan? What did you do? And that happens over and over again. Again and again. It’s not just one program, it’s a lot of them that do that. At what point does it become their responsibility instead of this committee’s responsibility for them doing it? I think your right, I think we will not have a choice. But, I think the committee needs to make a decision of how we’re going to go forward in the future with this because it’s not doable. It’s not doable. I also think in order for it to be equitable, the only thing that we can do is have Erica send out an email to everybody who is undergoing comprehensive review and offer, if they wish to meet with the committee that read their program review.
(Inaudible, everyone talking at once)
Thea: I don’t know any other way to do it?
Nancy: you know, I think what would be equitable is maybe making that statement, I don’t know about this year, but, in upcoming years, maybe making the statement that we will work with anybody working on their program review early but were not going to an 11th our meeting with them in the last two weeks that its due. I mean we’ll meet with people up until (interrupt[ted)
Joni: May
Nancy: May
Thea: and we do
Deborah: we do say that
James: but they don’t do anything
Thea: they don’t so the problem is, people either don’t come or they come and they sit and they don’t ask any questions. There are occasionally those that come in, well the ones that come in and are the most active was consumer families. Every time they came they had a series of questions, what did you mean here? How do we do this? It was very concrete and very, they were working on it. And everybody else sat around and just watched them. Almost no one else had any questions. So, (interrupted)
William: the schedule calls for nine comprehensives this year. We already talked to Counseling. My areas information I think is clear enough, so that’s three taken care of. So there’s potentially six groups that want to meet.
Thea: right. And it’s scheduling a time when everybody can get together because the other issue is, and I am telling you this, it is not a good idea to go one person. A minimum two of the readers
William: I was going to say that we could probably take out BICS because they didn’t submit anything, so that’s another one. So we have five. Food Service didn’t do anything so that’s four that we can be (inaudible) to, the Library, I&T, Work Experience, and (interrupted)
Thea: well, I&T has already sent us stuff that they have corrected from all of our suggestions
William: then that’s three
Thea: and did they give me a zing because they said the date was wrong?
William: I guess I’m trying to narrow it down here. Library, Work Experience, and Bookstore are the only three that could potentially come back and say I need a meeting too. I mean the Library did already so we have two other ones. I’m just trying to narrow it down and see.