Good Monday morning to you on September 19, 2016---

The District and the nine LACCD colleges got some great positive notice in the press in last Wednesday’s announcement of the LA College Promise over at LA City College. The promise is a partnership between the LACCD, the LAUSD, Mayor Garcetti of the City of Los Angeles, and the L.A. Chamber of Commerce where ANY high school student who graduates from an LAUSD high school and attends full-time will receive free tuition for their first year at any of the LACCD community colleges starting in Fall 2017. That could mean more high school students toward LATTC.

The official announcement of the LA College Promise was made by among others, Mayor Eric Garcetti and Dr. Jill Biden. Here’s a link to some of the news pieces. Especially check out the Vimeo that captured a number of our classes.

For us, the discussions have started about how our college will approach the LA College Promise – our PACTS Promise. Our first Day of Dialogue of the school year was this past Thursday. Discussions were devoted to the enrollment efforts, outreach, and the work ahead. Although we all need to be congratulated for the 6% growth goal we reached for 2015-16, we have more to do in order to build our base for 2016-17.

Several efforts that include the LA College Promise will be part of our upcoming enrollment push. Faculty and staff have offered some excellent input in the areas of advertising and marketing efforts, and have helped guide our strategies. Our direct mailer, television commercial and geo-marketing to phones, appear to have caught some traction among our younger students where we have seen significant growth. Add to that our new social media team and its efforts to push our message through different platforms, and we have an aggressive and multi-target push in building our enrollment and image. Thanks to all of you who have offered ideas and for attending the dialogue, and to Kaneesha Tarrant for taking the lead.So that you can plan ahead, please save the date every third Thursday of most months from 1:15pm-3pm for DoD.


The LA College Promise is about opportunity and free tuition. But lately we have heard about the closures of ITT Tech, the Corinthian campuses, Wyotech, UTI, Cordon Bleu and other for-profit schools, which for years, pushed predatory loans on students who could not afford their expensive tuitions. There are several students now attending LATTC who have come from these schools with heavy student debts. Tomorrow, Tuesday, September 20th, California Attorney General Kamala Harris will be on campus to speak with students to learn more about their experiences with predatory loans at for-profit schools. The roundtable will take place in the Magnolia Hall atrium from 11:00am to 12:30pm.The discussion is open to everyone, so please come by and listen in, and you may get a chance to discuss your experience with Attorney General Harris.

While our students benefit greatly from low enrollment fees; our students still take advantage of the numerous scholarships we make available each year. The Fall 2016 Scholarship Application is currently underway. The process is entirely online and it will close on Sunday, September 25, @ 11:59pm.Please encourage your students to apply for the more than $90,000 available. Students can access the application at: can also support students by completing the reference when you receive an email.

Today,September 19th, is our first College Council meeting of the school year, and as always we invite everyone to attendthe meeting. The council is the most representative participatory governance committee on campus that last year monitored our successful accreditation effort. It is this body that will help guide our campus through to our follow-up report set to be completed for approval in Summer 2016. The meeting will start at 1:15 today in Aspen Hall, Room101.

A couple of “open” gatherings this week. First, on Wednesday at noon of this week the LAH3C program team will be holding an “open house” to discuss career opportunities in the health career pathway.

The open house will take place in MH302 from 12:00pm to 2:00pm.

Also do not forget that Open Enrollment is underway for all employees. This week there will a special information session on Thursday, September 22nd, about open enrollment choices in Aspen Hall, Room 101 between 11:00am and 2:00pm.Anyone with any questions can show up, or call the benefits team at (888) 428-2980, or email them

Also, one week from today on Monday, September 26th, we have a special meeting of our Work Environment Committee, that will take place in the South Tent starting at 1:15pm. We will spend time discussing the upcoming Bond Measure CC on the November ballot. We need to look at possible projects and the process for selecting and prioritizing proposed bond projects. We hope to see you there.

Once again, our LATTC Foundation Student Benefit Dinner is taking place on Thursday, October 20th. This is one of the best ways you can support students financially, and the Foundation is offering all LATTC employees a special rate of $200 per ticket, in hopes of getting many of you to join us that night. We will be honoringour own Pulatian family, operators of the catering truck that has been on campus for 50 years, along with our SLATE-Z partners and several others. I encourage you to support students by buying a ticket to the dinner. Contact Christine Du from the foundation at 213-763-7166 or , and she will make it happen.

On Sunday evening I joined about fifteen Trade Tech faculty and staff, along with a hundred or so members of the Dharma Vijaya Buddhist Vihara, at a service for Karen Amarawansa. I have often wondered about the Buddhist community on Crenshaw, on the west side of the street between Washington and Venice when I would drive by. On Sunday, they held an amazing memorial for Karen and her wonderful family. After a career as an attorney at the public defender’s office and a few years as a public school teacher, she served for nine years as the department secretary for the Business Department before retiring in 2015. Her cancer came back about four months ago and after some time in a hospice, she passed on Monday, September 12th. Many spoke of her intelligence, her keen sense of right and wrong, and her kindness, traits that we knew in her at Trade Tech. In my first year, we discovered that I was friends with her step-dad, Ralph Fertig, a Freedom Rider to Alabama in 1961. Last night, Paulette Bailey spoke for all of us from Trade Tech in a beautiful eulogy. There are so many talented individuals who give so much of themselves here. We remember Karen Amarawansa. I believe there will be another chance to join her family in remembering and we will let you know.

Here is hoping for another solid week at LATTC.

Larry

Laurence B. Frank

Pres., LATTC

College to Career-It’s All Here

L.A. Trade-Technical College