Thank you all for joining me this morning as we gather to welcome the dawning of a new academic year. It is such a joy to watch the campus come together to welcome the promise of a new opportunity for our students to realize their greatest aspirations.
I would like to welcome some special guests that have joined us this morning - our returning academic senate chair Dr. Virgil Adams, our new student government president Atticus Reyes, our returning Staff Council Chair Rosario Cuevas, Foundation Board members Lois Rice, Linda Dullam and Peter Wollons, and the new co-presidents of our Alumni and Friends Board, Melissa Mirkovich-Scholes and Leah Lacayo.
I am also pleased to welcome the newest member of our executive leadership team – Dr. Richard Yao – our new Vice President for Student Affairs. And new members of our academic leadership team - Dr. Vandana Kohli, the Dean of Arts and Sciences; Dr. Osman Özturgut, the Dean of Extended University and AVP for International Programs; Dr. Susan Andrzejewski Interim Dean of the MVS School of Business and Economics; and Steve Stratton, Interim Dean of the Library.
Thank you all for joining us, I look forward to partnering with you in the year ahead as we work together to advance the mission of Cal State Channel Islands.
I would also like to extend a very warm welcome to our 12 new tenure-track faculty members who hail from disciplines ranging from communication to mathematics as well as to our 30 new lecturers and 37 new staff members from across the campus. Would all of the individuals who have joined the campus in the last year please stand and be recognized? Welcome to the dolphin pod! We are delighted that you have joined us.
Before we begin talking about the vision for what lies ahead, I wanted to take a minute to recognize some of the exemplary achievements that were realized last year.
When we were all last together, we witnessed the graduation of a record-breaking number of students. Leading up to the commencement ceremony, the campus was filled with celebration – at the nursing and school of education pinning ceremonies where we welcomed healthcare providers and future educators to their new professions. At Si Se Pudo, the lavender cording ceremony, the black student stoling ceremony, and the veteran’s medallion ceremony we celebrated the richness that our diverse student population brings to our academic community. And at Mortar Board, Gamma Beta Phi and Honors Convocation where we witnessed the remarkable academic achievements of our students.
We celebrated inquiry, discovery, and the advancement of knowledge, culminating in two commencement ceremonies where nearly 2,000 students received their diplomas – accompanied by 20,000 of their closest family and friends. It was a powerful reminder of the impact of the work that each of you engages in every day. We are not just impacting individual lives on our campus, we are changing family trees and strengthening community roots.
Of course, it is an enormous amount of work to throw a party for 20,000 people. Thank you to Kim Ritchey and her team for leading the effort, to the groundskeepers, electricians, the technology crew, police officers, parking officials, custodial staff, disability services professionals, cooks, faculty, staff and students! Your behind the scenes work enabled a safe and joyous celebration for our students and their families. Would everyone who participated in commencement this year, please stand and be recognized. Thank you!
Last year was full of additional accomplishments as well:
- Our campus was ranked 18th in U.S. News & World Report’s listing of Top Ranked Public Schools.
- We were ranked 26th in Washington Monthly’s “Best Bang for the Buck” among Universities in the West.
- Thanks to the collaborative work between University Police, Public Safety and our Student Affairs professionals, we were ranked as the 9th safest campus in the nation.
- Thanks to the commitment of our facilities, grounds and maintenance team, we were recognized as a “Tree Campus USA” university for the sixth time.
- As a result of the dedication of Dr. Andrea Grove and Dr. Chris Scholl who run the Model UN program, CI was named as one of the top volunteer-producing Minority Serving Institutions by the Peace Corps.
- Led by Dr. Jaime Hannans and Dr. Jacob Jenkins, CI became the first CSU campus to establish z-majors. Thanks to the faculty in Communications and Early Childhood Studies, students will now be able to complete their degrees without purchasing a single textbook for their major courses.
- Maggie Tougas, our emergency manager, received the Douglas Shivley Award for Outstanding Community Impact from the United Way for her volunteer work during the Thomas Fire.
- Two of our esteemed colleagues were recognized by the Pacific Coast Business Times. Ysabel Trinidad, Vice President for Business and Financial Affairs was named one of the Top 50 Women in Business and Celina Zacarias, Senior Director of Community & Government Relations received the 2018 Latina Leadership Award.
- Alumna Alexis Mumford was one of 18 students nationwide selected to participate in the American Committee on Foreign Relations Young Leaders Initiative in Washington D.C.
- Communications major Kelsey Genesi served as a Non-Governmental delegate to the UN’s Commission on the Status of Women.
- Thanks to the remarkable coordination from Denise Lugo, CI was selected by the Getty to host Pacific Standard Time LA/LA, a collaboration across southern California that explored the critical importance of Latin American and Latino Art in LA.
- And finally, Dr. Cynthia Flores, Dr. Blake Gillespie and Dr. Ahmed Awad received a nearly $200,000 grant from the National Science Foundation to develop a model for increasing underrepresented minority faculty in STEM.
And, last but certainly not least: CI ranked among the Top 10 colleges for surfers. And two weeks later, California designated surfing as our official state sport. Coincidence? I think not!
If we had all day, I could recount hundreds of additional accomplishments from throughout the University that reflect the quality of the work that happens on our campus every day. So let’s have a round of applause in recognition of the many accomplishments we celebrated this year.
While many of you were away this summer, there was a flurry of activity here on campus and, thanks to the excellent work of Conferences and Events, we hosted more summer visitors than ever before. We welcomed everyone from the New Zealand Olympic cycling program to budding young scientists in day camps; LULAC Upward Bound, African American Enrichment Academy, and the Engineering Innovation Summer Bridge Program. We also hosted the Migrant Summer Leadership Institute which has been so successful thanks to the collaborative work of Dr. Jorge Garcia, Dr. Hiram Ramirez, Dr. Charles Osiris and the ROI staff, the California Department of Education has doubled our funding, enabling us to welcome 200 students in 2019.
I hope that your summer, whether it was on campus or off, was full of adventure. As it turns out, my summer had more adventure than I had bargained for when my children and my sister convinced me to go camping. It probably does not surprise anyone in this room that I am not a particularly skilled camper. So, as my family was holding me against my will in the wilderness, my oldest son Aidan convinced me to go on a night hike with him. “It’ll be fun, mom.” Famous last words. While I am very fond of hiking, I am, unfortunately, not very good at reading maps and we quickly lost our way. As panic set in, Aidan reassured me that we would not actually be eaten by bears because he knew precisely how to navigate us back to camp. I suspect this is something he learned on YouTube—the primary source of his Gen Z wisdom. But it turns out that if you want to find your way in uncharted territory, all you need to do is locate the North Star – it is constant and dependable regardless of what is happening around it. And low and behold, we found our way back to camp.
That adventure got me thinking about the utility, and more importantly the necessity, of that which is constant and dependable in an ever-changing world.
I know that each of us shares a fundamental commitment to serving a largely first generation, historically underserved student population. That is the foundation from which everything else on our campus flows. We are in the business of facilitating human potential. But through the course of the year, this foundation may lose its luster, become buried in checklists and routines. If we’re not paying attention, these day-to-day demands can dominate the focus of our work. It may appear to be goal directed – we send the email, write the lecture, attend the meeting – but those activities themselves do not provide meaning to our work.
So, as we gather to discuss our vision for what lies ahead – let us all remember to pause and look up at our North Star – we are transforming lives for the better.
We serve as a powerful engine of social mobility – 18th in the nation – and we play an essential role in expanding participation in our democracy. That is not a tagline. That is the essence of what we do and why we do it.
I do not need to tell you that our work is needed now more than perhaps ever before.
But it’s not just our students and our community who will benefit from our ability to reimagine higher education – it is every student at every university across the country who has been failed by antiquated practices and invisible barriers to success.
I stood before you two years ago in my first convocation address and said: “We have the opportunity to serve as a role model for other institutions of higher learning because what we do here matters, not just to our community; it matters to the world.” That is my North Star – the opportunity and responsibility to transform lives for the better.
I also spoke about the importance of intentionality in the next chapter of our academic journey. Whenever I ask someone on campus about their experiences in the early years, nine times out of ten, they will describe it as “building a plane while flying it.” And, of course, that is precisely what it requires to create something from nothing. As a founding faculty member myself, I know firsthand just how exhilarating and challenging “building the plane while flying it” can be – the canvas is blank, you can employ all of your creativity to crafting it. But the canvas is blank, and sometimes you find yourself midflight and realize that instead of a back-up engine, you only have a parachute. But of course, the plane is in motion and will eventually arrive at a destination. We are now an established mid-sized university – a university that is larger than 60 percent all of the colleges and universities in this country. Our plane has been built. Now we need to ensure that we have a flight plan that will guide us to our intended destination.
We began the strategic initiatives planning process to do just that.
The process began in the Spring of 2017 under the leadership of Interim Provost Wakelee and the Strategic Initiatives Steering Committee who hosted open forums and worked with subcommittees. That work continued on last fall as we gathered input from the campus community through world cafés, Divisional meetings, an all campus survey, and responses to my whitepaper. The process was extensive. We took 18 months and not nine because, in my view, it is better to get it right than it is to get it quickly. The resulting plan is a culmination of our collective effort and I thank each and every one of you for your engagement in this important process.
We have our flight plan - the strategic initiatives are in place. I realize that many of you have committed this plan to memory, but for those of us who might have forgotten one or two, allow me to refresh our memories:
Thank you to the Communications and Marketing team – particularly Kevin Mapp and Jennifer Kubel – for producing such a high-quality video, and for making me a celebrity in the eyes of my children. Whatever else I may accomplish in my career will pale in comparison. I have arrived; I am a cartoon character.
Now that the initiatives have been finalized, we move from a planning phase to an implementation phase. This work will be guided by our implementation team co-chaired by Dean Brian Sevier and my Chief of Staff, Dr. Genevieve Evans Taylor. Other team members include Dr. Richard Yao, Dr. Virgil Adams, Dr. Amanda Carpenter, Elaine Crandall, Dr. Jill Leafstedt and Dr. John Yudelson.
The team has a short-term, prescribed task: to assist behind the scenes to ensure we have the structure and the processes to support the campus in implementing the plan and ensuring we capture, measure and report our progress.
So let’s talk about the work that is already underway and what lies ahead in the year to come.
Our first Strategic Initiative is Educational Excellence. Last year, we invested in the expansion of immersive learning experiences for our students – for example:
- The Summer Student Undergraduate Research Fellows program led by Dr. Sean Kelly and Dr. Luis Sanchez doubled its’ participation this summer to 11 faculty members and 40 paid student fellows who were transformed by their participation in this extraordinary program.
- Professor Paul Murphy established the first ever CI songwriting competition and I was delighted when he asked me to serve as a judge. The winners recorded their music with Beatles sound engineer Geoff Emerick. They were thrilled for the opportunity and you will be able to hear our talented students perform their original songs live over lunch this afternoon.
- Our Center for Community Engagement expanded opportunities for our students to connect with regional partners. This past year, under the leadership of Dr. Dennis Downey, Pilar Pacheco and Kaitlyn Cotton, our faculty facilitated the work of nearly 1,800 students who completed more than 40,000 service learning hours resulting in an economic benefit of more than $1 million to our community.
This year, we will:
- Expand peer mentorship as part of our commitment to increasing on-campus student employment opportunities that improve student success and foster leadership. Thank you to Dr. Marie Francois and the Peer Education & Equity Programs for demonstrating the power of embedded peer support.
- The School of Education, in partnership with the National Center for Teacher Residencies, will establish a program to provide our new teachers with deep clinical experiences that will help them to excel as educators.
- We will establish a Faculty Development Office and hire a Director to increase support for our faculty.
- And Academic Affairs will establish a taskforce to conduct a detailed analysis of tenure density and staffing support, with the aim of freeing up faculty time to engage in instructional and scholarly pursuits.
And now, on to our efforts around Student Success:
Last year, several Strategic Initiative subcommittees launched new programs aimed at enhancing student success. Academic Advising implemented a “Boot Camp” for new freshmen and transfer students, Enrollment Management adopted an E-Transcript reader to facilitate timely transcript evaluation, and an Orientation Task Force was established and instituted several changes this summer including block scheduling for freshmen. University Advancement, Student Affairs, and Business and Financial Affairs worked collaboratively to develop the Basic Needs and Emergency Intervention Program that includes a Hot Meals Program, a food pantry, emergency funds and emergency housing for our most vulnerable students.
Our work in fostering student success is directly aligned with the CSU 2025 Graduation Initiative. We are all aware of the imperative to increase graduation rates and eliminate equity gaps to support the state’s growing need for college-educated individuals. Our targets have been established – the Chancellor’s Office, our elected leadership, the people of Ventura County and most importantly, our students, expect us to realize these goals.
The good news is that we have made progress. In reviewing the preliminary data, our transfer 2-year graduation rates increased by over three percentage points last year. The even better news is that we met our 4-year transfer graduation rate of 78%!
We have had mixed success in eliminating equity gaps. The equity gap between under-represented minority and non-underrepresented minority students narrowed by nearly 1.5 points last year. That is great news! However, the equity gap between Pell recipients and non-Pell recipients actually increased by two points. We have more work to do in facilitating the success of our low-income students.
Based on preliminary data, our 4-year graduation rate for freshmen increased slightly, but our 6-year, first-time freshman graduation rate decreased.
It is important to remember that this work is complex, it involves multiple strategies and it takes time. But I am confident that we will realize our goals, not by lowering our rigorous academic standards, but by elevating them.
Here are a few of the things we will be implementing this year:
- We will be establishing a comprehensive data dashboard that will allow everyone on campus to access data related to student success at any time and from any location.
- We will be implementing a campus-wide approach to Executive Order 1110, ensuring that our curriculum, student support and placement procedures promote student success in quantitative reasoning.
- We will be developing a supplemental online orientation.
- We will be releasing a Degree Planner for all students that will emphasize the importance of enrolling in 15 credits per semester.
- And finally, in partnership with Gallup Research and Excelencia in Education, we will be unveiling the results of a research project assessing the success of our alumni. This is the first time we have had access to comprehensive data on the post-graduate success of our students. While the results are currently embargoed by Gallup, they have graciously agreed to allow me to share a few highlights with you this morning:
- 78% of CI Alumni – strongly or somewhat agreed that “My professors cared about me as a person;”
- 82% that “CI is a good place for racial and ethnic minorities”
- 83% that “CI is a good place for Latina/o students.” and
- 95% that “I had at least one professor who made me excited about learning”
Now on to Inclusive Excellence:
As a vibrant, multicultural campus community, we are committed to realizing a collective vision for equity and inclusion that extends to every corner of our campus community.
- Two years ago, I stood on this stage and expressed my commitment to increasing the number of high-quality and diverse tenure-track and tenured faculty. Today, I am proud to welcome our 12 new tenure-track faculty members. As a group, they represent our efforts to continue diversifying our ranks to better represent our students and our community. With their arrival, we have hired 31 new tenure-track faculty members in the last two years.
- In addition, this summer, four assistant professors were successfully promoted to associate professor with tenure – Dr. LaSonya Davis, Dr. Jaime Hannans, Dr. Jacob Jenkins and Dr. Elizabeth Sowers. And three associate professors were successfully promoted to full professor – Dr. Tracylee Clarke, Ms. Debra Hoffmann, and Dr. Tiina Itkonen. Congratulations to each of you on the exceptional quality of your academic work. Well deserved.
- Our staff have also developed innovative programs to meet the needs of our diverse student body and have been recognized for the quality of this work. For example,
- The American College Personnel Association awarded our Undocumented Student Ally Training Program with an Exemplary Program Medallion.
- Leticia Cazares was an El Concilio Family Services’ Latino Leadership Awards recipient for her work with foster and adopted youth.
- And Project ALAS is creating opportunities for our faculty to collaborate with faculty from our partner community colleges to increase transfer student success.
This year, we will be focused on:
- Working together to build a shared understanding of inclusive excellence and applying an equity framework to our Strategic Initiatives implementation process.
- The President’s Taskforce on Inclusive Excellence and the Community Action and Dialogue Committee will be co-sponsoring a series of open forums on equity, inclusion and collegiality. The taskforce is co-chaired by Dr. Amanda Quintero and Dr. Jose Alamillo.
- We will receive the analysis of our first campus Climate Survey and utilize the results to enhance campus climate.
- We will meticulously analyze disaggregated student success data to identify barriers to completion and develop a comprehensive strategy to eliminate student equity gaps.
- And our efforts to recruit and retain a diverse faculty will continue this year with a core team of faculty leads – Dr. Robin Mitchell, Dr. Geoff Buhl, Monica Pereira and Dr. Catherine Burriss, supported by a grant from the Chancellor’s Office and in partnership with academic leadership.
And our final Strategic Initiative - Capacity & Sustainability
We can’t talk about revenue and sustainability without first discussing the budget, which has been challenging in recent years. This year was no different as the CSU was facing significant budget cuts after the Governor released his initial budget. Thanks to the tireless advocacy of our students and CSSA, our faculty and CFA, our staff, Celina Zacarias, the CSU, and the incredible support from our legislature, in the end, the governor increased his proposed funding and we are grateful that he decided to invest in the CSU and our students.
The final budget did not fully fund the CSU, but it reflected a 5.7% increase to our general operating budget and several sources of one-time funds. While it is much better news than we had expected, the majority of those funds will be used to cover mandatory cost increases.
Although the CSU was not fully funded and our mandatory costs will continue to climb in the years ahead, we must continue to invest in our future. As a result, I have authorized the search for 14 tenure-track faculty members next year. We must remain steadfast in our commitment to providing our students with the highest quality educational experiences.
We also have some flexibility with one-time funds to support student success. As a result, I have set aside $1 million in one-time funds to support our strategic initiatives and our GI 2025 efforts. The details of the budget process for those one-time funds will be distributed from the Strategic Resource and Planning Committee soon, but the first round of requests will focus on the evaluation of the proposals that were developed and vetted with the campus last year through the strategic initiatives process.
In an era of declining state support, we must continue to develop new and innovative revenue streams in order to advance a robust University.
The fundraising team and Community and Government relations have kept me busy introducing me to stakeholders throughout our region and I would like to thank them for their hard work. We are building on the important relationships developed over the years, as well as creating new ones. Like each of you, these accomplished professionals and community leaders are deeply committed to supporting our students’ success and I am profoundly grateful for their partnership.
We have a great deal of momentum on the Capacity and Sustainability initiative.
- Last year, a Culture of Philanthropy Committee was established to engage our campus community and recommend fundraising priorities to me that support the work of our strategic initiatives.
- I am delighted to announce that we have already secured two significant gifts to support these initiatives and one of those individuals is right here in this room. Linda Dullam and her husband John are the first to help establish an Academic Innovation Fund. Linda, we can’t thank you and John enough for supporting this important work.
- And just last week, Tipper Gore stepped up to become the founding donor of an endowment that will support the expansion of peer mentorship on campus. We are very grateful for her support.
- I am also delighted to share with you that we are in the midst of completing final negotiations to install a solar array on campus. This solar installation will make Channel Islands one of the largest producers of green energy in the CSU.
- We are also working with the Chancellor’s Office on the expansion of campus facilities. We hope to receive funding next year for the design of Gateway Hall. This two-phase project will provide a one-stop shop for student support services that is essential to advancing our graduation and student success goals. If we receive the funds, Gateway will serve as the future home for Enrollment Services, Financial Aid, and Academic Advising as well as an expansion of faculty offices and additional classroom space.
- The development of a high-level conceptual plan for the Mixed-Use Capital Project is underway. Using a public-private partnership model, this project would provide much needed student housing, academic and instructional space, along with new student health and wellness facilities. This innovative model would expand academic space with the use of private development. Provided our feasibility study is positive, we will work with the campus community to develop more detailed plans.
- In an effort to assist the campus in the proactive resolution of workplace conflicts, I have reallocated a position from the Office of the President to create a campus Ombuds Officer. The search for this important position will commence this fall.
- We are also focused on expanding opportunities for staff development. In order for our university to reach its best and highest potential, every member of the campus community must be given opportunities to reach their best and highest potential. You will hear more about this new program in the months ahead.
In closing, I want you to know that it is a tremendous honor to stand before you as the President of California State University Channel Islands and to represent the transformative work that you facilitate every day.
As we look to the future, let us all remember our North Star - the power of higher education to transform human lives is constant and dependable in a world that is in great need of that transformation.
I look forward to the journey ahead as we continue to work together to facilitate a more just and equitable future for us all.
Thank you!