OGLALA LAKOTA COLLEGE Administrative Departments Annual Report Year: 2014 ‐2015 Department: Pine Ridge College Center 1. Describe your unit’s/department’s Mission or Purpose (Two or three sentences.) To provide comprehensive student resources for the successful completion of a terminal degree in their area of study. While promoting the value of lifelong learning through the provision of quality adult and higher education. 2. 2014‐2015 Budget: $359,696.00 3. Personnel Data: Name Title Years of Service Shirley Brewer Director 24 Bessie Le Beau Assistant Dir/Counselor 9 Loretta Red Feather Counselor 21 Chrysan Smallwood Counselor 8 Terry Little White Man Janitor 17 Theresa Cuny Counselor 1 Carol Big Crow GED Tutor 1 Aloysius Wounded Head SSS Counselor 1 4. Personnel Changes: We hired a new counselor, GED tutor and Student Support Services counselor. The assistant director/counselor returned to work here at the center. 5. Staff accomplishments: The counselors have become more than proficient at student advising and meet with each of their students at least once for a thirty minute session. The GED tutor is guiding her student in becoming proficient with electronic study and test taking. 1 6. Professional Development: Center staff have no opportunity for professional development, other than taking courses offered by OLC. PRCC staff would benefit greatly by receiving training from qualified personnel: in working with difficult people; professional ethics, student motivation, to name a few. 7. List the number of customer service concerns/complaints you have received for the year. Summer Fall Spring Total Concerns received 0 0 0 0 Complaints received 0 0 0 0 8. Describe four most common customer service concerns/complaint and how you addressed them. The concern most often encountered is the frequency of student’s inability to take a full load because their courses are not offered anywhere in the system or that students have to drive to another district for class. In other words course scheduling. Another issue that arose is that center staff were not informed of the availability of a cost waiver for students needing to take the Praxis. Accuplacer remains a barrier to timely degree completion, in that students are incorrectly placed in Foundational Studies courses. Another issue that has arisen is that the Registrar has refused to let students go in to Math 134 when that is where Accuplacer indicated they should be. Reasoning behind this was that she felt students should take the common math final utilized by the Math Department. Requiring students to declare a major as soon as they enter OLC remains an area of concern. These students usually do not know what they want to go in to and need career education and counseling prior to declaring a major. 9. List the number of individuals you have served for the academic year (dependent upon the purpose of your unit). Academic year # served Summer Fall Spring Total # students 50 289 276 615 # faculty 6 30 38 74 # staff 6 8 8 22 2 # community members 15 40 40 95 10. Describe number of activities you held within your department. (Orientations, trainings, etc.) Note: you can delete the tables if it is not applicable to your unit or you can add more if you need to using copy and paste. Fall 2014 Activity #1 title: New Student Orientation Purpose of the activity: To inform students on how to successfully navigate OLC (reg.;FAID, etc). Who was the target audience? Entering freshmen, new students and returning stop outs. Number in attendance. Twenty five. Activity #2 title: Welcome back/Encouragement gathering Purpose of the activity: To welcome students, smudge everything/body and offer words of encouragement on how to succeed in college. Who was the target audience? All new and continuing students and their family member, and OLC staff. Number in attendance. One hundred and seventy five. Activity #3 title: Purpose of the activity: Who was the target audience? Number in attendance. Spring 2015 Activity #1 title: New Student Orientation Purpose of the activity: To inform students on how to successfully navigate OLC (Reg; FAID;etc). Who was the target audience? Entering freshmen, new students and returning stop outs. Number in attendance. Twenty –two. Activity #2 title: 3 Purpose of the activity: Welcome back/encouragement gathering. Who was the target audience? All students, family and staff. Number in attendance. 0ne hundred fifty. Activity #3 title: Purpose of the activity: Who was the target audience? Number in attendance. 11. Describe your unit’s most significant accomplishments. Provide data that supports the accomplishments if applicable. We have improved a great deal in all areas over the last five years or so. We continually encourage independence in our students and they have really improved in seeking out whatever they need assistance with. They are familiar with the total system and are now most competent in tracking their status sheet, completing the financial aid process and being involved in their education. 12. Describe your unit’s Significant Challenges. Provide data that supports the challenge identified. Requiring students to declare a major up front continues to be a problem. Requiring the Praxis be taken prior to graduation is a major stumbling block. We are unique in that we require it before graduation. This has a serious effect on student completion rate. 13. Describe your unit’s Critical Needs. Provide data that supports the critical need(s). Scheduling in an ongoing problem, we will continue to ensure that we offer courses needed to move students toward their degree. Shortage of faculty is an ongoing need, which we could address if we had a professional development program for all staff rather than just faculty. 14. Describe how you plan to address the challenges during the upcoming year. By using data available to us in tracking student status sheets, which will be more challenging without having Reference Web available to us. It has provided us the opportunity to track our students more effectively and more or less given us a system to cross check information. 4 Technology is frequently a problem especially during critical times. The problems being, slow functioning systems, being kicked out of the system. Reference Web was a real bonus that will be greatly missed. 15. If applicable, how did you address the HLC identified needs of persistence, retention, graduation, and long range planning. Everything we do addresses these critical needs. Each year we reinforce our commitment to doing a better job. We promote that all of our students be actively involved ub their education and encourage them to call us out if we are not providing the kind of education/or services they are paying for. We stress that we are here to serve the student body. 5