South Plains College
Institutional Effectiveness Committee
November 14, 2014
9:00 am – Oil Room
MINUTES
Members Present: , Corye Beene, Rob Blair, Ashleigh Brewer, Lynne Cleavenger, Dane Dewbre,
Shanna Donica, Jerry Findley, Ann Gregory, Stephen John, Sue Ann Lopez, Kara Martinez, Mollie
Melton, Stuart Moody, Dan Nazworth, Susan Nazworth, Yancy Nuñez, Gracie Quiñonez, Yolanda
Salgado, Shalyn Slape, Dawn Valles, Jim Walker, Ben Walton, Jack Wardlow III, and Ronnie Watkins.
Julie Jones attended to take meeting notes.
Members Absent: Billy Alonzo, Hope Beyer, Nanette Blair, Kaleb Corder, Lola Hernandez, Patti
Lindsey, Cathy Mitchell, Jeremy Nicholson, Pete Stracener, Ron Spears, and Alan Worley.
The meeting was called to order at 9:02 am. Minutes for the September 19 th meeting were presented for approval. No changes were suggested. Jack Wardlow III made a motion to accept the minutes, Yancy
Nuñez seconded the motion. Motion carried and minutes were approved with no changes.
The following agenda items were presented.
West Texas Assessment Conference
Recap of the West Texas Assessment Conference (WTAC) by Corye Beene. The first speaker Dr. Darcy
Hardy suggested to centralize faculty online learning. We need to be more structured with online classes.
The website facultyfocus.com has 91 ways to talk about online academic integrity. Hybrid courses could be used where part of the course is presented online and part in the classroom in order to free up classroom space.
James Kemper’s presentation was well received on the topic of critical thinking and teamwork. He suggested allowing students to use cell phones to search for material for group discussions. Embracing technology was suggested with the use of twitter to ask and answer questions which would help get students more involved.
Shanna Donica thanked those who participated and commented that SPC had a good turn out at the
WTAC. Suggestions were made that the conference center more on academic assessment and less on administrative topics. Dr. Hardy during the conference had suggested a strategic plan for online courses and Stephen John commented that “Project Gold Star” from the SPC Information Technology department had been adopted as a standard for online courses. Yancy
Nuñez
confirmed that yes it was and that the
Information Technology department had also started a quality matters rubric review of online courses. He also commented that Dr. Hardy said there were two reasons for online courses a) facilitate students you have and b) attract new students from different regions. SPC is mostly in the first category. Stephen also commented that Governor elect Greg Abbott is promoting Mass Online Courses (MOOCs) without really seeing if they are accredited.
Institutional Priorities, Goals and Outcomes
Randy Anderson helped to identify the school’s strengths, weaknesses and challenges. There were 5 priorities that were identified from the results of the analysis of the four groups that met. The administrative council created a taskforce to implement priorities. The draft given as a handout was drafted by the Task Force and reviewed by the administrative council and will be sent to the Board of
Regents. The priorities, goals and outcomes will be entered into TaskStream so that departmental level

objectives and outcomes can be mapped to the new Institutional Plan. This is what will strategically advance the college. Stephen encouraged individuals to continue to provide additional input.
Enrollment Snapshot for Fall 2014
Stephen John went over a three page handout of the data profile of our Fall 2014 students. Our student population is changing. Jack and Andi submit this data to the coordinating board. Enrollment is up, which was a welcome change after a three year decline. 82% of our students are college level and 18% are Dual Credit students. We are enrolling more students at the college level with more women than men.
Stephen noted that at the college level we have 5 fewer men than the previous year so maybe this number is beginning to stabilize. We have slightly less than 50% of students are Anglo, 40% are hispanic and
10% are other ethnicities. We have noted an enrollment growth in African American students. Fewer of our Dual Credit students are minorities – what is causing this and how can we improve those numbers?
The average age of our students is 23 and those 25 and older are an increasing percentage of our student body. The number of FTIC has also increased as well as first time transfer students. We have a higher percentage of full time students than most colleges in Texas, we only have 6.9% of students who are attending part time. We have noticed a decline in the service area which correlates with the decline in dual credit enrollment. Students stated intent shows that 52% intend to earn an associate or certificate and
43% want to transfer to another school. 27.6% of students are academically disadvantaged and 53.5% are economically disadvantaged. We need systems and programs to help these students. We also need to keep a lookout for the upcoming legislative sessions.
SACSCOC New Policy Statements
SACSCOC President Belle Whelan sent out an email with a new policy statement as well as a reminder to take the 5 th year Interim report seriously. The email sent to Jim Walker was handed out during the meeting. The policy statement is below:
In June, the SACSCOC Board also approved a new policy: “Institutional Obligations for Public
Disclosure.” This policy outlines in one document an institution’s obligations to provide information that is complete, accurate, timely, accessible, clear and sufficient. Among the 6 items listed, Item 4 addresses one of the standards of the Council on Higher Education
Accreditation (CHEA) requiring that SACSCOC includes in its standards or in a policy the requirement that an institution publishes statements of its goals for student achievement and the success of students in achieving those goals. In the future, our Institutional Profile will ask institutions to record the website where it displays this information to the public.
In the meantime, please forward to my attention the website where your institution publishes its statements of goals for student achievement and the success of students in
achieving those goals. We have received questions regarding what type of specific information should be posted. Most often, an institution provides some of the measures outlined in Federal
Requirement 4.1 (Student Achievement) of the Principles of Accreditation. But the information on achievement disclosed to the public is solely the decision of your institution. Thank you in advance for your immediate attention to this matter.
This policy statement reflects that we should have achievement goals and achievement data that will be published on our website. In order to be in compliance with this, Shanna Donica has reworded 3 of the purpose statements from the SPC mission statement to reflect what our students will do. The document

will be sent out for review and then changes made and it will be published on our website. Stephen suggested data from the Institutional Resume could be used to fulfill the policy statement.
In regards to the 5 th year Interim report it is important to have a process of continuous improvement and to continue to keep documentation of assessment activities up to date in TaskStream. We must continue to have improvement through 2019 and cannot start with assessment activities a year out.
Deadlines for TaskStream
Shanna Donica brought up the previously presented deadlines for TaskStream and asked that a motion be made to accept. Based on discussions is was decided not to accept the current proposed deadlines and instead form a task force to discuss the reporting cycle. Yancy
Nuñez
brought up the idea of having a
Spring, Summer, Fall reporting cycle that would help to make assessment data available in February or early March to be used in the budget and planning hearings. Stephen John commented that following a calendar year might be appropriate. It was also discussed that planning is currently based on the fiscal year. Sue Ann Lopez and Mollie Melton both commented that the current reporting cycle of Fall, Spring,
Summer works well for them based on their cohorts and other accrediting agencies.
Dan Nazworth commented that with the assessment in spring that the budget has to be made prior to that and we are always a semester behind on data. Sue Ann Lopez commented that a lot of allied health/nursing TaskStream data isn’t from budget and they do not finish until late August. The data from allied health/nursing is used to make projections for the budget. Rob Blair stated that technical programs are on a similar timeline to nursing. Stephen John asked if there is an expectation that there be a universal cycle of assessment reporting. Shanna Donica thought it is more beneficial to be on one reporting cycle and must be divisional if we have more than one reporting cycle to be able to provide adequate support.
Further discussion from Sue Ann that accreditors need time frames and from Mollie that we shouldn’t change because we get better every year with the process.
It was decided that Shanna Donica will gather a group of TaskStream users to discuss this further and it will be brought back before the committee in April. Shanna will also investigate to see what other schools are doing.
The deadline for all 2014-2015 TaskStream assessment data entry is September 30, 2015. This is because we are currently half-way into the year and it would be difficult to come up with a set of effective deadlines.
Other Topics of Discussion
Shalyn Slape – Scholarship Office
Scholarships are going online and they plan to go live December 1, 2014. The due date will remain the same. The scholarship office plans to host trainings in early spring. The software will not show students if they qualify for scholarships. You will be able to see if students have received general scholarships.
Students will have to apply to SPC before they can apply for scholarships.
Rob Blair – Technical Programs
Texas Tech University has initiated a BA in Applied Arts and Sciences. Any student transferring to TTU with an associate of applied arts or science will be guaranteed 51 hours of transfer credit. Sue Ann’s students will be able to receive up to 90 hours of transfer credit.
Gracie Quinonez – Plainview Center
Plainview will possibly begin offering Auto Technology in the spring. They must find a full-time instructor prior to offering the program.

Dawn Valles – Disability Services
Dawn stated to the committee that technology needs to be accessible to students with disabilities.
Meeting was adjourned at 10:15 AM