THE FOLLOWING IS A NEWS-GAZETTE ARTICLE BY JENNIFER BAILEY
ABOVE: Danville Area Community College Board of Trustees pose with DACC Interim President Randy Fletcher (back row, far right).
DANVILLE — It’s been a month since Danville Area Community College Interim President Randy Fletcher took on the college’s leader role, after previous DACC President Stephen Nacco retired, and DACC Board Chairman Greg Wolfe said they’ve been hearing positive feedback.
Fletcher has met with the DACC faculty, he’s been working closely with Provost and Vice President of Academic and Student Affairs Carl Bridges and other DACC officials, and he’s also been meeting and reintroducing himself to the public, being from Vermilion County and having previously worked at DACC. He’s gone to a Rotary meeting, county principals’ and Vermilion Advantage meetings, Danville’s Martin Luther King Jr. Communitywide Celebration and other events.
DACC board members met Thursday night for its regular monthly meeting, and it also has a board retreat at the college at 4 p.m. Wednesday, Jan. 29 in its board chambers to talk more about the six-month interim president process.
Facilitating next week’s board session will be Illinois Community College Trustee Association’s Executive Director Jim Reed. He will continue assisting the board in planning, now with Fletcher in the interim and what the next steps are.
Discussion topics are to include: benefits of an interim president, components of a successful interim president and term, ways the board can assist the interim president, reflections of the interim president, and what the president needs from the board.
“We’re just kind of getting our ducks in a row,” Wolfe said.
Wolfe said they are planning a public survey on Fletcher possibly by mid-February.
“Similar to when you do a national search, you bring groups in, community and faculty and staff and students to meet. But this will be for everybody to be able to respond to,” Wolfe said.
“But the goal is, over the course of the next six months, that everybody has opportunities to send us their feedback,” he said.
These won’t be anonymous comments being able to be submitted, he also added.
Wolfe said once they have the retreat, the board should have a clear, written plan of how they’re moving forward.
Lisa Martin has been sworn in to the DACC Board of Trustees to complete the unexpired term previously held by Board Member Dave Harby, who stepped down for health reasons. Martin will be on the April 1st Consolidated Election ballot for a six year DACC Board of Trustees term.
“But ultimately the goal is, over the next six months, everybody in the 507 (community college) district will have an opportunity to evaluate Dr. Fletcher,” Wolfe said. They want the most people to be involved.
“We also think this is a good situation that, and we’ve never done any of this before, we feel like it’s best because I’ve been on two hirings where you go a year, you do this search and spend $100 thousand dollars, it’s a lot of time, a lot of money and at the end you hire somebody and a year into it, you go ‘this isn’t the person we interviewed…’ So, I like this idea, we’re going to try it, and let people work with him, the board, the faculty,” Wolfe said.
The DACC board normally has an annual retreat to discuss college business, but next week’s is a special one, with new board member Lisa Martin sworn in Thursday night, and the interim president process being different than what the board has ever done and they want more direction.
“He’s got to earn the right to become our permanent president. It’s not a given. We’re hopeful,” Wolfe said. “It’s a clean slate right now.”
Martin was sworn in Thursday night to fill former chairman Dave Harby’s unexpired term. Martin, who the board chose from three applicants, is seeking election in April to a full six-year term on the board.
In other business, DACC Foundation Executive Director Tonya Hill gave an update on the foundation which moved on the DACC campus to Bremer Center. The foundation as of Dec. 24, had $23 million in assets. Scholarships given out last year were valued at more than $1 million. Grants issued to the college totaled more than $2.6 million including for Hegeler Hall, Middle College and the food pantry. For industrial equipment, it paid out more than $66,000. They’ve introduced 18 new scholarships of their record-breaking 857 scholarships last year and are now visiting high schools about scholarship opportunities. For the most recent annual appeal for funding from the community, the foundation has so far received approximately $335,000.
Board member Dylan Haun said growing up as a first-generation college student with not a lot of money, the foundation afforded him the opportunity to get an associate’s degree at DACC and he’s a Master of Business Administration graduate at the University of Illinois, something he never thought he would accomplish, but “DACC was the catalyst.”
The board also heard an enrollment report, with new semester first-day numbers showing a 10 percent increase from last spring and credit hours up about 11 percent.
The board also talked about how well the county basketball tournament has been going at the college, with Fletcher saying “it’s a machine” in how well its operated by DACC and Danville is a great “tourney town”; and 2025 goals, including more opportunities and room to grow for high school dual enrollments, where students can get high school and college credit at the same time for classes.
