End of Year Speech 2004-05
President Jean Floten
June 8, 2005
Good afternoon, and welcome, everyone, to the 2005 year-end celebration. It's good to see so many of you here to celebrate this year.
First, I would like to recognize our best community advocate and ally, and member of the college's Board of Trustees, Ruthann Kurose . Ruthann, we love having you here and appreciate so much all that you do on our behalf for BCC. Thanks for coming.
Dear Colleagues:
When we reach the end of the academic year, it's my experience that four things happen:
The first three are fairly inevitable, but the fourth sometimes slips away. As you approach summer, I hope you take time to let down a bit and rejuvenate as you have definitely earned it. What you have achieved together is nothing less than impressive over what has been a challenging year.
As I think back, I see a year of striking contrasts. One the one hand, we were preoccupied with some very important and difficult issues—taking yet another round of budget cuts, addressing enrollments, and accomplishing vital work on the accreditation self-study, general education, assessment, and strategic goals; while at the same time, we were working with the same dedication to dispense our day-to-day duties of providing students with the high quality education and support services they deserve. Although we grappled with keeping all of this going, we certainly confronted and met our challenges admirably.
And, on the other hand, we never lost sight of the great powers we hold; the power to teach and help those who come to us and the power to work and act as a community. The power of teaching and helping hits home to me every time I hear from our Margin of Excellence award winners about what compels them to be a member of our academic community—from Julius Armstrong 's preparation of students to help those who are battling cancer, to Gwyneth Jones' transmission to students her unwavering passion for the primordial forces that have created the earth, to Marika Reinke's love of teaching and creation of new programs, to Celinda Spaulding 's enthusiasm in helping students reach their academic goals, to Juan Ulloa 's ingenuity and creativity in building the earth's best website -- I am aware that we are a varied community, but one united by the deep convictions we hold in common. We value the power of learning to transform lives; we understand our importance in transmitting knowledge from one generation to the next; we dedicate our personal knowledge to improve our community; and, we share a dedication to bettering the lives of our students through teaching and service. These values sustain us and hold us together even through challenges and frustrations.
This year we have also experienced the power of our community as we have worked together to size up what we have needed to do and moved forward on it. We found we needed each other to help soften some of our trials and to bring fun and joy into what was sometimes simply hard and difficult work. I was moved many times by the generosity of spirit shown within our college community. What comes immediately to mind is the community-building work of the Diversity Caucus that paid respect and homage to others who have done great things at our college, inducting this year in their ranks as Living treasures Tom Nielsen , Helen Taylor , and Phil Lucas and recognizing Rossie Norris and Jack Surendranath for their life-long commitment to pluralism at our college. I believe the caucus members, too, are our living treasures for their untiring work.
I am also reminded of the outpouring of sorrow and support to those who lost their beloved husband, father, valued co-worker and friend, Norm Choo.
I think of many people who have stepped forward to make a difference for their co-workers and colleagues, those unsung heroes who work every day to make BCC a better place for all of us; contributing personal time and energies to bring us together even when we feel pulled apart. These people and their kindnesses supply heart to our college—a necessary and valued part of what keeps us together and wanting to come to work each day. As I stand on the set of Oz, I can't help but think that finding a heart was the life-pursuit of the Tin Man. We are lucky to have it here at BCC.
And now I turn my thoughts to all that we have accomplished together during this year. It is truly astounding how much has gone into this year, and how much was accomplished in each office. All this was achieved despite the extra challenges of flooding, of moving offices and the library to accommodate construction, and the major time investment that went into our accreditation self-study and moving forward various initiatives. You have done a marvelous job handling all these things while still attending to your own highly demanding responsibilities.
This year I'm going to forego a listing of all the special things you each have accomplished; we are simply getting too large and energetic to cover all that requires mention in one sitting. Yet, I don't want to minimize the importance of those achievements as they – YOU--are the sum and substance of BCC's success. So with heartfelt appreciation, many of these achievements have been combined into an electronic scrapbook, BCC's Year in Review , that will debut this afternoon in continuous format in Carlson Theatre. I hope you take some time to watch it and credit its author Debra Ross for her fabulous effort, with support from Rick Otte. In the spirit of celebration, many departments have captured their memories of the year in displays in the lobby and into the courtyard. Unsurprisingly, there are very creative designers out there! Please take time to swing by and honor their work.
As we conclude this year, we could spend our remaining time together talking about the milestones we achieved, such as the legislature opening up the potential for us to begin to offer limited baccalaureate degrees and the establishment of our new, far-reaching partnership with Eastern Washington University to bring our campus bachelor's degree programs right now.
We could justifiably breathe a collective sigh of relief at our huge accomplishments of completing our self-study, implementing our general education program, moving sharply ahead on learning assessment, obtaining a balanced budget, progressing against our strategic plan. And, we could rightly revel at all of the wonderful programs, events, and accolades that have occurred this year—the Cultural Diversity Fair , the American Indian Film festival , BCC Reads, our Mathletes, business students consulting work, the Jibsheet , Celebration, drama and dance students, PTK- among many, many, many others.
But, today, I want to focus on our collective success with the students we have been privileged to serve. This is our real story . This year, together, we:
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Helped approximately 6,000 low-income and/or first generation students take a step forward by obtaining an education.
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Provided opportunity to 6,000 students of color to experience the advantages that education offers.
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Assisted almost 1,000 immigrants and refugees and more than 2,000 ESL students to make a new life in a new land.
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Served almost 9,000 students, who returned to school later in life, to find something more to give their lives meaning.
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Aided hundreds of Adult Basic Education students to take that first step to improve the quality of their lives.
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Attended to more than 9,000 professional and technical students, including hundreds of displaced workers, who were looking to retool their careers and create new futures.
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Supported more than 10,000 academic or transfer students, who chose us for their first step toward a bachelor's degree or to obtain a two-year credential.
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And, we reached more than 15,000 Continuing Education students, who were seeking personal enrichment, job skills training, and adventure.
That all adds up to the fact that we, together and as members of this great academic community, changed thousands of lives for the better; each and every one of us made a direct difference in people's lives. We know our work is probably the most important work there is; l earning nurtures the human spirit while advancing civilization; learning provides opportunities for individual lives and livelihood; learning strengthens the civic and economic fabric of our community. Next Friday night we will be reminded of all of this as we witness the transition of our graduates to the next part of their lives. This deserves our celebration!
But, looking back, I also know this was not an easy year. BCC asks a lot of you. No matter how much you do, there is always more that needs to be done -- your students want more of your time, the college asks more of you, and it seems there are always fewer resources. And even though our college is very good, there is nothing easy about holding on to students or adding more into our mix.
You have managed to do all those things this year because of your hard work, dedication, and personal commitment. I am reminded of the pianist who comes to the passage in one of Schumann's piano sonatas marked - 'As fast as possible ,' which is followed a few bars later with the instruction - 'Faster .' It sure can feel the same way in our work. We have been going 'as fast as possible' And then ‘faster.'
And so, at this year's closing, I want to thank you. I want to thank each of you for giving your talent and your dedication, and, especially, for making our college a family community. It's the support and understanding we provide each other that helps through the long hours, challenging tasks, and the tough days. I thank you sincerely for that.
And I want to thank this entire college community for continuing to serve students and coming up with ways to innovate and excel. We keep achieving incredible results, and the reason for that is no secret -– it is the quality of the people who work here. As I look around at this community, I feel pride.
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I'm proud that you are so dedicated and so committed to helping provide opportunity for our students.
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I'm proud that you have high standards for your departments and programs.
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And I'm proud that you want to contribute to our college's excellence.
Taken together, it supports the fact that we are not only the largest community college in Washington state, but also, by the way we work together and the way our students succeed, we have good reason to claim we are the best.
Before we leave today, I want to thank Eduardo Gomes, our international scholar in residence. Among all he has contributed to BCC and our larger community this year, he is also inspiring me today to cut short the formal speech and celebrate Brazilian style, Carnivale! In just a minute, we'll share fabulous Brazilian food, more great Brazilian music, and a demonstration of Capoeira, the Brazilian martial arts form (available as a P.E. class for all interested). All of this is inspired by Eduardo, who has been a marvelous addition to our family this year. He will return for a month next October to finish some of his research and receive a more formal send off, but today, we thank you, Eduardo, for choosing to come to BCC this year. Eduardo, please stand so we can convey our appreciation.
A ton of people are responsible for the fun and food we will have shortly. I want to thank Bart Becker , Kara Talbott , Elizabeth Perera , Bob Adams , Gaynor Hills , Casey Spence , Kyra Olson , Terri Halsey , Brian Healy, Jay Strevey , Adam Burke , Steve McLaine and his food services crew, Brenda Erwin and the custodial crew, Rick Otte, Faisal Jaswal , Ray Butler , Ken Muter, Mitchell Bland, Ed Biggers, Khanty Mounivong, all the folks who contributed displays as well as photos for the slide show presentation and Debra Ross , the slide show author. Let's give these folks a hand.
And, now, one last huge thanks to each of you for all the effort that that has brought us this point today. After all these years, I am still inspired by the faculty, staff, and students of our great college. I am gratified to participate in this academic community that prepares graduates with good hearts, able minds, opportunities for livelihood, abilities for life, and nothing less than the potential to change the world. Have a restful summer and please join me in giving your colleagues and yourselves a round of applause. Now, let's have a party—welcome to Carnivale!
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