SCHEDULING TASK FORCE Observations and Recommendations

Charge  Review all Brookhaven College scheduling processes through contacting division staff, deans, and lead faculty  Gather relevant data from at least the last three years of enrollment trends based on schedule  Develop, revise or refine a scheduling process

Committee NameAreaEmployee Group Natalia ArredondoAdvisingPSS Rhonda BitnerCommunicationsFaculty Sheila BrockWorkforce/CEAdministrator Patti BurksBusiness StudiesFaculty Evonne ClarkMathematics/SciencePSS Brenda DaltonStudent ServicesAdministrator Octavio GutierrezSchool of the ArtsFaculty Debbie HanusMathematics/ScienceFaculty Becky KnickelBusiness StudiesFaculty Sarah LopezSchool of the ArtsPSS Kevin ParisWorld LanguagesFaculty Bill SigsbeeSocial ScienceFaculty Sarah FergusonLRCAdministrator

Data Collection  Visited with every division dean/administrative assistants and with a number of lead faculty/faculty chairs  Asked all groups about processes, how scheduling decisions are made and what information/data they used to make those decisions

Data Collection  Requested reports from Planning, Research and Instructional Effectiveness  3 years of enrollment data with room utilization  Number of Brookhaven students taking courses at other DCCCD colleges, what courses were taken and the delivery mode

Data Collection  Visited with colleagues from other DCCCD colleges  Compared processes  Conducted an informal space inventory comparison  Compared logistics: days/times/flex/hybrids

Observations  What we learned:  Past enrollment trends play a key role in future schedule development  Significant amounts of time, energy, effort and commitment go into the development of the schedule  Divisions and lead faculty track their enrollment numbers during registration

Observations  Space CollegeGeneral Use Lecture General Use PC Labs Brookhaven65 (81 with E & W) 22 Eastfield114 (excludes W/CE, Pleasant Grove) 40 Northlake56 (110 all locations) ? Richland114 (excludes Garland) 47

Observations  Space, cont.  Difference of 49 lecture classrooms at both EF and RL  Each can offer 293 more lecture sections at prime time  However, for several years BC has not been full at prime time.  Spaces are left at the end of schedule build and then from cancellations during first two weeks

Observations  Space, cont.  Unofficial prime time spaces available SemesterLecturePC LabsTotal Spring Spring Spring 2012 (does not include all cancellations) 13 26

Observations  Space Management  Every division tracks enrollment numbers  Many lead faculty track enrollment numbers plus create detailed spreadsheets of daily numbers, then archive for subsequent semester builds  However, there is no group or committee globally monitoring enrollment trends daily for the duration of registration.  The compartmentalization of information leads to unused space.

Observations  Space Management, cont.  Since there is no plus/delta at the conclusion of registration, some of this information has never been compiled or shared in this format.  Credit and W/CE have not used matching class start and end times. Thus, we’re unable to share any vacant spaces.  Since a larger portion of our students elect to attend classes during prime times, it would be logical to maximize our prime time spaces.

Observations  Faculty Hiring  Adjunct faculty hiring is a lengthy process  We have space, but we have difficulties connecting space to available faculty for last minute new sections

Observations  Know the Competition  We are not aware of the number of sections or course offerings at surrounding colleges  We are not aware of institutions outside our county. We are unaware of NCTC, their limited course offerings, their identical costs and their lack of space.

Observations  Timeliness  Our timing is off during registration.  The dilemma: when to add, when to cancel.  We tend to wait too long to add another section and we learn too late about available spaces.  We’re not connecting the dots effectively between new courses, new sections, space, faculty and cancellations.

Observations  Marketing and Advertising  We don’t know our own marketing plan  We don’t appear to aggressively market our affordability  We do not advertise during registration those courses with spaces remaining  We do not appear to aggressively market our distance learning opportunities outside our county  Tech/occ faculty noted they recruit, market, and advertise their programs in addition to teaching

Observations  Marketing and Advertising, cont.  With the move from paper schedules to online, the ability to alter the sequence of courses has evaporated.  Specialty programs with an ordered progression of courses are less apparent or “invisible” because of alphabetical constraints.  Programs have created their own printed material to advertise what is not apparent in the online system.

Observations  Colleague training  We’ve not maintained our Colleague skills  Lead faculty can have access, but they need to know the function screen name and need to know what the function provides:  RGAM  CSAR  PSPR

Observations  Growing Indefinitely  “Elephant in the room” – district allocation formula  Percentage of Growth = more money  Failure to grow = BC forfeits a portion of the budget  Strategically:  Are we committed to growing?  If so, what does the plan look like?

Recommendations  The following 8 recommendations reflect the recommendations presented at the April 2014 presentative and the additional comments and suggestions from the Convocation Conversations August 21, 2014.

Recommendation 1  An Enrollment Management committee is needed to globally monitor, review, and suggest scheduling changes throughout the registration process.

Recommendation 1  Enrollment Management Committee  Composition  Faculty chair (serves as chair with decision making authority in consultation with lead faculty and/or deans)  Deans  Lead faculty  Room coordinator  Dean, Student Enrollment Services  Colleague content specialist

Recommendation 1  Enrollment Management Committee  Review daily enrollments  Identify additional courses/sections to meet demand  Manage space  Review number and type of sections offered at the other colleges  Suggest targeted advertising of low enrollment sections

Recommendation 1  Enrollment Management Committee  Goals:  Manage limited space effectively  Make timely decisions  Review processes – registration plus/delta

Recommendation 1  Enrollment Management Committee  Additional comments:  Some on the committee and some at the convocation sessions stressed the need for one person to be responsible with decision making authority.  There were concerns that a large representative committee could be difficult to assemble and manage during crucial phases of registration.

Recommendation 1  Enrollment Management Committee  Additional comments:  At issue, how much authority and how timely?  The compromise: The Chair makes decisions but in consultation with lead faculty and/or deans.  In reality, only the deans can manage their budgets and make hiring decisions.

Recommendation 2  Conduct a Student Survey asking students their preferences for when and how courses are delivered.  Delivery modes?  Times?  Courses?  Enrolled at other locations?  What, where, why, what days, times, etc.

Recommendation 3  Provide on-site Colleague training targeting “just-in-time” information, reports, and understanding how Colleague limitations impact enrollment management.

Recommendation 3  Colleague Training  Additional comments:  In the discussions it became apparent that different groups “see” similar information in Colleague differently.  Colleague limitations impact building a student schedule and the length of time required to build that schedule.

Recommendation 3  Colleague Training  Additional comments:  For example, advisors can only view 8 items per page - - there is no scrolling.  Advisors cannot see annotations.  ECHS courses are not obviously tagged as ECHS only courses  New sections added do not appear with other sections with the same days and times. New sections fall to the bottom of the discipline.

Recommendation 4  Create user-friendly and timely enrollment and space utilization reports available on- demand to support enrollment management processes.

Recommendation 5  Workforce and Continuing Education review their course starting and ending times to more closely match credit course times to increase opportunities to share space.

Recommendation 6  The instructional community needs to develop a strategic plan for continual growth reflecting the District’s funding allocation formula.

Recommendation 7  The College needs to seek a more effective and aggressive manner of marketing programs and review procedures to expedite division requests for marketing materials.

Recommendation 7  Marketing  Additional comments:  This includes our web presence.  There was much discussion during one of the sessions about the District “rules” associated with Brookhaven advertising outside our county.

Recommendation 8  The Scheduling Task Force recommends that the task force become a standing College committee.

Recommendation 8  Scheduling Committee  Additional Comments:  This committee could review the current schedule planning process to look for opportunities to improve communication and optimize the schedule across the college.  The committee could research what the other college’s are offering compared to the BC schedule.  The committee could review room utilization information.

Recommendation 8  Scheduling Committee  Additional comments:  At the end of schedule build the committee could summarize the number of sections and seats available by course and time.  And, the Enrollment Management Committee (Recommendation 1) could be a subset of the Scheduling Committee.

SCHEDULING TASK FORCE Thank you for your time and providing answers to our endless questions.