Cloud Atlas, and us....

I came out of the theatre numb, and not wanting to talk or make eye contact with anyone for fear of what come of it.  And, for the most part, the attempt to suppress all of what I felt but could not explain was successful….. until I got into the car.  Then I started to cry, and cry for maybe an hour without really know why.

The movie, Cloud Atlas, is bigger than life… or at least bigger than any individual life, because it’s about all of our lives bound together.  Looking to the present, the past, and the future in ways that blend them into a mind numbing – and mind expanding – whole, the movie reveals a world where we all are bound to each other in inexplicable ways.  Each of our actions has consequences that spread out and forward and even backward such that present and future and past are all interwoven into a “fabric” that spreads across time and space and beyond our individual births and deaths.  While each of us acts individually, none of our consequences are individual.

And thus there emerges a certain order to this world around us, and in us.  Things like culture, religion, political and economic systems begin to embody – and then define – normative beliefs and behavior.  Eventually, we find a certain kind of security in maintaining this order, even if and when this order includes things like injustice, inequity, enslavement, and the like.  In fact, this “order,” and the need to maintain it, eventually justifies these things…  and the world that we construct to protect us becomes one and the same with the world that imprisons us.

Cloud Atlas is about two things:  The great interwoven complexity, and order, and oppressiveness of the collective “we,” and the power of an individual act to change it.  Not just any act, but only those that are disruptive to that order – acts motivated by things like courage, and compassion, and love, and sacrifice.  And Cloud Atlas gives us beautiful, and comic, and tragic examples of these acts and, as we cry (and rejoice) over amazing lives offered up in the moment, we share in the hope that their ripples spread across time and space and beyond their individual births and deaths, to make for something better.

But I now know that this was not the cause for my tears.  I cried in the revelation that we  - that I - too often choose order over the opportunity and obligation that each of us has, in each and every moment, to make this world we share just a little bit freer.

Other Duties, as Assigned

Being a community college president affords me lots of opportunities to get out in front of people, to let my voice be heard and my face seen... but who would have thought that it would come to this! 

 

At this year's Runaway Pumpkin Half Marathon, a fundraiser for ABC House, I got to spend 3 1/2 hours cheering on 970 half-marathoners of all shapes and sizes and speeds.... An amazing gathering of dedicated runners and walkers, at least a few of whom were deaf (they'd say “thank you” to me in sign language as they ran by), a few were physically disabled, and all of them running or walking those 13.1 miles through the pouring rain and thinking that it was great humor that I was standing 1/2 mile from the finish line in my Grim Reaper costume and encouraging them with the words "The end near"  .....Priceless!!!

What I Learned in Boston

For the ACCT Congress, I actually stayed in one
of these cobblestone rowhouses, 3rd floor

What I Learned in Boston (....and at the Association of Community College Trustees (ACCT) Annual Congress)

Boston is one of my favorite cities and, if you're willing to step outside the protective cocoon of the conference site, you get to experience "Bean Town" at least a bit like the "natives" do.  The historic roots of our country are here, found in somewhat equal proportion in its historic churches and taverns, and I was fortunate to take in both.  But Boston isn't just about the past.  As my picture visually demonstrates, this town has managed to bring the past and future together in ways that respect both; in ways that make both better.

The ACCT Congress brought thousands of community college trustees together, affording them a once-a-year opportunity to see their work in the context of a powerful national agenda of improved student completion.  And, as I watched (and presented too!), I couldn't help but hope that our community colleges - and LBCC in particular - take a lesson from this great city of Boston, building a future in a way that honors our past.

Blessing....

 

No matter how many times I find myself in Washington DC and, no matter how dysfunctional Congress may seem to be at the moment, I never cease to be awestruck when I stand next to the Capitol, marveling not just at the building's architecture but more so at the architecture of the republic for which it stands.

We are an amazingly blessed nation..... a statement that I make not so much with pride as with an overwhelming sense of responsibility for spreading this blessing to the rest of the world. And it's not all that different from the "blessing" I feel here at LBCC, and the corresponding sense of responsibility I feel for using what we have and who we are to benefit our communities.

Oh, and I was in DC to participate in what is being described as a "blue ribbon" committee that has been commissioned to take the AACC Report of the 21st Century Commission, Reclaiming the American Dream, and turn it into "feet-on-the-ground" implementation on our 1300 community college campuses.  Being given the opportunity to be a part of this work is another "blessing"....

Here's a link to a recent article about this "AACC Implementation Committee."  

http://www.communitycollegetimes.com/Pages/Campus-Issues/EmbeddingCentury-Initiative-ideas-onto-campuses.aspx

Hot Air Balloons

This past Saturday, my wife Rita and I have the privilege of taking our first ride in a hot air balloon as part of the Northwest Art and Air Festival.  Rita and I had skydived together a couple of years ago and enjoyed that experience immensely, but the hot air balloon offered different - and perhaps deeper - kind of experience that neither of us will soon forget.

One of the big differences was the ability to converse while in the air - to be able to reflect on the experience with the people we were sharing the ride with us.  And so I got to know Randall - our pilot - who, once he learned that I was LBCC's presented, shared with me that he had no less than three Associates degrees from one of our sister schools, Portland Community College.  So he and I talked a lot about the opportunities that our respective educations had afforded us and he shared that, while he had for a time considered going on to complete a Bachelors degree, his three community college degrees (including one in aircraft operations and service) had provided all the opportunities he needed.... including the doorway into his business that rebuilds hot air balloons!

I thanked him for the ride, and he thanked me for the work we do as community colleges.

Fear

It's hard to explain the moments of terror that cause me to lose control of my legs, that cause me to lose my balance and collapse to the ground......

I am deathly affraid of heights. But, in spite of this fear - or perhaps because of this fear - I tend to put myself into situations where I am faced with this thing that fear almost more than anything.  A couple of years ago I went skydiving.  Last year I climbed a mountain.  This year I went backpacking in the Goat Rocks National Wilderness Area. 

So, there was a place in this most recent backpack where the trail ran along a vertical face maybe 300 ft above the ground below.... At one point the trail narrowed to no wider than a foot and there, for about two feet, the trail actually sluffed off into the void below... a void that I had to step over! I panicked and it was only by focusing my eyes on my friend in front of me, and tuning my ears to his encouraging words, that I made it through that section.

Yes, I made it, but the fear associated with those moments stole the joy from miles of the hike that I would have otherwise enjoyed and, in that experience, I realized that fear is NOT always exhilarating - sometimes it's just pure debilitating FEAR!

Not sure I'm ready to run away from my fears but, at 59 years of age, perhaps I'm learning to be more prudent in my efforts to face it.

Perhaps....


 

Education in Isolation?

At this year’s American Association of Community Colleges’ (AACC) Presidents Academy Summer Institute, I had the privilege and pleasure of listening to one of our profession’s most progressive and provocative teachers, Cole Camplese, who serves as the Senior Director for Teaching and Learning with Technology at Pennsylvania State University.  During his presentation, he shared with us a student’s response to a survey question about what going to school is like…

“Going to school is like getting on a plane.  You get in, sit down, strap in, and turn off all your stuff…. and you can't turn it back on until you land.”

If education is meant to help us be productive and fulfilled in the rest of our life, perhaps this “isolationist” approach may not be the best way to go about it…..

Being Put to Good Use

In the past week I have presided over LBCC's largest ever graduation, officiated at a dear friend's wedding, guided 22 high school students through the whitewaters of the Deschutes (and hopefully, by inference through some of the whitewaters of their lives as well), and lovingly (and publicly!) roasted a friend who has just retired from being a high school principal. 

What I discover in all this is that I am most happy when my life is being put to good use for others....

In My Spare Time

If there’s anything I’ve learned while here at LBCC, prominent among my lessons is that we as a community share in a passion for people.  Not just our students, but the community beyond our classrooms as well.  Through organizations like our local food banks, Boys and Girls Clubs, Big Brothers and Sisters, YMCA, religious organizations, Relay for Life, United Way, Habitat for Humanity, Helping Hands, Jackson Street Youth Shelter, and so many, many more, we "in our spare time" are working to make a better life not just for ourselves, but for those around us as well.  This is part of what makes LBCC so great!

Many of you know that one of the ways in which I try and contribute to this work is through my guiding (both in the technical and in the relational sense) high school students through the shared experience of whitewater rafting.  While the ride is most certainly a thrill for these students (and for me too!!!), the real thrill for them comes in the form of some pretty significant self-discovery and the visceral experience of some powerful teamwork. 

After 90+ kids in three back-to-back groups, I’m both tired and elated.  Watch and see…..

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cz-6X3H7yPE

Greg

What I learned about Tuition Equity while rafting the Deschutes River

It was back in March of 2011 that I provided testimony in support of Senate Bill 742, the “Tuition Equity Bill” which, if it had passed, would have provided all graduates of Oregon’s high schools with access to all of our state institutions of higher education at in-state tuition rates.  Unfortunately, the 2011 Legislature chose not to pass that Bill and so hundreds upon hundreds of our young people continue to be denied the equal access they deserve and from which our communities would benefit.  But that’s all, as they say “academic,” until you spend some intense time with one of those young people…  And that’s where Javier* comes in.

Javier was one of the high school students on the raft I guided down the Deschutes River this past weekend.  A wonderful young man of captivating charm and energizing spirit, a senior who will be graduating in another month, and a person of incredible potential that quite possibly neither he nor our communities will ever realize because he is an undocumented resident of our State.  Javier came to the US when he was 5 years old, has worked hard to learn English and then to complete high school, has a job that he works equally hard at, and hopes someday to go to college, marry, have a family, and be a productive member of his community.  He’s what every one of us should hope for in our students…  and I was immediately taken in by him.

At the end of our trip down the river together, Javier went out of his way to tell me how much he appreciated our time together… and to give me the biggest hug.  I teared up, partially because of his heart-felt expression of affection, but also because I know how hard it will be for him to achieve all that he dreams of.

The “Tuition Equity Bill” is sure to be reintroduced for the 2013 Legislative Session, and I am hopeful that this time we will do this one thing to help make Javier’s chances a little better.

*Note:  “Javier” is not this young man’s real name, and I have chosen to use a pseudonym so as not to risk the chance of making his path even harder.

LBCC Pride...

So, this past Sunday my wife and I had a chance to see the LBCC Theatre production of Agamemnon and, I have to say, it's hard to refrain from superlatives in describing what we experienced....  The music, the industrial Gothic sets, the acting, the interpretation of Greek tragedy into a modern form.... nothing short of amazing!

And then, in this morning's paper I read about our Choir going to London!

And then I read in an Email about LBCC Baseball Coach Greg Hawk's 600th win!!!!

And then........  well, let's just say that I'm awfully proud to be a part of the LBCC "team."

Connective Tissue

What is it that forms the connective tissue between classes that turns those individual instructional modules into a life-changing and empowering whole?

This is what I was thinking about as I was trying to learn the scores of our baseball games against Lane CC, and then again as I was working to buy tickets to the LBCC production of Agamemnon.  How do these activities enrich not only their participants’ experiences of LBCC, but all our experiences?  Are these activities part of the “connective tissue” and, if so, do we take full advantage of them… for ourselves and for our students?

Of course, when I think about it, I realize that it’s not the activities themselves that form this connective tissue but, instead, it’s the people who are a part of them… the people who, because of them, become a part of a whole.... part of a Community.

Bill Ayres (Co-founder of World Hunger Year) once said, “A man not only needs to know how to fish, he needs to have the freedom to do it and a place to do it. That's where community comes in.”

Perhaps this is what attracts me to things like our Sports Teams, our Choral Groups, our Theatre, our ROV Team, Student Leadership, Active Minds, Poetry Club, Welding Competition, Livestock Judging…….  Well, it’s a long list, but it’s all about the same thing: Providing a place where we have not just the opportunity to learn, but the place where we have the opportunity to “do it”... to "try it out."  And I think that it's this "doing" - and doing it together - that knits us together into something more that we are in ourselves, forming “community” here at LBCC..... and planting the seeds for “community” out there too.

One of my favorite authors, Frederick Buechner, once wrote “The life I touch for good or ill will touch another life, and that in turn another, until who knows where the trembling stops or in what far place my touch will be felt.”

We are the “connective tissue”…….

Mickey Mouse and the 21st Century College

Just back from Orlando, Florida where, unfortunately, I didn't get to meet Mickey Mouse and, in fact, didn't even make it across the street to visit his home, Disney World!!  Instead, I was functionally confined to the hotel where the American Association of Community Colleges (AACC) was convening its 92nd Annual Conference.  (Yes, I know......  poor planning on my part!)

The Conference theme was "21st Century Vision: Igniting Innovation" and, to "ignite" that vision, AACC used the Conference as a platform from which to release it's landmark "21st Century Report" entitled "Reclaiming the American Dream."  In it are an ambitious set of recommendations for how our community colleges can - and need to - play a leading role in this "reclamation" work, and I invite you to read it (or, at least read the Executive Summary - the first 13 pages).  You can see a copy of the Report at

http://www.aacc.nche.edu/AboutCC/21stcenturyreport/index.html

Bottom line - - we certainly have our work cut out for us but, as you read the Report, you will see that we at LBCC are already well on our way!

Why We Work at LBCC

Every once in awhile, we receive emails and letters from past students, providing us with feedback on their experience with us.  This week we received the following open letter to the college. As we face the challenges of our work, perhaps this kind of feedback helps keep us all in touch with the positive impact we have in our community -- and the importance of finding ways we can ensure that even more students have stories of support and success to share with us as they move forward. I hope you will be as inspired by this as I am.

Dear Linn-Benton Community College:

I would like to take a moment of your time to express my feelings regarding my experience at your school. When I tell people (often) that if LBCC offered a bachelors degree I would get mine there, I’m not just posturing a compliment. I make the statement in all directness and with no reservation. My experience at Linn-Benton was that of a truly high caliber education. When I interact with other university level institutions, I find myself thinking “I already learned that at LB” or “they do a better job of this at LB.” I earned my Associates of Applied Science in Instructional Assistant and in doing so knowingly chose a non-transfer oriented degree. I did this knowing that my education at Linn-Benton was going to be one that I would not want to take for granted. What I didn’t know was just how stellar that education would turn out to be.

Before I go into the classroom experience, I’d like to make sure to point out that it isn’t just the learning environment at Linn-Benton that has earned high praise. The administrative structure and student services on campus are also exceedingly well conducted. I’m the kind of student who takes it upon myself to directly interact with every aspect of the college environment. I spend time sitting down with the people who are going to have an impact on my life as a student. When I do this I make sure to get the message across that I care about my education and I make very explicit observations as to whether they care about it as well. Time and time again the members of; admissions, financial aid, academic advising, disability services, student government, counseling, and administration went above and beyond to meet my needs as a student and show me that they care about my outcome. I’ve had the opportunity to work with other colleges in my life before and after my time at Linn-Benton and continue to do so today. Let me tell you that no other institution I have attended or interacted with has even come close to understanding the purpose of serving their students like Linn-Benton.

So then, the teachers. While I can’t say that each and every instructor at Linn-Benton was the best thing since sliced bread, I can say that nearly all of them were and the few that might not be are still pretty good considering how hard it is to have me as a student. With my major being in education I was able to interact with most of the faculty in that department. I say this with the deepest conviction; the people working in the Luckiamute Center are saints each and every one! With every class I took that carried an ED prefix, I grew leaps and bounds in terms of my knowledge and understanding. I also grew greatly as a person. Because of them I finally was able to bring into focus what my place in the world would be (no small feat for an autistic high-school dropout). The instructors in my education classes taught me more than just the meaning of words, concepts, and theories; they taught me what those things truly mean to me and gave me the tools to apply them in my life. I can honestly say that without these people being some of the best educators in the state (or beyond); someone like me would never have found my path in life in such a clear and profound way.

The teachers in the education department aren’t the only ones who showed themselves to be exceptional educators. Today I can look someone in the eyes and honestly say that I got to spend a summer living inside of an active volcano with underwater robots (I do this often as well). I can say this because of a unique program offered at Linn-Benton through a certain exceptional science instructor. The instructors in the math department were able to work with me and my Asperger’s style of learning so that I could finally make sense of algebra. And the CWE and GED programs I worked with connected me to the students I would strive to serve and brought a level of value to my education that most don’t get until they look back on their working careers years later.

Speaking of the GED program, I cannot emphasize enough how amazing this program is on your campus. Having obtained a GED myself back in 2000 from LCC, I can tell you that the difference in quality cannot be accounted for simply via a decade or so of progress (and the LCC program was pretty decent, just saying). The staff and faculty of the GED program work more and harder than a mule team for the students they serve. Of course again that goes for pretty much everyone working in the Luckiamute Center.

I am a non-traditional student with Asperger’s Syndrome. I was the kind of student who in my K-12 education was the sole reason that more than one teacher quit their job. I have seen a lot of learning environments, both primary and college. At Linn-Benton I have seen a community of people who have what it takes to inspire and enrich the life of the students they serve. I make it a point in my life to not only study the subject in a given class, but also to study the learning environment in that class and at that school. So it is with a critical lens that I go into any academic program to see if it is one that will hold up to my high standards. In that sentiment, I say again, if I could come back to LBCC for my bachelor’s degree I would do so in a heartbeat.

I hope that my words resonate for you the quality that I have come to appreciate and miss at your school. If ever you need it, my story of success and growth at Linn-Benton is at your disposal.

Sincerely,

Nathan P. Wobbe

Students - Scholars

Last Thursday I had the privilege of attending this year's Oregon Community College Association's Student Scholar Recognition Event.  40 of Oregon's best students, gathered to meet with the Governor and to showcase the role that community college education is playing in changing the lives of our students.  This year, LBCC's Student Scholar is Tony Hewson, a Computer Science major who, after losing his job at age 41, has found new success with us and is already moving toward the completion of a BS in Computer Science at OSU.....  pretty inspiring!

A Student Connection

This past weekend I had the pleasure of spending a couple of days with a "young" friend, celebrating his 46th birthday, and our 28 years of friendship.  Do the math.....

I met him when he was 18, when he was a Freshman student at the college where I worked and, through my being his teacher, his employer, and his mentor, we became friends.  He tells me that his life has been changed forever (and for the good) as a result of our friendship, but I would be surprised if the change-for-the-good hasn't benefited me more than him.

What I've learned from him is that the change we hope for in our students doesn't come through their connection with a program, a course, or a subject matter.  It comes through their connection with us.

Every one of us at LBCC has the potential of being this catalyst for change in a student... and of being changed ourselves in the process.

Planning for our Future

So, while my Blog begins with a re-posting of my March President’s Report (which is being re-posted in this form to invite some dialogue around the issues and ideas I raised there), this represents my first-ever “real” blog post….

Last Friday I had the opportunity to make one of my “Community Presentations” at the Lebanon Chamber Forum, and got quite a bit of coverage, and comment.  Here’s the article from the Albany Democrat-Herald covering that Forum.

http://democratherald.com/news/local/alternative-fuel-center-on-horizon-for-lbcc/article_5d7db1c4-7ace-11e1-a05e-0019bb2963f4.html?mode=story

The reason I bring it to your attention is to invite you to think about – and converse with me about – what I say about LBCC in my Presentations, and especially about our plans for program expansion in some critical Career and Technical areas.

At the same time, I want to remind you that the next Wild Thinkers Forum is scheduled for Friday, April 13^th (hopefully none of you suffer from Triskaidekaphobia!) at 3 PM, and I hope you will consider being a part of this work…..  A “work” that is most definitely a “work in progress” and open to anyone, even if you were not able to join the group for their first meeting.  For my information, check the WTF paperless file at  http://po.linnbenton.edu/presidentsoffice/wildthinkersforum/

President's Report March 2012

“Purpose and Process; Mission and Means”

“If it ain’t broke, break it!” is the provocative title to Robert Kriegel’s 1991 book on change in the business world and, in the two decades since that work was published, we have seen some major businesses succeed – and fail – to a great extent on the basis of their ability to apply this principle.  A few examples:

• Founded in 1918, Zenith soon became the TV brand that was synonymous with quality.  “The quality goes in before the name goes on” was Zenith’s slogan and I know from personal experience that this was the best TV that my (or my parent’s) money could buy.  It was easy to see why Zenith would be proud – and protective – of its standing in the world of CRT technology-based televisions, and so they were… standing.  But the world was changing around the feet of this electronics giant, and some of those companies less invested in aging markets and technology moved in like a swarm of bees.  By 1999, Zenith filed for bankruptcy and became a wholly-owned subsidiary of LG Electronics, a Korean-based company that is one of the world’s leading producers of flat-screen TVs, major household appliances, and cellphones…. but you already knew that.
• At this year’s Academy Awards, Billy Crystal’s opening monologue began with the words “We’re here at the beautiful Chapter 11 Theatre,” in reference to the recent filing for bankruptcy by Eastman Kodak Co., after which that theatre, until just recently, had been named.  Before anyone could say “goodbye” – or was that what Billy Crystal was doing for us all? – the creators of the “Kodak Moment” were gone and we were left with nothing more than the question “why?”  In the words of Dr. Kamal Munir, a professor of business strategy and policy at the University of Cambridge, the answer is that “Kodak’s top management never fully grasped how the world around them was changing.  They hung on to now obsolete assumptions about who took pictures, why and when.  Kodak always thought that people would never part with hard prints and that people valued film-based photos for their high quality.”  In spite of the fact that the people at Kodak actually invented the digital camera in 1975, because they were so convinced of the superiority of their product legacy, they never saw digital as a direct substitute for film based photography…  When’s the last time you bought a roll of film?

And then there’s Apple…  In November 2001, Apple released the first iPod, and the world has never been the same since and, for that matter, neither has the iPod , or the iPhone, or the “new” iPad!  Never to be shackled by the past, Apple’s loyalty is not to any specific means of production or their products, but to the users they serve!  And that’s the lesson that Robert Kriegel wanted business to learn back in 1991, and it’s the lesson that we in education need to learn today:

Our future must be defined by the needs and interests of those we serve,

and not by the models or systems or structures we currently use to serve them.

Recently I’ve begun reading Disrupting Class: How Disruptive Innovation Will Change the Way the World Learns by Harvard Business School professor and world acclaimed change theorist Clayton Christensen (http://www.claytonchristensen.com//).  This book and others like it, together with some of the lessons learned from the business world, can help us to see beyond “what is” to “what needs to be” and this needs to be part of the foundational thinking for how we move into our future.  Paraphrasing Dr. Kamal Munir (the guy who did the post-mortem on Kodak), these “lessons learned” include:

• Don’t burden new ways of thinking and doing with the weight of “legacy assets.”  Clinging to past “products,” even – or especially – if they were great in their time, is a prelude to failure.
• Don’t try and prolong old ways of thinking and doing things by creating false synergies between the old and the new.  As Kodak learned the hard way, developing digital photography that still needed to be printed to be viewed and shared was a fatal error.
• And, most important of all, design all of what you do around your users and not around any existing business models.

But what does this look like?!?  And how do we change without losing what we need to keep?!?  I believe the answer is in

• staying focused on purpose – OUR PURPOSE – of providing “an education that enables all of us to participate in, contribute to, and benefit from the cultural richness and economic vitality of our communities,”
• …and letting go of the rest.

According to WikiAnswers.com, Disney’s mission is “To make people happy.”  They may build great amusement/theme parks and produce great animated films, but these are just the current means by which Disney is accomplishing that mission.  The lesson to be learned from Disney, and Apple, and Kodak and Zenith too, is that their future – and our future too – depends on being able to tell the difference between purpose and process; between mission and means.

To that end, I am going to be forming a very special group – a group that anyone at LBCC will be welcome to join but for which the formidable goals, hard work, and considerable risks of both failure and success may temper the inclination to volunteer.  I’m calling this group the Wild Thinker’s Forum (yes, I know…..) and its purpose will be, in Linchpin author Seth Godin’s words, to “come up with dozens of bad ideas because among them will be the one transforming idea that we need.”  A little more specifically, the group’s purpose will be to:

• Clarify our college’s “purpose” and commit it to the memory that consciously and unconsciously informs and directs all that we do (and choose not to do)…. Make our “purpose” our “religion.”
• Identify our college’s “legacy assets” and begin to identify those that are limiting our capacity to move forward.  This will be a provocative process and may raise some eyebrows among our co-workers and friends.  Questions like “does all learning require a classroom – or even a course?!” will need to be faced head-on.
•  Identify the enduring resources that are now ours and on which our future must be built.  Again, this will be provocative work.  My guess is that we will come to discover (re-discover) that it is our PEOPLE that are our most valuable enduring resource… but not necessarily the roles we currently play or the positions we currently fill.  Hmmmm….
• Create and sustain a group culture where “bad ideas” are welcomed and where we assume that almost every success will begin with failure.  In other words, bring the creativity you once had (and still have, if you look hard and deep enough)… but leave your egos at the door.
• Develop “answers” to questions like the ones I first shared with you in January.  Questions like:
• How can we assure our students that the classes they need will be available to them at the times and in the sequence that best supports their progress toward the completion of a degree?
• How can we ensure that our students have the capacity to succeed in every class they register for?
• How can we adapt our educational delivery systems (or adopt new ones!) to better serve a renewed focus on student success and completion?
• How can we ensure that our communities reap tangible cultural and economic benefits from the investment they make in us as THEIR community college?
• How can we develop and/or take advantage of centralized processes and curricular resources that hold promise for increasing our effectiveness, and efficiency?
• How can we assure our students that we will be aware of and care about their presence and that we will support their progress for every moment that they are with us?
• How can we ensure that every member of the LBCC community understands, accepts, and is appreciated for the role they can play in answering these questions?
• Do as much as we can by the end of the Spring 2012 Term.

Interested?..........  The first Wild Thinker’s Forum meeting is scheduled for Friday, March 16th from 2 to 5 PM (with a second meeting scheduled for Friday, April 13th) and all who are eager to see what we can do together are welcome!  I only ask that you let Renee Windsor-White know that you’re coming so we can prepare accordingly, and that you come prepared to think and work hard.  You can prepare by:

• Think in advance about the purpose of this group and about the questions I am asking us to answer.  Take time to really understand the questions – what they really mean – and whether or not they are the “right” questions for us.  Are there other questions?  More questions?
• Begin reading what you can on anything that pertains to this work.  Some suggested books:
• “Disrupting Class” by Clayton Christensen (2008)
• “The Innovative University” by Clayton Christensen (2011)
• “The Innovator's Dilemma: The Revolutionary Book That Will Change the Way You Do Business” by Clayton Christensen (1997)
• “Linchpin: Are You Indispensable?” by Seth Godin (2011)
• “Willful Blindness: Why We Ignore the Obvious at Our Peril” by Margaret Heffernan (2011)
• “Adapt: Why Success Always Starts with Failure” by Tim Harford (2011)

 NOTE: If you are really interested in reading any of these books and can’t find one to borrow or don’t have the resources to buy one for yourself, our Library has ordered two copies of each and they will be placed of reserve there for you.

On the inside cover of Clayton Christensen’s book Disrupting Class we read “For America to stay competitive – academically, economically, and technologically – we need to rethink our understanding of intelligence, reevaluate our educational system, and reinvigorate our commitment to learning.”  In other words, our future is not about being smaller or bigger, nor is it even about being leaner or better funded.  Instead, it’s about being fundamentally different – admittedly, in ways that maybe we do not yet fully understand, but nonetheless in ways about which we do have some significant clues.  Fortunately, I believe that LBCC is especially well-suited to seeing those “clues” and I am excited to see how the efforts of the Wild Thinker’s Forum will help guide all of us in understanding how we can best respond.  I look forward to sharing this work with you!

With Sincere Appreciation and Hope,

Greg