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No description available.

No description available.

The purpose of this study was to examine Alabama community college presidents’ perceptions regarding distance education. Further, this study was intended to determine the adequacy of the training opportunities and support for faculty that teach distance education courses and what services are available for distance education students. This study was designed to investigate distance education in the Alabama Community College System and to provide information in an effort to create a comprehensive plan to maximize access to online learning for students within the system. A survey was given to a total of 26 Alabama 2-year college presidents (22 comprehensive community colleges and four technical colleges). The online survey consisted of 40 closed-ended multiple-choice questions and 2 open-ended questions. The survey asked questions regarding the presidents’ perceptions of distance education, online courses, student support, and virtual community colleges. The results of the statistical analysis were presented in both narrative and table forms to provide answers to the four research questions. Descriptive statistics were used to analyze the data. The study concludes with a summary, conclusion, and recommendations for further research. The findings of the study showed that Alabama community college presidents’ perceived distance education as important to the growth of their respective institutions. Alabama community colleges provided adequate training opportunities for faculty who taught distance education courses, and provided adequate services for students that enrolled in distance education courses. In addition, the findings indicated the following factors had a major or moderate influence on their institutions’ decisions regarding college-level, credit-granting distance education offerings: seeking to increase student enrollment, making more courses available, making more degree and certificate programs available, meeting student demands for flexible schedules and reducing seat time, providing access to college for students who otherwise would not have access, and maximizing the use of existing college facilities. The findings also determined that institutions provided adequate services for students enrolled in distance education courses.

Good writing skills are an essential component of a well-educated workforce. The competitive nature of business and industry demands a diversified and educated workforce. This study investigated the intersections of a community college writing center and the writing demands of business and industry in North Mississippi. The research was qualitative and employed observations, interviews, documents, and other artifacts that were relative to the study. The Itawamba Community College (ICC) Writing Center was purposively selected for the case study. Participants for the study included current and former ICC students, writing center directors, faculty, ICC peer tutors, and business and industry leaders from North Mississippi. This study discovered the following: (a) the ICC Writing Center helped students with their writing needs which directly assisted them in passing their college courses (this ultimately helped students to remain in college and created a more educated workforce for North Mississippi); (b) former ICC students who used the ICC Writing Center agreed that the writing center did help them to complete their college education at ICC; (c) business and industry listed their writing demands for employees and concurred with former ICC students that the ICC Writing Center has helped to create a more educated workforce.

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The problem of this study was selected aspects of public community college non-credit law enforcement training programs in Texas. Purposes of the study were: (a) to examine the development of police academies at community colleges in Texas; (b) to provide normative data describing the academies in terms of background, organization and administration, adequacy of facilities and equipment, personnel, student policies and practices, the program administrator's perceptions of internal and external support, involvement of outside forces and the extent of the program, and (c) to provide data which community colleges can use in organizing and developing police academies.

The problem of this study was the relative value and importance of perceived benefits of active foundations of public community colleges. The purposes were to identify a list of benefits; determine the importance of these benefits as perceived by presidents and foundation executive directors; assess the degree to which the level of importance of the benefits was affected by college or foundation demographics or foundation executive director characteristics; and to determine if presidents and foundation executive directors differ in their perceptions of the importance of the benefits. Survey instruments were mailed to presidents and foundation executive directors of colleges determined to have active foundations. Both instruments contained seven categories listing potential benefits to the community colleges of an active foundation. The foundation executive directors' instruments also requested college and foundation demographic data. Respondents were asked to rate the benefits according to their level of importance. Analysis of variance tests were performed to determine whether the categories of benefits were affected by any of the demographic data, when a level of significance emerged, a Scheffe' test was performed to determine the source of significance. Major findings were that the most important single benefit to the community colleges of active foundations is the provision of student scholarships. The "Public Relations/Political Influence" role of the active foundation is the most important category of benefits. The more fund-raising activities held and the greater the amount of contributions, the more positively community college administrators felt about the role of their active foundations in terms of external relations. Highly experienced foundation executive directors were more positive about the importance of the public relations role of their active foundations than were their inexperienced counterparts. The major conclusion of this study was that community colleges benefit from having active foundations, both monetarily and through the role of the foundation in enhancing the college's image.

A Faculty Orientation and Design for Writing Across the Curriculum is a case study of the work done to introduce the concept of writing across the curriculum at an urban community college. Emphasizing the related processes of learning, thinking, and writing, the researcher describes private interviews and analyzes transcriptions of small group meetings designed to discuss ways to encourage increased quantity and improved quality of writing in vocational and university-parallel courses on the campus. The focus of the study is the transcription of the faculty meetings where teachers reveal their methodologies and educational philosophies as they discuss ways to provide increased writing opportunities to large classes of open-door students. The culmination of the orientation project is a faculty booklet of ways to increase writing. The researcher concludes that although a writing "program" is not in place as a result of the year's work, essential groundwork for such a program is laid.

Throughout the United States, colleges and universities are faced with an increasing need for financial funding, while at the same time resources continue to diminish. With the limitations of available funds, community colleges must exhibit efficiencies in the operations of their institutions. External interests, such as governing boards and legislatures, require demonstration of efficient financial management. This evidence is then used to make decisions concerning future financial support for the community college. This study determined if community college chief executive officers use financial performance indicators as provided by the State Auditor's Office and if the chief executive officers of the community colleges value the compilation and the distribution of the financial performance indicators. In the selected colleges, many of the chief executive officers depend on their chief financial officer for understanding and application of financial performance indicators. The performance indicators distributed by the Auditor's Office captured only a snapshot of the college's performance, and failed to fully describe the whole college performance or specific financial events captured by the indicators. Though the indicators had flaws, either through incorrect data or lack of explanation, the CEOs did value their compilation because they provided a means for ‘getting the community college story' to decision makers external to the college.The State Auditor's performance indicators were developed using a university model. Because of the distinct difference in mission between the community college and the university, several of the indicators were not applicable to the community colleges. The CEOs suggested that another set of indicators be developed, using community college input, that would better capture the financial performance of the colleges. The new set of indicators should be simplified and measure only those areas, such as revenues and expenditures, that are truly comparable from one institution to another.