New Superintendent/President. Measure R passes with 70% voter approval. Six-year accreditation passed.
I am completing my second term on the Board of Trustees and just finished my second term as President of the Board a few months ago. During my term as President we had a very busy and productive year. We hired Dr. Jackie Fisher as our new Superintendent/President and he has earned the respect of the campus community as well as the Antelope Valley community as a whole. We passed Measure R with a nearly 70% approval---the highest pass rate of any Antelope Valley school bond and higher than all other Community Colleges in the State except one. This will allow us to build out the Lancaster Campus. We are expecting 23,000 students by 2015 (currently less than 13,000), so the passage of Measure R was not only desired, it was essential if we want to continue to serve everyone who wants to attend Community College in the Antelope Valley. Measure R will also allow us to begin the permanent Palmdale Campus, which is much needed in the South Valley and will serve another 10,000 students. We implemented new four-year degree programs in conjunction with CSU Bakersfield and CSU Fresno, which allows our local students the opportunity to get a four year degree without having to leave the Antelope Valley, including much needed engineering degrees. Our Honors Program provides local students an unprecedented transfer rate to prestigious four-year colleges. We passed our six-year accreditation with very few areas for improvement (areas which we had already identified and had begun working on). Overall the accreditation report was very complimentary to AVC, our administration, faculty and staff. The re-accreditation comes at a time when other Community Colleges are having a tough time with the process...in fact one Community College recently lost accreditation and several were put on "Watch". Finally, I worked closely with the AVC Foundation (I am on the Board of Directors) to raise funds to benefit our students, including a $300,000 Title V grant and numerous scholarships.
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