Start fall 2023 semester strong!
August 18, 2023
Dear Chaffey Campus Community,
Welcome to the fall 2023 semester at Chaffey College! As many of you heard at our Convocation/Flex event on August 9, the theme for this semester is “Re-engaging Campus Culture.”
For some of us, the pre-pandemic days may seem like a long time ago. For others, it may feel like just yesterday. No matter how you see it, we all will be witnessing the effects of COVID-19 for some time.
Perhaps the most noticeable remnant of the pandemic here at Chaffey is our enrollment numbers. We have rebounded somewhat from the declines we saw in 2020. Summer saw across-the-board increases in headcount, enrollments and units attempted. For headcount alone, we had a jump of more than 29 percent in students. As of today, our enrollment is at 20,283.
However, we cannot become complacent about Fall numbers. While early data showed increases in headcount, we are still significantly lower than where we want to be.
We still have a lot of work to do, and you all will play a major role in this. We have been working to get our former students back on track with multiple approaches – from telephone and face-to-face outreach, to targeted marketing campaigns reaching students through social media, digital advertising, billboards, television and radio streaming services. We have been engaging with our partners and our community more than ever to remind people that Chaffey is here and that we play a critical role in the region’s economic recovery and development.
We are continually finding new ways to better serve our students, and these approaches align with what our colleagues in the chancellor’s office are doing right now.
Our new Chancellor, Dr. Sonya Christian, took her role in June, becoming the first woman to oversee California’s system of 116 community colleges. She has hit the ground running, continuing our progress toward achieving Vision for Success goals.
Dr. Christian said during a July conference: “California is counting on the community colleges to keep us strong economically and socially.”
She recently spoke about various priorities, including increasing support for low-income adult learners and aligning workforce development with Governor Gavin Newsom’s priority sectors, such as healthcare, climate, science, technology and education. The Chancellor’s Office is working on ways to increase apprenticeships in these areas.
So are we.
By now, many of you have heard about Workforce Innovations and Entrepreneurial Development – a new area being led by our new Interim Associate Superintendent Sheneui Weber.
We are very excited to be the first California community college to take on such an endeavor, turning our approach with InTech into a college-wide model.
InTech has started working with our automotive technology department and the LAUNCH Apprenticeship Network to create a master automotive technician apprenticeship program at Chaffey. Mercedes Benz of Ontario will mentor our apprentices.
Students will have access to a new 18-unit mechatronics level 1 certificate program this semester thanks to another collaboration between the industrial electrical technology program and InTech. Many thanks to Jonathan Polidano, as well as Bill O’Neil, Mary Romero and Laura Alvarado for helping to make these programs a reality.
InTech will also be hosting thousands of high school students for our annual Manufacturing Day event this October. When it comes to preparing students for skilled trades, this is where it all begins – with planting seeds of knowledge.
Guided Pathways remains at the forefront of our work as well. With nearly 29 percent of Californians living at or in poverty, equitable pathways to baccalaureate completion is a moral imperative.
The chancellor encourages the development of more dual enrollment partnerships in underinvested communities, and the enrollment of more students from groups that have historically experienced barriers to success. We know this is important because dual enrollment students are more likely to enroll in and complete college, and it is known to be effective for students of color, first-generation and low-income students.
In Sacramento, leaders are working to establish pathways from high school to universities, as well as a mandatory ninth-grade course in self-development, career exploration and college planning.
Guided Pathways also aligns with the Governor’s Roadmap, which includes the goal of increasing the number of students graduating high school with 12 or more dual enrollment college units by 15 percent. This is an easily achievable goal, if high school students start their college coursework as freshmen.
You have probably seen the headlines regarding diversity, equity and inclusion (DEI) and its presence on college campuses. As of this summer, more than a dozen states have introduced or passed bills putting a stop to DEI programs at colleges and universities.
Let me be clear about this. Chaffey College and the state of California do not support this change. Now more than ever, we need to make our college campuses places where everyone feels welcome, empowered and represented. I believe eliminating DEI is a major step backward, and the last thing that higher education needs.
We have met our initial goals outlined in the 10-Point Plan as of spring 2022, and have already seen positive results from our work. Tomeika Carter, our Interim Director of Human Resources and DEI, reports that our efforts over the last few years have resulted in an increase in applicants from underrepresented groups. The district has also seen consistent growth in the number of employees hired that are from underrepresented groups.
We are excited to see this shift, and this energy will propel us forward.
As of spring 2023, about 500 employees have completed training on the elimination of bias in hiring and employment. This is a requirement for anyone serving on a hiring committee. We are also building our support for undocumented students and the LGBTQIA+ community. Our focus is to establish more partnerships on- and off-campus, leading to more programs and services that better serve these student populations and result in greater persistence, retention and success rates.
We will be holding our 2nd annual Black and Brown Minds & Mattering Conference on Nov. 1, so mark your calendars and join us for this rewarding event. Speakers and workshop details will be released soon.
Additionally, the chancellor’s office is holding a DEIA Institute in San Diego next month. This will be a one-day conference focused on anti-racism practices and ideas.
We have a lot of news coming out of our Academic and Career Communities.
From Health and Wellness, the non-credit phlebotomy program will enroll its first group of students in Fontana in spring 2024. The physical therapist assistant program completed its accreditation over the summer and will enroll its first group of students in Fontana next summer. Many of us, including Dean Amy Nevarez, are very excited about the culture this will bring to the campus.
Speaking of Fontana, the Upward Bound program is seeing great success. More than 90 percent of Upward Bound students maintained a 2.5 GPA or higher for the 2022-2023 academic year, and many had a GPA of more than 3.0. And 95 percent of the 2022 graduating class had enrolled in a college course by fall. Dean Nevarez, Elizabeth Almanza and others have been working hard to keep students engaged with weekend workshops on everything from financial literacy, to communicating effectively with professors. They hosted a six-week summer program in Fontana, giving participants an opportunity to take up to two Chaffey classes through the high school partnership program.
In the spring, we signed a memorandum of understanding with Inland Empire Health Plan that will streamline access to the associate degree in nursing program for IEHP vocational nursing employees. The organization will invest $1.5 million to enroll 10 of its employees in the ADN program each semester for the next three years. Many thanks to the Chaffey College Foundation and Interim Director Heather Parsons for leading this effort.
We are also launching a community health worker certificate program this semester, and are developing paid internships with IEHP and other public health entities in the region. These professionals provide various community services including care coordination, health education, informal counseling and more.
Over the summer, the Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics community received nearly 1,000 biology lab kits for our online students to conduct scientific experiments at home. These kits contain authentic labware such as beakers and graduated cylinders, in addition to chemical bags to evaluate cellular respiration. There is even an owl pellet in each kit so students can learn about an owl’s feeding habits.
This semester, STEM is implementing a student-centered math pathways model that will give students more options for their college math requirement. This includes a new transfer-level liberal arts math course called quantitative reasoning. STEM majors will have a streamlined pathway that reducing their course sequence from three to one.
And speaking of innovation, our STEM department is working with the Wignall Museum on an exhibition called “Seeing the Unseen: Science and Art” which will feature works of art that investigate the intersection of science and the arts. It will be the first of two exhibitions featured during the academic year where STEM and art will intersect. Keep an eye out for this starting August 21.
The Art, Communication and Design Success Center and the English department have collaborated to align and streamline supplemental instruction for English 1A students. Online and in-person English students now have access to supplementary activities, as well as “one stop shop” support pages through Canvas.
Our communication studies program was an early adopter of the Zero Textbook Cost program and will be expanding its ZTC commitment this year. The department is currently working toward making the communication studies degree a full ZTC program. In all, zero textbook cost course offerings have grown from 14 percent in spring 2022 to 36 percent in spring 2023, with 43 percent of our faculty teaching at least one ZTC course.
In Business, Technology and Hospitality, we are rolling out our new CORE Academy non-credit certificate program in property management. This program is completely free, with no textbook or materials costs. We are grateful to National CORE and especially Assemblyman James Ramos for securing $1 million in funding to make this program possible. We have also added two cloud computing programs – a cloud analyst certificate and a cloud security associate’s degree. We are the first community college in the region to offer this degree.
Last but certainly not least, I want to give a huge shout-out to the athletics department for its successful season last year. Not only did women’s soccer make it all the way to state finals for the first time in Chaffey history, but the department became the first recipient of the Inland Empire Athletic Conference Commissioner’s Cup. This award goes to the community college with the most points earned during conference competitions. I look forward to seeing what our student-athletes can accomplish this season. Go Panthers!
We have much to be proud of and a lot to still accomplish, but I want all of you to know that you are valued and appreciated. Without you, we cannot fulfill our mission to improve lives through education. Thank you for being a part of the Chaffey community.
I am excited by the efforts made by all of you to focus on the needs of Chaffey students and Dean, Jim Fillpot who has provided some excellent data on student enrollments prior to, during and after the pandemic which is quite interesting. Jim’s data is attached.
Have a wonderful fall semester!
Sincerely,
Henry D. Shannon, Ph.D.
Superintendent/President 
