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May is an exciting time of year at every college, but it is an especially rewarding time for those of us in the community college world. Almost every evening for three weeks we have had the pleasure of celebrating student achievements from scholarship to athletic prowess to those honored for leadership. While many colleges use phrases such as “student success,”…
Continue readingIronically, as community colleges emerge from the pandemic, experts, according to an article in the Community College Daily, are counseling that we do so slowly, recommending that we “focus on small realistic changes that can make the biggest impact.” However, having come through a pandemic during which our college community exercised resilience and commitment to remain fully open during those tough…
Continue readingHow satisfying to celebrate Thanksgiving almost free of the constraints that have held our holidays captive for the past two and one-half years! While many are still cautious, most of us will gather for Thanksgiving dinner without masks, hand sanitizers, and measured 6’ distances. The “Zoom” Thanksgiving dinner will finally become a memory to chuckle over in Thanksgivings to come. And so…
Continue readingThis year Election Day and Veterans Day fall within days of each other, bookending the week with powerful imagery that each day offers independently but which links them inextricably together. On November 8, even in the midst of a divisive and toxic political environment, Election Day reassured us—everyday Americans that we are—that we have the power to define or redefine…
Continue readingA national decree in 1934 declared a day in October as Columbus Day. Last year, President Biden issued a proclamation announcing the celebration of Indigenous Peoples to coincide with that day, this year being October 10. I doubt that celebrating Columbus Day and Indigenous People’s Day on the same day is intended as a slight to the Italian American community. …
Continue readingAlthough the perception of America’s colleges as tranquil oases of learning may have always been little more than a fanciful image, a harsh reality faces every community college president today. In a world seemingly gone mad in terms of gun violence, we are confronted with a challenge framed by a simple question: How do we keep our campuses safe? No…
Continue readingMany of us think of commercials as a time to get up from the couch to grab something to drink and a bag of chips before Downton Abbey or the last episode of Game of Thrones resumes. CCBC commercials, however, strike a note worth heeding. We are not selling jewelry or potato peelers; instead, we are selling “futures.” CCBC College…
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