PRESIDENT'S UPDATE
Dear Colleague,
I hope all of you are enjoying your summer and that you’ve had the opportunity to take time off to rest and be with your family and loved ones.
Tomorrow, Friday, I will complete my first month as your college President. I’ve enjoyed meeting faculty, staff, students, managers, and community members. I’m looking forward to meeting others who I have not had the chance to connect with. As promised, my first few months are focused on getting to know you and understanding our culture. To schedule a visit with your department or an individual meeting with me, please feel free to reach out to my Departmental Assistant Holly Strother at hstrother@gavilan.edu or 408.848.4711.
I am excited to report that we have received a donation of $167,782 from the Gene R. Medinnus trust to assist our financially disadvantaged students. These funds will be available to us next year and will go towards providing scholarships to support our students with the greatest financial needs. It is an honor for me to welcome such a significant donation for our students and I hope it is the beginning of many more to come.
Our bridge, which unites the two sides of our campus and holds history and symbolism for our college, is near completion. We are planning a student led ribbon-cutting ceremony in September. More information will be coming soon.
At Tuesday’s Board meeting, a major topic of discussion surrounded the Emergency Conditions Allowance from the Chancellor’s Office. This condition would allow our district to receive a higher level of apportionment based on a higher number of Full-Time Equivalent Students (FTES). It would increase this year’s budget allocation of $38 million by $4.2 million to approximately $42M. This option would increase this year’s funding by $4.2 million but comes with some risks, liabilities, and added requirements for the college. This includes having to increase enrollments to protect future funding, increasing our Full-Time Faculty Obligation costs, impacts to future COLA, and the college must complete a number of requirements to become eligible.
The deadline to apply for the Emergency Conditions Allowance is September 1, 2022. My team will continue to work with the Chancellor’s Office to gather more information and make a recommendation to our board. There will be consultation with our Academic Senate President on areas related to 10+1 faculty purview. The Board will hold a special meeting during the last week of August (to be scheduled) to review and discuss the information and recommendations presented based on our analysis.
I encourage you to review the attached presentation and will keep you updated as we learn more. As always, please feel free to reach out to me directly with your comments or questions or contact Departmental Assistant Holly Strother, to set up a time to discuss should you have any questions.
Kind regards,
Dr. Pedro Avila