The Austin Community College District (ACC) Board of Trustees held its August regular meeting on Monday, August 1.
Trustees approved the FY 2022-23 budget, including a compensation package; called a general election on November 8 to fill three trustee positions, leased out space at Highland Business Center, and extended the Green Pass program.
Below are highlights from the meeting.
FY 2022-23 Budget Approved
The board unanimously approved the FY 2023 budget for the district. The $467 million budget is balanced and funds new facilities, like the Rio Grande Campus main building and Highland Campus, Building 3000. It also includes a compensation package of approximately $20.8 million.
The compensation package is the college’s largest to date. It is roughly double the compensation package in the college’s FY 2022 budget. The package provides all employees a raise with the lowest paid employees receiving the largest percentage increase. Learn more here.
Potential General Obligation Bonds
ACC may pursue a general obligation bond at the November 2022 election. Trustees reviewed and discussed two unique scenarios at the regular August board meeting. Each scenario includes projects to build or expand campuses districtwide.
Scenario 1 totals $815 million and includes the following:
| South Region | Total | Program Focus |
|---|---|---|
| Hays | $100 million | Health Sciences | Significant expansion including Professional Nursing and other programs |
| Pinnacle | $75 million | General Education | Additional programs to be determined |
| Southeast Travis County | $200 million | Applied Technology & Advanced Manufacturing |
| Central Region | Total | Program Focus |
| Eastview | $20 million | Expansion of Health Sciences | Additional science labs and Wellness Clinic |
| Elgin | $30 million | New skilled trades building for welding and advanced manufacturing |
| Highland | $120 million | Expansion of Advanced Manufacturing, implementation of Entrepreneurship Institute, Cyber Security |
| Rio Grande | $40 million | Expansion of Computer Science | Cyber Security Program |
| North Region | Total | Program Focus |
| Cypress Creek | $100 million | Expansion of IT |
| Northridge | $25 million | Expansion of Student Affairs, Business, Continuing Education, and IT |
| Round Rock | $75 million | Expansion of Applied Technology, Advanced Manufacturing, and Health Sciences |
| San Gabriel | $30 million | Applied Technology and Advanced Manufacturing |
Scenario 2 totals $500 million and includes the following:
| South Region | Total | Program Focus |
|---|---|---|
| Hays | $75 million | Health Sciences | Significant expansion including Professional Nursing and other programs |
| Pinnacle | $75 million | General Education | Computer Science & Business |
| Southeast Travis County | $135 million | Applied Technology & Advanced Manufacturing |
| Central Region | Total | Program Focus |
| Eastview | $20 million | Expansion of Health Sciences | Additional science labs and Wellness Clinic |
| Elgin | $15 million | New skilled trades building for welding and advanced manufacturing |
| Highland | $40 million | Expansion of Advanced Manufacturing, implementation of Entrepreneurship Institute, Cyber Security |
| Rio Grande | — | — |
| North Region | Total | Program Focus |
| Cypress Creek | $50 million | Expansion of IT |
| Northridge | —- | —- |
| Round Rock | $60 million | Expansion of Applied Technology, Advanced Manufacturing, and Health Sciences |
| San Gabriel | $30 million | Applied Technology and Advanced Manufacturing |
Trustees are expected to continue the discussions during their Board retreat on August 11. A decision on whether to put a Bond package on the ballot will be made no later than August 22. The general election is Tuesday, November 8.
UPDATE: Trustees approved a $770 million general obligation bond package at the August 11 Board retreat. Learn more >>
Chancellor Priority 5: Increase Course Completion and Accelerate Degree Completion
ACC Vice Chancellor for Academic and Student Affairs, Dr. Shasta Buchanan, presented an update to the board on measures and milestones for Chancellor Priority 5. The priority aims to increase course success rates and accelerate degree completion through innovation in teaching and learning inclusive of K-12 partnerships.
Dr. Buchanan highlighted the successes and next steps, including:
- On track for 25% degree completion
- More students participating in tutoring and coaching
- Successful launch of an upgraded advising platform which includes academic alert system
- New student orientation implementation
- Work continues to increase students taking English and Math in their first year
- Improving number of students taking 15 semester credit hours in their first year
- Work to increase credential completion of students in Early College High School programs
- Continued work to decrease course withdrawals.
Next, the college has begun to pilot Ruffalo Noel Levitz College Student Inventory (CSI), a proactive intervention tool that could impact student withdrawals. The CSI will be administered to a pilot of 4,000 new students entering Fall 2022. Three main categories are included in the assessment academic motivation, general coping skills, and receptivity to support services. The college also will look into external issues, like child care, hours of work, food insecurity, homelessness, mental health news, health insurance, and sexual orientation.
Trustees approve November 8 general election
The Board approved election contracts with Travis, Hays, Bastrop, Lee, and Caldwell Counties for the upcoming Austin Community College District Trustee elections. Williamson County’s election contract comes before the Board next month. Three trustee seats will be on the ballot in 2022. The six-year terms for places 4, 5, and 6 expire this year. The candidate filing period for these seats ends August 22. The general election is Tuesday, November 8.
Increased access to Online Tutoring Platform to target underserved populations
ACC will enhance its free online tutoring program for ACC students. Trustees approved the ability to use Department of Education Title V grant funding to the college’s current contract with Upswing International, Inc., an online tutoring services platform. The use of these approved Title V funds will be used to improve the online tutoring platform experience for students and tutors and will improve data tracking to better analyze the efficacy of the online and embedding tutoring initiative. Upswing offers all ACC students five hours of free online tutoring services each semester. To date, more than 16,000 tutoring sessions have taken place.
ACC leases space to United Way at Highland Business Center
Trustees authorized the Chancellor to execute a lease agreement with United Way of Greater Austin (United Way). The local non-profit seeks to rent office space at the college’s Highland Business Center (HBC) to relocate some of its administrative team. As part of the proposal, United Way would lease approximately 7,000 square feet of vacant space on the fifth floor of HBC. These areas are expected to be available as early as fall 2022 when ACC begins moving significant portions of its HBC occupants to ACC Highland, Building 3000.
Free rides to campus through Green Pass continues for at least another year
Trustees voted unanimously to extend the ACC Green Pass program, which provides FREE rides on Capital Metro services to college employees and currently enrolled students. The board reviews the college’s contract with Cap Metro each year. With ridership down, due to COVID, the new Capital Metro agreement allows ACC to pay the cost of actual ridership, not a fixed annual fee.
The board also extended an agreement between the college and the City of Round Rock for a bus stop at the Round Rock Campus. The extension now goes through January while work continues to install a new stop across College Park Drive.
Phi Theta Kappa Update
Board members heard an update on the continued success of the Phi Theta Kappa (PTK) chapter. PTK is the officially recognized Honor Society for community colleges and other two-year schools. ACC’s chapter ranks among the top two programs in Texas for inductions. Highlights during the 2021-2022 academic year include:
- Ranked in the top 39 International chapters out of 1,233 chapters
- One of the Top Texas Chapters
- The chapter has Texas Region Vice-President for District V
- Candidate for International Officer in the final four
- Inducted 496 new members. In addition, over 257 returning PTK members remain active through volunteering and/or serving as an officer.
- Members volunteered 2,640 hours of service
- Success rates among PTK students at ACC is 91 percent, including students who graduate and/or transfer with 30 credit hours or more
- PTK officers and members participated to ensure that the “voice of the student” was included in the new ACC Academic Master Plan, 2020-2025
- 2 Austin Community College and 11 chapter scholarships were awarded to members and officers to use in their fall 2022 term
- Faizan Khan was awarded the first prestigious Jack Kent Cooke Scholarship at the college