October 4, 2018

Meeting Notes

---

Attending Members:  Booye, Glapion, LeBleu-Burns, Mandy, Mieso, Robles (co-chair), Tanubrata (DASB), Wethington, White-Daniels

Precious Gerardo represented ACE for Kirkpatrick.

Guests:  Lisa Castro, MaryKay Englan, Kimberly Fukuyama, Melinda Hughes, Truly Hunter, Chrissy Parker, Tram Pham, Lan Trinh

There were no amendments to the agenda.

---

Membership Review

Mieso went over the SSPBT webpage that included the Mission, Charge, Committee Structure, and Membership. One committee position is vacant and another classified committee position is in the process of being filled.

---

Reorganization Presentation

At the last College Council meeting, the President expressed concern about the deep cuts to front-line counselors and staff in the SSPBT recommendations but no recommendations regarding the administration of Student Services.

• The President decided to take only 8 of the 10 counselor positions recommended for elimination in General Counseling.
• The President also directed the VPSS to address the remaining deficit ($274,026) through reorganization.

Recommendations previously presented to College Council by SSPBT:

• Counseling Reduction Target Total: $1,346,000 (All phases, Tier 1-3)
  • Phase I & II – $1,030,000 – proposed reduction: 6 faculty/counselor,
    2 classified (1 transfer to a different fund).
  • Phase II – Tier 3: $516,000 – Proposed reduction: 4 faculty/
    counselor positions
• Saving 2 counselor positions will result in a deficit of $274,026
• Deficit has to be addressed through reorganization

The Amended SSPBT Recommendation:

• Eliminate 2 management positions: $382,912
  (AVPSS and Dean of Counseling)
• Save 2 counselor positions: $274,026
• Save 1 classified A & R position: $108,886
• Met Student Services reduction target: $3,207,000
• Total eliminated positions: 10 faculty, 11.5 classified, 2 managers

Full Presentation

---

Reorganization Discussion

White-Daniels expressed that the presentation did not speak to what is really in Counseling. The Counseling Division has 14 Counselors with 3 of them in the Transfer Center, 3 Article 19, 6 part-time Counselors, and 6 Academic Advisors with 5 department staff. The Dean’s responsibilities include:

• Direct day-to-day contact with students
• Exceeding units
• Probation
• Foster Youth
• Orientation Workshops
• Work with all programs and services regarding students
• Starfish
• EduNav
• Liberal Arts Dean
  • Instructional Dean
  • Classes and curriculum
  • Undocumented students

When White-Daniels started there was a wait time of 1 hour 30 minutes that had gone down to 15-30 minutes. Now it is back up to 1 hour 30 minutes due to cuts. They serve 28,000 duplicated students a year. The Counseling Dean works with students on a daily basis while Instructional Deans work primarily with their faculty. One person cannot do this on a daily basis.

The decisions from Senior Staff to reduce Counseling started 5-6 years ago with moving Assessment and Health Services. ISP and Articulation were recently moved but still reside on the Counseling floor.

White-Daniels stated the savings could be made with just the AVPSS alone and wanted to know why we were filling the Dean of Enrollment Services position. White-Daniels also wanted to know why the $274,000 had to be taken out of Counseling and if they were going to get any credit for the retiring Counselors from the retirement package that was offered.

Mieso responded that the proposed elimination of the two Administrative positions totaled about $382,912. The $274,026 deficit came from the two counselor positions that were on the list to be eliminated but were declined by the President.

• Each area was given a % of cuts by the Finance Division based on their funding and budget.
• Each Dean had a budget reduction amount and positions were moved to different funding sources when possible and some placed on the elimination list.
• There really is nowhere else to go to fund this deficit so the cuts were directed to come from Administrative positions and the AVPSS would not cover the deficit created by the two counselor positions.

Wethington expressed that she believed we are losing Student Services. SSRS and other programs need to come back to Student Services and not be under Instruction. There are many counselors dispersed across the campus and she is often seeing these students and correcting their ed plans, etc. The data for these programs needs to be looked at to make sure they are serving the students properly and that the students are successful.

Hunter wanted to know if the impact of this reorganization decision had been discussed and if there were other options looked at. She said the impression was that this was a done deal and the process didn’t feel transparent. She also felt that it wouldn’t be an easy transition.

Michele wanted to go over her responsibilities currently as the Dean of Student Development/EOPS/CARE:

• She is 50% Director of EOPS and 50% Dean
• The Director of Health Services
• Oversees Psychological Services
• Office of College Life
• Chair of the HEART team
• Campus grievances
• ADA compliance
• Title V coordination and investigations
• Student complaints and hearings
• Legal compliance
• Staff development

She felt the work of Instructional Deans has a different nature to it. This reorganization would decentralize Counseling and is not in the best interest of the students. It would also spread a manager too thin and we would need to decide what isn’t going to get done. The college has to decide what the college is not going to do for its students. Also the elimination of 2 positions out of 7 is also not proportional.

All positions have been frozen at this time so the Enrollment Services Dean position should be placed on hold as well. Since LeBleu-Burns just found out about this the day before, she wasn’t sure exactly what the impact of this reorganization was going to be.

Booye asked what were SSPBT’s options for today. She wanted to know if the committee could take some time to think about the information presented and then vote at the next meeting. Did the vote need to happen today?

Mieso responded that we are up against the district November 1st deadline for the budget reduction recommendations from De Anza. The SSPBT recommendations still need to be approved by College Council that is currently scheduled for October 11th. Some points Mieso covered:

• The reorganization is a result of the fiscal component that caused the reductions that in turn, led to the structural component since there is less staff to manage.
• Budget reductions were primarily given to areas that were funded by fund 14. Any position that was in fund 14 was transferred to a different fund if possible.
  • DSPS – Categorical
  • Financial Aid – Categorical
  • EOPS – Categorical
  • Outreach – Categorical
  • ISP – Primarily Categorical
  • OTI – Categorical
• Senior Staff looked at many options for the reorganization. The Enrollment Services Dean position needed to be filled due to the critical nature of the position for college operation, funding and required state 320 reporting.
• There was a push from Senior Staff to the District to hold off on the budget reduction submission because of the SRP deadline but the district is moving forward with original plan for budget reduction submission deadline.
• The full impact of the budget reductions and reorganization will not happen until after 2019-20 when all of this goes into effect.
  • Enrollment, funding formulas, the retirement package, all can affect the budget reduction.
• Workload, issues, comments, etc. will be noted with the reorganization recommendation.
• If SSPBT doesn’t make the decision, someone else will. He wanted the option for SSPBT to make this decision.

Robles did feel that it’s not acceptable that the Student Services manager notification of the reorganization was not made in a timely manner. He has had classified staff come up to him saying that no one is being transparent and what is being transparent is collusion. Robles apologized to White-Daniels and LeBleu-Burns about how this was handled, “I’m sorry.”

Hunter also felt it was disrespectful that the reorganization was not discussed earlier. She said it felt personal even though it was not supposed to be. Senior Staff needs to know what kind of impression this is leaving.

Gerardo mentioned that she served on IPBT and at their last meeting, there were not ready with their budget recommendations for College Council next week and suggested SSPBT may not have to take this to College Council on October 11th. Other SSPBT members also expressed interest to have more time to review the proposal.

Mieso agreed to schedule an extra SSPBT meeting for next Thursday, October 11, 2018 to continue the reorganization discussion.