More Delta distress

Written by Jennifer Wadsworth / Tracy Press
Tuesday, 08 July 2008

Delta College was given a plan for improvement by a commission this month, and if the plan isn’t followed, the school could lose its accreditation.

San Joaquin Delta Community College has two years to get its act together before it slides a step closer to losing its accreditation, which would effectively close the school.

Raul Rodriguez, the school’s president, said it’s unlikely the school will sink that low.

A loss of accreditation — the state’s approval to operate — would render the school’s credits and degrees essentially meaningless and bar it from getting public money, according to the commission that pointed out the college’s needed improvements.

But being bumped from warning status to unaccredited is a huge jump, Rodriguez maintained. And two years is plenty of time to live up to state standards, he added.

The report, issued this week by The Accreditation Commission for Community and Junior Colleges, an agency that holds colleges to task, gave the school until 2010 to reform its paid and elected leadership, among other things.

"They basically told the board: No more micromanaging," Trustee Janet Rivera said. "I agree. It’s right on target."

Monday’s review echoed some points brought up in a San Joaquin Civil Grand Jury report issued last month that lambasted school trustees for violating open-government laws and wasting millions of dollars in taxpayer money.

Delta trustees should adopt a formal code of ethics and quit micromanaging the school’s administration, the review charged.

"We should just let the president do his job," Rivera said of Rodriguez. "We’re the policymakers. I, for one, think we should all step back and let the college do its job."

Aside from the elected board, the college should also develop a more stable paid management team, the review continued, specifically for the position of vice president.

When the review team visited the college earlier this year, four upper management positions were vacant. Since then, the college has hired people to fill three of those four openings, school officials pointed out.

Commissioners also reminded the college of a looming four-month deadline to meet the last set of recommendations given six years ago by the agency to improve students’ academic performance, provide better staff accountability through peer review and address charges by some employees of the school’s bias against its "diverse population."

Trustees generally agreed with the recommendations.

Delta’s dubious status is hardly uncommon, Rodriguez said. The school is one of 20 California community colleges that the agency placed on a "warning" status. The state has 110 such schools in all.

Diablo Valley, Sierra and Ohlone are a few Northern California community colleges given the same ruling.

Delta would have to be placed on probation before it would face the immediate threat of losing accreditation.

"We definitely have our work cut out for us," said Trustee Ted Simas, who has historically been the most critical of his peers.

Fellow trustees Rivera and Anthony Bugarin agreed.

Simas especially criticized the rest of the board for failing to live up to the ethical standards already in place and agreed with the review that standards should be officially codified.

"We can do this; we’ll work as a team," he said. "I hate to be negative, but a person’s ethical or they’re not. (Being ethical) requires a change in attitude."

Leo Burke, Delta’s board president, and trustees Dan Parises, Greg McCreary and Maria Serna did not return calls for comment Tuesday.

The college has until Oct. 15 to respond to the commission.

The official warning is a lot like a fix-it ticket, noted college spokesman Greg Greenwood.

"We can address these problems," he said Tuesday. "There’s virtually no chance Delta will lose its accreditation."
Complete article here...