October 2013

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A Student Publication of the University of Hawai`i • Honolulu Community College • October 2013

ACCREDITATION: THE COLLEGE RESPONDS What we want A survey finds that many students want more and better places to eat on campus. And more trees, too. Page 3

Dancing days A group of students hanging around the mall let their feet do their talking. Page 5

Cheap eats There are plenty of places to find good, cheap food within walking distance of the campus.

Our reviewers turn you on to three of them.

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School confident it can beat warning By Mathew Ursua

Ka La editor

Lounge lords Meet Larry Kaupahi and Zachary Lagrimas, two guys who help program the entertainment in the student lounge. Page 8

After underestimating accreditors’ suggestions in the past and being put on warning, the college’s administration thinks this time they’ll get it right. This month, the school submitted a report to its accreditors explaining that problems found in a review last year have been fixed or addressed. Chancellor Erika Lacro said an accreditation team put the school on warning after finding problems in six areas, some of which had been noted in the previous review six years earlier. “I think our interpretation of what they wanted to see done was different from what they felt,” Lacro said. “We felt as though we did this, but they wanted a strategic plan and a whole lot of other compo-

nents,” Lacro said, “In our mind we thought we had met it, but when they came out and looked at our evidence they thought, ‘No, this isn’t what we want to see.’” There were a total of six recommendations on the 2012 report, and one was a carryover from 2006. Lacro said failing to address it was probably the reason the school was put on warning. Lacro, who has been chancellor for a year, said she worked on accreditation matters in her previous position with the school’s administration dating back to six years ago. She wasn’t with the college in 2006 when accreditors first took issue with the school’s deficiencies in planning and measuring success for distance education. Being put on warning has led Lacro and her administration to make big changes. “Even though the good work is spurred by us being put on warning, it helps accelerate us looking

more closely at the experience for the students,” Lacro said, “Even though we’re under warning and it’s a lot of pressure, it’s a good time to make improvements.” One change on the way is a more rigorous curriculum for those pursuing associate’s degrees in technical and professional fields. The math and English core requirements have been raised to meet college standards. Lacro said that the accreditors are most familiar with California colleges, and she’s using that to her advantage. Lacro said that the school has been studying schools on the West Coast. That’s not so much to mold Honolulu Community College after systems over 2,000 miles across the Pacific, but instead to aid in explaining why the solutions the college chose are right for it. See accreditation on Page 2


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October 2013 by Michael Leidemann - Issuu