Feb 21, 2013 (44.7)

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Passport to College PG. 5

Perfect Pasta PG. 3

Program helps foster students succeed

Quite a Catch PG. 8

Science of pasta

Feb. 21 - March. 6, 2013

State trout record is blown out of the water

Volume 44 | Issue 7

SPOKANEFALLS.EDU/COMMUNICATOR

Committee to determine allocation of tech funds Corbin Bronsch

The Communicator This spring the tech committee will decide campus purchases for the 2013-14 fiscal year. Every Feb-March our tech fee committee, which includes students, has a series of meetings deciding what purchases should be made with the technology fees paid by tuition. “The Student Technology Committee is composed of nine voting members, with students holding the majority interest and two non-voting members.” According to the Spokane Falls Community College Committee Template,“ The Student Technology Committee is composed of nine voting members, with students holding the majority interest, and two non-voting members.” SFCC feels that students should have the majority vote because the revenue is from the students. Each member of the committee has a one year term except for the chairman who has a two year term, and the chairman goes back and forth between the Vice President of Learn-

Visual and Performing Arts 8.8% Student Services 3.9% Human Services 1% Health Ed, PE, Recreation, Athletics 0.8% Computing, Math and Science 9.1% Business, Professional Studies and Workforce Ed

College Wide Purchases 69%

6.4%

ing and the Vice President of Student Services. “The student government representatives on the Tech Fee Committee took their jobs very seriously last year,” said last year’s chairman and Vice President of learning at Spokane Falls, Jim Minkler. “Not only did they ask good questions, they were able to suggest additional funding resources that allowed us to spread our tech fee

Sarah Dyer | The Communicator

funds further.” The selection process is done by the student government. “Student representatives are chosen from/by Student Government. Faculty and staff solicitations are done by the appropriate union representatives and the Administrator is appointed by the President,” according to the committee template. The committee then has 3-4 meet-

ings where they decide to approve or deny requests from each division for different items of technology. “The technology fee for one student is $40 per quarter,” according to the Spokane falls website. This equates to $880,000 for SFCC to spend on the different division requests. The different divisions can be broken down into 7 different groups; Business, Math, Health Ed, Humanities, Human Services, Library, Student Services, and Visual and Performing Arts. There were also college-wide purchases which made up about 70% of the money; it was spent on items such as server, network, and desktop replacements. The department that was given the most money was visual and performing arts, which had big purchases like the Performing Arts Auditorium Lighting Project, costing $45,441. The department with the least amount of funds was the library which was a total of $5,109 for their tech requests. But some students already have an TECH | Page 2

Tech Fee Expenditure for 20122013 College Wide $607,238.55 Business, Professional Studies $56,409.01 Computing, Math and Science $80,342.34 Health Ed, PE, Recreation and athletics $6,941.36 Humanities $2,940.34 Spokane Falls Tech committee

Faculty to begin advising students

Mireesha Huff | The Communicator

Vice President of Learning, Jim Minkler is helping to implement new plan

Jacoby Flansaas

The Communicator In a 2011 survey, SFCC students were asked to assess what they thought of counseling and advisement; advisors did not get good results. Two interventions were developed to combat the flaws in the system: early alert and academic advising, which are both part of the Achieving

the Dream Initiative funded by College Spark. College Spark is an organization whose goal is to work with colleges so they can have higher success rates. Academic Advisement aims to help students succeed in their classes and college life. “Academic advising is not just to help students register for classes, but to help them throughout their college career.” says Jim Minkler, The

PERSPECTIVES

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ADVISING | Page 2

FOCUS

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The Communicator

Vice President of Learning at SFCC. “Achieving the dream is not only to help quarter to quarter, but year to year.” Academic Advisement is a way to help spread out the work load. “The program urges help from more than just counselors.” Minkler said, “We are asking faculty to step up, and each take on five students and help them with their academic issues, and take some of the load off of the counselors, so they can do more of what they are good at, while faculty works directly with their students in whatever field they are studying” Instructors will mentor and assist students whose majors fall within their departments. “We are trying to find an accelerated way to get students through to college level math, reading, and w r i t i n g ,” said Minkler. “It is our goal to mentor to get students to the next level in their academic career,” said Kurt Kinbacher, an instructor in Social Science. “I have been through a

SFCC Food Bank

509.533.3602

SIDELINES Page 8 Page 8

Winter Concert

SFCC Alumni

www.twitter.com/_communicator


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