Dear Colleagues,
I have spent my first weeks at ACC connecting with our students, faculty, and staff. You’ve been open and honest, and it’s helped me understand our strengths and challenges. I am immensely proud to be a part of this college. We have the talent, resources, and community to make magic happen, and most importantly we have the passion and care to do the right thing.
I have promised to be transparent with you. It’s important for me to share with you what I’m seeing and where my heart is. I’m hearing rumors and speculation that stem back several years and continue to circulate. I want to focus on facts, put rumors behind us, and do what we need to move forward with our work to improve student success.
As you know, I have hired an external firm, McConnell Jones, to help audit our work — specifically in the areas of safety, operations, and business. They’re starting this work immediately, and here’s why:
Safety Planning
While we have an emergency plan to guide us in the event of a situation on campus, there remain significant gaps we must address. As I’ve traveled to our campuses, it’s become clear that many people don’t know what to do in the event of an emergency. That has to change. We need to know how to put our emergency plans into play with role clarity and better training. Our vice chancellor over this area is no longer with the college. I have asked Dr. Michael Garcia, our executive director of Regulatory Affairs (who wrote our emergency plan), and Brette Lea, our vice chancellor of College Relations & Marketing, to work together to accelerate planned improvements and ensure our faculty, staff, students, and administrators are trained and well prepared in case of an emergency or disruption to business operations. The external firm will provide guidance and recommendations in this work. You can expect updates over the next several months.
Business Processes & Operations
Second, I’ve heard frustration, speculation, and — at times — rumors about people at our college. One example that was recently brought to my attention is about a former administrator. This individual was accused of entering the college into questionable contracts. Much of this is rooted in rumor. I want you to know the facts.
Several years ago, the college conducted a criminal investigation (assisted by outside agencies) following allegations that a former administrator had personal ties to a vendor. The investigation found that the vendor was properly selected through the college’s normal Request for Proposal (RFP) process and there was no criminal wrongdoing. Through these investigations, it was determined the individual was hired and working at the college without the appropriate hiring documents. They are no longer at the college.
I won’t go further into personnel matters, but these reviews clearly uncovered mistakes in our hiring process. The reviews and investigations simply took too long, and a problem that should have been resolved quickly dragged out longer than necessary, creating a perception of questionable business decisions.
Why am I sharing this? It’s clear to me that many of our challenges stem from fissures in our structures, policies that are not followed, and a lack of clarity about our roles and responsibilities. These are issues we’ve already begun to tackle, but we need to get to the bottom of what has happened to begin to rebuild.
There are people at the college who could perform the kind of audit I’ve requested. I think it’s critical that someone outside the college conduct this level of review to help ensure an unbiased evaluation.
What I want you to remember is that I think y’all are awesome. I love being here. I love that we have the courage to have conversations with each other. I want to root us in a foundation of love, trust, and good intentions. My ask of you is to please put rumors to rest. Let’s focus on our work to improve student outcomes so that we can become the best community college in the nation. That’s what our students deserve, it’s what our community deserves, and it’s what this college deserves.
As always, I will keep you updated.
Much Love,
russell
Russell Lowery-Hart, Ph.D.
Chancellor, Austin Community College District