Watching the Volusia County School Board and the Volusia County, NSB, Edgewater and Oak Hill governments grapple with revenue shortfalls makes Volusians ask the question: What could they have done better? The management, faculty and staff at Daytona Beach College, which includes a campus right here in New Smyrna Beach, provide some insight into what can be done.
It all started several years ago when D. Kent Sharples took over as president. He was cost conscious right from the start.
I know firsthand because I am on the DBC Board of Trustees.
The first big move was to arrange the class scheduling so that the average number of students in each class went up considerably.
This, obviously, made the education process much more efficient and cost effective. The second noticeable act was that a top notch financial team was assembled which kept track of all expenditures and revenues.
On top of that they do an accurate job of forecasting revenues and expenses so that there is always ample warning of any financial problems.
No project is ever started unless the funding is assured and all projects are done on a priority basis.
The third most noticeable thing was that responsibility for decisions and results was spread down the line away from the top. This has the effect of letting the people closest to the problems be empowered to solve the problems. This is actually one of the newer trends in business management.
The teaching load for instructors was restored to what it was supposed to be.
One of the biggest factors in the DBC success is in getting the enrollment up. This requires the cooperation of everybody especially the instructional staff.. Besides getting students on campus initially, it is necessary to retain them.
Extra effort is being put into seeing that each student is progressing satisfactorily. This always requires extra effort on the part of the instructors. It has also been enhanced by a learning lab where students can tackle their courses on a computer with faculty help right at their elbows.
To give incentives for this great effort, a pay increase was promised to the faculty and staff if certain goals were met. The goals were more than met and the staff and faculty got their raises.
One move that is in the works is to let pay increases take the form of one time performance incentives rather than permanent pay raises. This has two beneficial effects.
First, the people become more aware of how things are going and they are constantly motivated to make things better. Second, if things don’t work out well people understand smaller bonuses or performance incentives better than they understand a pay cut.
The enrollment effort is starting to work very well and is gaining momentum. DBC is seeing enrollment increases well into double digits. This is virtually unheard of in community college circles.
The record enrollment figures have partially balanced out the budget cuts because of more tuition being collected directly from a larger number of students. The cut in the state money was 3.4 million dollars and would have been more without the increased enrollment.
The cut in state funding is compensated by the ever increasing efficiencies in running the College and cut backs in low priority programs.
Retention is way up and the number of graduates hit an all time peak this May. This is being accomplished without any sacrifice in academic standards.
The faculty has experimented with speeding up the remedial course process. One result has been that the number of people successfully completing remedial math has gone from about 40 per cent to 80 per cent. As a further result the number of students taking college algebra has hit all time highs.
In another area, the number and variety of online courses has been steadily growing. This promises to improve the efficiency of the education process as well as make education more available for all.
The college is self insured for its medical coverage. By making the employees cognizant of the fact that it is their money that is being spent and having the employees take part in designing the plan, costs have so far been way below what one would expect. The college is also considering offering health savings plans as an option in the future.
The reader should be aware that all of these plans have taken years to develop. In the area of enrollment increase several approaches were tried to increase enrollment and retention before the present very effective system was arrived at. It takes time for successful strategies to evolve and for the employees to develop faith in what was being done.
What the DBC experience demonstrates is that vision, good planning and hard work can overcome the adversity of budget shortfalls. Furthermore, these plans don’t happen overnight. DBC arrived at its’ current favorable position after years of hard work.
The management, faculty and staff at DBC hope that the plans, programs and general operational philosophy that have been developed here can help other colleges and institutions operate in a better manner and with fewer crises.