San Diego City College

Background

The Caring Campus initiative, developed by the Institute for Evidence-Based Change (IEBC) and funded by the California Community Colleges Chancellor's Office (CCCCO), is designed to create a college environment that increases students' sense of connectedness and belonging, leading to increased student persistence, and, in turn, completion of each student's education goals. This is accomplished by involving the often underutilized Classified Professionals in engagement strategies.

The planning process included four meetings completed during one semester: a general orientation to the work; development of general and specific commitments; development of an implementation plan; and development of both a communication and monitoring plan.

Work Sessions

From January to June 2019, twelve (12) Classified Professionals, representing each main area of the college (Instruction, Student Services, and Administrative Services) convened to discuss what it means to be a caring campus, and worked towards creating general, as well as department-specific committments that articulated these ideals.

San Diego City College’s Classified Professionals participated fully in each meeting and were very engaged throughout the process. They are passionate and caring about student engagement and student success.  Paula Jean Miranda served as the coordinator for the convenings and as liaison to IEBC.

Commitments

Through in depth discussions and working meetings, the group developed the following general commitments for all Classified Professionals:

1. All campus employees wear nametags and/or have business cards to hand out to students. (Caring Campus Work Plan: Name Badges)
   
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2. Expand campus directory for resource by other departments to help guide students to correct department/person for their specific issue. (Caring Campus Work Plan: Directory)
   
   
3. All campus employees are encouraged to engage in daily self-care.
   
   
4. All campus employees proactively greet students in a caring, welcoming manner.

As shown above, engaging in these commitments requires little to no funding, and will greatly increase the connection among Classified Professionals and students.

Next Steps

City College's excellent Classified Professionals want to lead by example and to support the college in improving its student success efforts. The Classified Senate has been working closely with the Professional Development Coordinator to take intentional action towards the commitments, and work plans have been linked above to describe and track the work.

In order for this work to be fully realized among Classified Professionals at City College, it is important for the supervisors of each department to be informed and fully support these commitments. Since each supervisor is the site manager for that department, their encouragement and support of classified professionals engaging in these commitments is critical to the success of this effort.