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Good afternoon everyone,
I am so pleased that you are here
on Cascade Campus today. I'm equally pleased that
we have the honor of hosting the Dean Shirley
Anderson conference for 2013. It's
a wonderful honor. Now you might notice that I have two
mics here. And only one is working,
you know it's not everyday that an individual
gets to introduce the President of Portland Community College
this esteemed institution so
I thought about prerecording my introduction, so I wouldn't mess it up
I really am a Beyonce fan.
But I'm going to
take a chance doing it live okay?
You know Dr. Preston Pulliams is a wonderful guy and I am
so glad that he is giving the keynote address
today. By the time I complete this introduction
I also hope that I will be getting a raise.
I can tell from your response that's probably not
going to happen and that's okay. I'm very pleased that
diversity is the focus of today's activities
because the fact that we live in a diverse
and multi global society is perhaps
the defining factor of the 21st century.
Thomas Friedman, and I'm sure many of you have
read Thomas Friedman, the New York Times columnist. In his
book "The World is Flat" he describes
the interconnectedness of the modern world. Not just in terms
of economics which we hear about everyday but in terms of
culture and education, art,
goverment and more. It is in this
context that Dr. Preston Pulliams
is the ideal person to deliver today's keynote address
Diversity is a very strongly held value for him
and he has in turn made it
one of PCC's core values.
And he's done this in a very intentional way. Simply put
that when it comes to diversity, Dr. Pulliams
gets it. He gets it. He understands
that a more diverse institution is a stronger
more resilient and more welcoming institution.
He also understands that
diversity lends itself to being a
stronger community, a more resilient community
and a more welcoming community and I don't mean
community in the small sense but in the large sense of the world.
But most of all, he
understands that if our students are going to compete across the
world and across this nation
that they truly must be able to compete on a world wide basis
and we must serve as role models preparing
them to do this, and this is
why we are working to instill across the curricula
such values as diversity and sustainability.
Excuse me, and this effort is indicative
of the vision of the high quality of leadership
of Dr. Preston Pulliams. Ladies and gentlemen please join me
in welcoming Dr. Preston Pulliams.
First of all I want to thank Dr. Gatewood for that
outstanding introduction, he's not
going to get a raise. He always talks about that but I really
really appreciate it. I'm really excited to start in
a few moments and share a few remarks with you
as a keynote of this really critical conference and
workshops and work you're engaged in in terms of continuing
improvement, in terms of developing
highest potential. In terms of what you do
in service of the college the classroom how do you work with the students
So I'm excited about that, but that's not
I'm excited to be here, but I'll tell you, I have to be honest with you I have
another exciting event that happened just the other night.
I got a call from my wife, who's out in New York
and my daughter just delivered my second grandson.
His name is Cam, after Cam
Newton the Republican, Joshua,
biblical. Now I'm excited about this as a proud
grandfather but he's also going to join
his older brother who's 6 years old his name is Nathan Preston so
he carries my name so they're going to make a dynamic duo but
Nathan Preston needs someone to help him level
himself a little bit he's kind of got the big head by being the only
only child in the family right now
and I shared this story at a management meeting the other day about
Nathan. Nathan has fallen in love
with his first grade work partner,
her name is Jenny, the other day
he decided to propose to Jenny, marriage.
So he stepped up to her and asked Jenny to marry him
and Jenny said no way.
So he called me for counsel
as he often will do, in times of this rejection
we were talking about, I said well Nathan where are you at with this, what do you tihnk
and his response to me was Papa
she's going to accept the proposal she's going to marry me
I said why are you so sure? His response is
I've got better grades than she has she needs me. Alright
so I'm excited that his brothers arrived to level this guy.
Let me say that I want to first of all thank
the teaching and learning center coordinators who invited me.
Where are they by the way, I want to... Are any of you here?
One of ours is in labor right now.
Oh really, oh really, all right
well let's give them a round of applause.
Absolutely fantastic
Thank you also for the wonderful legacy and
I know you're developing your skills and this is probably staff development
learning about diversity and how to engage with the diverse learning styles of students
but I want to thank you because
most of you know that I plan to retire, July 1 of this year
and I've been very proud for 9 years to represent this
college in the community and a lot of that pride is based
on the great job that you're already doing. I cannot go
anywhere in the community, thanks to that website
we have with my face right in the middle of it. People will stop
me in the mall, they will stop me shopping, they will stop me in the grocery
store and flag me down and say
you're that guy, they don't know exactly what guy, then they say you're that guy,
you're with uh, you're with um Portland Community College.
And I'll admit to that and they will often say well what do you do.
Well I'm in charge of talking at the college
And one student actually said can you fix a ticket that I have, can you
do something about this ticket. Umm
No but the stories I get
I wish I could report all of them, because it's often the theme of
what a great experience they have, in your classes
in your programs and how good they feel about themselves and how good they feel about
the experience at Portland Community College, this excavation
you see out here as they taxpayers send us we will invest
$175 million in you a total actually of $274 million
that's a result really of how the community
believes in what we're doing. The foundation of that reputation
the foundation of that feel about us starts
with what you do and I realize that. So everytime I get a chance I want to
compliment you for the great work that you're doing.
I want to start my remarks with a working definition
of diversity. The conference I want to make some remarks
about diversity conference focus as a theme is diversity
so I want to give you my working definition of diversity
and it starts with a little paperback book that
I have, I use sometimes as a source for
inspiration as a source for when I talk to groups
about leadership, when I talk to groups about education
and a number of different topics and maybe some of you have heard of it.
It's a wonderful book called "All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten"
have you ever heard of that book. By who wrote that anyone know
Fulghum, great, great fellow.
Little paperback it's a quick read, if you haven't read it read it.
Now the author's an interesting feller, fellow, he is a chararcter.
He takes different jobs around the country and he writes about
his experiences. He once volunteered to work
with a group of kindergarten students, as a volunteer, and
in his book he describes what that experience was like. It's a brief
little short statement about that I'll read that for you.
He began organizing the children to play
game called a giant, a wizard or dwarf.
The game requires the children to get into groups and then run
around making a lot of noise and having a lot of fun
he writes that while the children were selecting which group they wanted to be in a little girl
approached him and asked, where did
a mermaid stand? A long pause, a
very long pause. Where did a mermaid stand,
said I. Yes you see I'm a mermaid.
There are no such things as mermaids. Oh yes
I am one! She did not relate to being
a giant, a wizard or a dwarf she knew her
category and that was mermaid and she was not
about to leave the game and go over and stand against the wall
where the losers stand. She had intended to
participate wherever the mermaids fit into the scheme of things without
giving up her dignity or identity.
She took that for granted that there was a place for mermaids
and that I would know just where.
And then he notes that while the children played the game he
allowed the little mermaid to stand next to him and he held her
hand to comfort her, he thought of society, if society could
indeed answer this question that we could build a better world
a world where all of us as individuals can live and work
and play together. This story, that
little clip of that story give me my definition of
diversity. I worked so hard as a personal and professional
value it's really about giving everyone a place at the table
that's what it's really all about. No matter
your background no matter what you bring to the table, you have a place
there. I was asked to talk a little bit about
what motivated or challenged me
and in terms of me growing up and developing and
going to school because I had to face some real challenges in terms of
this process. One was I
needed to see something in me that I didn't really
realize was there and I discounted my own self.
And I have a couple heroes to talk about who really saw
something in me I did not see in myself.
I learned about it, they helped instill it, they helped
identify it for me. I want to read some a short
passage that reminds me of my first hero I want to share with you.
It's a couple stanzas from John
Henry. John Henry hammered on the right side,
steam drill kept driving on the left.
John Henry beat that steam drill down but he hammered his poor heart to death
lord lord he hammered his poor heart to death.
Well they carried John Henry down the tunnel and they laid
his body in the sand. Now every woman riding on that C and O
train says quote "There lies my steel-driving
man, lord lord there lies my steel driving man."
Now what memories does that bring to
me of my hero, well that would be
Mosley Pulliams my father. My father was a mans man.
He made a living working in the fields
in Mississippi. He went off to a war,
world war 2 he fought in a segregated unit
that was not allowed to enter combat but he built bridges
and roads in the North African desert.
He did not talk a lot about that experience but
he did indicate it was a really very very tough experience
for him to live through. But it also instilled in my mind
that what a tough tough fellow he was
my dad. He moved north after the war
because as many blacks did in Mississippi there was little chance.
One of the things that he was really
really always embarassed by and he said this, the last thing I talked
to him before he passed away was his lack of education.
He did not have a chance to go to school and he struggled with
reading and writing and he was jealous he told me
as he worked in the fields when other kids had an opportunity to go to school
and he never did because of his economic circumstances. Well he moved
to Michigan he got a job in a Foundry, a pretty good job
in those days and I was the first born of 6 children
3 boys and 3 girls.
We were poor but we really didn't know it, we didn't realize it
but my dad had one dream for us and
that was you were going to finish school. what he
talked about school at that point he meant simply high school
he was so proud, he was so proud,
the day that I graduated from high school his first son.
Now this is a mans man he put on his only Sunday go to meet suit,
and there were tears in his eyes as he got ready to drive us
to the services and he looked at me and said son we
made it. We have made it. Now me
being something of a smart aleck responded, what's this we I did all the
homework, I walked through those storms to get to school
alright, but I
realized how important that was for him, but
also this triumph he felt in terms of his background.
Now I was processed in the
60's in Michigan
and as an African American male
at those times my aspiration was not to finish
high school. My aspiration was to go to Detroit
go to Motown and sing with the Temptations
alright
now my mother who was a Christian woman one day heard me
singing "My Girl" one of the hits upstairs in Motown
and over my bedroom door and said son
you can't sing worth a damn
you better get back in that school alright because you got to work
for a living. My second goal was
to play football in the professional football league.
Now back in 1963 I weighed about 120 pounds
alright, very small,
my, my nickname on the track team was
Turtle because I didn't have real speed.
I had no chance, but think about why in the
'60s a black man, young boy thought
about, when he thought about his future, it was based
in entertainment or sports
because that's what the media said to us. That's what
the media talked about. That's what we talked about.
That was something
a dream that I could never, never accomplish. My options
were very limited certainly in that. But that was part of the times
we really didn't think as black men about much opportunities,
about going away to college etcetera etcetera
I was also one of those students in high school that was
often overlooked in terms I mean I didn't play sports
I wasn't on the student government I struggled with my
grades because I had to work to help my dad support the family a lot I had
a couple jobs on the side. My conselor met with me
and said Preston you know, you may be
wasting your time here why don't you go and get a job at a foundry. You, you're old enough to get a job
and I thought okay my job was to go work in the foundry next to my
father. That was my aspiration actually
at that point because as counselor said you don't have a place here
that's what he was saying to me. Now this was a predominately
white high school in a blue collar community there were very few blacks there
attending anyway and I noticed that most black students just didn't graduate.
But something happened, another hero came
along for me, it was a group of rotarians
who decided that they were going to give a scholarship
to somebody who was not certainly at the top
grading scale who didn't have great test scores but
perhaps had some potential somewhere to be identified later
and they invested in me for a scholarship
to my local community college. I had no idea what a community
college was all about quite honestly but this scholarship there,
my dad said this is your chance.
So I accepted the scholarship by the way 1964
that scholarship paid for all my books, fees,
tuition for two years of free education at that community college
was $660.
That $660 changed my life.
My dad couldn't afford to really help send me, but
it changed my life. The next hero in this story
was a speech teacher
at the school was one of my first classes was introduction to
speech. I enrolled in the course as I was required
to graduate. I got up to give my first speech, boy did I bomb
I mean I was so nervous I could hardly remember
my name and where I was or what to say but after
I finished and after the class that professor came up to me
Dr. Spitaro, and said to me I want to see you after school stop by
my office. I thought boy, I've never been kicked out of class
the first day. Usually it takes a little longer
to throw me out but he sat down in his office
and said to me, he said look I'm going to work with you I want to
I'm going to mentor you I want you to be successful here. You're going to be
my project. I'm going to support you.
I'm going to do everything I can to make sure you graduate from this college
and so he helped me with my career choices and my courses.
He took time out of his schedule to meet with me
that was a traumatic experience for a number of reasons but it was very positive
experience because that was the first time someone who was
an educator, a person of authority said to me
I possibly had a place there. It was a
scary place for me where I came from in the community
to that college. I was questioning all the ways there
do I belong, where I will be successful, should I quit?
That was all questions but Professor Spitaro changed that
so he became also one of my heroes. Now
the story ends up that I go off
graduate from there, go off to Michigan State University graduate
come back to that college I became hired as a counselor
to work with students just like myself to help them be
successful. Boy was that a great job.
I enjoyed that job for 7 years, working along side the other
counselors, working with students, asking themselves do they belong?
That got me started in community college, now let me
also tell you about community college and it's influence on my family. My father
died of a heart attack at age 63 in
18, 1982, he came home he had worked a double shift at the
foundry and he dropped dead, but he
lived to see all 6 of us graduate
from that community college, go on to state university
and we're very proud to say, at that time when he passed away
all of us had a total of 16 college degrees. Isn't that a wonderful
story, isn't that a wonderful story?
But look at the components
someone took time to say to me
you belong here
you may not be the smartest, you may not be etcetera etcetera
but we're going to make sure that's what this is all about
that's what PCC is all about and that's why I have
such a great time being president here. Because I get
to here those stories, and participate in those stories and everytime I make
a decision vis a vis financial vis a vis program
vis a vis politics vis a vis raising money, that story
is still with me it's internalized in me
about what we are capable of doing, and what you
are doing and that's why I'm so proud to serve
as your president. Let me talk
about how did these experiences shape my leadership style
in terms of what I do now as an administrator and as a
manager and as a leader. Well first of all I believe in something called
servant leadership. Anyone ever heard of that?
It's a philosophy about leadership, that leadership
is not about power, or not about
how I distribute power, or formally how I behave
as an authority figure, formally but it's all about
it's all about serving a mission , serving
an institution, sharing power engaging
with individuals.It's about
believing in others have
having growth potential and that's how I see my role here
at the college as president, to develop each of you as far as you
want to go to develop this institution as far as it can go
so it reaches what we call a place of self actualization.
Now no one ever gets there but everyone it means
has a positive sense of growth. If you start out
with that as a leader I really believe in that, part of it is my
counseling background, part of it is my own life experience
but that's how I like to behave as a manager that's my
theory of management. It requires several skills:
1. the ability to listen
I didn't say talk I said listen
if you're truly a servant leader, an effective one
you spend more time listening and engaging then you do talking
and giving direction. Number 2
believe in the healing value of potential. That
everyone can grow and everyone has an opportunity no matter
where they come from or their background and I strongly believe in that
that was my counseling background, that's how I operate as a conselor but I also
believe in that as a manager.
The strongest power I have or
anyone of you could have as a leader, and you all are leaders
formally and informally is to have respect
if you gain respect
you can become very powerful as a manager as a leader
as an informal leader. Now how do you gain respect? One
in terms of walking your talk.
If you believe in certain things, and certain principles
people are watching all the time. I'm always surprised by
how people watch leaders or keep an eye
I get all kinds of reports people say I saw you over
here I saw you doing this or that people are watching you all the time
one of the strengths of a leader is the ability to model behavior I call it
role modeling. I had this happen to me we had a
president that I replaced here that wasn't here very long and people were afraid
that I had moved here from New York I wasn't going to stick around very long. and I had a
call one day about, they knew where my car was parked in
the parking lot and this call was people were concerned because
I had been here for 3 months and I still had my New York license plate
on. They assumed I was going to make a quick dash
back to New York, now here's a
true story behind that and it's part of my challenge in terms of me.
Have you ever taken that computer test at the driving, where you gotta get your driver's license
around here? Isn't that one scary sometimes, I'm sorry.
I flunked that twice.
The problem was I couldn't pass it to get my license.
The moral of the story though is really
that people, it taught me again, that peeople watch
so you model behavior. You carry yourself in a certain way you present yourself
in a certain way and you're consistent in that behavior
and you're straight and honest with people and the respect you gain
from that is the most powerful thing you can ask for as an individual and as a
leader. So that's my design. That's what I'm about
as a leader and that's how I try to carry myself and deal with
those around me. Let me talk a little bit about
as I close because I want to open up with questions
let me talk a little bit about, I was asked to look
at my legacy at PCC or the college's legacy
from my 9 years here of what I would like to see the college
what path I'd like to see the college move on. I had this story
that I always tell management groups when I would talk to leaders about
my goal is not to be this particular thing
okay have you heard the story about a 3 legged chicken?
Have you heard the story? I don't want
to be a 3 legged chicken, and the story goes as
follows. There's a guy who bought a new corvette paid $65000, this had
600 horse power and he's out driving on a country road and he's
passing everything on the road. Left everything behind but
what he noticed was, running right along side the car
was a chicken. He's doing 80 miles an hour, 90 miles an hour
and this chicken's keeping right up with him but he noticed the chicken had
3 legs. So he wanted to know what was going on. The chicken
blew doors off ran up to a little farm yard
little farm, ran into the yard and this guy pulled off he said I got
to find out what's going on but what he noticed in the yard was a whole yard full
of 3 legged chickens and there was farmer sitting by himself kind of
rocking with a long beard he pulls up gets out of his
$65000 sports car and walks up to the farmer he says
What's going on here? That chicken of yours blew by my
$65000 car 600 horses, I was doing
120 miles I couldn't keep up with it, what's the story? And the farmer leaned back he says well
son, he says,
I have 3 boys and they all love chicken and they all
love drumsticks. So I discovered a way to
create 3 legged chickens and the guy said wow that's
something he says well how do they taste and the farmer says
we don't know we can't catch them. The moral of the story
is you can look good you can do, appear to be doing some great things
but have no worth what so ever. My goal,
my goal is always to bring
something to the table and my goal for this college is for us, not to just
build beautiful buildings and have great sounding
programs but to do the right things to make
a contribution there are 3 ways I believe we need to do that.
Right? 3 ways. One
we need to always engage because we're not here all by ourselves
in terms of what we got to do. You see Oregon
and I've learned this in 9 years is on a disastrous business plan
is on a disastrous business plan, it will never ever survive
long term with this plan that it's on. The plan
is, is investigating, is investing
money in prisons,
gang task force, metal detectors,
and a lot of it is to deal also with our education system
which is horribly underfunded. Instead of investing
money in more counselors, more mentors,
more teachers, more school supplies,
this plan is a plan for disaster.
Oregon has a promise for you, if you do the wrong thing
they guarantee you a prison cell
alright, it's in the law, but what about if you do
the right thing? If you graduate from high school or if you do
the right thing in terms of getting good grades, if you, and you're
poor perhaps you can't afford to go off to college. What's your option if you do
the right things? The other
thing that we're faced with here in some parts of this community are what I
call low expectations.
There's a built in sense with some families, and individuals
that there's really nothing out here for me.
It's not their fault, sometimes they get blamed as a victim but it's not their fault
we were talking with a
parent a while back and I told this story before and others at the college
a young mother, head of her
single parent household, struggling
struggling barely able to find a job
had a young boy, a young girl and we talked to her we engaged her in terms of
prospects of thinking about college and other things and you know what she turned
to me and said, Look Mr. President
here's my dream,
for my daughter I hope that she does not get pregnant,
and maybe she'll graduate from high school and hopefully she'll get a job.
For my son I hope he stays out of jail. That was it.
That was her expectations about, now think about that
in terms of what that says about our society, and the kind of work that we
need to do to reverse those sense of expectations
and powers. The gap between those that have and have not
continues to grow and mark my words
this is a path to disaster for us. I
really believe that PCC and community colleges
offer an answer to this and that answer being
as I talked about engaging with community to hear about these
situations to plan to have programs to address them. Two
to partner with others because this
program, this challenge is too big for just PCC
we gotta figure out how to partner and that's my desire that's why I worked so hard
over these 9 years to partner as much as we can and third to be as
innovative as we can. To work as hard as we can to kind of training
you're engaging in today, the kind of techniques
you're learning will be critical for us if we're going to be successful.
So my dream for this college is that it continue moving
forward it continue to be innovative very innovative, but you gotta keep, because
change continues and we gotta stay
on the learning curve regarding that. So as I look back that's
my wish and my legacy that I hope to have PCC
involved in in those 3 strategies, I'm not going to define in terms of what that looks like
in terms of programs I'm going to leave that up to you and those who work with you
but that's my hope for this college because I'll tell you if we're
unsuccessful we risk losing a whole
generation and maybe a society.
Thank you very much for an opportunity to speak with you I'll be
open to questions, if you'd like to, if you'd like to ask me any questions at this point but
thank you very much for listening.
Any questions? About anything I said
or questions you have about...
Yes sir?
[Indistinct talking]
There's a microphone there if you... You walk the way you talk. Right.
You know I'm in a philosophy class where
I'm finding difficulty in understanding Socrates and Cont,
and the readings of it
but the moral principle is good
doing good. Right. You know and I have carried that
same thing my question is, is that
for the student that finds difficulty in
certain classes like that
what is your advice the words that you would give them to continue
when his thinking is
just drop the class and move forward... Right. But if he drops the
class, you've not gained anything.
Exactly. You know my advice is, do everything
you can to be successful
but also there are certain strategies that you need to employ academically
in terms of that situation and one of them is things I made the mistake
as I was struggling with math in college.
I wasn't going to give up I was going to hang in there. I was going to you know
I wasn't going to go get any help I was going to show I could handle this. Well when I got my D
minus I realized I had planned the wrong strategy.
1, get help. You know what I discovered
there are people just asking, waiting to be asked to help you.
I didn't really believe that but ask for help
like I got the help from my instructor, if the instructor's not willing to do that
go somewhere else. That's also a technique I think is important for us
if we're going to take on some of these new challenges, I talked, shared with you about
I believe that every student, every student
somehow should have a mentoring experience, a coaching experience at PCC
and I don't know financially how to figure that out I don't know
structurally how to set that up but there should always be someone that's got your back
because often it's hard, it was hard for me to talk to my professor in terms of trouble
I was having, I needed someone I could relate to, a peer mentor
someone I could go to for tutoring and help. So part of
responsibility is on us but also part of responsibility in terms of
orienting yourself in an academic environment is some strategies you can
take. There's a wonderful book by Claude Steel
from Stanford University called whistling Vivaldi, and he's done research
in terms of how some poor students, African
American students do the very thing you say stay in a class
until it's hopeless and then when they fail give up
versus strategies of other groups of students who will
immediately get tutoring, immediately get help, or
they will even audit the class before they take it so they know what to expect.
So part of it is strategizing but many people
arrive at our door without any idea of how to do all this. So it behoves us
as part of our responsibility through orientation and working with students more closely
to give everybody more personal support, so we have part of the, we have part of the
responsibility but also students have part of the responsibilty. Yes?
Yes miss?
Microphone is there. Hi um
thank you for telling us your story I really appreciate hearing how you
came up through community colleges. My name is Beth Kaufka
and I teach in developmental education here at Cascade and
I love that the focus of this conference is diversity.
Our student population in DE is among the most
diverse in the entire institution. Our students have been
historically oppressed in the most devastating ways
the majority of our students have been abused
homeless, they're in recovery, they've struggled with
extreme poverty, all sorts of things that
many of us in this room can hardly even imagine.
So my question to you is what do you think PCC's
responsibility as an institution is to this group of students?
If we open our doors to them and we admit them
we have every responsibility to make sure we do everything that they're successful
that they can be successful so our job is not to just do
provide the classroom experience and say okay it's all on you now
because they're not starting at the same place many other students
are starting at. They have less skills in terms of the ability of be successful
and nothing's wrong with them in terms of what's up here but it's been there past experience.
So first of all we've got to be,
make real sure that we're doing everything first of all
realize that to be able to test and understand
in a way in terms of how we're offering our instruction that's part of
I think the diversity sense is that everyone doesn't learn the same way everything didn't
come from the same place so we have to do what we can to
individualize what we're doing.
Do we have an obligation? You bet we do, because I'll tell you what
that group is probably your description of it in terms of they're past
experience many of those experiences I guarantee have been very negative and we can probably, and
you're belief and you're energy can give them a very positive experience so we have
an obligation to do that okay, but
realize that everybody's not starting from the same place and sometimes we do.
We're a big organization and sometimes we don't individualize
enough. I think we also kind of review those
programs and see what we can also do to, to maybe do more individualization
I know there's some people committed to working on that. But we are obligated
to have them be successful because I'll tell you what it's a good
thing to do, it's a great servant leadership
but you know what else is happening? Because money is getting so tight for education
the governor and others are saying to us, that
if you don't help those to be successful we're going to now
not fund you. Because the state is saying to us look we're going to pay you for
what we want and what we want is successful students. So this whole discussion now
has turned around from just getting money if someone shows up to getting
money if they're successful, and that's going to have to change the way we look at everything
we do. Alright. I see is it time? Am I running out of time?
The organizers have given me the word that
we are. Can I take one more question, just one more quick question?
Yes? [Indistinct talking]
Well I
you should be speaking out. Alright. You have strong voices
I've always amazed, not amazed always so
pleased how articulate faculty members can be when there are real causes that they believe in
what I would suggest you to organize and speak out because
I'll tell you what. The policy makers and the legislaters need to
hear this. Alright, because I, guess what they are hearing
from the other side. Alright, they're hearing from those
who, whatever reason, feel that more prison cells
makes life better. Alright, which is
absolutely ridiculous by the way. Alright it takes away potential
is what it does. So organize and speak out.
I always, my father used to say to me there's a difference between being a critic and a
leader. A critic is someone who complains a leader is someone
that does something about it. So I challenge the faculty to be a leader.
Thank you very much.
Good afternoon everyone if you can just hold of
for just a couple more minutes, I understand that we're running
a bit behind but after I speak just very
briefly, you'll have 5 minutes before the next
session resumes and then I understand you'll have that full hour
for that as well. So I'm Kristin Watkins
I'm the associate vice president for advancement at the college and in that
role I also serve as the executive officer of the PCC foundation
and I hope you're having a great conference
today. I think it's been a real
honor and privilege to work for Dr. Pulliams for these last
9 years, he has been a true inspiration
for our institution and for our community. His vision
for PCC and how it can be a beacon
for opportunity, for the type of personal
family and community transformation that really
only education can make happen is truly wonderful.
And I think he, I hope he has inspired
you today as he has inspired all of us for the last
9 years, he continues to inspire as he
many of you know, this year as one of the things he's working on as
his last project for the college. Is to
raise a million dollars for low income
first generation college students here at PCC to ensure
their success and I think he deserves a round of applause
for that.
Thank you.
You know one of the things that make this institution so unique is the number of first generation
college students that we serve. About 40% of our
credit students will be the first in their families to earn
a degree and no other insititution in this state
or in this city provides that type of access
to students who otherwise would not have a chance to go to college.
So this year with the president's campaign
for opportunity and the funds that we're raising to support it
I want to say, you know, this amount of money won't be the last
money we raise for these students, the need is much to great
we will keep working to serve these students, but it will help us
make sure that we serve hundreds more students at PCC
with the types of services that we know make them successful
and so the funds from the campaign will go to 2 main areas
one is for scholarships for low income first generation
college students here at the, at PCC
and one of the things that you probably do know is that
we are a great point of access for students
but one of the things that we know is critical to their success is
having financial aid and scholarship. It is the single
most important factor in ensuring that a student is retained
and completes their certificate or degree here at PCC.
And so maintaining scholarships, increasing what we're able to offer
to these students is critical. The other area that the campaign
will support is programs that offer critical support
services to low income first generation college students
at PCC. Those include programs like
the ROOTS program here at Cascade and Sylvania
many of you are familiar with ROOTs it provides intensive
academic support services and advising, access to
tutoring and other services to low income
first generation students through the TRIO set of programs at the federal level.
That's where the funds come from. We also have here the middle
college program in partnership with Jefferson
where students at Jefferson are able to earn their college
credits here at PCC Cascade while they're completing their
high school diploma at Jefferson, and then the third program
that we're highlighting through this campaign is our future connect program which is
a program that works with students who have recently
graduated or earned their GED from Multnomah County and
it also provides intensive support services along
with scholarships to those students so that they can complete their
degrees here at PCC. It's currently focused just on Multnomah
County but we're working very hard with the cities of Beaverton and Hillsboro
to get them to partner so that we can expand this program
in Fall of 2013 to the Rock Creek Campus
and also expanded services to Sylvania.
Now one of the reasons why I wanted to highlight all 3 of these programs
is that the students in these programs are really
wonderfully diverse in a variety of ways. They also come
from a lot of the backgrounds that someone mentioned already
they're homeless students in these programs there are students who have
suffered through many challenges they're
parenting they have a lot going on but they're also
very ethnically and racially diverse.
Our future connect students 65% of them are students of color,
our Sylvania ROOTs students 40% of students are
students of color. Here at Cascade in the ROOTs over 50%
of the students are coming from diverse backgrounds
and for middle college over the last 5 years over
80% of those kids are students of color.
We have incredible programs at PCC doing great
work with diverse groups of students and truly
helping them to succeed and earn their degrees. There's a
big difference that we see in these programs with the level of
service that they provide and the graduation and completion rate.
It's nearly double and triple what we see for students who don't receive these types
of intensive services. So the campaign for opportunity will go to
help us continue to serve these students, to serve more to serve them
into the future. We thank many of you who have already
made gifts to the faculty staff and retiree campaign
we would not be able to help our students the way that we do without
those gifts. We ask for you to consider
if you haven't yet, making a gift to the faculty staff
retiree campaign in support of the president's campaign for opportunity
Jen Sonntag one of development
officers is here, she has materials for you.
Now I understand that anyone who makes
a gift today gets an extra ticket to be entered
into the raffle drawing. Now I have no idea
what the raffle drawing is for so I'm really hoping that that's an incentive.
So those are here for you
we thank everyone for their support if you have given
please consider giving again. It is
a truly remarkable way that we can honor the president's legacy
here at PCC by helping him reach that goal.
The final introduction I want to do is a new member of our foundation staff
Jennifer McBratney is here. She is our new scholarship and
programs officer.
Our scholarship cycle closes February 19th if
you have any questions about how to provide
information to our students, writing reference letters, she is the
person to contact. And um I just thank
you so much for all that you're doing to support
our students at the college it truly makes a difference and we're truly
grateful for your gifts to the foundation. Have a great conference
and a great weekend.