Accreditation

When the WASC Accreditation Team that visited the College in April 11-15, 2005, and reported in the exit interview with the faculty, staff, and students that the condition of the facilities at Chuuk Campus has worsened since the last visit in March 1-5, 2004, the College was unaware of the time line to remove the sanction from the accrediting commission. It was pointed out during the PPEC sponsored Trustees and Presidents training that recently took place in Guam from April 29, 2005 to May 1, 2005, that U.S. DOE requires that the commission not allow deficiencies to exist more than two years. This means the College has less than a year to correct the problems or face losing accreditation for the College.

I had not been given the information that the COM-FSM will lose its accreditation if it will not take itself off the sanction, “warning status”, because I was not aware of the gravity of the situation when I visited Chuuk Campus and met with students and staff there, on April 21, 2005; my point of concentration at that meeting was to suspend Instructional Services during summer and do the corrective measures on facilities at Chuuk Campus that will meet the recommendation of the WASC. I subsequently met with the FSM Speaker and he recommended strongly to me that the College should not spend more money on new facilities at the current site. We also have been told that we cannot use Compact II funds to purchase land in Chuuk State that could be used as the permanent site for Chuuk Campus. Given these factors that are beyond the College’s control and the College having less than one year to remove itself from the sanction of “warning”, drastic measures are being considered to ensure accreditation is reaffirmed.

The Administration of the College is recommending to the Board of Regents at its upcoming meeting in Pohnpei the following: “The Board of Regents approves that Chuuk Campus will be temporarily closed with continuing students transferred to appropriate programs at other campuses. Plans to reopen the campus will be detailed in a substantive change report to be submitted to WASC when the accreditation standards for an adequate learning environment have been met by the construction of facilities to meet the Instructional and Student Support Services Programs needs”. Please remember that this is just a recommendation and it is not the final decision of the College.

The President of the College has sent a request to the Executive Director of WASC to appear before the Accrediting Commission at its June 6-8, 2005, meeting. The response to the request is positive. So the President will be appearing before accreditation commission for five minutes to report on what the College has done since the last visit in April 11-15, 2005, in regard to upgrading Chuuk Campus facilities that will support Instructional and Student Services Programs to meet the accreditation standards. The President of the College and key staff at the College have been asked to appear before the Chuuk Congress delegation at 2:00 p.m. on Tuesday, 5/17/05.

Board of Regents Meeting

The College of Micronesia-FSM Board of Regents will be meeting on May 24-27, 2005, in Pohnpei. The Board of Regents meetings are open to the public. The venue of the meeting will be at M ITC at the National Campus.

Campus Directors Meeting

The Campus Directors meeting will be held at the National Campus on May 23, 2005. The agenda of the meeting are the following: FY 2006 and 2007 budgets, facility construction, personnel matters, instructional matters, student services matters, and sponsored programs issues.

COM-FSM FY 06 Proposed Budget

The following is a comparison of the College’s FY 2006 budget as approved by the Board and as recommended by the FSM President to FSM Congress.

Units Budgets	BOR Approved Budget	FSM President Proposed bud.
Operational Budget	$3,856,067	$3,800,000
FSM-FMI	622,167	600,000
BOR	84,460	84,460
Student Assistant	475,000	300,000
Chuuk Campus facilities	540,898	612,000
Kosrae Campus facilities	888,030	888,000
National Campus	150,000	0
Pohnpei Campus	596,000	0

Candidates for Spring Graduation 2005 at COM-FSM Campuses

The following is the number of candidates for Spring 2005 Graduation from each of the COM-FSM Campuses: One hundred twenty two of these candidates will be receiving their AA/AS/AAS Degrees and 54 will be receiving their certificates.

Chuuk Campus	8 candidates
Kosrae Campus	9 “
National Campus	94 “
Pohnpei Campus	20 “
FSM-FMI	16 “
Yap Campus	29 “
Total	176 “

Endowment Fund

Mr. Jamie Mason, formerly the Dean of Technology, Guam Community College, donated $500.00 to the COM-FSM Endowment fund on Monday, May, 16, 2005. On behalf of the Board of Regents, faculty, staff, and students of the College, I would like to express our sincere appreciation, gratitude, and thanks to Mr. Jamie Mason. We also wish him success in his new job at the University of Guam.

Faculty/Staff Incentive Award Day at the National Campus

The faculty and staff at the National Campus held the Annual Incentive Awards Day on Friday, 5/13/05, at 3:30 to 5:20 p.m. at the Practice Gym. The purpose of this event was for the recognition for a job well done at the National Campus during school year 2004-2005. The event also to recognized those faculty and staff that have spent a good part of their life working at the College. Other awards included the students’ choices of faculty and staff as well as the faculty of the year selected by students and a panel of faculty and staff. The summary of the awards is attached for your information.

 

Thank you.

Link to summary of awards