College submits accreditation report
David Leos
Issue date: 11/20/09 Section: News
In response to the early 2009 "warning" issued by the Accreditation Commission of Community and Junior Colleges (AACJC) and the Western Association of Schools and Colleges (WASC), Rio Hondo submitted the much anticipated Follow-up Report on Oct 15.
By submitting the 54 page report, Rio Hondo has effectively complied with all requests made by the governing body and the college should be removed from "warning" status and placed on "Reaffirmed Accreditation" status by the spring semester in 2010.
In effort to verify the validity of the findings by Rio Hondo staff documented in the Follow-up Report, a two-member team consisting of Dr. John Gonzales and Dr. Jerry Patton (from AACJC) made a repeat visit to the campus on Oct 5.
The team met with various groups who participated in composition of the Follow-Up Report. Preliminarily, the AACJC is expected to respond to Rio Hondo by the end of November, but the official report will not be released until in January.
The report and the work that went into its completion has been a long ordeal, dating back to when the AACJC and WASC first visited the Rio Hondo campus in Oct 2008, and discovered areas the college needed to improve upon.
The recommendations handed down to Rio Hondo were in the areas, Institutional Effectiveness, Governance, Student Learning Outcomes and Services, Human Resources and Leadership.
Rio Hondo President Dr. Ted Martinez said the administration wasted no time preparing in response to the recommendations handed down by the AACJC, "As soon as they left, we had already begun the process of putting together a team and it came to be called the Accreditation Response Team [ART]."
Some of the improvements listed in the Rio Hondo Follow-Up Report: a comprehensive review of Student Services, General Education, Basic Skills, Degrees and Certificate Programs; a new code of ethics for all Rio Hondo employees and a revision of the hiring process and new campus-wide climate surveys in order to improve governance and work approval.
By submitting the 54 page report, Rio Hondo has effectively complied with all requests made by the governing body and the college should be removed from "warning" status and placed on "Reaffirmed Accreditation" status by the spring semester in 2010.
In effort to verify the validity of the findings by Rio Hondo staff documented in the Follow-up Report, a two-member team consisting of Dr. John Gonzales and Dr. Jerry Patton (from AACJC) made a repeat visit to the campus on Oct 5.
The team met with various groups who participated in composition of the Follow-Up Report. Preliminarily, the AACJC is expected to respond to Rio Hondo by the end of November, but the official report will not be released until in January.
The report and the work that went into its completion has been a long ordeal, dating back to when the AACJC and WASC first visited the Rio Hondo campus in Oct 2008, and discovered areas the college needed to improve upon.
The recommendations handed down to Rio Hondo were in the areas, Institutional Effectiveness, Governance, Student Learning Outcomes and Services, Human Resources and Leadership.
Rio Hondo President Dr. Ted Martinez said the administration wasted no time preparing in response to the recommendations handed down by the AACJC, "As soon as they left, we had already begun the process of putting together a team and it came to be called the Accreditation Response Team [ART]."
Some of the improvements listed in the Rio Hondo Follow-Up Report: a comprehensive review of Student Services, General Education, Basic Skills, Degrees and Certificate Programs; a new code of ethics for all Rio Hondo employees and a revision of the hiring process and new campus-wide climate surveys in order to improve governance and work approval.
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