Decatur, IL – As the year 2023 comes to a close, Richland Community College has assessed how they have achieved their goals in supporting students and staff through the Strategic Plan for 2020-2023.
Over the past three years, the college has focused on completing four goals:
- Goal 1: Provide relevant, high-quality learning opportunities
- Goal 2: Foster student success and completion
- Goal 3: Enhance and cultivate partnerships in business, education, government, and communities to meet current needs of students and emerging trends of the region
- Goal 4: Create a sound financial system that maintains long-term operational funding, promotes operational sustainability, and utilizes an effective organizational structure
To complete the first goal, Richland took a five-pronged approach. They started by developing a Teaching & Learning Center (TLC) with both a physical and online component. The College invested in staff, who provided needed support for faculty and students as Richland shifted to online and hybrid courses (as a safety measure at the rise of the COVID-19 pandemic). The TLC’s physical location opened in January 2022. As of Fall 2023, 47% of students are registered in online and hybrid classes. The next step was expanding the Transfer Academy and dual credit programs by establishing an AA Pathway with Decatur Public Schools (DPS) as part of the Prep Academy. Currently, the Prep Academy is in its third year – with 154 students enrolled. The third approach to completing this goal was the creation of an education pathway. By adding programs like Grow Your Own (GYO) and the Early Childhood Access Consortium of Equity (ECACE), the College was taking steps to address the high demand for educators and strengthen the teacher pipeline. In Fall 2023, 19 students were enrolled in GYO, and 27 were in ECACE. Then, Richland turned its focus to developing more transfer pathways to 4-year institutions and registered apprenticeships for industry clusters identified by the Illinois Economic Plan. Richland has partnered with a number of local employers for apprenticeships, and the College received a $450,000 grant from the Illinois Department of Commerce & Economic Opportunity to develop the Illinois Works Pre-Apprenticeship Program. Over the last year, the Pre-Apprenticeship program has held three cohorts – creating a pipeline for future employers.
The second goal was to foster student success and completion. Although the COVID-19 pandemic impacted the College’s initial outlined strategies, Richland was able to pivot and support students through removing basic needs barriers. This goal was completed through three efforts: strengthening Richland’s relationship with service area stakeholders, increasing student retention, and increasing student support resources. The College reached out to stakeholders through an Education Symposium (held in partnership with Heartland Tech Academy). At this symposium, the College was able to receive direct feedback – learning barriers for dual credit offerings at area high schools which will inform the 2024-2026 Strategic Plan. Student retention was another focus. After a loss of enrollment of new students in Fall 2020 (-43.31%), the College rebounded with a 14.3% increase (223 new students) in Fall 2021 and a 6.73% increase (238 new students) in Fall 2022. With this focus on retention came an increased focus on student support resources. Between 2020 and 2023, the Foundation awarded nearly $4 million in donor-funded scholarships. The College has also created partnerships by offering onsite mental health services – starting with Crossing Healthcare in Spring 2022 and transitioning over to Memorial Health in Fall 2023. Another barrier Richland has broken down is transportation. In Spring 2023, the College partnered with Decatur Public Transit to give free transportation to their students. In the first quarter of the partnership, nearly 1500 rides were taken by Richland students.
Goal 3 was centered around enhancing and cultivating partnerships in business, education, government, and communities to meet current needs of students and emerging trends of the region. Richland achieved this goal through connecting with District employers to identify needed skills, and they collaborated in the delivery of training opportunities. In February 2022, the College receive a $3.2 million grant from the Decatur Memorial Foundation to grow enrollment in nursing and clinical programs and create a diverse workforce through EnRich Healthcare. As of Fall 2023, more than 400 students are enrolled in EnRich Healthcare. 77% of participants are minorities, and 88% come from a low socio-economic status. Another community partnership started in early 2022 – when ADM partnered with Richland to develop an educational pathway for Process Technicians to receive paid training and hands-on learning opportunities. In Fall 2022, Richland became a primary partner in a massive collaboration – receiving a $15.3 million grant from the State of Illinois to contribute to the creation of a $53 million Electric Vehicle Innovation Cluster. The facility will be located on the T/CCI Decatur campus. In all, every single one of these efforts provides their own educational pathways – collectively positioning Richland to be a trailblazer in designing innovative curriculum to meet the needs of tomorrow’s workforce.
The final goal was focused on creating a sound financial system that maintains long-term operational sustainability and utilizes an effective organizational structure. Over the past three years, the team has positioned the College for financial sustainability, sought alternative funding sources, enhanced student learning spaces, enhanced faculty & staff training options, created an effective equipment replacement plan, and maintained and enhanced the IT infrastructure to support College operations. Richland achieved their goal of having a general fund balance equal to 6 months of current budget expenses almost one year ahead of schedule. Since 2020, there has been a significant increase in grant funding with a current portfolio of $25 million from state and local funding agencies – allowing the College to grow partnerships, programs, and staffing to support students and meet the area’s needs. When students and staff moved off campus due to COVID-19, it was the perfect opportunity to expedite construction. Before students returned in Fall 2021, the College already had built modernized science labs, learning spaces, and inserted new technology and instructional equipment. Richland also broke ground on the new Agriculture building in spring 2022, and construction on the new space is nearing completion. With faculty & staff training opportunities, 93% of employees are in compliance with completion on online training provided through Safe Colleges – a program specifically designed for higher education. Mandatory training has been completed by 100% of staff. Richland’s IT team is nearing the tail end of a push to replace obsolete equipment on campus; only 10% more needs to be replaced during fiscal year 2023. IT has even made additional bandwidth available throughout the College and replaced outdated wireless access points with 802.11ac devices.
All of the faculty and staff at Richland Community College work tirelessly to create an environment for students to learn and grow. As the College finishes strategic planning for 2024-2026, they have one consistent mission in mind: continue to provide the resources for students to succeed. To learn more about Strategic Planning at Richland Community College, visit this webpage.