Foundations of Excellence project goes Collegewide

By Cindy Tanner

Weepers. That’s what they’re sometimes called. You know, the people who never think they are going to do well, yet always manage to succeed with flying colors. The highly disciplined student who stays up all night studying for fear of flunking the mid-term ... then aces the test, as usual—that’s a weeper.

A quick look at the record shows that Pellissippi State is an institution of weepers. No matter how well we do our jobs, individually or collectively, our tendency is to (1) underestimate how well we’ve performed, (2) give fleeting acknowledgment to positive recognition and (3) quickly revert to being our own worst critics.

Case in point: The 2002 Self-Study Report, a self-critique contributed to by almost every employee, then submitted to the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools as part of the reaffirmation of accreditation process. In it, we noted our need to improve on 34 of the 300 accreditation criteria.

The “weeper” syndrome became apparent when SACS did its own review of the College. A memo from President Allen Edwards to faculty and staff, said this:

“Dr. Robert Judson [chair of the SACS visiting committee] characterized Pellissippi State as a ‘very, very outstanding institution.’ He also said that ... Pellissippi State had further work to do on only 10 of [criteria]. He emphasized that this was the smallest number of recommendations an institution that he had visited ... had ever received.”

If we think the SACS success was a fluke, we need to look at the recent Interact study of the College. Interact found that the Knoxville area community thinks we are great and that—guess what?—we think we’re, well, okay.

And there’s plenty more recognition out there. Some of the most recent:

Adult Education Program—Commitment Award, Tennessee Center for Performance Excellence
Interior Design Technology—Statewide competition, repeated first-place winner, Tennessee student chapter, American Society of Interior Designers
Phi Theta Kappa, Pellissippi State chapter—numerous local, state and national awards
Students in Free Enterprise—First place, Two-Year College Division, SIFE Regional Exposition
Peter Nerzak—Award of Excellence, Tennessee Board of Regents
Margaret Choka—June Anderson Award, Women in Higher Education in Tennessee
Judy Gosch—Adult Educator of the Year, East Tennessee College Alliance
Tom Gaddis—Hospitality Educator of the Year, Tennessee Hotel and Lodging Association
Jerry Bryan, Julia Wood—Executive of the Year, Oak Ridge chapter, International Association of Administrative Professionals

But did we stop to savor those successes? Generally not. Instead, we quickly tucked them away and returned to the business of making the College the best it can be. Yep, an institution of weepers.

Well, 2006 is the year that that may change.

“The Policy Center consultants have conveyed that our self-critical nature has been responsible for Pellissippi State’s reaching a higher level of excellence than many colleges,” said Dr. Bruns.

Second, as part of Phase II, a task force from the College actually had to identify specific areas, or “dimensions,” that make us especially effective in helping new students learn and succeed. Yes, that’s right. We had to admit we were good in certain dimensions, then commit them to writing.

“Identifying the nine dimensions of excellence forces us to recognize our strengths as a whole,” said Berta Ward, director of articulation, advising, and curriculum and a member of the FOE project task force. (See sidebar for all nine of the project dimensions.)

With our major strengths identified, the nine dimension committees went to work in the fall and will continue working into spring semester to make those strengths even stronger. At the end of April, the project task force will gather the committees’ reports and recommend a Collegewide plan of action for improvement.

An example, from the learning committee’s final report:

Strength: “Foundations institutions [in this case, Pellissippi State] deliver curricular and co-curricular learning experiences that engage new students in order to develop knowledge, skills, attitudes, and behaviors consistent with the institutional mission, students’ academic and career goals, and workplace expectations.”

Area(s) of Concern: “Even though there are learning goals as defined by TBR (General Education Goals) that address all students, the goals do not explicitly focus on first-year students and their unique experiences to transitioning to college.”

Recommended Action(s): “A new student pamphlet should be developed to address the first-year experience.”

Again, our ultimate goal is to help shape a national model to improve the learning and success of first-year students.

So far, well over 100 faculty and staff have been involved in the FOE project, and throughout the semester, we’ll find out how they are progressing. That leaves 700-900 employees to observe ... unless there’s a part each and every one of us can play.

The Plan

Not only is there a way we can all take part in the FOE project, but our involvement is already under way. For starters, everyone who has a door to put it on should by now have received a gold star. The star reads, “Are you good or ... are you exceptional?” On the back is a message from the FOE project to “Stay tuned.”

Now for the fun stuff: Soon, every person in the College will receive his or her own FOE project “kit.” In it will be Pellissippi State’s Statement of Philosophy for the First Year of College, as well as information on each dimension.

In the kit there will also be five gold stars. For our part, each of us is being asked to give, over the course of spring semester, those five gold stars away to employees we see providing not just good service but exceptional service.

The recipient could be a faculty member giving above-and-beyond help to a needy student. It could be a groundskeeper who is taking special care in planting flowers to make our campuses a beautiful place. It could be a Business Services employee who goes the extra yard to make sure a student receives her loan check. It could be anyone who is doing an exceptional job.

It’s up to each person how and when to give one of those five gold stars. But however we dispense them, the reward is guaranteed to be threefold: The receiver will appreciate being recognized, the giver will feel the positive power of recognizing others—and everyone will begin to notice, and acknowledge, that there’s a lot of exceptional work going on here!

And isn’t it about time we stopped being weepers and started patting ourselves on the back?