Employee Engagement At Richland College

Employee Engagement at Richland College RECOGNITION APPROACHES Birthday Card from the College President President Steve Mittelstet sends each employee a specially designed electronic greeting on their birthday. The e-card is interactive and delivered via e-mail.

Birthday Card from Information Services & College Relations Each year the Information Services Office creates an employee birthday card that includes a small commemorative item. In the past, greetings such as “You’re a star,” accompanied a specialty pen. Other items included stress balls, custom door hangers and Thunderduck Post-It™ notes. This year, in the spirit of sustainability, we’re offering a recycled cardboard pen that’s attached to a card featuring a haiku poem as a birthday wish.

Celebrating you We also honor our earth Finding harmony. A Happy Birthday haiku for

Roy Bond

From all of us in Information Services.

This birthday pen is made from recycled card stock and sustainable wooden chips.

Longevity Awards The Exalted Order of The Snowy White Fillet celebrates employee longevity starting with 10 years of service with recognitions for every five subsequent years. Inductees into Snowy White Fillet are honored at an annual luncheon. Honored employees receive: • 10 years: Richland medallion and the 10-year pin • 15 years: 15-year pin • 20 years: Choice of a tree on campus with a commemorative plaque installed at its base with the Latin inscription, “Notatu Dignum” (of worthy note) and the employee’s name, and the 20-year pin President Steve Mittelstet, left, honors Ron Clark for 40 • 25 years: Crystal box with Richland logo • 30 years: Framed photograph chosen from Multimedia Program and the 30years of service to Richland College and the Dallas year bronze plaque displayed in Crockett Breezeway County Community College District. • 35 years: Engraved brick installed in Labyrinth Arbor walkway and an engraved brick for personal presentation • 40 years: Engraved marble bookends and a second engraved brick installed in Labyrinth Arbor walkway.

EMPLOYEE RECOGNITION Employee of the Month & Innovation of the Year Parades A staple of our awards approach is the “employee parade” for recognitions, such as Employee of the Month and Innovation of the Year. Employees parade across campus in ceremonial regalia, gathering additional employees and students along the way, to the recipient’s location. The honoree is joyfully declared and receives gifts such as movie passes, a plant, a parking pass, and a coveted Thunderduck mug. These recognitions are reported in the ThunderBridge newsletter to employees and friends.

The recipients of the 2007-08 Innovation of the Year Award – ThunderBbolt Training project.

The Thunderducks start the parade, complete with ceremonial regalia, from Alamito Hall.

Thuy Anh Nguyen of the Multicultural Center was named the April 2008 Outstanding Employee.

EMPLOYEE RECOGNITION (cont.) Excellence in Teaching This award recognizes the contributions of instructors in these categories: Full-Time Faculty, Adjunct Faculty, Continuing Education Faculty, and Others Who Teach. The Excellence in Teaching awards are presented at Richland’s annual Convocation. To honor the nominees, the RLC Instructional Television crew makes a full video production featuring each nominee. The video is shown at Convocation to honor and recognize our beloved colleagues. The Excellence in Teaching Award winner is nominated for the DCCCD Miles Production Award for Full-Time Excellence in Teaching and the Minnie Piper Stevens statewide award. Professional Support Staff Employee of the Year To recognize the work of Richland’s Professional Support Staff, the PSS FullTime Employee of the Year Award and PSS Part-Time Employee of the Year Award are given annually. The winner of each college award is nominated for the Districtwide PSS Employee of the Year Award. Nominees are selected on the basis of outstanding job performance; interpersonal relationships; service to the college and District; special awards, honors and community service; and professional development. Administrator of the Year Outstanding administrators are nominated annually on the following basis: the President Steve Mittelstet, left, celebrates with PSS Part- positive effect the nominee’s leadership has on his/her work group, the college, Time Employee of the Year Victoria Glass and PSS Fulland/or the District; the nominee’s contributions to the development and success Time Employee of the Year Phil Key. of students and staff; how the nominee is a role model/mentor for others at RLC and/or in the community; the nominee’s contribution to RLC’s culture; and how the nominee has exercised initiative and/or taken risks to continuously improve the college’s services. The Administrator of the Year award is presented at Richland’s annual Convocation. Campus winners are nominated for the District level award. Jean Sharon Griffith Student Development Leadership Award The award for student service excellence, renamed the “Jean Sharon Griffith Student Development Leadership Award” after the untimely death of Vice President for Student Development Sharon Griffith in 1987, recognizes a person who or a team which exemplifies the personal characteristics, exhibits the leadership qualities, and makes the kinds of significant contributions to the development of students and student success that Sharon did. The award, given at the campus level and then to a Districtwide winner, recognizes those individuals or groups who will “tell the truth” in spite of the consequences while remembering that we must also “warm the hearts” of our students and colleagues. The Jean Sharon Griffith award is presented at Richland’s annual Convocation.

CROSS-CUTTING COUNCIL STRUCTURE The Council for Community Building was formed in Fall 2002 and is designed along with the Council for Teaching and Learning to enhance ongoing college-wide communication among all divisions and work groups in Richland’s large, complex organization. Each of these councils sponsors a recognition program, as detailed below. The Council for Community Building This council functions as a forum to offer input and feedback on major issues and policies within the institution. Council membership is comprised of representatives from various student groups and from all employee classifications and departments throughout the college. The college president and vice presidents are invited to attend the council meetings and take an active role in the work of the Council. Any member of the Council may be contacted for agenda items for future meetings. The mission of the Council for Community Building (CCB) is to establish open lines of communication among all those who have a stake in the success of Richland College to develop ideas, strategies and measures to improve Richland’s learning environment. Student Wall of Honor The CCB recognizes and celebrates Richland’s former and current students that have made unique contributions to Richland and our community. At a ceremony held each semester, honored students receive a framed photo with their stories on the Wall of Honor located in Crockett Hall.

President Steve Mittelstet, left, congratulates Student Wall of Honor recipient Alhaji F. Saccoh.

CROSS-CUTTING COUNCIL STRUCTURE (cont.) Fifteen Minutes of Fun The CCB provides fun breaks that last only 15 minutes, so that all staff and faculty can find time to attend. They are scheduled on different days and times just after classes end, so that all faculty, staff and students can participate at least once or twice per semester. The Council provides a sign to all division heads for their doors to close the office and invite others to attend (giving the time, date, place and description of the event). Fun break activities have included kite flying, parachute activities, finger painting, bubble blowing, hula hoop contests, paper airplane making and more. Students and employees take a joy break with a parachute and a beach ball during Fifteen Minutes of Fun.

The Council for Teaching and Learning The Mission of the Council for Teaching and Learning is to support and enrich the learning cultures, climates, and contexts throughout Richland College. The Council for Teaching and Learning (CTL) functions as a forum to promote excellent teaching and learning practices. It also recommends enhancements to the teaching and learning environments, and creates and nurtures links between all those who support the teaching and learning process. Members of the Richland College community are invited to attend the Council meetings and take an active role in the work of the Council. Employees also may contact any member of the Council for Teaching and Learning for input or information. Featured Teaching and Learning Practices CTL sponsors a program that promotes Featured Teaching and Learning Practices at Richland College. This program recognizes individual faculty members and shares their innovative and successful teaching practices with the Richland learning community. Featured faculty members are invited to present their practices to their peers as part of Richland’s faculty and staff development program.

OPEN-MEMBERSHIP COLLEGE COMMUNITIES Richland’s Uncommittee The Uncommittee is an interdisciplinary reading-discussion group(s) for Richland employees committed to the value of integrated learning as a “humanizing process.” There is no discussion leader; all participants are equally responsible for coming to the sessions prepared to participate with questions, observations, comments. Although literary criticism and analysis are legitimate activities in certain academic settings, these activities are not the purpose of the Uncommittee. Uncommittee discussions focus more on synthesis, rather than analysis, and more on the impact of the readings on the readers as human beings. The Uncommittee's reading list for 2007-08 was The Glass Castle: A Memoir by Jeannette Walls; Generation Me: Why Today's Young Americans Are More Confident, Assertive, Entitled – and More Miserable Than Ever Before by Jean M. Twenge; Three Tales by Gustave Flaubert; Faster: The Acceleration of Everything by James Gleick; The Secret Life of Bees by Sue Kidd; The Two Cultures by C. P. Snow and Stefan Collini; and Teaching the Trees by Joan Maloof.

GREENRichland GREENRichland is a group of employees and students who believe in shared responsibility for the natural environment and in the potential for a community college to make that responsibility real, accessible, and rewarding. GREENRichland partners with all Richlanders to develop and implement an action plan for moving the college onto a path of environmental sustainability and for inviting others onto that path. GREENRichland envisions a college community for which environmental sustainability is a way of life for staff and students, a benchmark for decision makers, an emphasis for educational programs, and a catalyst for collaborative global partnerships. GREENRichland’s mission is to lead and learn with students, colleagues, and global partners in developing practices, policies, programs and partnerships that promote a robust natural environment and an abundant quality of life for future generations.

OPEN-MEMBERSHIP COLLEGE COMMUNITIES (cont.) Center for Renewal & Wholeness in Higher Education (CRWHE Headquarters) CRWHE’s predecessor organization – the Center for Formation in the Community College, which later became the Center for Formation in Higher Education (CFHE) – was launched by generous funding from the Fetzer Institute, sponsored by the League for Innovation in the Community College, and headquartered at the District Office of the Dallas County Community College District (DCCCD). In spring 2008, a group of CFHE Distinguished National Advocates met in Taos, New Mexico, and recommended that CFHE programs be continued in a broader organizational context to coincide with a more comprehensive impact on the mission of higher education. The CFHE became the Center for Renewal & Wholeness in Higher Education (CRWHE). Beginning in August 2008, CRWHE is headquartered at Richland College and is supported by the DCCCD and the League for Innovation in the Community College. The vision of the CRWHE cultivates communities that serve, where the balance of being and doing is honored and the essence of healthy relationships to self, others, and the earth is sustained. The mission is the formation of whole people which is Center for Renewal & prerequisite to the transformation of whole organizations that strive to form whole Wholeness in Higher Education communities.

FACILITIES SERVICES’ EMPLOYEE OF THE QUARTER The most recent Employee Satisfaction Survey showed that Facilities Services staff desired more recognition for their work. To respond to these employee’s needs, a Facilities Services Employee of the Quarter award was created. The award is announced and celebrated in the Facilities Services Newsletter and at the annual Fall Convocation. PAGE 2

NOTE OF THANKS I express my sincerest Thanks for the sympathy card you sent me, I was deeply touched. What wonderful friends to have, I am very blessed. P.S there were some signatures I could not read, so please tell everyone there I said Thank you!!! Rhonda

ON CAMPUS

CONGRATULATIONS!

All ballots are in and counted for our Employee of the Quarter Fourth Quarter (June - August 2008) Congratulations to Austin Longacre, Irrigation Technician II, as the Facilities Services Employee of the Quarter. Thanks for a job well done! District Human Resources has notified that the Ad Hoc Job Evaluation for Austin Longacre was approved effective 06/09/08. Mr. Longacre's new job title is Irrigation Technician II.

Scott Dunn and Ricky Hoyle fixing the fountain and Michael Chamberlin in the lake fixing the fountain!

Source: Campus Quality Survey, 98,00,02,05,07

Congratulations on completing the 10-Hour OSHA Class!

The text below, from the June 2008 Facilities Services Newsletter, is also in the image at left in the “Congratulations!” box:

EMPLOYMENT PT Groundskeeper Seasonal (1 position) Richland College FT/$1,338.00/Mo. open until filled

Target Range > 3.15 - 3.50 Performance = 3.43 % of max. target range = 98.00%

TOP LEFT: Mike Hau, Anson Ngo, Jone Tsou Michael Brantley, Hong Tran and Terrick Tu. BOTTOM LEFT: Roberto Manzanares and Ron Woodson

Employee of the Quarter Fourth Quarter (June - August 2008) Congratulations to Austin Longacre, Irrigation Technician II, as the Facilities Services Employee of the Quarter. Thanks for a job well done! District Human Resources has notified that the Ad Hoc Job Evaluation for Austin Longacre was approved effective 06/09/08. Mr. Longacre's new job title is Irrigation Technician II.