CCL Student Handbook Doctoral Program

CCL Doctoral Program

Vision Statement

The Community College Leadership Doctoral program will be a primary provider of doctoral education for community college leaders for Northern Illinois within the next five years.

Mission Statement

The Mission of the Community College Leadership (CCL) Doctoral program is to prepare students to meet the challenges and opportunities surrounding community colleges in a rapidly changing society and enable them to provide enlightened and competent leadership for the 21st century.

Program Overview

The program is designed for professionals currently working in community colleges and higher education settings who desire entry into a quality doctoral program experience that allows them to continue meeting family and work responsibilities. Offering a curricular focus on theory, practice, scholarly foundations, students enhance their critical thinking ability, problem-solving dexterity and research skills that transfer to the leadership challenges faced in community college positions such as program director or coordinator, department chair, academic dean, vice-president, or president. The CCL doctoral program is intended to engender a broad understanding of community college education by encouraging focused scholarly inquiry grounded in the reality of leadership and administrative practices. The program is directed towards developing scholar-practitioner who understand the power of ideas and who place those ideas in service to improve educational practice.

Moreover, the administration of complex postsecondary education enterprises, including community colleges, requires leaders who possess well-developed educational philosophy, a depth of knowledge, a broad range of professional experiences in a number of operational programs and activities, a sound understanding of human and organizational development theory, and well-developed educational leadership and analytic skills. The Community College Leadership Doctoral program was created in response to the notable lack of leadership preparation programs targeting the unique needs of community colleges. The program is a graduate experience that is intellectually stimulating, professionally relevant, and incorporates research endeavors around the key issues facing postsecondary institutions. The new doctoral program serves a variety of educators, administrators, and community college leaders.

Common Core of Knowledge

Prospective educational leaders will acquire a common core of knowledge and skills grounded in leadership and administrative practices. The core of the CCL program is designed to:

Accommodate working professional who are mature, self-disciplined learners, motivated to engage in active learning
Expand students' theoretical understanding of leadership and administrative practice through a grounding in the conceptual underpinnings of one or more disciplines related to Higher Education Administration and Leadership
Provide students with a broad appreciation and understanding of the United States community college system in historical, social, and political perspectives
Produce scholar-practitioners who can use data analysis to drive informed decision making for best practices
Convey scholarly inquiry skills useful to the practice of higher education and to the conduct of research valuable to community colleges
Provide opportunities to bridge theoretical understanding and every-day practice in the context of evidence-based practices relative to community colleges.

Common Curricular threads permeate throughout supporting the program’s mission and programmatic outcome objectives. These common threads are:

Critical reflection, personal and professional
Global mindset and awareness of diversity
Scholarly inquiry, critical thinking, and evidence-based problem solving
Bridging theory and practical applications

Scholar- Practitioner: Conceptual Framework

The CCL program prepares leaders who will possess the practical and scholarly grounded knowledge, skills, values, and vision to change and transform community colleges. The scholar-practitioner model espouses this concept whereby leadership and administrative practices are informed by scholarly inquiry. Scholar-practitioner leadership is grounded in a view of leadership, which seeks to blur the boundaries between knowledge and practice. The scholar-practitioner concept of leadership represents a complex set of relationships among inquiry, knowledge, practice, and theory. At the convergence of knowledge-practice and inquiry-practice, an emerging framework for an epistemology for community college leadership exists. Engaged in this new epistemology, students learn to lead and articulate knowledge and practice through inquiry as praxis.

Embedded in the scholar-practitioner model is the belief that professional identity is not a static phenomenon that ends once a terminal degree is achieved but instead consists of life-long learning that evolves as the field does. The goal is to develop research, critical thinking, conceptualization, problem-solving, and other scholarly skills that are particularly pertinent to leadership and administrative practices in community colleges. There are a variety of activities viewed as vital in implementing this philosophy, including integration of professional literature, engaging in research in a variety of ways, and using a scholarly approach to facilitate critical thinking. The scholar-practitioner model encourages faculty to enrich each of their courses with exercises, case studies, and projects that reflect the actual demands placed on today's leaders and administrators in community colleges. Likewise, the scholar-practitioner model propels the student into immediate and continuous interaction with the complex and dynamic issues facing community college leaders throughout the curriculum. This exposure to the problems, issues, or concerns facing community colleges seeks to achieve better understanding of the relevance of the concepts, theories, and skills required of them in their doctoral studies. At the same time, students are better able to participate in the classroom through questioning, discussion, and providing examples of applications of the material in certain situations that they have experienced or are experiencing in their community colleges.

With respect to instruction, the scholar-practitioner philosophy demands the selection of full time faculty holding terminal degrees in appropriate disciplinary areas who also possess substantial career experience in community college leadership and administrative positions. The scholar-practitioner concept further encourages the appointment of adjunct faculty who are currently engaged or have recently retired from community colleges and/or those who offer the students a range of academic, real-world professional experiences relevant to community colleges.

Program Design

The program design recognizes that all doctoral students enter the program with a wealth of skills, abilities, and prior experiences. The intent of the program is to assist students as they build on those capacities while developing new skills and perspectives that underlie leadership. The program design recognizes that knowledge is continually being created more rapidly than any individual can ever master. The program balances knowledge acquisition, the development of perspectives, and the enhancement of skills fundamental to effective leadership. The expansion and diversification of knowledge is facilitated through discourse, dialogue, and collaborative student-centered interactions among faculty and peers, facilitating the expansion and diversification of knowledge.

The CCL program provides students with perspectives on current knowledge in postsecondary education and on methods of inquiry aimed at improving the quality and ensuring the continued growth of community colleges. Through courses and other planned learning experiences, students critically examine current understandings of administration, leadership, organizational functioning, diversity, policy, technology, and student development. They also conduct research culminating in a dissertation constituting in a significant contribution to knowledge in the field of community college leadership.

The Community College Leadership (CCL) doctoral program is three years in length including an integrated dissertations process. Coursework is offered over the initial two years and six months of the Program. Students participate in regularly scheduled class sessions; and two summer sessions (two weeks each summer). Guided study over the Internet supports coursework. A dissertation clinic with faculty consultation is required to facilitate the completion of both the coursework and dissertation within the three year timeframe.

The Program seeks a diverse cohort of approximately 15-20 learners. Cohort members are encouraged to conduct their doctoral work, including dissertation, within a group support and learning model. The Program is designed for people working in community colleges. Its unique delivery system integrates academic study with practice and gives students the benefits of collaborative resources without interrupting their personal responsibilities and employment obligations.

Terminal Programmatic Outcomes

The coherence of the Community College Leadership doctoral program mission and programmatic outcomes with those of National-Louis University and the College of Arts and Science is preserved.

Assessing programmatic effectiveness and learning outcomes and using the generated data and information allow for continuous quality improvement. Evidence is provided via an annual systematic programmatic evaluation process that articulates both expected student outcomes, and a comprehensive program of analysis directed at measuring programmatic effectiveness. Some of the steps include a feedback loop where information and data gained from assessment are utilized to improve teaching, the curriculum, the outcome objectives, and other program areas. Later, another component will be added to measure student’s success as self-reported by the CCL doctoral graduates.

Upon successfully completing the Community College Leadership Doctoral program, students are expected to have acquired specific skills, abilities, qualities, and characteristics.

Expected outcomes for graduating CCL students include:

Utilize theories and skills from social, behavioral, organizational and management sciences which can be used to facilitate essential operations in the community college setting
Demonstrate mastery of research skills through professional presentations, scholarly writing and successful completion of a quality dissertation
Foster the effective use of multiple types of technology in the community college environment
Understand the complex interrelationships among the diverse stakeholders residing in the community college milieu
Demonstrate an understanding of leadership and administration as process for innovation, change, and transformation in community colleges
Transmit high ideals of cultural plurality, principles of multicultural education, and learn how to maximize the learning potential of those using a variety of educational opportunities provided by community colleges
Demonstrate an understanding of the convergence of globalization on the community college education system and an appreciation of diversity
Discuss contemporary educational thought on themes such as achievement, assessment, accountability, and evaluation related to programs and the community college institution as a whole
Demonstrate knowledge of federal, state, and local laws and policies as they affect the complexity of decision making in the community college
Analyze funding resources for community colleges, utilize the latest techniques in budget development, and evaluate the parity funding of education in the community college system.

American Association of Community Colleges (AACC)

Competencies for Community College Leaders

Undergirding the terminal programmatic outcomes are the Competencies for Community College Leaders delineated by the American Association for Community College. Development of the Competencies for Community College Leaders by the American Association of Community Colleges (AACC). On April 9, 2005, the AACC Board of Directors unanimously approved this document.

The following are the competencies prescribed by AACC:

Organizational Strategy

An effective community college leader strategically improves the quality of the institution, protects the long-term health of the organization, promotes the success of all students, and sustains the community college mission, based on knowledge of the organization, its environment, and future trends.

Illustrations:

Assess, develop, implement, and evaluate strategies regularly to monitor and improve the quality of education and the long-term health of the organization.
Use data-driven evidence and proven practices from internal and external stakeholders to solve problems, make decisions, and plan strategically.
Use a systems perspective to assess and respond to the culture of the organization; to changing demographics; and to the economic, political, and public health needs of students and the community.
Develop a positive environment that supports innovation, teamwork, and successful outcomes.
Maintain and grow college personnel and fiscal resources and assets.
Align organizational mission, structures, and resources with the college master plan.

Resource Management

An effective community college leader equitably and ethically sustains people, processes, and information as well as physical and financial assets to fulfill the mission, vision, and goals of the community college.

Illustrations:

Ensure accountability in reporting.
Support operational decisions by managing information resources and ensuring the integrity and integration of reporting systems and databases.
Develop and manage resource assessment, planning, budgeting, acquisition, and allocation processes consistent with the college master plan and local, state, and national policies.
Take an entrepreneurial stance in seeking ethical alternative funding sources.
Implement financial strategies to support programs, services, staff, and facilities.
Implement a human resources system that includes recruitment, hiring, reward, and performance management systems and that fosters the professional development and advancement of all staff.
Employ organizational, time management, planning, and delegation skills.
Manage conflict and change in ways that contribute to the long-term viability of the organization. Communication

An effective community college leader uses clear listening, speaking, and writing skills to engage in honest, open dialogue at all levels of the college and its surrounding community, to promote the success of all students, and to sustain the community college mission. Illustrations:

Articulate and champion shared mission, vision, and values to internal and external audiences, appropriately matching message to audience.
Disseminate and support policies and strategies.
Create and maintain open communications regarding resources, priorities, and expectations.
Convey ideas and information succinctly, frequently, and inclusively through media and verbal and nonverbal means to the board and other constituencies and stakeholders.
Listen actively to understand, comprehend, analyze, engage, and act.
Project confidence and respond responsibly and tactfully.

Collaboration

An effective community college leader develops and maintains responsive, cooperative, mutually beneficial, and ethical internal and external relationships that nurture diversity, promote the success of all students, and sustain the community college mission. Illustrations:

Embrace and employ the diversity of individuals, cultures, values, ideas, and communication styles.
Demonstrate cultural competence relative to a global society.
Catalyze involvement and commitment of students, faculty, staff, and community members to work for the common good.
Build and leverage networks and partnerships to advance the mission, vision, and goals of the community college.
Work effectively and diplomatically with unique constituent groups such as legislators, board members, business leaders, accreditation organizations, and others.
Manage conflict and change by building and maintaining productive relationships.
Develop, enhance, and sustain teamwork and cooperation.
Facilitate shared problem-solving and decision-making.

Community College Advocacy
An effective community college leader understands, commits to, and advocates for the mission, vision, and goals of the community college.
Illustrations:

Value and promote diversity, inclusion, equity, and academic excellence.
Demonstrate a passion for and commitment to the mission of community colleges and student success through the scholarship of teaching and learning.
Promote equity, open access, teaching, learning, and innovation as primary goals for the college, seeking to understand how these change over time and facilitating discussion with all stakeholders.
Advocate the community college mission to all constituents and empower them to do the same.
Advance life-long learning and support a learner-centered and learning-centered environment.
Represent the community college in the local community, in the broader educational community, at various levels of government, and as a model of higher education that can be replicated in international settings.

Professionalism

An effective community college leader works ethically to set high standards for self and others, continuously improve self and surroundings, demonstrate accountability to and for the institution, and ensure the long-term viability of the college and community.

Illustrations:

Demonstrate transformational leadership through authenticity, creativity, and vision.
Understand and endorse the history, philosophy, and culture of the community college.
Self-assess performance regularly using feedback, reflection, goal-setting, and evaluation.
Support lifelong learning for self and others.
Manage stress through self-care, balance, adaptability, flexibility, and humor.
Demonstrate the courage to take risks, make difficult decisions, and accept responsibility.
Understand the impact of perceptions, world views, and emotions on self and others.
Promote and maintain high standards for personal and organizational integrity, honesty, and respect for people.
Use influence and power wisely in facilitating the teaching-learning process and the exchange of knowledge.
Weigh short-term and long-term goals in decision-making.
Contribute to the profession through professional development programs, professional organizational leadership, and research/publication.

http://www.ccleadership.org/resource_center/competencies.htm