Building a Healthy Learning Community
In the interest of cultivating a climate of openness and collegiality and unity, the administration initiated two separate orientation meetings in late September and early October. The first meeting involved the College administration, faculty, staff and workers. The second included those plus the students.
To have everyone “on the same page”, both orientations began by calling attention to the College’s purpose, mission, vision and values. The President, Kiros Teka, traced the history, reporting what the College has achieved within the last 22 years. He reported on the previous year’s fiscal plan and its accomplishments and its challenges. Then the group heard reports from the four subsections: Finance and Administration, Academic Dean, Public Relations, and the Dean of Students.
The whole community’s eyes and ears were opened as they heard about all the work that goes into running a successful College. They participated in discussion, raising questions, and sharing suggestions. Some of the issues that came up included instructors’ capacity building and scholarship, the College’s relations with other educational institutions, good governance, overtime payment, research on contemporary issues, implementing the launching of the Liberal/Social Arts program, serving God and the church as one community, the abhorrence of plagiarism or literary theft and fabrication in the field of education, the need of on-time tuition fee payment, students’ punctuality, discouraging ethical decline, keeping the neatness of the College compound, making a maximum effort towards academic success, keeping a focus on the mission, vision, and values of the College, participating in the College’s promotion work among the home churches and regions and so on.
In his conclusion, President Kiros challenged the students to support the College in prayer and by enhancing strong relationships with the local congregations, and in promoting its fund raising efforts for building and scholarship support.
—Reported by Teku Kebede