The Advocate Vol. 49 Issue 27 - May 9, 2014

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The Independent Student Voice of Mt. Hood Community College

May 9, 2014

Volume 49 Issue 27

Eight staff members are now jobless s t u c t e g d u B

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employee cuts

Photo by Carole Riggs - The Advocate

MHCC President Debbie Derr (right) addresses Jack Schommer, Integrated Media instructor, at her informational budget and coffee session on Tuesday

by Greg Leonov & Katelyn Hilsenbeck

partment; Laurie Linn, executive coordinator of Administrative Services; Pam Polito, recruitment specialist for Human Resources; Maggie Huffman, director of communications for MHCC; Michelle Gregory, director of community engagement for MHCC; Sue Aschim, manager of auxiliary services; and Karen Reynolds, manager of environmental health and safety. Facing the layoffs, Aschim and Reynolds elected to take early retirement instead, Derr’s office reported. Derr told assembled staff on Tuesday, “I really believe we need to address the fact that we’ve lost some folks.” She offered counseling to Mt. Hood employees shaken by the changes. Previously, Derr had mandated a

The Advocate A Mt. Hood board of directors budget meeting on Wednesday addressed the unfortunate news of elimination of 16 employee positions from the MHCC proposed 2014-15 budget, including the layoff of eight current employees. “It was a very, very difficult day,” said Debbie Derr, MHCC president, during an informative budget discussion with staff and students held a day earlier, when the affected workers were notified. Employees laid off were: Norm Woods, client technologies technician, and Jeff Sperley, online learning web CT technician, from the IT de-

Editorial: Our support staff play an integral role Page 2

6 percent campus wide budget reduction, which was predicted to save the college $5 million, she said. However, the school actually saved only $3.3 million. Therefore, she decided to eliminate the 16 positions from of the 2014-15 budget. “I’m hopeful that we won’t have to have any more position eliminations,” said Derr of the budget-cutting work ahead. On the flip side, Derr also announced in an all-staff email sent Monday that the college will hire three more full-time faculty members. On Tuesday, she explained that the school has a labor contract agreement to maintain a 60 percent full-time employee level, and that adding three positions was necessary. She said ad-

Profile of the month:

ministrators have identified which two positions make most sense, and are working to identify a third. Derr said she anticipates a shift from part-time to full-time employees to accommodate the 60 percent requirement. She noted that with a decreasing number of available class sections next year, part-time faculty will not have as much of a teaching load. Derr assured her audience that “My goals have not changed,” and that her focus is on the success of students and creating a financially sound institution. In response, several people attending on Tuesday voiced concern about the thin number of staff in Facilities. One of the vacant positions

eliminated is a custodian position. With more third-party events proposed to be held on campus, Derr said if the school has to, it will hire extra hands (contract out servcies) for the day, in that case. Jennifer DeMent, MHCC chief financial officer, explained that the school is implementing a new “work loading” software. It allows managers to load a blueprint of the school and fill in when they want each physical area cleaned. The software will then calculate how many custodians are needed. In addition, DeMent said the school is looking to create a new custodial management position.

Budget

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Recognizing deserving students at the recommendation of MHCC staff

Student shuffles photography major, graphic design for ASG by Greg Leonov The Advocate Mt. Hood photography student Sarah Hyndshaw creates graphic art for ASG while also working in the print shop burrowed beneath the Academic Cernter’s 1200 building. She started attending Mt. Hood while still in high school, thinking that she wanted to be a web designer, but eventually changed her mind. “I decided that it wasn’t for me, and then I went for animation – I wanted to be a cartoonist, a children’s book illustrator,” Hyndshaw said. She decided she wanted to pursue a career as an artist, and left to enroll at the Art Institute of Portland. After attending the Art Institute, Hyndshaw changed her mind again and decided to return to MHCC and study photography through its Integrated

Media program. “Photography’s always been very interesting to me. I’m pretty artistic in general,” she said. Hyndshaw said she enjoys the program at Mt. Hood because the teachers are really knowledgeable: “They definitely know the field, because they actually do it, or have done it.” The first-year student has the opportunity to learn aspects of photography she didn’t think were important to the craft. “It definitely is very beneficial,” she said. “I’ve learned a lot since I’ve started — ­ a lot that I’ve never really considered, like lighting and stuff.” Food and people are the focus of Hyndshaw’s photographs. “Food is awesome. It tastes good and is something that everybody enjoys usually, which has a certain beauty to it, and people are just fun in general because they have their own personalities,” she said.

She hopes to eventually have her work displayed in food magazines, which she sees as the evidence of achievement in her passion. “That’ll be like... ‘This is legit, my work is in a magazine, and suddenly special,’ ” she said. Hyndshaw enjoys doing the artwork for ASG. “It’s been really positive, (the student leaders are) all very friendly and they all have a certain kind of personality that is much different from my own. “I make art for them because most of them are artistically challenged, which is perfectly fine,” she said. She began doing graphic art for the ASG in mid-February, after the group’s previous graphic designer had to step down. “Everybody in ASG is very business-oriented. They all want to be doctors, lawyers, politicians, and leaders,” Hyndshaw said. “I don’t really consider myself a leader ,per se, so it’s interesting being around people who are very

much different than me.” She encourages business-oriented students to “pursue your passion and lead the world, ’cause that’s great,” she said. “I’m really inspired by those people.” Working in the print shop, as well as creating graphic art, Hyndshaw has the rare opportunity of being involved in the entire process of creating printed work. “Honestly, it’s kind of a weird sort of thing being in ASG and being here, too, because I will make something up there, and then I will print it down here.” Being involved in every step of the production process, she is very thorough with her work. “I know I could fix it, (know) how to fix it. It kind of makes me want to be even more detail-oriented, because I have such a connection to it — I’m printing it,” she said. “It becomes ‘more.’ ”

Sarah Hyndshaw POTM

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2013 FIRST PLACE

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