Page 16 - Flathead Beacon // 2.4.15

16 | FEBRUARY 4. 2015 NEWS FLATHEADBEACON.COM FVCC Wins Prestigious Community College Award
By BEACON STAFF
Flathead Valley Community College recently received a highly acclaimed na- tional award for improving students’ ac- cess to financial aid.
FVCC was one of three institutions to receive the 2015 Community Col- lege Bellwether Award, one of the high- est honors for community colleges in the U.S. The award was announced ear- lier this month at the annual Commu- nity College Futures Assembly in Lake Buena Vista, Fla. The award recogniz- es competitively selected leading-edge programs in community colleges wor- thy of replicating.
FVCC won the award in the Plan- ning, Governance and Finance category, which recognizes programs or activities that have been designed and success- fully implemented to improve efficiency and effectiveness in the community col- lege.
FVCC’s project, “Using Financial Aid Data and Fundraising Strategies to Improve Access, Persistence and Com- pletion through Scholarships,” was pre- sented by college Executive Director of Institutional Advancement Colleen Unterreiner and Executive Director of Institutional Research, Assessment and Planning Brad Eldredge, Ph.D.
The project involved the Flathead Valley Community College Foundation
The Flathead Valley Community College campus in Kalispell. BEACON FILE PHOTO
est honors an institution can receive. The awards are similar to being selected by your peers for the Oscar or Emmy Award,” said Dale, F. Campbell, Ph.D., professor and director of the Commu- nity College Futures Assembly and In- stitute of Higher Education. “Leaders of past winning programs have obtained ‘free agency’ status through the dem- onstrated results their programs have made. Leaders from the winning insti- tution are often recruited by other col- leges to replicate the award-winning program. They also receive hundreds of phone calls and visits by other colleges wanting to replicate the success of their program.”
The Community College Futures As- sembly serves as an independent policy summit, to identify the critical issues facing community college leaders, while showcasing leading edge programs with demonstrated results, worthy of repli- cating.
This year, approximately 1,000 pro- grams were nominated nationwide with over 300 applications received. Peer-re- viewed committees judge entries in each of the three categories to select 10 final- ists to travel to Lake Buena Vista to pres- ent and showcase their programs. In the last two decades, only 53 programs have been honored with the prestigious Bell- wether Award.
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collaborating with the college’s financial aid and institutional research offices to examine the relationship of scholar- ships financed with FVCC Foundation event proceeds to persistence and com- pletion. Study outcomes motivated the Foundation to improve marketing of the scholarship program, increase revenues for scholarships and transform its schol- arship program to better impact student success.
“This is a tremendous honor,” said FVCC President Jane A. Karas, Ph.D.
“We have seen significant growth in our Foundation and donor support since we began measuring the Foundation’s im- pact on student success. The support of our donors has transformed our abil- ity to help students succeed and has re- sulted in measurable increases in per- sistence and completion. We hope other community colleges across the nation will be inspired to explore this effective model.”
“In more than 1,200 national com- munity colleges, this is one of the high-
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