The five-member team from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools that interviewed administrators, faculty, staff and students at FAMU last week to determine if issues such as financial mismanagement and poor governance had been fixed said they were pleased at the progress the university has made since being placed on probation. "In the three months since receipt of the notification, FAMU has made remarkable progress," Robert Gratz, chairman of the on-site accreditation committee, said in a news release.
Gratz added that a "broad range" of corrective action had been taken. The team said governance and the hiring of qualified administrators are "moot" issues now for FAMU. They also offered suggestions that focused on finance and audit receipts.
The committee will draft a report on its findings during the interviews. FAMU will receive a draft to check for accuracy. Then, the final report will be sent to a SACS compliance committee. That committee will recommend one of three options for FAMU in December.
The monitoring team will either recommend that probation is dropped, continued or that FAMU lose membership to SACS to full Commission on Colleges who will decide FAMU's fate in December.
Meanwhile, State auditors will be on campus next week to begin examing the financial statement the university turned in on September 17th.
Also see: FAMU turns financial statement in on time
This is good news. There is no question that Dr. Ammmons is on the job. The key for us is to get past these issues and press on. Remaining accredited should not be the goal. Becoming better and better for our students, the community and ourselves should be the goal.
ReplyDeleteTo anonymous...REMAINING accredited SHOULD BE the goal, along with becoming better and better for our students, the community, and ourselves! Without total and full accreditation, we will not exist! I agree, this is good news!
ReplyDeleteThis is great news. Thank you Dr. Ammons and Team for your hard work and leadership. I realize there is more work to do, but we have so much confidence in you and your ability to take us to a level that no other university in the world has ever been before. I'm ready for the ride. Thank you again.
ReplyDeleteWe love you Dr. Ammons & Leadership Team. Thank you, thank you, thank you.
ReplyDeleteMy financial contribution is in the mail.
RN, can you verify street committee rumors that there will be a downsizing of all assistant and associate deans across the campus, that certain schools & colleges at the university have too many "assistants this" and "assistant thats"? Also, much of what we see here on RN is a repete of what's already in the Tallahassee Democrat newspaper, and many of us go online and know this stuff already.
ReplyDeleteI hear you anonymous 2:23 p.m. I would like to get the "inside scoop" from RN rather than a "repeat" of what we already know.
ReplyDeleteCan you tell us what the plan is regarding the proposed "management downsizing" of certain Schools and Colleges.
Do you know what the deal is with Arts & Sciences???
The on-site accreditation committee also stated that FAMU is already compliant in two of the areas on which it was cited as being deficient under the previous administration:
ReplyDelete"The SACS committee reported that based on their review, the issues of board oversight and competent administrators are 'moot.'"
http://www.famu.edu/?a=headlines&p=display&news=422
On Arts & Sciences, don't be surprised if the new university administration decides to divide it into two (or more) colleges.
ReplyDeleteNCCU's College of Arts & Sciences comprised two-thirds of the student population when Ammons arrived there. He divided it into three separate colleges.
FAMU's College of Arts & Sciences currently has more than half the university's student population.
Sorry 1:54, this is 1:50, I meant remaining accredited should not be our sole goal.
ReplyDeleteAnonymous said...
ReplyDeleteOn Arts & Sciences, don't be surprised if the new university administration decides to divide it into two (or more) colleges.
NCCU's College of Arts & Sciences comprised two-thirds of the student population when Ammons arrived there. He divided it into three separate colleges.
FAMU's College of Arts & Sciences currently has more than half the university's student population.
10/06/2007 3:46 PM
Please explain further if possible. Thanks!
The Herald-Sun (Durham, NC)
ReplyDeleteJune 21, 2006 Wednesday
Final Edition
NCCU likely to redo biggest academic unit;
3 colleges likely to replace current Arts and Sciences
PAUL BONNER
SECTION: DURHAM; Pg. D1
N.C. Central University's trustees are expected today to approve splitting the biggest of the school's academic units, the College of Arts and Sciences, into three colleges.
As it stands now, the College of Arts and Sciences includes 22 departments as disparate as math and theater and makes up two-thirds of NCCU's students, faculty and staff. The new plan would divide it into colleges of science and technology, social sciences and behavioral studies, and liberal arts, each with its own dean.
One dean, Cesar Jackson, currently oversees the college. Under the new plan, Jackson, a physicist, would become dean of science and technology, and the university will create positions for deans and associate deans of the other colleges.
Trustees of the Educational Planning and Academic Affairs Committee approved the plan unanimously with no discussion Tuesday and referred it to the full Board of Trustees for action during its meeting today. If approved, the measure will go to the UNC Board of Governors for its OK.
The plan has been discussed at NCCU for the past six years, Provost Beverly Washington Jones told the trustee committee. NCCU's Faculty Senate and other campus deliberative bodies have approved it.
NCCU's growth in recent years increases the need for the reorganization even more, Washington Jones said. The university is expecting more than 8,500 students next year.
Other campuses in the UNC system have made similar divisions, she said.
'Quality of education'
Fayetteville State University in 2004 split its College of Arts and Sciences into a College of Humanities and Social Sciences and a College of Basic and Applied Sciences.
Smaller academic divisions could give better instruction and student support, Washington Jones said.
"Why should an institution do this?" she asked. "No. 1, a growing student population. And if your emphasis is on the quality of education and assuring you're looking at retention and graduation and the advising of these students, it's going to be important that you create a structure that will support and augment the support of our students."
Washington Jones has recommended interim deans for two of the new colleges from a committee's nominations.
"Also if you think about how we have been operating, 22 departments under one dean, that's somewhat difficult, to say the least," she said.
The university also will consider consolidating some programs, such as merging environmental science, earth science and geography, Washington Jones said.
"We think it will be to our advantage to have academic units with smaller numbers of departments," NCCU Chancellor James Ammons said afterward.
It's official
In other business, the committee heard a report from Robert L. Chapman Jr., assistant to the interim dean of NCCU's School of Business, Bijoy Sahoo, on the annual meeting of the Association of Collegiate Business Schools and Programs.
NCCU was formally awarded its reaccreditation of the business school during last weekend's meeting in Chicago.
The school lost its accreditation with the ACBSP at the end of last year because it had failed to file a self-evaluation on time while it pursued accreditation with the more prestigious Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business. The school's dean, Benjamin Newhouse, resigned, and the school regained accreditation with the ACBSP in four months, a much shorter time than usual.
Trustees and officials Tuesday applauded as Chapman passed around the framed certificate.
"This accomplishment is really something special," Ammons said.
The trustees committee also approved a plan to offer a master's degree of social work focusing on juvenile justice.
i agree with anonymous 10/06/2007, 2:23...FAMU's website is being update everyday now with new things and they've developed their own blog that broke the story on SACS way earlier than you guys did...is RN slipping????
ReplyDeleteWhat is the URL for the FAMU administration's blog?
ReplyDeleteThe new FAMU blog, which comes directly out of the public relations division, is:
ReplyDeletewww.rattlerWire.com
It's very nice, too. I believe James Ammons' public relations/director of communications, Sharon Saunders, is the administrative coordinator behind this effort. We know with this one, which is officially sanctioned by the university, will not contain all of the mad, crazy stuff that the OLD RN had on it, in terms of folks calling people out and cursing and name-calling and that sort of thing. There's a system for anonymous comments (much like RN), but of course, that blog will be closely monitored and controlled (as it should be), and no uglg, nasty, derogatory postings will be allowed. And that's a good thing, because it is an official representation of the university and that, of course, means that it's an official representation of Dr. Ammons and the entire university. His entire team is on it. CVB didn't have the smarts and wherewithal to jumpstart such a thing. Plus, the university made an announcement of it in the Tallahassee Democrat in its "Campus Notes" on 10/7/07, so you know the site will contain worthy and meritorious news.
Are you sure that's the correct URL? Nothing's coming up.
ReplyDeleteThe address is http://rattlerwire.blogspot.com. The FAMU PR Office is now Rattler Nation's next door neighbor.
ReplyDelete10/06/2007 3:21 PM
ReplyDeleteSomeone please inform me of the purpose of the sacs and assessment office. FAMU should not be going thru this mess.
Are there any renderings of the new teaching gym?
ReplyDeleteSACS is one of six regional accreditors of higher ed in the US. They are recognized by the US Secretary of Education to "accredit" schools for eligibility for federal student grants and loan guarantees (HEA Title IV).
ReplyDeleteNeedless to say, without accreditation and the federal funds that this makes available, FAMU would die.