Produce plan for Modesto JC stability — or leave yourselves, college district | Opinion
The parade of heavy-hitting community leaders voicing deep concern for Modesto Junior College at a board meeting Wednesday was at once sobering and encouraging.
Sobering, because it’s clear that MJC’s leadership dysfunction is tearing at the hearts of some of the most respected among us. Encouraging, because seeing these leaders mobilize is a sign that the community will tolerate this train wreck no longer.
On the stand were those responsible for the revolving door of top management at MJC: Yosemite Community College District Chancellor Henry Yong and trustees Leslie Beggs, Nancy Hinton, Milt Richards, Don Davis, Jenny Nicolau, Darin Gharat and Antonio Aguilar.
Confronting them in the audience were former Chancellor Tom Van Groningen, former MJC president Stan Hodges, former interim president Steve Collins, MJC Foundation President John Schueber, and Stanislaus Community Foundation CEO Marian Kaanon. Among other education and business dignitaries were Lynn Dickerson, Mary Ann Sanders, Lou Friedman and Jeff Cowan.
The caliber and quantity of this list are impressive. It’s sad that the foundering of one of Modesto’s gems has forced them to unite.
In two decades, MJC “has gone from one of the most well-respected junior colleges in the state to an embarrassment for our community,” Dickerson said, adding that “MJC has lost its way” because of a lack of “strong leadership.” The problem has been noted several times on this opinion page: MJC’s position at rock bottom of California’s 115 community colleges for retention of presidents. Since 2000, we’ve had 16; the statewide average is 4.2.
“Having developed a reputation for a place where college presidents go to fail, it will be very difficult to recruit and retain the quality of leadership we so desperately need,” Dickerson said, laying blame on “a very weak chancellor and an overreaching board of trustees.”
Kaanon said she has provided references for departing administrators. Head hunters recruiting them for positions elsewhere “consistently apologize for what we’re going through at our local college; it’s the worst-kept secret in the state,” she said.
Both women noted MJC’s key role in training young people for jobs offered by area employers, and its failure to do so. MJC should be a workforce engine, “but the engine is broken,” Kaanon said.
Changing course
If such strong words and the worried faces of luminaries in the audience didn’t grab trustees’ attention, one wonders what will.
It’s time that those on the dais recognize the mess they and predecessors have made, and come up with a solid plan for stability.
Yong and trustees must commit to finding a president who appreciates MJC for the gem it is. They must drop the failed strategy of dangling short-term contracts — the last president was offered two years, and the one before, only 18 months, they told The Modesto Bee — and invest in someone who will invest in us.
To paraphrase Kaanon, a community college doesn’t belong to the people on Wednesday’s dais. It belongs to the community. It belongs to us.
We don’t deserve what’s happened to our beloved MJC. If YCCD leaders refuse to change course, they need to go.
This story was originally published January 12, 2023 at 12:00 PM.