accreditation reference handbook. again, it's a peer process. so, the standards also go through an evaluation process where they can make changes to those standards. they're general statements of what an institution needs to have. the commission and the standards do not dictate how to meet that standard. so, most general statements might be that your budgeting systems are integrated with your planning systems. they don't specify exactly how you do that. the institution needs to do that itself. it might state -- the standard will state the institution must have a mission statement that's regularly reviewed by using this governance processes and evaluated on a regular basis. >> so, this is a state set standard or is it the acc/jc set standard? >> there is the accreditation community that the board of junior colleges. the larger organization is the western association of schools and colleges.

so, there is the commission for the senior colleges and universities. there is the commission that deals with elementary, middle school, and high schools. and this is the one for junior and community colleges. >> so, as far as like our department of education for the state of california, that doesn't have necessarily a role that is played in terms of how standards are set -- [multiple voices] >> there needs to be alignment, of course, with whatever the federal regulations are, state regulations. >> so, is that for the acc/jc role of accountability with -- directly with state or federal level? >> they are reviewed by the u.s. department of education and there's another body called the council higher education -- council of higher education of accreditation. it's called chia. >> thank you. >> and i can send more formal

information on that as well. the commissioners of the accrediting commission are faculty members from other institutions. there are 19 commissioners. there are some that represents -- there are three members that represent public interests. there are administrators, some other member institutions, and then people representing other educational entities. they go through a nomination process and it's the chief executive officer, the chancellors and presidents who elect the commissioners. and, again, it's a peer review process. the commission is basically servicing all of its member institutions in this peer review process. evaluation teams are also composed of faculty members, administrators, even trustees of other institutions when they come to evaluate an institution. i need to make clear also the accreditation standards need to be met at all times. so, it's not like you go through a review process, check

mark, great job, and then you stop what you're doing and you get ready for the next evaluation. you need to be in compliance at all times. those are the basics of the commission. and again, i'll give you more information on that. to provide you just an overall update of where we are at this point, on july 3, 2013, the accrediting commission for community and junior colleges acc/jc, they announced their decision to terminate accreditation effective july 31, 2014. the decision is not final. it's not a final decision. city college remains open, accredited. we are pursuing a review and appeal process. they have procedures and processes and we will be following those by laws and policies to pursue the review and appeal process. that will take a long time. and as long as we're undergoing the review and appeal process,

the college still remains open, accredited, enrolling students. >> when you say a long time, what does that mean? >> you have to read the policy. it could take up to a year. i don't know. it depends how long each process takes. there is a review process. if they uphold the determination that we're terminated, then we go into the appeal process. and we're going to be pursuing that process. >> so, the action of the trustee agrila is within the context of review and appeal process or agrila is actually working toward another pathway to maintain accreditation that i read in the paper he's calling on hopefully we'll make progress, and then the spring of next year is going to call on another review to see if -- by the acc/jc to see if there is going to be ability to maintain accreditation and keep the school open?

that's what i read. >> so, my understanding is that the state chancellor appointed the special trustee, dr. robert agrela as our special trustee, and it's really just to expedite decision-making process. to be accredited, we still need to make significant changes to meet the accreditation standards. we made significant progress in the last year. we still do not meet the accreditation standards, even though we went from, let's say point c to point b, and amazing work was achieved by our faculty and changes in administration and operations. to move from point b to point a, that work still needs to be accomplished and it needs to be accomplished as quickly as possible so that we meet the accreditation standards. and that's what we are all focused on, is meeting the accreditation standards as quickly as possible while we pursue the review and appeal process so that they can

reconsider their decision. our focus right now is very much -- >> so, there is a review and appeal process going on and there is also the work that the trustee is doing to hopefully maintain accreditation. >> with the college. i mean, it's not just -- he's helping to expedite the decision-making processes, but it's really the college pulling together to implement the action plan that we set forth to meet the accreditation standards. >> and, so, is the trustee supporting the review and appeal process? he's working under that rubric? >> yes. the special fruit trustee is working closely with the state chancellor's office, working with our chancellor ~ -- he's going to be meeting with various folks and sending out messages and really supporting the process to meet the accreditation standards. it's whatever we need to do so

that we can say we've achieved the standards. >> okay. >> i believe supervisor campos has a question. >> thank you, madam chair. so, who decides whether or not the accreditation standards have been met? >> the commission makes the final determination. they take a look at the entire history of the institution. they review the team evaluating report, the visiting team that came, the report that they prepared. they take into consideration the testimony that the chancellor, the special trustee and myself provided to the commission. we sort of plead our case of the changes that we've made. and they take a look at our show-cause report that we prepared, which was a self-evaluation of how -- how well we're doing to meet the standard, where we fall short, and what our plans are to meet the standards.

and the commission makes its decision. >> and what standards does the commission follow in making that decision? >> i can't answer that question. the original standards of accreditation, if you read them and you look at where the college is, it's very clear if we've met it or not, yes or no. when you read our report, significant changes were made, but perhaps not completed. so, for example, the mission statement, we fell short a year ago and the standard reads something to the effect that the institution will review its mission statement, governance process and review it on a regular basis. we had not reviewed our mission statement in more than four years or something like that. so, last year we did a review. we made some changes to the mission statement, but we did not put in processes in place to conduct the regular review. we changed the policy that said that the board of trustees will conduct an annual review. we put in some other action

plans to meet the mission. we need to go through that review process again. >> i guess what i don't understand is that if the elected board rightly decided, you know what, we're going to follow the advice of the team that has been working here for the last year and let them do whatever they say that we need to do to, to, you know, not lose our accreditation, they did that. you guys have been there saying, do this, do that, but then it turns out that whatever that team was saying to them, was that enough? i mean, what do you do then? where is the accountability in that case? >> i'm not understanding your question, i'm sorry. >> that's the problem. [laughter] >> that's the problem that i think that there is a disconnect between what these folks are doing and what's actually happening on the ground. where is the accountability by the acc/jc, who is it accountable to? >> they're accountable to the u.s. department of education.

>> and -- >> and again, it's a peer. it is not a private organization. they're elected members. they are representing all the institutions in california. >> so, you know, i've heard that they get some funding from some foundations. do you know whether or not that's the case? >> i don't. >> do you think that would be relevant to know how objective they are? >> my job is to focus on meeting the accreditation standards so that we retain our education and this institution. i know everybody here in the room understands the vital importance that it has for the city and community. and accreditation is the public assurance that we meet a standard that all institutions are held to. and that is our goal. that's my goal and role. and, again, vice harris came

and he spoke to the leadership of our institution. he spoke with -- it was a group meeting. it included academic senate leadership, classified senate leadership, afp 21 21, aeiu [speaker not understood], department chair, and he made it clear that what the college needs to do to keep its accreditation is to continue the work and continue the momentum to meet the accreditation standards. and that -- he gave a great analogy. you're in the middle of a game and the game has an end timeline. you cannot stop to argue about the rules of the game and use city college as collateral. do that outside. right now everybody needs to work together to meet the accreditation standards. so that the commission will reconsider its decision. the clock is ticking, and

that's what we've got to do. >> the problem with that analogy is that the game is not a fair game if the referee has their own agenda -- (applause) [cheering and applauding] >> and is -- has already decided which team should win. that's the problem here. (applause) >> all right. would you like to continue with the presentation? >> that's pretty much where we're at. we're focusing on our action plan, continuing to make changes in the institution, and trying to get the word out that we're open, we're accredited, and we're enrolling students. >> [inaudible]. >> all right, everyone, i know this is a very passionate issue for all of us, but i want to make sure we respect all speakers who are here. so, with that, i don't know if we need to call up hydra mendoza from the mayor's office. >> and if we can pass around

the few items. it is the accrediting commission questions and answers for commonly asked questions and answers as well as the frequently asked questions for our students that we are promoting and hope that you will help us in promoting. and i thank you for your assistance and the city's for supporting city college. thank you. >> thank you. >> thank you. >> good morning, supervisors. i'm hydra mendoza, mayor lee's education [speaker not understood] advisor. thank you for having me in the committee. i was asked to give you an update on the involvement of the mayor and what we've been doing in support of city college. so, there absolutely no question the value of city college and many of us attended and many of us continue to support the work that they're doing. the mayor has not been asked -- in regards to his involvement, a lot of the work that we've been doing has been part much behind the scenes, offering up services that come from staff

mostly. ~ absent and making sure that they have what's available in terms of our resources. and, so, we've been really focused on making sure that our students and our families continue to go to a high-quality educational institution that will not only bring them to higher education, but work force development. so, the mayor has provided several key staff members that include kate howard, our budget director, ben rosenfield our controller, mickey callahan and [speaker not understood] from the department of human resources, [speaker not understood], and myself. and although we haven't been in discussions about program decision making and those types of things, we're fully aware that departments can be helpful and supportive. and you know that our work in the city is deeply affected by what happens to city college. more recently, we came together with several of the department heads that will be deeply impacted to city college not remain, which is what's driving

our desire to keep accreditation in place in addition to the students and families. so, our office of economic and work force development has work force training classes [speaker not understood] tech s.f., the health care academy and the hospitality initiative line. our office of [speaker not understood] education and first five, preschool for all, metro academy metro -- excuse me, [speaker not understood], subsidized care and special development. our department of youth and families have our college readiness housed there with our bridge to success which has been incredibly meaningful for many of our sfusd students going into city college and we've actually increased significantly the number of enrollees that go to city college from san francisco unified school district. and our human services agency which supports cal work [speaker not understood] ged [speaker not understood], those kinds of things, to bring our families there. we also want to make available our real estate department, the department of public works and

mta. with the real estate department, this is actually something we did with san francisco unified school district and supervisor campos, you will remember this. there was a lot of title work that actually -- the school district owned but was under the city and i don't think that kind of an evaluation has ever been completed. so, just in terms of knowing what city college has in valuing property, the department of public works, we're going to be engaging with them to help with beautification. we have kids come onto the campus, make some efforts to clean and beautify. and then talking to mta on advertising on buses because enrollment is going to be one of our key pieces to helping city college. the mayor also has a mayor's education leadership council which is -- are the members of all of the chancellors and presidents of every higher institution here in san francisco as well as the superintendent. so, we've engaged with them because it's really important

for them to understand the challenges of one of their colleagues and the institution which many of their students come from. so, we've been working closely with them as well. they are clear on what they need to do and around accreditation and for the mayor to get professionally advised on how they can be supportive. and some of things that have come out of that is superintendent will send [speaker not understood]. it is important for us to ensure that kids understand it's still open, they're enrolling, and that credits are good. dr. leslie wong from san francisco state has set up a hotline to answer questions with regards to transfer students and they're preparing to take field trip students in the spring and he's been working with his own trustees to see how these kinds of accommodationses can get made. usf golden gate university and other private institutions are looking to take and support

students as needed for the four-year transition piece and do any support pieces that need to happen around that as well. so, the special trustee has been really clear about what his priorities are going to be and that a lot of that is around suring up the internal operations. and, so, that's where we've been focusing because we know that's what we can provide. we want to just make sure that they have access to any of our city resources around that departments can offer. so, for example, if it's around hiring or if it's around auditing or if it's key pieces where we have staffing that's available to help support or have another eye take a look at that, we're going to be providing that. the mayor has been really focused on looking at the self-evaluation of the college, the recommendations that were developed by not only staff, but with the elected trustees.

and we're really wanting to focus on getting those accomplished in a much swifter manner and that's where our energies have been placed. thank you. >> thank you. just a couple questions. so, on the pathway to accreditation, can you say what the mayor sees in terms of opportunities for the college to be able to transform itself? not just meeting accreditation standards, but is there a vision that the mayor has in terms of what more the college could be that could help guide the work efficacy departments do? >> i think it's really clear the importance in value, particularly around work force development and our higher education opportunities for our kids transferring over. that was our huge focus area. i have asked all of the departments that i had mentioned to outline the areas that they are engaged and the impact that it would have if it was eliminated. and, so, i have that available to you so you can clearly

understand how the city is very attached to city college and the work in which we provide together. you know, i think, i think a lot of what we're waiting for is the action plan that the special trustee is laying out so when dr. grella has an action plan in place we can be more intentional about the work we want to provide. we're not -- what we're certainly speaking with the state chancellor and dr. arduella what they need, but we also want to start thinking about what are the other areas in the city that we can be helpful. ~ at [speaker not understood] office, our aso, is it around real estate? is it around dpw? are there other areas we can be helpful? what we don't want to do is to tell the college, this is what you need to do. i think the college is really clear about the challenges that it has, the report, the recommendation. there are some very clear areas that have identified what it is

that they need to accomplish, and we want to be helpful in helping them get there. >> in terms of helping students go into higher education, i just met before the hearing with student leaders from the school and talked -- what i've heard, you know, i'm learning a lot about city college day to day, it seems. not in my jurisdiction, but talked about how there is a real achievement gap we have in our school district, which you are aware of and you've been fighting against. and that continues on for many students, black and brown students, pacific islander students, into city college. it seems like an area of change that is needed, probably addressed in acc/jc report, wondering if the mayor has -- is looking at the outcomes for students of color like that and that's something that the mayor would like to be able to steer. >> right. so, in terms of the achievement

gap, i mean, that's not the area that the mayor wants to focus on. i mean, that's what the college and organization -- institutions like sfusd need to pay close attention to. so, again, we're not going to be as the mayor's office focusing on how do we close the achievement gap, how do we make sure our kids are ready. although we do support many of our programs and dcyf has invested significant dollars and we have a $3 million grant with the gate foundation to develop success which actually aligns a lot of our work together. and through that work we are actually able to have priority placement for sfusd students so our students that were coming into city college weren't at city college for five or six years and then dropping off. it also allowed us to register students right away with kids that were thinking about going, but not really sure if they wanted to go, who have now -- are showing great strides and being successful at city college. so, our priority around that piece of it is to be able to support the programs that have shown growth and success and

actually bridge the success was pointed out in the acc/jc's report as a program that has really been outstanding for the college in terms of aligning the work with our sfusd students. many of our kids that go from city college on to san francisco state require some remediation. so, we're looking at how do we ensure that our kids are actually ready to go on and move on. and that's what the mayor's council has actually been about, is to make sure all of the higher institutions are talking together and that there aren't these different waves of measurement. i'll give you a quick example. in san francisco unified, what we were considering proficient was a much smaller level of proficiency of city college and, so, how do we make sure when we're graduating do we think we're proficient, that they, too, are going to be proficient and successful at city college. so, there have been ways we have been looking at both pieces. >> do you see any room for growth and improvement in that?

you said outstanding which is pretty high level. where do you see things need to go in terms of strengthening that? we do hear from people -- i just had a packed office with students who feel that, you know, city college is not doing enough to make sure that people can actually spend less time, maybe two years instead of five or six years and going on to four-year institutions. so, what we can do in your work in the mayor's office. >> so, this is exactly where the report comes into play in terms of what city college is going to have to start looking at. so, we're not moving kids -- if classes aren't being available and we're not looking by on demand, [speaker not understood], those are the kind of pieces that city college is going to have to think about in terms of restructuring and making sure that those classes are available so that our kids can move on.

i think there's going to be some -- as part of the plan, really thinking about how do we -- how do we be more supportive and more efficient for our kids. the student services piece was a really large part of the recommendations that needed to be addressed in the plan. and, so, those are going to be some places that i think the college will have to seriously focus on. >> my last question, just again on the pathway to accreditation, what does the mayor see as threats to the college? a lot of people have been talking about possible sale of public assets, downsizing, that we're going to be cutting programs that have been very successful, people talk about our enrichment programs for adult education could be turned away. what does the mayor see as real threats to what the college actually provides? >> i think all of those pieces are going to be really important in terms of [speaker not understood] and the history of the college.

but again, that's not -- those are going to be decisions that the college will have to make based on -- and i will easily say for the mayor, that a lot of it has to be done based on data and information and really thinking about how do we make the college sustainable. our biggest concern is that a year out from now we have no college at all. so, our kid will have nowhere to go. our work force will have nowhere to be trained and our faculty and students will be out on the curb. so, we really want to pay our closest attention to making sure that within this year that we're making some immediate movement around what needs to get ticked off. now, the question around whether or not those are the proper things that need to get ticked off or whether or not the acc/jc is putting things in front of us that are challenging, you know, i think we all face as higher educational institutions in general some minimum standards.

we have to have standards for our kids and we want to make sure that what we're providing meets those standards. having said that, it is not the academic portion of city college that's in question. the academics that our faculty provides at city college -- (applause) >> -- is phenomenal. so, the accreditation commission isn't questioning what's happening in the classroom and how well that our kids are -- or whether or not our teachers are providing the proper -- meeting those proper standards. but there is some questions around whether or not the students are getting provided the proper support, whether or not there are some efficiencies in the finance area. so, you know, when there was a lot of conversation around let's give city college more money, it wasn't that's what -- even if we gave city college more money, the foundation piece of it was our biggest concern. so, it wasn't that we wouldn't give city college more money.

we're just not confident that the way in which the monies would get distributed and used are going to be efficient and that that foundational piece is intact. so, the -- [multiple voices] >> i really appreciate that component, the level of academic curriculum or standards that we have in the school. but that also -- there is a threat to that. there is a threat to some of our academic programs at city college not being around if the decisions that come down that we have to make are to [speaker not understood] some of these programs. i think that's something that -- [multiple voices] >> so, the program piece again is i think something city college really has to dig deep and think about what's going to be the best for our kids to go on to higher ed and for work force to be, to be robust. and, so, you know, i think when

the program piece discussions happen which may or may not happen during this evaluation process, during the review process or during the accreditation process, because if you read the recommendations, nowhere in it does it say, and cut esl. and cut wine tasting. it doesn't say what are the programs that have to be cut. what it does say, though, is that you have to be able to be self-sustaining. you have to be able to use -- to have a foundation of efficiency. you have to be able to run a college. that will be there for years to come. and, so, you know, again, focusing on the program piece of it, you know, we will have some opinions about programs that deeply affect our residents, particularly around esl, but what we won't support are things like esl classes that have three students in it.

so, and those are the kinds of things we're going to have to weigh in on. if it has three students in an esl class, we could be hiring a calculus teacher because calculus classes are packed. i mean, those, again, are going to be some of the really difficult decisions that city college will have to weigh in on. >> supervisor campos. >> thank you. thank you very much. let me say that i'm very grateful to hydra, commissioner mendoza. i'm glad you're involved in this because i think you have a great deal of experience and i think you bring a very important perspective. and i think that you have the respect of a lot of us. so, i'm glad to see you here. this is the fundamental question that i have. and i speak as someone who -- as a deputy city attorney, what's sent to the school district 10 years ago to help clean up the mess that had been left over by a prior administration and we