Another important aspect of a Department Chair's job is to manage enrollment. In a previous section, I talked about how I participate in various career fairs to aid in recruitment.

​

Part of enrollment management is also setting schedules for each semester. I do this with the input of my two fulltime faculty members. We are currently investigating setting up a structured pathway to ensure students get into the classes they need when they need them. It also helps students setup a specific time and day that they know they will have classes each semester so they can schedule their work and child care schedules around those times and not have to guess each semester.

​

Because I manage the classrooms and labs, and we want students to be able to use the labs when the rooms are open, I do a schedule each semester and post it outside the doors so the students can see when they can come in for open lab. An example of a schedule is at the link to the left. I have also included a schedule that I put together for the Fall, 2017 semester.

​

Something else we are trying to help encourage students to take face to face classes is to do a course pairing. We will set up the semester schedule to have an online section of a class paired with a face to face section. With each section standing on its own, most of the time we cannot fill the face to face classes. The way we are doing it now is that even if there are two students in a face to face class, we will pair that with a full online section for one faculty loading. That way, those students who really want the face to face interaction aren't forced into an online class due to low enrollment, and the faculty member can offer that the online students can connect to that face to face via synchronous delivery if they want to have that opportunity. It is a win-win for all involved. You can see this in the attached Spring, 2018 schedule.

​

We try to be very creative so we can meet the student where they need to be to be successful in their programs.

​

I am also a Commit to Finish Mentor, which is a program that pairs students with a faculty mentor during their first semester on campus. The idea is that the student will have at least one person on campus they know they can turn to if they need help. If they maintain contact with their mentor throughout their career at Ivy Tech, they earn some incentives along the way. Attached is a memo introducing me to my most current mentees.

​

​

 

​