Institutional Context | Strategic Planning | Master Plan | Divisional Planning Documents | Summary

V. Summary: Planning and Institutional Effectiveness
Based on the Strategic Initiatives that guide the planning and regular assessments at all planning levels (Strategic, Master, and Divisional plans), the college is able to obtain, at any point in time, a snapshot of its institutional effectiveness.  Whenever any assessment vehicle signals needs areas or targets of opportunity, the Office of Institutional Effectiveness is able to mount a Process Improvement Team (PIT) to intervene and initiate positive action.  Recent teams have worked successfully on class scheduling, the grants process, and the enrollment management process.  Upon the occasions when the PIT process reveals a greater or more urgent need, outside consultants are brought in, as in the case of the recent re-structuring in our Financial Aid department, to effect the requisite in-depth assessments and proposed remedies, revisions, or reorganizations. 

In addition, the college has scheduled a robust array of surveys to keep in touch with the success of both major initiatives and established practices.  Recent results from two major national surveys—CCSSE and PACE—have enabled the college to further discover targets of opportunity for process improvements.  Local surveys are also conducted using in-house web-based software to customize the survey instrument to our specific institutional needs.

Additionally, the Office of Institutional Effectiveness keeps an updated electronic file of support documents for strategic initiatives available to the entire college community on the college's web sit to enable immediate access to data needed for assessment, planning and budgeting.  This ready resource is also available to outside evaluators to aid in the overall assessment of the college.

The college administration team travels to numerous professional conferences and workshops in order to keep abreast of best practices in the areas of teaching/learning and institutional assessment and also mounts presentations to share, with members of the profession, those initiatives that seem to have well-served our college and the sector.  We have formed close ties with the Middle States Commission of Higher Education, serving as self-study team members, leaders, and assessment consultants, in order to stay close to assessment professionals and the initiatives that drive institutional excellence.

Assessment and planning at Ocean County College are inextricably linked, as even a cursory reading of this document will reveal.  Strategic Initiatives are directly derived from the mission statement and all other planning documents are linked to the strategic initiatives.  All plans are assessed quantitatively and qualitatively, some monthly, some annually, never less.  All new budget allocations are directly linked to the divisional plans through the college's planning and budgeting protocols, guided by a cross-cultural Advisory Council to the President on Planning and Budgeting.  As this Strategic Planning document attests, all college planning documents are directly aligned to the college's mission and aware of the need for ongoing assessment.

Institutional Context | Strategic Planning | Master Plan | Divisional Planning Documents | Summary

Copies of the Strategic Plan are available by request to Janet Hubbs, Assistant to the President for Institutional Effectiveness .