The Board of Trustees meets every month on the second Tuesday. The April meeting was held Tuesday, April 12 at 4:30 p.m. in the Dankert Trustee Board Room of the Welcome Center.
The call to order began promptly at 4:30 p.m. followed by the pledge of allegiance and approval of agenda. The meeting began with three group recognitions from the past year. The groups recognized included Phi Beta Lambda for their success at the state competition at Emporia State and students who qualified for the national conference. President Kim Krull recognized Keith West, professor of Mass Communications, and his broadcasting students for their awards won at the 2022 Kansas Association of Broadcasters (KAB) Student Production Awards. They won a total of 15 awards, seven times more than all the other two-year schools combined. Finally, Phi Theta Kappa was recognized for their All-Kansas academic scholars.
Executive session was then held from 4:57 – 5:17 p.m. followed by public comment, which there was none. Standing reports came next and SGA President Guadalupe Torres spoke about the events held in the last month such as Casino Night and the future events including the upcoming Spring Fling. Lisa Bolin, administrative assistant to Early College Academies, gave the operational staff report and mentioned the silent auction coming up where departments compete to donate the best basket. Financial Aid was the last champion from 2019.
The college’s Education Association President (BCCNEA) Terry Sader gave the professional employees report and spoke about the Master Teacher Award ceremony that will be held not only for this year’s winner Mike Swan, professor of Mass Communications, but the last two years, Cory Teubner, associate professor of English, and Robert Carlson, professor of Chemistry. The Education Association has announced the switch from mutual gains to traditional gains bargaining as the association feels trust has been lost on both sides. The association also wanted to make some change as few issues have been resolved in the past couple of years.
“This was a decision made by the professional employees team,” Sader said. “They felt that a good deal of trust had been lost on both sides with the process as it has unfolded over these last few years.”
Trustee Linda Jolly gave the Board Finance Committee report followed by the PTK Luncheon and Kansas Association of Community College Trustees (KACCT) meeting covered by Trustee Mary Martha Good. There will be new trustee training that all current trustees are encouraged to go to held by someone who works with the senate and the house on a regular basis. Krull covered the Foundation Board Report and president’s report in which she spoke about the Butler 2000 program and the students it has helped. Gov. Laura Kelly was on campus Friday, April 15 for the turkey hunt dinner, and the college is working on a partnership with the Frank Barton School of Business at Wichita State to provide scholarship opportunities for Butler students.
Trustee Dave Sherrer gave a brief update on the Education Facilities Authority Report before Humanities and Social Sciences Dean Susan Bradley gave the division report and spoke about the Open Education Resource (OER) program and how the English department has saved students $1.8 million.
“Shout out to that English department for saving students $1.8 million,” Bradley said. “Watch that savings climb in the future, many more departments are joining the OER movement.”
Vice President of Academics Tom Nevill then spoke about the partnership with El Dorado Correctional Facility and what that means for Butler and other colleges as well.
“We were awarded a large contract from the department of correction for three years with an eligibility to renew funding up to eight years,” Nevill said. “This increased adult education GED, English as a second language as well as provided a new non-credit masonry program”
The trustees voted 7-0 regarding three board action items: getting new first responder radios, the masonry and concrete technology certificate and Motimatic. Trustees also approved the consent agenda, 7-0. Esam Mohammad, associate vice president of research gave the Key Performance Indicators (KPI) update before the trustees went into executive session from 6:47 – 7:17 p.m. before adjourning with a vote of 7-0.
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