I have been with the college for a long, long time. I am saddened by the complete disrespect that the school has shown the faculty. I too was let go. 5+ years with the company, and I was told without warning that I was being let go in ONE day.
NO warning … NO courtesy … and a SCRIPTED read response.
I remember the good days at the college…back when STUDENTS mattered, not COMPLIANCE REPORTS or NUMBERS.
When faculty can actually TEACH students, not be STUDENT SERVICES.
Here is my take on the current status of things:
Michael Pierce:
I’m sure Michael is a nice guy, but I’ve never seen a more incompetent dean in my life. His decisions and focus are downright horrendous and reflect an emphasis on metrics that don’t work instead of actual student outreach. According to Anna Lindemann, he is a total control freak who basically asks that same STUPID questions every meeting with her (why is XYZ on this report? Because it is Tuesday, dumb ass and they did their outreach on MONDAY!) He only has an M.Ed., and previous experience before being a Dean was a Technology Instructor and Director of Student Services at Everest (it is no wonder he is trying to make Faculty into Student Services). Even his Linkedin focuses not on coordinating students, but on Microsoft Office and SmartBoards. And this is the Dean for the entire online division?!
Anna Lindemann:
One word … micro-manager. It is funny … when people claim constantly they aren’t a micro-manager, it usually means they are. And Anna is the poster-child for this. She can speak for 30 min without breathing, and can tell you the same stories for weeks on end like you’ve never heard them before. She will say things like “Hope springs eternal” 50x in one meeting. She is obsessed with staying off reports with no regard to students or faculty. And despite saying she sticks by her faculty, this whole incident proves that she does not. Unfortunately, her emphasis is not based on academic research, but is more a “Yes” woman to Pierce’s poor non-research based approach to education.
SOS (Suck Our Souls):
Daily meetings to talk about the same crap of staying off reports? WASTE of time. And especially the way Anna does the meetings. It ends up being “Anna’s story time” while she rants about how she was picked on by people, how she stands behind her faculty, how she is for the students although it is really about the numbers, and “Hope Springs Eternal.”
Talisma:
Supposedly the school spent millions of dollars on this program. Who was the stupid idiot that made that decision?! Talisma is a CUSTOMER SERVICE platform, NOT a school based system. In essence, faculty became Student Services and used this stupid program to track it all? What ends up happening is students are getting harassed by teachers contacting them constantly. They could have invested in something to highlight at-risk students, but instead use this crazy non-sense to track/harass students.
Non-research based:
The emphasis on student-outreach is non-researched based and ignorant. It is harassing to students. I know someone who analyzed student responses, and this was a major theme … that students felt like the school was no different than “bill collectors”. What did Tina do with this info? What did Michael do with it? Ignore it.
Despite the saying that layoffs were based on longevity and performance, this obviously did not happen. I know certain class types in which ALL the instructors were let go … people who were QUALIFIED to teach them. Who replaced them? Ph.D.’s IN the field replaced by B.A. and M.A.’s OUTSIDE the field.
It is a very sad time for a college I once loved and believed in. What used to be one of the better online colleges now has become the worst one I’ve ever known.
And I felt this way BEFORE the layoffs.
I think ultimately, they are either going to do away with the online division, or force any remaining faculty to be “on campus” employees or lose their jobs.
The weirdest thing about these layoffs … why on earth lay off adjuncts?! I mean … just don’t give them classes! Why lay them off? And why not give the full time faculty a chance to go part-time, or move back to adjunct status?!
Just madness ...