Building Institutional Capacity at Rural Community Colleges through Consortium Partnership

Speaker:

Kevin Pennington
Director, Community College Education Program
Western Carolina University
250 A Killian
Cullowhee, NC 28723
828-227-7415
828-227-7388
penningtn@wcu.edu

Mitchell Williams
Director of Leadership Programs
University of North Carolina
Asheville One University Heights; CPO #1830
Asheville, NC 28804
828-251-6125
828-251-6142
mwilliams@unca.edu

In the past, the most prosperous community colleges were the ones willing to face tough external and internal political issues and compete for a diminishing portion of the total economic resource made available from funding sources. Today all community colleges face greater scrutiny for funding as well as all other resources. Community colleges can continue to compete with each other to eliminate the resource disparity, or they can choose to develop consortium partnerships. Rural community colleges are perhaps ideally positioned to profit from consortium partnerships. This proposed poster/demonstration will examine reasons rural community colleges would benefit from participation consortium partnerships, some reasons rural community colleges may see consortium partnerships as not being effective, motivation for rural community colleges to sustain consortium partnerships, and implications for the future for rural community colleges in consortium partnerships.
 
 
Presentation