Colleagues,
I hope you all enjoyed the holiday season and the winter break. As we begin the spring semester, I wanted to welcome you all back and share a few new developments and updates.
First, I’m pleased to report that our enrollment and retention efforts are continuing to pay off, with significant increases over last year in our final numbers for Fall 2023 and Winter Session, as well as an increase in enrolled students for Spring 2024. By the numbers, we are now the third-largest community college in New York State, and the largest in Upstate New York, behind only Suffolk and Nassau Community Colleges on Long Island. This is a remarkable accomplishment, and I’d like to thank you all for your ongoing efforts to support our prospective and current students. Well done!
I’d also like to share my thanks for the outstanding progress we have made under the college’s Future Forward 2019-2024 Strategic Plan. (Just some of our many shared achievements were highlighted at the President’s Annual Meeting in the fall, including our full re-accreditation from the Middle States Commission on Higher Education.). This year, we will begin the process of creating a new 2025-2030 Strategic Plan. The entire college community, as well as external stakeholders, will once again be invited and encouraged to participate in the process. Please keep an eye out for more details from the Office of Institutional Effectiveness and Technology as updates and opportunities to contribute arise throughout the year.
In addition, this April, I hope that you will be part of a series of events to formally announce the college’s membership in the UNESCO-UNEVOC International Centre for Technical and Vocational Education and Training. It is an honor to be chosen as the first community college in the Unites States to join this prestigious network and to share our knowledge and skills with the world. Additional details on our plans will be shared in the weeks ahead.
Finally, I’d like to ask you all to keep up the great work in helping our students this semester, inside and outside of the classroom. As you know, the college offers a wide range of support services, from academic to financial to social and emotional, and helping our students access them will improve their chances of meeting their goals. With that in mind, whether you are a faculty member or staff member, please continue to go the extra mile in your interactions with students, as you always do. Sometimes, your support is all it takes to help a struggling student have a successful semester.
As always, I welcome your ideas and feedback, so please reach out with any thoughts or concerns as the semester begins. Join me for Coffee with the President on Wednesday, Jan. 17 in the Administration Building lobby. I look forward to seeing you there!
Thank you once again, for all of your efforts, and have a wonderful start to the semester!
Sincerely,
Roger Ramsammy, Ph.D.
President, Hudson Valley Community College