Shannon Galofaro / Roundup
In an Academic Senate meeting on Monday, headlines of the faculty and staff gathering potentially face millions of dollars in fines.
Pierce College students could potentially lose credits and the college could owe $1 million in fines if a staffing problem is not fixed, according to Tom Rosdahl, president of the Academic Senate.
The district possibly hired 100 part-time instructors who were “without papers,” meaning their credentials weren’t checked and did not meet the minimum requirements.
If this is confirmed in the states annual audit, the students who took the unqualified teacher’s courses could lose the credits they earned.
There is an estimated 500 part-time faculty members all the time and this problem occurs with five out of every 500 members, according to Rosdahl.
Pierce has planned to avoid this fine in the near future.
Also discussed was the deadline to avoid $6 million in fines if full-time faculty doesn’t fill the state’s 60 percent requirement. District requires Pierce College to have 60 percent of full-time professors employes to avoid hefty fines.
“Its cheaper to hire new faculty than pay the fine,” said Rosdahl.
The fine for not having enough teachers is $65,000 per teacher, per year, said Rosdahl.
“The college is going forward with the number of new hires,” said Rosdahl. “This should start as soon as next week.”
Pierce was previously fined $1.7 million for falling short 27 faculty members in Fall 2008.
The funds that pay the fines comes out of the same pot the Professors get paid from.
“It currently comes from the district reserves,” said Rosdahl, about where the money comes from when the college gets fined.
The fine is paid out of the $600 million California provides the district to operate on annually.
PIERCE NOW ACCCEPTNG GENERAL EDUCATIONAL COURSES:
Pierce has started accepting all general education courses completed from different schools.
Elizabeth Atondo, articulation officer, said they would accept GE’s backdated before the approval.
There are two major guidelines that the counselors will use to determine the acceptance of the units: one is if the course met a GE taken at an institution, and the second is there must be an equivalent GE course at Pierce, according to Atondo.
PIERCE WILL SOON BE WIRELESS:
Jill Binsley, professor of computer applications and office technology, informed the counsel that Pierce will soon be wireless. There was no set date determined.
More information regarding the Academic Senate is available at www.faculty.piercecollege.edu/senate/
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