Community, faculty, and staff voice their concerns about board leadership and the accreditation of the college.
During the Wednesday meeting’s time for public comment, multiple groups called for the resignation of Chairman Todd Banducci, while others rallied behind him.
NIC graduate and former ASNIC president, Christa Hazel, called for him to resign. Chairman Banducci then tried to end public comment, but was advised by NIC’s attorney, Marc Lyons to continue public comment.
Joe Dunlap, who was a former President of NIC and Chairman then spoke about the recent panel report by the Northwest Commission on Colleges and Universities.
He said, “With the loss of accreditation, student credits will not transfer, students will not qualify for financial aid, college credit earned in high school will be worthless.”
Dunlap goes on to say that if NIC loses its accreditation, children in Kindergarten will not be able to progress to a PHD here in Coeur d’Alene.
Dunlap is not the only one concerned about the NWCCU panel report. Trustee Ken Howard said that it is shameful that there has been no meeting to discuss the panel’s findings.
Staff Assembly Chair Sarah Martin said,“It is not easy to be up here, delivering these resolutions. It’s terrifying, its intimidating, there is a sense of fear of intimidation that the staff and faculty feels. It is not okay.”
Martin said that they have shared this multiple times and asked the board to stop and listen to their concerns and to stop making decisions that tear apart the institution.
Ed Kaitz, a NIC Philosophy Professor, spoke about the Faculty Assembly resolution during public comment. He feels that himself and other faculty members were not represented in the voting process.
Kaitz said, “These kinds of resolutions are very deceptive to the public, and it does our community no good having these kinds of statistics misrepresented in that fashion.”
The resolution that Kaitz discussed was created by the Faculty Assembly and it highlights the NWCCU Final Panel Report.
The resolutions renews the “no confidence” in the Chairman Banducci’s ability to lead in the Colleges best interest, and calls for his immediate resignation.
Interim President Michael Sebaaly also talked about the NWCCU Final Panel report, and he said that if the college is put on probation the enrollment could drop as much as 10%. If the College loses even 1% it would be $100,000 in tuition revenue.
