Monday, December 22, 2014
By Denise Dick
YOUNGSTOWN
A California-based company will help Eastern Gateway Community College map out its future.
College trustees recently named Collaborative Brain Trust of Sacramento to complete comprehensive master-planning services. The company will be paid $150,000. The plan, expected to be done this summer, will cover programming, human and physical resources “to provide a guide for the college and the new administration,” a news release said.
Longtime President Laura Meeks will retire in July, and a search for a new president is underway.
Four firms responded to a request for qualifications presented by EGCC.
Besides CBT, the other firms were Strollo Architects of Youngstown and Perkins Eastman and WTW Architects Inc., both of Pittsburgh.
A committee ranked the proposals and selected CBC.
The completed document is to address academic, staffing and facility plans for EGCC.
The college started as Jefferson Community College in Steubenville but expanded to Mahoning, Trumbull and Columbiana counties, becoming EGCC in 2009.
The Valley Center opened in downtown Youngstown in 2012, and the Warren Center is expected to open next month in downtown Warren in the former Mickey’s Army Navy store.
Classes continue to be offered at the career and technical centers in all three Mahoning Valley counties.
The comprehensive master plan “will provide the framework for future EGCC academic, staffing and facilities program developments, and support the goals and initiatives of the EGCC Strategic Plan,” the request for quotation says. “EGCC envisions that the comprehensive master plan will be developed from three focused plans, each supporting the goals of the plan.”
The educational plan will “develop strategies for academic program and delivery,” it says. The staffing plan will “develop strategies for staffing growth and support necessary for current college needs, and as required to achieve the goals developed from the educational plan.” The facilities plan will develop strategies “for physical plant maintenance and improvement to support current college needs and develop physical plant concepts to support the goals developed from the educational and staffing plans.”
The college expects to submit its request to the State Controlling Board for the board’s January meeting. Because the project includes state funding, the board must authorize release of the money, said Ann Koon, EGCC spokeswoman.