Peachtree – Tri-County Community College is continuing to buck statewide trends, with good news on the enrollment front.
At the Tri-County Community College Board of Trustees meeting Thursday, President Donna Tipton-Rogers announced that enrollment was up 4 percent from last year, even as most North Carolina community colleges saw decreases in enrollment.
"I'm telling you, it has been all hands on deck with our outreach of students, working with our COVID restrictions and requirements, students going online and then back in the classroom," Tipton-Rogers said. "Our maintenance staff have bent over backward trying to make things safe so the environment is as healthy as possible. It's just been a lot of busy work here, but I will tell you that our numbers look really good."
She added that the data came from the N.C. Community Colleges office in Raleigh.
"That speaks highly of the work that's being done in-house," Tipton-Rogers said.
She lauded Tri-County faculty and staff for their role in working with students.
"We have good people here, good personnel who are doing a lot of hand-holding during these times, but that's what it takes," Tipton-Rogers said.
Keeping with its theme of growth, the board also approved starting the process to add two new programs, one in building construction technology and another in real estate. Steve Wood, vice president for teaching and learning, said the construction program would allow the college to start teaching some new trades as well as put existing courses under the same umbrella.
“That is a program that would allow us to start offering on the curriculum side, masonry classes, plumbing classes, bringing our existing HVAC classes,” he said. “We think that in the future it will be good for folks in the community, but also for high school students.”
The real estate program would cover all pre-licensing education required by the N.C. Real Estate Commission leading up to the N.C. Real Estate License Examination.
“We’ve been asked about it, so we’re trying to answer the community’s request,” Tipton-Rogers said.
She also discussed adding a health clinic on the college’s main campus.
“The attorney contacted me yesterday and said everything looks like it’s a go,” Tipton-Rogers said. “We received some grant funding to help support that effort, but we think it will be a really good benefit for our students to give them access to a health clinic maybe one our two days a week on campus.”
She added that there was already space set up and ready to go in the college’s health building.
In addition, the board’s leadership will stay the same, with Larry Kernea remaining chair following the election of board officers. The meeting was the first of the 2021-22 fiscal year.