Cerritos College students can rest assured that the campus is no longer under accreditation warning status.
According to Dr. Joanna Schilling, vice president of Academic Affairs, “Cerritos addressed all our recommendations successfully and our accreditation was fully reaffirmed on June 30, 2015. We are no longer on warning status and the college will now complete our usual midterm report in Spring 2017 [this is a normal part of the process].“
According to the action letter provided to former President Dr. Linda Lacy, which is available online, the commission finds that Cerritos College has addressed the 2014 recommendations.
Therefore the commission took action to remove the warning and reaffirm accreditation.
The midterm report is to be turned in by March 15, 2017.
Details are on the school’s accreditation site.
Furthermore the document dated April 6, 2015 states, “The institution demonstrates that all instructional programs, regardless of location or means of delivery, address and meet the mission of the institution and uphold its integrity.” (Accreditation Standard II.A.1)
The Accreditation team commends the Board of Trustees, President/Superintendent and college community for their efforts to achieve compliance with the standards.
College President/Superintendent Dr. Jose Fierro said, “All the credit goes to Dr. Lacy and her staff,
“In April a team visited the campus and spoke with different constituents to ensure we were in compliance with their instructions. By the time I got here I was sent the certificate of re-accreditation.”
He went on to talk about how the campus improved in the warning areas the team issued; one of which was mapping through courses getting student learning outcomes online.
Frank Mixson served as the SLO coordinator this past academic year.
Together with his team they made it possible to work with several departments to get every course of Cerritos College mapped by teaching faculty how to use a software called Elumen.
Chad Greene is now the new SLO coordinator for the campus this academic year.
In addition, all the degrees and certificate courses outlines that are found on the campus catalog can be found online.
Dr. Fierro added that a team will visit in 2017 and he will do his best to make sure the school is compliant, the campus programs are solid and faculty has the tools they need to teach students.
Trustee Zurich Lewis said, “As a newly elected trustee I only got to be involved in the accreditation process for eight months. Along with six members of our board we had to follow the recommendations of the state accreditation team.”
One of the warnings the accreditation team gave to the campus was that they wanted better working relationship between the president and trustees.
Lewis concluded, “After we met with a smaller team our warning status was removed and we were restored full accreditation. I believe accreditation is a rigorous, but necessary process that ensures community colleges across California provide the best service to its students.”
