Yates announces SouthArk’s fall lecture series speaker

Jones’ contract extension approved by Board

By Brittany Williams

Staff Writer

EL DORADO — South Arkansas Community College dean of arts and sciences Dr. Jim Yates announced the college’s fall lecture series speaker at the Board of Trustees meeting Tuesday.

Yates said that finalizing a contract with the spring lecture series speaker, but author and former Special Agent John Douglas has signed on to speak on October 12 at SouthArk.

“John Douglas is the founder of the behavioral science unit at the FBI and the character Jack Crawford from ‘Silence of the Lambs’ is based on him,” he said. “He’s the author of 13 best-selling books and we’re excited that he’s going to be here … It’s interesting (that) the next day Netflix is premiering a TV series based on his first book.”

The board approved the Personnel & Planning Subcommittee’s recommendation to extend college president Dr. Barbara Jones’ contract. The president’s contract is “a 36-month rolling term contract” that’s reviewed annually, trustee Gary Griffis said.

“We did review that and there were no grounds for not continuing the employment … The leadership that Dr. Jones has provided we certainly desire to renew that,” Griffis said. “It does comes as a motion from the subcommittee that Dr. Jones’ employment contract be renewed and thus extended.”

Last month, the Board of Trustees deferred approving the college’s Administrative Procedures Manual (APM). Almost 40 of the amendments proposed were categorized as “minor changes,” characterized in Procedure No. 1.07 as “grammatical, title, spelling and formatting changes that is not a new/alteration/deletion of a procedure.”

The APM is a board-approved document developed under the direction of the trustees that lays out procedures for “the governance of faculty and staff,” trustee Dr. Kermit Parks said.

“There has been (and) will be litigation based upon what is in this procedures manual. We have paid out settlements based upon the procedures manual not being followed,” Parks said. “I think we started out as the board approving the procedures manual. Then it seems as it’s evolved into something that has passed by and I would like to present a statement and a motion regarding the procedures manual.”

Parks said that his motion would “clean them up” and prevent future litigation based on compliance, or lack thereof, of the APM.

“I think I understand Dr. Parks’ position on a legal aspect of what we do as an institution and how we carry out our procedures. We can legally open ourselves to some very real issues,” trustee José Covas said. “I think it’s important before we just change procedures that we ensure that these procedures are proper … Even though we set policies, the procedures to carry out those policies are just as important. We certainly need further discussion on this.”

Parks’ proposed motion read, “The APM shall be presented to the Board of Trustees each year at the meeting proceeding May 1. Proposed changes, edits, corrections or new materials will be presented in both existing form and proposed form. These additions will have been developed in the culture of a shared governance. In the event a change is needed prior to May an emergency document may be added to the agenda of a regular board meeting. Changes to the revised document will sent SACC-all. The board can approve, reject or make recommendations for revision to any or all of the proposed APM changes.”

Though the board approves the APM, according to the Policy No. 1.07, modifications are made via the South Arkansas Community College Procedures Approval Form and submitted to the area vice president. The Executive Cabinet, comprised of Jones and several vice presidents, determines whether a modification is made.

“This process has been in place before I came … The board passes policy and these are procedures so that we can handle things operationally,” Jones said. “It was explained to me by previous employees … that it was ‘This is how we operate. That we make those changes, we put those in place and we continue operating and then once a year we have all those changes that we just present those to the board.'”

In a vote, Parks’ motion was not approved. The board agreed to review the APM at the board’s retreat next month and deferred the manual to its next meeting.

The SouthArk Board of Trustees’ next meeting is scheduled at 3:45 p.m. Tuesday, August 15 in the administration building board room, located on the west campus.

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