The Navajo County Community College District Governing Board gave its approval to a dual enrollment agreement between Northland Pioneer College and Miami Unified School District, an unprecedented step as the school district is located in Gila County, which is home to Gila Community College and Eastern Arizona College.
“This is a dual enrollment agreement with a school district outside of the Navajo/Apache boundary,” Vice President of Student and Learning Services Mark Vest said. “This is groundbreaking in that we are moving our scope outside of this district.”
Board member James Matteson expressed concern over legal aspects that might arise from such an agreement. “I have concerns about the relationship we have with other community colleges who might think that we are encroaching,” he said.
“We were specifically brought into the discussion by Miami High School,” stated President Jeanne Swarthout, explaining that MUSD was unable to forge dual enrollment agreements with GCC or EAC prior to working with NPC.
Dr. Swarthout stated that she had been in discussion with the president of EAC, who understands the situation and said EAC may be able to resolve the situation with MUSD by the end of the school year. The year-long agreement has been called a “toe in the water” as far as reaching beyond the boundaries of the college to provide services and comes at no cost to the college.
“The boundary issues have got to be addressed at the level of all 10 community college administrations. The boundaries are no longer what they used to be; things don’t stop at the county line. We are being poached all the time and those presidents have never been in direct communication with this president. I have been in direct communication with the president of Eastern Arizona College. I will be up front wherever we go,” stated Swarthout.
Vest also noted that there are instances when school districts within NPC boundaries wish to have dual enrollment for a program that NPC doesn’t offer. “In some of those cases, those districts, a couple from Maricopa sometimes other districts, have come to the president’s office and said we’d like to serve this district and that permission has been granted,” he said. These situations have been handled through what Swarthout called “gentleman’s agreements” with no legal repercussions.
Following the discussion, the board approved the agreement, as well as the dual enrollment agreements between the college district and the Holbrook, Joseph City, Chinle and Snowflake school districts.
In other business, the board also updated a policy pertaining to college service sites, a procedure pertaining to board travel, and a salary and wage clarification.
The board also presented Meritorious Service and Emeritus awards to Leonard Lee, Shannon Newman and Theresa Artz-Howard.
NPC Friends & Family Director Betsyann Wilson reported that the organization will award $1,000 scholarships to 10 of the 15 nursing students who applied for them. Frontier Communications and Summit Health Care were the contributors for those scholarships.
She noted that Friends & Family will host its first disk golf tournament on Saturday, Aug. 12, at the Snowflake Four Seasons Disc Golf Course at 32 W. Country Club. Another fundraising event coming up is Pedal the Petrified, which will be held on Sept. 6. For more information on these events, visit
www.npcfriendsfamily.org.
