Amid the tumultuous climate of California’s education sector, Santa Rosa Junior College is working on its own personalized campus-wide vision and strategy for the future of the school, a “strategic plan.”

The adoption of this initiative is a result of ever-changing internal and external influences affecting community colleges throughout the state.

State mandates, such as those coming from the California community college chancellor’s Student Success Task Force, are pushing toward changing the mission of the community college system. This involves shifting funds, changing registration priority and focusing more on traditional and basic skills.

These new mandates, along with the uncertainty of school funding (depending on whether or not Prop 30 passes), is forcing SRJC to asses how it is going to maintain a productive establishment despite varying conditions.

“We’re trying to figure out what programs are meeting the needs of the students, and how we can preserve those, and also how we can make sure that we’re stable and have enough resources to serve those students,” said Jessica Jones, president of SRJC’s Associated Students.

Strategic planning will involve looking at what others are doing and what the best practices are across the state; whether it’s in student services, facilities or academic affairs. It would also involve looking at what internal changes SRJC is facing from it’s pool of retiring teachers and administrators, to the return of the Doyle scholarship, and personalizing an all-inclusive, large scale cohesive plan for the future of the school.

So far, strategic planning at SRJC is still in the early stages of it’s conception. The junior college has created a “Strategic Planning Task Force,” headed by co-chairs President Frank Chong and faculty member Terry Shell. This planning committee is made up of about twenty members, including administrators, faculty and students. The task force has been working on developing the plan and is beginning its two-year drafting stage.

In a recent press release, the task force said it, “assures that there will be many opportunities for [students] to participate, review, comment, and engage in this critical effort,” and to, “Please be patient for a few more weeks while we finalize the process.”