WWCC leaders select 15 for layoffs

Director of GR Center included in layoffs

Needing to cut more than $2.4 million from Western Wyoming Community College’s 2021-2022 operating budget, the college’s president revealed a plan that would cut 15 positions from the college, including the director of the Green River Center.

According to board documents, the cuts are being recommended because of a lack of funding and other events beyond the college’s control. The positions impacted are:

Director of workforce development

Director of admissions and recruiting

Director of Green River Center and community education

Assistant professor of dance

Three instructor of mathematics positions

Instructor of English

Instructor of sociology

Professor of anthropology/geology

Associate professor of theatre

Assistant professor of communications

Business information systems lab assistant

College and career readiness office assistant

One custodian position

According to the plan, the three director positions, all of which are occupied, will be placed on a leave of absence and released from their job duties Feb. 8. The faculty impacted in this plan will remain employed through the spring semester and teach their advertised courses.

The cabinet members overseeing the plan also recommended each employee being laid off receive three months salary, totaling $185,000, which would be paid through general fund salary savings.

During a virtual special meeting Thursday evening, many of the people commenting about the plan specifically criticized the desire to reduce the college’s math department by three positions, while one commentor, Theresa Shafe, mentioned the college’s biology and athletics departments were largely unaffected in the budget plan.

Overall, there was a sense that the cuts were coming, especially since discussion of cuts and layoffs took place in late 2020, with an original proposal to cut positions at the end of the fall semester.

“This is not something any of us wanted to do,” Board President Regina Clark said. “This is not just numbers and a piece of paper.”

Clark said WWCC President Kim Dale and her cabinet had been transparent with the rubrics used to determine where cuts should be made.

Aside from the position cuts, changes in the college employees’ benefits package were also announced.

However, the layoffs and specifically who was being laid off was heavily questioned by a representative of the Wyoming Education Association.

Kit Kofoed, vice president of the WWCC Education Association, disagreed with the transparency originally cited by Clark, saying information about the rubric scores was mostly summery, with only some of the material shown to employees.

“We have been told that a rubric was consulted when making decisions about position cuts. When will this rubric—as well as specific data points it was used to evaluate—be made available? Was this rubric applied to all positions at all levels, including administration and managerial,” she said.

In a letter read to the board, she also questioned why the number of graduates were being considered in the cuts, but not the current number of majors enrolled at the college.

She also questioned why a new school and administrative position was created, wondering where the funding for the position comes from.

The board did not answer those questions specifically and did not vote to act on the plan Dale presented them.

 

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