Shoreline Community College shares plans for development of buildings, students

Shoreline Community College President Dr. Cheryl Roberts listens to Stuart Trippel, the senior executive director and chief financial officer explain the capital budget and plans for development on campus at the college during the fall neighborhood community meeting on Nov. 13.
Photo by Aidan Walker

By Aidan Walker

Construction and changes are coming to Shoreline Community College with plans for a new living space, combined health and sciences building and a new image for the college. 

Shoreline community members gathered in the Pagoda Union Building on the Shoreline Community College campus on November 13 at 6:30pm for the fall neighborhood community meeting hosted by college President Dr. Cheryl Roberts.

During the community meetings, local residents come to ask questions of the administration at Shoreline Community College and listen to presentations from faculty members. This is the second neighborhood community meeting. The first occurred on June 21. 

“The meetings are starting to catch on,” Martha Lynn said. “I recognize most of the people here from the last meeting.” Lynn is the executive director of communications and marketing for the college and helps organize the meetings. 

The timeline of the college’s construction of new living spaces and academic buildings is uncertain because no capital construction budget has been passed by the Washington state legislature due to a dispute between Democrats and Republicans over water rights. 

Stuart Trippel, the senior executive director and chief financial officer for the college, did speak about upcoming plans for campus development. The college continues to plan for development and has created a unified identity for media materials in an effort to make the college more recognizable. 

 

A residence hall with 220 beds is in the works, as well as renovations to the Pagoda Union Building and the construction of a combined health, science, and manufacturing building, which is also waiting on the legislature’s capital budget before moving forward. 

The residence hall is scheduled to begin construction in spring 2018, but if the capital budget takes longer to be approved then the timeline will be pushed back, Trippel said. 

“There’s a possibility of an early December session,” Trippel said. A legislative session in December could mean that the capital budget will pass and allow development to move forward on campus.

Once housing moves forward, then the college will be able to begin working on frontage improvements at the main entrance to the college on NW Innis Arden Way to improve traffic around that area, Trippel said.

Mary Brueggeman, the vice president for advancement, presented on the college’s effort to create a unified graphic design aesthetic across their media, with a set color palette and fonts in order to give Shoreline Community College a distinct marketing look. A style guide has been developed to guide future design related to the college’s image in brochures and on the college’s websites, she said.

A new slogan was adopted for the college as part of this effort to refresh the college’s image. The slogan “Engage. Achieve.” was adopted after a poll of students was conducted about what students thought of when they thought about Shoreline Community College. The tagline will be appearing under the college’s logo in all future college-produced media, Brueggeman said. 

Dr. Alison Stevens, the executive vice president for student learning and success at Shoreline, also spoke about success in retaining students, and has plans to help students who are struggling with pre-college math. Plans include offering more tutoring resources, and utilizing a system that notifies academic professionals when a student’s grades begin to slip, allowing for those students to be guided to resources to help improve their grades. 

“Shoreline Community College is in the top five community colleges in the state for completion,” Stevens said.

Construction designs for development are close to complete, and administrators at the college are waiting to see what happens next. 

“We were just talking about concepts in June,” Roberts said. “Now we have plans.”