Top 10 of 2015: Changing of the guard (2)
The No. 2 Oakton story of 2015 is the retirement of former president Margaret “Peg” Burke Lee and selection of Joianne L. Smith as the college’s fourth president.
After an extensive nationwide search to fill the retirement vacancy left by the nationally respected Lee, the Oakton Board of Trustees and presidential search committee selected one of Oakton’s own to become the college’s fourth president in March. Mentored by President Lee over the past 13 years, Smith is a believer in continuity but not complacency.
“One of the things I learned from Peg is that if you are not pursuing positive change, you are not leading,” Smith explained.
In one of her first acts of leadership, Smith instituted two monthly conversation events: “Pasta with the President” and “Coffee and Conversation with the President.” Pasta is a monthly casual luncheon that encourages students to meet face-to-face with the president. She invites students to call her “Joi” and to ask questions and share experiences, joys, and frustrations about college life at Oakton. Coffee and Conversation is an open forum for faculty, staff, and administrators where all employees are invited to discuss their ideas or concerns. Smith has also met one-on-one with trustees and reached out to union leaders, and she has begun meeting with superintendents of district high schools, business leaders, and local legislators.
“To be most effective, I need to listen and be able to understand the environment from various perspectives,” Smith said.
“Community colleges were developed 50 years ago with the goal of creating access to higher education for every U.S. citizen. Today, access alone is not enough. We must find a way to provide both access and success so that every college story has a happy ending—a degree conferred, a better job, a dream met,” she told attendees at her recent inauguration.
As president, Smith knows that she faces many great challenges. However, there are none more important than the one she has identified as the college’s “wildly important goal.”
“In today’s knowledge economy, our community, our state, and our country need college graduates more than ever before. Enrolling more students and helping them persist from enrollment to graduation is a vital mission entrusted to us,” she said. “Persistence is the greatest challenge community colleges face throughout the U.S., especially because less than half of enrolled students stay to earn a degree or certificate.”
However, research indicates that persistence levels can be improved, especially when students feel welcomed, encouraged, and mentored. To attack the problem of persistence, Smith is spearheading a new “All for One” initiative intended to move the college forward on persistence and other key student success metrics.
In her speech at the annual college breakfast that kicks off fall semester, Smith asked all employees to work as one to increase fall-to-fall new student persistence by eight percent. One way to accomplish this goal is to go above and beyond daily jobs to get to know students more personally.
“Everyone from entry-level maintenance workers to tenured professors has a role to play in student success. Studies of college success repeatedly show that students perform better, have greater success, and stay enrolled longer when they feel at home and connected to their colleges,” she explained.
To accomplish this singular goal, Smith provided every faculty and staff member at the breakfast with the name and contact information of one student. She requested that the students be contacted several times during the semester to see if they were making the adjustment to college life, to offer assistance, and to simply be a caring member of the community who could direct them for further help, if needed.
Throughout her tenure at Oakton, Smith has worked tirelessly to increase student engagement and promote an inclusive environment for teaching and learning. In addition to the announcement of the college’s wildly important goal, her long-term goals include working on the strategic and master plans as well as getting the college ready for reaccreditation.
Listening is a skill that Smith developed both professionally and academically having earned a Ph.D. and master’s degree in Counseling Psychology from Virginia Commonwealth University after earning a bachelor’s degree from Wittenberg University, where she graduated Summa Cum Laude. She became a licensed clinical psychologist (a license she still maintains in the state of Illinois).
Her career has taken her from counseling to academic leadership, starting as dean of Brainerd Commons at Middlebury College (1999-2001), following as assistant director of University Residence Life at Northwestern University (2001-2002), and then moving to Oakton as dean of students in 2002. While in this position, Smith collaborated with faculty to revise the academic integrity and student conduct processes in addition to defining distinct roles for academic advising and counseling services.
In 2005, she was promoted to vice president for Student Affairs. For the next 10 years, she led the reorganization of the division to create integrated student support services. She established the Office of Access, Equity, and Diversity and hired the institution’s first chief diversity officer. She led the creation of the Office of Student Success, hiring its first director, and was instrumental in Oakton’s participation in Achieving the Dream, a national reform network to help community college students succeed with improved skills and better employability to help promote economic growth.
Smith has been active as a leader in professional groups including Student Affairs Professionals in Higher Education (NASPA), the leading association for the advancement, health, and sustainability of the student affairs profession.
She resides in Glenview with her husband, David, and their children, Noah and Rachel. She is actively involved in her family’s faith community as a member of Temple Beth-El in Northbrook and as a mentor in the Chicago InterfaithFamily Network. She serves on the Skokie Hospital Community Advisory Committee and will join the Presence Holy Family Medical Center Community Leadership Board in January 2016.
