Column: Riverland reflects on year’s successes
Published 12:00 am Friday, June 10, 2005
By Terrence Leas, president of Riverland Community College
A Riverland Community College tradition is to reflect on our successes and “brag” to the community at the end of our academic year.
Since the successes of all our students, employees, and institution are too numerous to list, the following highlights illustrate the caliber of achievements across our college.
Student success:
Students Jon Nelson and Damien Viltela placed first and third, respectively, in mechanics dexterity contest at the Minnesota SkillsUSA-VICA competition.
PSEO student Monte Flaskerud placed first in the secondary division of diesel equipment technology.
Allen Yule was first in the post-secondary division of automotive service technology and Joe Reese received honorable mention in the secondary division of automotive service technology.
Yule and Flaskerud will compete at the national SkillsUSA championship conference in Kansas City this month.
Many students continue to achieve 100 percent pass rates on state and national tests including: All first-year industrial maintenance and mechanics program students for the special engineers exam and all second-year students for the state boiler exam; accounting students who chose to take the national accreditation council for accountancy and taxation exam; all 2004 radiography graduates for the ARRT certification examination.
Golfers Alison Stutzman and Dan Breuer competed at the NJCAA national tournament.
Radiography student Sam Miller presented the first-place award paper “Geriatrics in Radiography: Changing with the Times” at the Minnesota Society of Radiologic Technologists annual meeting.
Employee success:
Counselor Jeanne Poppe was named the Southeastern Minnesota School
Counselor Association Postsecondary School Counselor of the Year for 2004-2005. She was also elected to the Minnesota House of Representatives.
Members of the farm business management instruction staff received awards from the Minnesota Association of Agricultural Educators. They include Ron VanNurden, “Region 8 Outstanding Agricultural Education Teacher” award; Doug Frodl, “Region 8 Outstanding Young Member award;&uot; John Hobert, Eric Deter and Jim Christensen, “Region 8 Outstanding Postsecondary/Adult Agricultural Education Program.”
Biology instructor Pamela Tranby was accepted into the 2005-2006 ASM scholars-in-residence program, a year-long program for advancing scholarly teaching in microbiology.
Athletic Director David Lillemon was re-elected as the director for Region XIII (two-year schools in Minnesota, North Dakota and Wisconsin).
Institutional success:
Minnesota State Colleges and Universities gave Riverland awards for excellence in financial management and excellence in facilities management. Additionally, Riverland Vice-president of Finance and Facilities Karen Snorek received an outstanding service award.
RCC’s automotive service technology program was named national
runner-up in the Automotive Industry Planning Council’s Award of Excellence. The program also obtained ASE recertification from the national automotive technicians education foundation board.
Southern Minnesota Initiative Foundation recognized Riverland for workforce development projects including Viracon University and the Owatonna College and University Center.
The American Council of Engineering Companies presented an award to Riverland and architectural firm Stanley Consultants for the Riverland HVAC upgrade project.
The culmination of this year’s success stories was graduation.
More than 300 of our 725 graduates participated in our May 13 commencement ceremony.
We congratulate our graduates and all Riverland students and employees for their hard work and commitment to student success and excellence.
(Terry Leas is the president of Riverland Community and Technical College.)