complete information. Detailed budget information is shared at meetings with faculty and staff leaders, as well as in open forums. There is a Budget Development Team and a President’s Budget Advisory Committee that includes representatives from our shared governance groups. These two teams really are the initial drivers that help set the budget and monitor our progress. Their input is essential in making sure that our university community is involved in making budgetary decisions. These groups include faculty, staff, and students so that we have full involvement of the university community in the initial setting and the monitoring of our budget. The vice presidents also share detailed information not only about the university budget but also about their division budgets at open forums. This happens for the President’s division as well. While we have done really good work in sharing information on our budget, the work is always ongoing. Before moving on to the next goal, President Wohlpart shared an analysis that was done by Jason Jones in Institutional Effectiveness. It compares winter terms starting in 2021 through 2026. The First Time in College students bottomed out in 2024 and are slowly creeping back up. Transfer student enrollments are continuing to go down. Further analysis shows that across the state, students are not leaving community colleges and going on to the six public universities. We do not know if this is a trend that will continue, but this could have a huge impact on our total enrollment number and our ability to get our numbers up. Jason Jones will continue digging into this and share more information as he has it. Goal 3: Elevate Equity and Belonging We have shifted our strategy for expanding equity and belonging across the university from having a single office leading the work to sharing the responsibility for that work across the campus. This will test our ability to live into our vision of being a model learning community and will require us to investigate what we think and believe and develop new ways of thinking and coming together as a community. The Shared Equity and Belonging Leadership Committee is making good progress and has begun the process of reading, reflecting, and sharing. While we have done good work over the last several years moving towards the creation of an equitable, fair, and caring university where everyone feels included, to build out responsibility and accountability for this work across the university will be ongoing and take time. Wildcats Rising • CWU’s Jazz I class is the premier instrumental jazz ensemble and performs under the direction of Dr. Keith Karns. Jazz I was recently invited to perform at the 17 th Annual Jazz Education Network Conference, providing our students with the opportunity to get experience performing at a professional conference. • Two CWU graduate students joined Dr. Susan Kaspari in Norway in December to study ice cores, furthering our understanding of the world’s changing climate. • Superintendent Robert Bowman partnered with our music department to have the CWU Pep Band, under the direction of Kyle Edwards, perform at a Naches basketball game and to play with and mentor young band members. • Last week CWU partnered with Naches, Othello, Mattawa, and Royal City School Districts to bring 50 students to CWU for the Amazing Shake Event, a skills-based competition that helps students build confidence in communication, professionalism, and critical thinking. • About five years ago, CWU and Wenatchee High School started envisioning a way to build a seamless and integrated pipeline of students from high school into college. Wenatchee High School administrators and teachers built several pathways for students to prepare for college
7 Board of Trustees Minutes February 19-20, 2026
Made with FlippingBook interactive PDF creator