X. Administrative Processes for Carrying Out the QEP and Maintaining Progress

The QEP will be led by individuals who serve in prominent positions at the college, including division chair, chair of the OCTC College Assembly, dean with responsibilities on all three campuses, leadership team member, and board member. In addition, two are award-wining faculty, and all three are members of the Administrative Council, the primary planning body of the college. These roles will provide opportunities for the on-going communication of QEP initiatives and the gathering of general feedback and assessment on the progress of the plan.

Though no release time to work on the QEP project has been allocated for the President, she has been consistent in her involvement and support of the process. While this endeavor has been faculty and staff driven, the President is a "hands-on" leader and is a strong advocate for the plan to be a college-owned process. In addition, she has expressed her commitment to whatever resources are required to make the QEP a success.

The co-chairs will direct the QEP Team, the primary driver of the QEP initiatives. As noted in the Objectives and in the Implementation Plan, the QEP will use the measures of success as formative assessments of the plan’s progress, making changes and additions to the tasks to be completed as necessary. Questions in regard to the QEP will be included in the annual OCTC Faculty/Staff survey as well, providing another avenue for feedback. The QEP Team will have a minimum of three scheduled meetings each semester, and as the QEP Team has a number of members in common with the Administrative Council and OCTC Leadership Team, the communication lines between these key groups will remain open at all times.

The OCTC Institutional Effectiveness Committee will serve as the internal monitoring committee separate from the QEP Team. This group, which includes many of the members of the Administrative Council and is a broad, representative cross section of the college, will provide direction and feedback to the QEP Team as they monitor the results of the formative measures as well.

In addition to the above measures, the QEP will be built into the Strategic Plan. OCTC was recently described as having a “substantial history of utilizing systematic planning and evaluation activities” by the SACS Off-Site Review Committee, and the review of the QEP will be subject to the same procedures as other strategic initiatives. These processes include the tracking of identified performance indicators that are published on the web, annual focus group meetings to gather feedback on strategic objectives (The QEP will be the primary focus of two of the college’s ten objectives over the next five years.), the annual identification of action steps, and semi-annual (twice per year) reporting of task progress. Each of these processes will provide additional public monitoring and feedback to the QEP Team, and to the QEP Co-Chairs in particular, as they carry out the plan.