JCCC’s Strategic Academic Master Plan reflects the college’s academic goals and priorities.
Johnson County Community College’s Strategic Academic Master Plan reflects the College’s mission, vision, values, and academic goals and priorities. The Strategic Academic Master Plan provides a framework for ongoing analysis, academic planning, and decision making that prioritizes academic excellence, establishes action plans for continuous improvement, and provides guidance for resource allocation and facilities planning.
Objective 1:
Offer academic programming to meet the needs of our students, communities, and the industries we serve in career and technical and transfer programs. Strategically provide support structures for all programs to ensure the competitiveness of certificate and degree programs. Explore and implement the following if feasible:
- Action Item 1: Pursue new programming to further enhance our focus on construction trades and associated programs.
- Action Item 2: Develop an advanced Emergency Medical Technician credential.
- Action Item 3: Modify the Practical Nursing curriculum.
- Action Item 4: Expand the Practical Nursing program to a capacity of 100 students to meet student and community demand.
- Action Item 5: Achieve national accreditation for the Practical Nursing program.
- Action Item 6: Develop a Surgical Technology program.
- Action Item 7: Expand the Dental Hygiene clinic to serve increased number of students and to meet community demand.
- Action Item 8: Add areas for the Career Ready program.
- Action Item 9: Modify the Paramedic class to allow for flexible schedules for working firefighters.
- Action Item 10: Expand the Registered Nursing program to include part-time scheduling in order to graduate more nurses.
- Action Item 11: Rewrite the Licensed Practical Nursing to Registered Nursing bridge for part-time students.
Objective 2:
Provide state-of-the-art instructional facilities as appropriate for the disciplines. Develop a plan to anticipate and meet facility and capacity needs for all programs. Explore and implement the following if feasible:
- Action Item 1: Co-locate facilities on the main campus to house all law enforcement and public safety related programs (Fire Science, Emergency Medical Science, and the Police Academy), to support their growth and collaboration.
- Action Item 2: Remodel the first floor CLB Nursing Lab area.
- Action Item 3: Identify appropriate space for the proposed Surgical Technology program.
- Action Item 4: Relocate the Fashion Merchandising and Design program (to include laboratories, office space, and room for the historical collection).
- Action Item 5: Create a computer lab for students in Information Technology programs to practice computer hardware skills.
- Action Item 6: Construct a new astronomical observatory to support student demand in the Astronomy program.
- Action Item 7: Create new infrastructure to support Journalism taking on the Student Media Center.
- Action Item 8: Transform the Horticultural Science Center to support usage and collaboration among Horticulture, Floral Design, and Sustainable Agriculture programs.
- Action Item 9: Evaluate current programming at the Olathe Health Education Center (OHEC) and consider a new facility to consolidate all healthcare programs on the main campus.
Objective 3:
Develop infrastructure to provide flexible scheduling for a variety of courses and modalities in alignment with the Strategic Enrollment Management Plan at JCCC.
- Action Item 1: Create areas of interests (meta-majors) as a program alignment for student pathways.
- Action Item 2: Enhance marketing efforts to showcase JCCC programs to spark student interest.
- Action Item 3: Create more flexible scheduling to provide more options for high school students and adult learners. This could include standardizing Parts-of-Term as possible block options, exploring short-term cohort-based program offerings (possibly connected to areas of interest), and publishing a year-long course schedule to increase opportunities for completion.
- Action Item 4: Capitalize on newly implemented technology to determine course demand.
- Action Item 5: Strive for appropriate enrollment efficiencies (fill rates across Academic Affairs).
- Action Item 6: Establish and foster a partnership with Information Services that supports the optimization of the goals of the Strategic Academic Master Plan.
Objective 4:
Align with KBOR initiatives and policies to expand transfer opportunities without impacting career and technical programs and students with prior credit.
- Action Item 1: Create math pathways and run a pilot during the fall 2025 semester.
- Action Item 2: Align with KBOR’s systemwide transfer initiative.
- Action Item 3: Collaborate with Student Services on the completion of Academic Program Maps.
Objective 5:
Collaborate with Student Services and build infrastructure that supports a mandatory advising model by leveraging the Guided Pathways project impacting career and technical programs and students with prior credit.
Objective 1:
Actively recruit and retain highly accomplished faculty and staff.
- Action Item 1: Incorporate multiple measures of employee engagement into faculty evaluations,
- while aligning faculty evaluations with faculty job descriptions.
- Action Item 2: Explore ways to provide additional faculty and academic staff positions to support enrollment growth, retention, completion, and industry experience in critical areas to serve student and community demand.
- Action Item 3: Develop gap analysis and compensation plan relative to competitive industry positions in
Computer Science / Information Technology, Industrial Technology, Healthcare, career and technical programs, or other fields experiencing difficulties hiring faculty. - Action Item 4: Provide resources to ensure academic integrity and maintain commitment to high standards of student achievement.
Objective 2:
Foster a culture of continuous professional growth, in which all employees are empowered to enhance their skills to advance the mission of the college and their career goals.- Action Item 1: Expand departmental professional development opportunities to include College Now faculty and to promote vigor, innovation, and cohesiveness in academic disciplines.
Objective 1:
Enhance connections with the community.
- Action Item 1: Continue to develop strategic industry partnerships with companies such as General Motors (GM), BNSF Railway, and Panasonic to promote learning and employment opportunities for our students and community.
Objective 2:
Through collaboration with the campus bookstore, promote open educational resources (OER) and other cost-effective course materials for students.
Objective 3:
Explore ways to incorporate artificial intelligence and augmented reality technologies to enhance student learning, and provide guidance for faculty and staff in upholding excellence and academic honesty.
Objective 4:
Foster interdepartmental collaboration across JCCC to strengthen academic programs, and promote interdisciplinary curriculum enhancements between the academic and support areas within Academic Affairs to support student learning.
- Action Item 1: Create and encourage training opportunities that increase students’ sense of belonging in the classroom and in campus communities.
- Action Item 2: Strengthen the academic program review process to be more responsive to stakeholder feedback and establish clear, transparent criteria for assessing programs and supporting enrollment growth in critical areas.
Objective 5:
Foster a culture of curiosity and exploration through programs, co-curricular activities, and innovative teaching methods.