Our second program in this year's ACL series on measuring impact features a panel discussion with our colleagues Christine Kimball of The Five Colleges of Ohio, Cathy Wilt of the Pennsylvania Academic Library Consortium, and Chuck Thompson of the Claremont University Consortium.  They shared approaches they use to measure and communicate the value of shared administrative programs to their consortial communities.

As a result of participating in this interactive session, participants acquired models for setting project and service goals, prioritizing and selecting projects, measuring satisfaction and calculating the value of cost avoidance.

Slides (and other episodes) are available for download at https://acl.site-ym.com/?page=webinars

For ACL members who couldn’t attend the conference, who missed a session, or who just want to be reminded of what they learned, the Virtual Professional Development Committee has compiled a “lightning round” podcast of multiple conference presenters sharing their top “take-aways” from their sessions, as well as any “a-ha!” moments from the conference.

1. Strategic Planning for Cooperation

Beth Moy, the Southeastern Pennsylvania Consortium for Higher Education

2. Building and Sustaining Cooperative Academic Programs

R. Owen Williams, Associated Colleges of the South

3. Building and Sustaining Cooperative Administrative Programs

Susan Palmer, Five Colleges of Ohio (interviewed by Diane Dimitroff)

4. The Strategic Use of Technologies to Support and Enhance Collaboration

Tracy Thompson, NELLCO Law Library Consortium

5. Projects and Project Management Strategies

Barbara McFadden Allen, Big 10 Academic Alliance(interviewed by Victoria McGillin)

6. Measuring Success: Assessing the Performance of a Consortium or Cooperative Projects

Irene Burgess, Pennsylvania Consortium for the Liberal Arts (interviewed by Robert Diggs)

7. Communicating the Value of Collaborative Work

Kevin Kennedy, Five Colleges, Inc. (interviewed by Victoria McGillin)

Slides (and other episodes) are available for download at https://acl.site-ym.com/?page=webinars.

In this professional development webcast for consortium leaders, Diane Dimitroff (Executive Director, Lehigh Valley Association of Independent Colleges) and Christine Kimball (Strategic Procurement Director, The Five Colleges of Ohio, Inc.) describe how to consider new administrative collaborations, including collaborative buying. Vicki McGillin (Independent Consultant on Higher Education Collaboration) moderates the program, which covers foundational or baseline principles and conversations. Listeners will learn:

• How to create a framework to start your collaborative buying exploration by defining your outcomes first, not your actions.
  
  
• Tips and tools for creating and maintaining momentum and commitment.

Webcast slides (and other episodes) are available for download at https://acl.site-ym.com/?page=webinars.

In this professional development webcast for consortium staff, Diane Dimitroff (Executive Director, Lehigh Valley Association of Independent Colleges) moderates a panel of experts on communication strategies in higher education collaborations. They discuss different methods for various types of communications (e.g. promoting a program, communicating organizational impact, soliciting input) and effective strategies for communicating with different target populations. The panelists consider differences between small and large organizations and when and how to use social media tools like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

Kevin Kennedy and Taliesin Nyala (Five Colleges, Inc.) kick off the conversation with a Communication Overview. Robert Diggs (Pennsylvania Consortium for Liberal Arts) talks about Starting up with Social Media. Then, Jeff Oberg and Kara McKinn (Committee on Institutional Cooperation) offer their take on Communicating Impact. Finally audience members engage the experts in a question and answer session.

Webcast slides (and other episodes) are available for download at https://acl.site-ym.com/?page=webinars.

What strategies are successful in managing your consortium board through changes in membership and leadership?  How do you bring new members up to speed? And how can you energize and engage your board? For this ACL webcast (now a podcast), we assembled an expert panel representing over 30 years of consortium leadership. They offer their take on one of the greatest challenges to consortium impact and success: transition. The dialog is guided by our guest moderator, Dr. Cathy Trower, a consultant, coach, and author of The Practitioner’s Guide to Governance as Leadership: Building High Performing Nonprofit Boards.

About the panelists:

Neal Abraham is Executive Director of  Five Colleges, Inc. in Massachusetts, where he serves as a member of the Board of Directors of the consortium. For the 11 years prior to coming to Five Colleges in 2009, Neal served as vice president for academic affairs and dean of the faculty at DePauw University. Previously, he held appointments at Bryn Mawr College and Swarthmore College.

Barbara McFadden Allen is Executive Director of the Committee on Institutional Cooperation (CIC), a consortium of 15 research universities including the members of the Big Ten Athletic Conference and the University of Chicago. Barb has been with the CIC for 21 years, including 5 years as director of their library initiatives, and 16 as executive director.

Christopher Welna is President of the Associated Colleges of the Midwest (ACM) since 2006. He works with ACM’s two boards to set overall priorities and policies for programs to help strengthen the 14 member colleges as leaders, and exemplars, in liberal arts education. Prior to leading the ACM, Chris held appointments at the University of Notre Dame, Duke University, and the Ford Foundation.

About the moderator:

Cathy A. Trower is President of Trower & Trower, Inc., a board governance consulting firm, through which she has provided consulting and coaching services to more than 125 nonprofits. Cathy is author of The Practitioner’s Guide to Governance as Leadership: Building High Performing Nonprofit Boards (Jossey Bass 2013).  She spent 25 years in higher education as researcher, administrator, department chair and faculty member.