Tarrant County College:

the First Half-Century

by

William W. Lace

This work is dedicated

to the memory

of Erma Johnson Hadley

Acknowledgments

My thanks go first to my editor, Chris Whitley of Northeast campus, for his proficiency, perseverance, discernment and the perspicacity to urge me not to use long words. Thank you also to the dozens of faculty, staff and students from TCC and members of the community for being so gracious with your time and agreeing to be interviewed. Finally, a big thank-you to my wife Laura who endured, for 18 months, a study littered with newspaper clippings, magazines, three-ring binders and photographs.

– William W. Lace

Contents

Chapter 1: Groundwork

Chapter 2: The Race Toward August

Chapter 3: Starting from Scratch

Chapter 4: Another Race Against Time

Chapter 5: The Parallel Race

Chapter 6: Curtain Up!

Chapter 7: Encore!

Chapter 8: Northwest Makes Three

Chapter 9: Meanwhile, the ‘70s

Chapter 10: Growth and Change

Chapter 11: Arlington at Last

Chapter 12: Toward a New Century

Chapter 13: Toil and Trouble

Chapter 14: Storm Warnings

Chapter 15: Change of Plans

Chapter 16: Fallout

Chapter 17: Full Speed Ahead

Chapter 18: Looking Out, Looking In

Chapter 19: Goodbyes and Hellos

Chapter 20: Upsetting the Applecart

Chapter 21: The Wraparound

Chapter 22: Fifty Years and Counting

Chapter 23: Looking Ahead

Chapter Notes

Appendix: TCC Facts and Figures

Tarrant County College: The First Half-Century

Chapter 1: Groundwork

Tarrant County Junior College was an idea whose time had come.

It was such a good idea, in fact, that it popped up in three different places at three different times in the early 1960s. At length, civic leaders from throughout the county came together and – with a combination of vision, optimism, and plain hard work – created what would become an integral part of the fabric of Tarrant County.

Junior colleges, as they were known then, were hardly new. Joliet College in Indiana is generally acknowledged as the first public junior college, founded in 1901 at the urging of William Raney Harper, president of the University of Chicago. Harper called for a separation between the first two and second two years of study toward a bachelor’s degree, writing, "It is not until the end of the sophomore year that university methods of instruction may be employed to advantage.”[1]

Junior colleges were no stranger to Texas, either. In fact, Decatur Baptist College predated Joliet by nine years and served largely as a preparatory academy for Baylor University until moving to Dallas in 1965 as Dallas Baptist University. El Paso (1921) and Wichita Falls (1922) had the first public junior colleges, but both were eventually to become universities – UT-El Paso and Midwestern State. The oldest continually operating junior college in Texas is North Central Texas College, which began in 1924 as Gainesville Junior College.

The movement grew steadily, doubling in number in each of the next three decades. The explosion came in the 1960s when 497 junior colleges were established, more than in the previous six decades combined. Many of these newcomers were of a different sort than their predecessors. Junior colleges had been largely a rural phenomenon, especially in Texas. Of the state's 10 largest community colleges in 2010, only San Antonio College – now a campus of the Alamo Colleges system – was around before 1960, having been established in 1925.

In the 1960s, however, junior colleges began moving into the big cities in a big way. This movement can be traced to the boom in higher education brought about by the G.I. Bill after World War II. A college education was no longer for the wealthy and influential. Military veterans enrolled by the hundreds of thousands. “In the 1960s when record numbers of baby boomers — the children of those veterans — left high school looking for post-secondary education, community college enrollment soared again,” former San Antonio Mayor Henry Cisneros wrote in 1996. “Four-year colleges could not handle the large numbers of new students; it was easier and cheaper to build new two-year schools and expand their enrollment.”[2]

Not only did the number of urban community colleges mushroom but so did the number of campuses they sprinkled around the cityscape. Accessibility was a keyword, and districts chose to place campuses as close as possible to prospective students. Writing in 1964, educator Clifford Erickson listed five factors leading to the rise of multi-campus colleges:

- “a rural to urban population shift,

- ‘“selective population migrations’” accelerating the need for education in urban areas,

- an increase in college-age population,

- changes in technology requiring higher levels of training for employment, and

- greater understanding by university presidents of the extent to which community colleges could provide an additional source of students.” [3]

Texas climbed on the bandwagon in 1963 when Governor John Connally appointed the Texas Commission on Higher Education to study the state’s colleges and universities and to make recommendations, one of which was to establish more junior colleges to help handle the influx of enrollment. Accompanying the recommendation was a list of Texas cities considered ripe for a junior college. One of them was Fort Worth.

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram needed no further encouragement and assigned Austin bureau reporter Harley Pershing to do a 13-part series, “No Room for Mediocrity,” on the role and scope of community colleges. A key question was whether Fort Worth and Tarrant County needed a junior college. Not surprisingly, the Star-Telegram’s answer was a resounding “yes.”

Pershing pointed out that the junior college that had served the area since 1917 – Arlington State College – had gained university status as part of The University of Texas system and that its technical training function had diminished just as the need for such training was needed most. “A community junior college seems to be the needed replacement,” he wrote.” [4]

It is not known whether the Star-Telegram series sparked conversations throughout the county about the possibility of a junior college or whether such conversations were one reason for the series being written. Regardless, a junior college became an increasingly hot topic among civic leaders.

One such hotbed of discussion was in the county’s northeast quadrant where the Haltom-Richland Chamber of Commerce in late 1963 began a grassroots effort to secure a junior college that would serve such school districts as Haltom, Hurst-Euless-Bedford and Birdville. Banker Charles Brinkley was appointed chair of a task force to study the issue.

The project moved slowly but picked up steam in 1964 when Brinkley brought area service clubs on board, one of which was the Hurst-Mid Cities Rotary club whose president was Dr. J. Ardis Bell, a family practice physician living in North Richland Hills.

Bell, a Fort Worth native and a 1941 graduate of Arlington Heights High School, had been sold on the idea when Newell H. O’Dell, superintendent of the H-E-B schools, spoke to the club about the need for a junior college. “We felt there was a need on the part of people who did not really seek four years of academic training,” Bell said in 1982. “Also we felt there was a need for more technical-vocational training. And we brought up the idea – and I think this has been borne out – that there are probably a lot of people who think they’re ‘too old’ for a university setting and might be interested in a junior college.” [5]

Fort Worth’s civic leaders had not been idle. Don Kennard, a member of the Texas House of Representatives and later the Texas Senate, had been keenly interested in the recommendations coming out of the Commission on Higher Education, especially the one promoting junior colleges. In the spring of 1964, he arranged a meeting between Grady Hogue, then president of Cisco Junior College, and Fort Worth oilman Larry Meeker. Ironically, Hogue had originally come to speak about junior colleges to the northeast Tarrant County group, but the meeting had been postponed at the last minute. In a 1967 interview with UT-Austin doctoral student Quentin Bogart, Meeker said, “Hogue converted, baptized, and delivered me to the junior college movement on the spot, and I knew we had to have one!” [6]

Thus evangelized, Meeker began rounding up other believers, including Star-Telegram executive J. Lee Johnson III and a 50-year-old attorney named Jenkins Garrett who was destined to be the most pivotal figure in the establishment and early history of the College. Garrett was born in Caldwell, Texas, but grew up in Fort Worth where his father was pastor of Rosen Heights Baptist Church. He earned a bachelor’s degree at UT-Austin and a law degree from Harvard. At the time Meeker approached him, Garrett was general counsel for the Marvin and Obie Leonard companies.

Johnson, at the time president of the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce, asked Garrett to chair a Chamber task force to study the junior college proposal. Johnson later reported to a friend that Garrett hesitated before accepting. If so, it might have been because he was about to leave the Leonards to go into a law partnership with Robert Stahala.

Garrett had already been intrigued by the idea of a junior college, having been a member of Connally’s Committee on Education Beyond High School. “One of our speakers pointed out that Texas was short on meeting the responsibilities that junior colleges meet,” he was to say. “I took a real interest in that.” [7]

Throughout late 1964 and early 1965, Garrett, Meeker, Kennard and their allies worked to convince others. The Chamber committee needed a vehicle through which to grow the junior college seed into a flowering, community-wide campaign. That vehicle was the Town Hall of the Fort Worth Metropolitan Area, created in 1963 after a bond election in which Fort Worth citizens soundly defeated a proposal for a new City Hall. It wasn’t the first time the voters had scuttled an establishment proposal. “We had turned down every major civic project offered for election in the past five or ten years,” said Lee Goodman Jr., then executive secretary of the Downtown Fort Worth Association. [8]

The Town Hall was the brainchild of Willard Barr, a printing company owner and Fort Worth mayor pro tem. Barr would later, as mayor, describe the Town Hall’s purpose as “massing [Fort Worth’s] various constructive forces into a coherent and effective, though loosely knit, community organization – one larger than the various normal groupings in the city, and dedicated to a common cause which is engaging enough to override the normal disparity among us … the organization can grow around an ever-widening circle of people meeting in conversation.“ [9]

City leaders recognized that the citizenry perceived civic initiatives as coming from the top down – from what, in Fort Worth, was known as the Seventh Street Gang, named from the address of the Star-Telegram as well as the city’s major banks and some heavyweight law firms. Barr and others realized voters would be far more likely to support proposals generated through a democratic process. The Town Hall also had the foresight to see an increasing need for regional cooperation and thus extended membership beyond Fort Worth to all Tarrant County, a factor that would prove important later.

After two organizational meetings, the first Town Hall open session took place in June 1963. Predictably, there was no shortage of proposals. The rules called for all proposals to be considered by an executive committee consisting of Fort Worth’s mayor, the presidents of the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce, the Downtown Fort Worth Association and the Tarrant County Central Labor Council along with two at-large members. The committee would recommend proposals that seemed most viable and well supported for further study through the organization’s committee structure. The junior college was one chosen, and a committee formed.

The project had strong backing, but it would have to take its place in line along with another attempt for a city hall and – the top priority – a proposal for a convention/sports center. It was a tribute to the Town Hall concept that the bond election to finance the downtown Fort Worth convention center passed by a 2-1 margin.

Garrett, Meeker and the committee continued to plead their case and in December 1964 got the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce to make the Town Hall Junior Committee part of the chamber’s official structure. Shortly afterward, they enlisted the aid of Dr. C.C. Colvert, Texas’ acknowledged expert on junior colleges.

Colvert, who would have a tremendous impact on the founding and early operation of the College, had been founding president of Northeast Junior College in Monroe, La., later to become the University of Louisiana at Monroe. He joined the faculty of UT-Austin in 1944 and founded what grew into the Community College Leadership Program, an incubator for dozens of future presidents in Texas and throughout the nation.

Colvert met on December 2, 1964, with Garrett, Kennard and Fort Worth Chamber executive Jack Key. He outlined the steps necessary under state law to establish a junior college. Thresholds stipulated the number of “scholastics,” or public school students in the area, to be served and also the amount of taxable property since the college would be supported in part through an ad valorem tax. Fort Worth qualified easily on both counts.

A much more formidable task was to obtain the signatures of at least 10 percent of the area’s qualified voters to be served, and qualified voters in those days meant everyone who had registered and paid a poll tax. Only with enough signatures on petitions could an election be called to establish a junior college district.

About this time, a phone call from Garrett to Bell greatly enlarged the project’s scope and in large measure determined the future of Tarrant County Junior College. Bell, Brinkley and others in Northeast Tarrant County had not been idle. More service clubs and civic groups had joined the movement. A steering committee had formed with Brinkley as the chair, and the group by December 1965 was on the verge of seeking an election. Garrett, however, had what Bell conceded was a far better idea. “He called me and suggested we have lunch,” Bell said in a 1985 interview. “He thought a junior college district taking in the entire county would form a stronger taxing entity, and he was right.“ [10]

The enlarged group of junior college backers circled January 14, 1965, on their calendars. That was the date of the next Town Hall general meeting at which the organization’s future projects would be prioritized. The two holdover initiatives – the college and the Fort Worth City Hall – were at the top of the list, but the question was which would come first.

Meeker and others on the committee weren’t taking any chances, making sure the meeting was attended by very numerous and very vocal junior college backers. “We salted [the meeting] real good, and we got all those folks in there,” Meeker said later. “Hurray for a junior college! And it was a mechanical thing, and they tabulated the number of suggestions for a junior college … and I believe we outweighed the other issues 8 to 1.” [11]

Some in the Fort Worth political hierarchy favoring the city hall project were not ready to concede defeat, but both sides knew only one of the two issues would likely go to the voters. The taxpayers had only recently approved $44 million in bonds for the convention center, and it was thought that, while they might approve one more large public expenditure, a second might be asking too much. The two groups, quietly and largely out of public view, jockeyed for position, buttonholing influential people they thought might be receptive to their respective causes.

Matters came to a head a few weeks after the Town Hall meeting at a gathering of the organization’s coordinating committee. Brinkley, whose Northeast Tarrant County forces had been prominent at the general meeting, moved that the junior college be designated “the project of top priority.”[12] J. Lee Johnson seconded, and the motion carried, and the junior college enterprise had received official sanction.

Tarrant County’s leaders had been convinced that a junior college was needed. The next step was to convince the voters.

Chapter 2: The Race Toward August

Town Hall’s official blessing opened the way to calling an election to establish a junior college district as a new governmental entity. The movement’s leaders had the backing of Tarrant County’s movers and shakers. What they did not have was time.

Those who promoted a new City Hall for Fort Worth had agreed to back the college, but with one important stipulation. Garrett, Brinkley, Meeker and the rest of their committee agreed that the election would be conducted prior to August 1965, so that an election for the new City Hall could go to Fort Worth voters the following fall. The committee had six months to make its dream a reality.

The election would contain four propositions:

1. Creation of a countywide junior college district

2. Election of a seven-member Board of Trustees

3. Setting of a maximum tax rate of 36 cents per $100 of property valuation for maintenance and operations and for financing the sale of bonds

4. Approval to issue $18,144,000 in general obligation bonds to finance the construction of two campuses.

College backers were outwardly confident of voter approval. Inwardly, there were lingering doubts. “Ignorance was a bigger thing to overcome than any opposition to the idea,” Bell said years later. “What was a junior college? Why did we need another college in Tarrant County when we already had three? [Texas Christian University, Texas Wesleyan College and The University of Texas at Arlington] Even up to the day of the election, there was some doubt we had convinced the voters. I really, deep down, thought it would pass, but here was something that to most people was new.” [13]

The task of convincing the voters, however, lay in the future. The more immediate and not inconsiderable hurdle was bringing about something on which they could vote – jumping through the hoops to get an election called.

The first step laid down by state law was to gain the signatures of at least 10 percent of property-owning, poll tax-paying voters – about 12,000 in the case of Tarrant County – on petitions requesting an election. Property ownership was required in those days for any measure involving approval of an ad valorem tax. These petitions then needed to be certified by the county tax assessor-collector as to the number of signers and their eligibility.

The petitions next would go to the county Board of Education for certification before being sent on to the Texas Board of Education. Normally, the state board would conduct a public hearing on the need for a new college and issue its decision within 30 days. Because of Tarrant County’s time restraints, however, the public hearing was waived. Instead, Commissioner of Education J.W. Edgar would rule that a study by C.C. Colvert commissioned by the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce could serve to establish the need for a junior college.

Once the state board approved a project, it went to the county Commissioners Court, which had the authority to call an election and set a date. That triggered a second round of petitions from persons wishing to run for election to the Board of Trustees. These petitions required only 2 percent of voters, and there was no property ownership requirement. Once the trustee petitions were validated by the county tax assessor-collector and Commissioners Court, the election could proceed.

On February 24, the Town Hall Coordinating Committee created a steering committee specifically charged with carrying out the junior college project. The chair was Charles Brinkley, who later said he thought he was selected because “we [the people of Northeast Tarrant County] had been talking it for a year and a half.”[14] Over the next few weeks, the committee grew to 45, including Garrett, Bell, Meeker, Goodman, State Representative Doyle Willis, J. Lee Johnson, Garrett Morris, Edmund Van Zandt, H.B. Fuqua, Atwood McDonald, Fred Dickey and Arlington Mayor Tom Vandergriff. The news media were solidly on board, with Frank Mills of WBAP-TV, Jack Butler of the Star-Telegram and Walter Humphrey of the Fort Worth Press all committee members. Meeker chaired the Campaign Committee, whose responsibility was to collect petition signatures, and Van Zandt took charge of spreading the word via a speakers bureau.

Garrett received copies of Colvert’s report in March and passed them on to Brinkley. Colvert came to Fort Worth April 17 to discuss his findings with the steering committee. The statistics, he reported, clearly bore out the need for a junior college. He cited the number of high school graduates, which had increased from 3,178 in 1958 to 5,644 in 1964. By 1976, he predicted, Tarrant County high schools would turn out more than 8,000 graduates annually.

The county’s economic outlook, he said, was similarly sunny. Taxable property, valued at about $450 million in 1957, had gone up to $695 million by 1964 and was predicted to reach almost $1 billion by 1976.

Taking these factors into consideration, Colvert projected the college’s initial enrollment would be 1,900 full-time students and grow to 6,500 by 1976. The 1,900 figure would turn out to be absurdly low, but it likely sounded fine to the Town Hall folks.

Among Colvert’s suggestions was one that would have far-reaching consequences. “It is also suggested that two campuses be chosen for the total enrollment of the county,” he wrote. [15] Two campuses were needed, he said, because enrollment would shortly be too large for what he considered the optimum size of a single campus – 2,500.

This was the first documented statement that the new college would have more than one campus. Whether it would be a multi-campus or multi-college district was still to be determined. The difference, largely lost on the public, was nevertheless significant to the district’s board and employees. A multi-campus district has highly centralized administrative functions and is accredited as a single unit. A multi-college district [Dallas is a good example] has multiple colleges that, while still part of a single administrative unit and governed by a common board, are accredited separately and sometimes have duplicative functions – separate human resource departments, for example.

Despite Colvert’s rationale for two campuses, it seems likely the decision had already been made for political, rather than educational, reasons. It is difficult to believe that Brinkley, Bell and the other Northeast Tarrant County leaders would have joined forces with their Fort Worth counterparts without a tacit understanding that their area would have a campus.

A Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce study corroborated Colvert’s findings, stating, “Results of this study clearly indicate that the Fort Worth business community needs the educational advantages and facilities which would be provided through a two year college operated on a community wide basis.”[16]

The report went on to list the career fields that the subcommittee members thought would be best served by a two-year, post-secondary college:

- Accounting

- Secretarial science

- Electrical technician

- Mechanical technician

- Aero technician

- Civil technician

- Electronics technician

- Chemical technician

- Instrumentation technician

- Medical technician

- Dental hygiene

- Dental technician

- Data processing-programmer

- Insurance underwriting

- Hotel and restaurant management

- Refrigeration and air conditioning technician

- Real estate management

- Retail trade

Much work was to be done for all this to come about, but at least the Junior College Committee had a home base. The Fort Worth Chamber, in addition to lending support to the effort, got involved financially as well, if only modestly. Director of Transportation Jack Key sent a memo in April to his supervisor, Assistant General Manager Ernest Larmer, suggesting the Chamber provide office space, supplies and some staff support. Larmer agreed.

The committee’s most urgent task was to gather enough petition signatures, but at least getting the petitions in proper, legal form was easy. Dallas County was in the middle of its own junior college campaign, and Meeker simply borrowed copies of the Dallas petition as a model. The Dallas bonding attorney firm of McCall, Parkhurst and Horton provided the printed copies for distribution. That company would later handle the College’s first bond sale and all subsequent ones.

The petition drive began during the last two weeks of April. Volunteers went to speaking engagements armed with copies. Safeway supermarkets agreed to take up to 3,000 for each of their 15 Tarrant County stores. Boy Scouts distributed copies to restaurants, drug stores and all chambers of commerce.

The search for signatures started slowly. On May 20, the steering committee reported in a news release that 3,917 signatures had been obtained and submitted to Tax Assessor-Collector Reed Stewart for certification. The release was not celebratory but rather imparted a tone of urgency. Meeker was quoted in what amounted to a call to arms. “Our greatest need in getting the additional signatures necessary to call an election,” he said, “… is manpower to man the booths and tables in public places where petitions are located.”[17]

Meeker’s exhortation must have paid off. A week later, Brinkley wrote to his committee that nearly 11,000 signatures had been submitted, but he called on the members not to slacken in their efforts and to collect signatures right up to the June 5 deadline.

On June 3, the Star-Telegram reported that 20,800 names were on petitions and that the total was expected to reach 24,000 by the time the petitions were to be delivered to the Texas Board of Education two days later. Jenkins Garrett couldn’t resist sounding a note of civic pride. “It took Fort Worth three weeks to get the signatures,” he said with some exaggeration. “The same task took Dallas three months.”[18]

The next day, Tarrant County School Board certified that the petitions met the 10 percent threshold, and the county tax assessor-collector announced he had validated 12,700 of the signatures. The petitions then were packed away by Meeker and driven to Austin for a Texas Board of Education meeting the next morning.

Early on June 5, a chartered flight carried a cargo of dignitaries including Garrett, Van Zandt, Kennard and Goodman to Austin. They were not to be disappointed. Brinkley, in his presentation to the board, said, “If you approve this petition, we promise you that we will build one of the best junior colleges in Texas.” A motion was made to approve the petition and waive the customary hearing and waiting period. It was seconded by W.C. Graves of Dallas, who said he did so because Vernon Baird of Fort Worth had earlier in the year seconded the motion to approve Dallas County Community College District’s application. “There’s nothing better than to have those Fort Worth people educated like the folks in Dallas,” Graves joked.[19]

The board voted 16-2 to waive the rules and approve the application but not without member James Harvey of Archer City warning the Tarrant delegation that it had much more work to do. In the past, he said, the board had approved applications without formal studies only to have the voters turn the proposition down.

The steering committee took Harvey’s warning to heart and vowed to do everything possible to sell the junior college concept to the voters. The next step was now to request the Tarrant County Commissioners Court to call for the election. The date chosen by the steering committee was July 10, barely a month away.

This was Van Zandt’s cue to go into action. He rounded up more than 40 volunteers to extol the virtues of a junior college to any audience who would listen. Some volunteers were polished speakers. Others, like Bell, got by on enthusiasm. “I guess the thing I remember most,” he once said, “is my knees knocking when I had to get up to address someone. … But I had a sincere drive and desire, and I guess my fear was one of whether I could get my point across.”[20]

Dr. May Owen, a pathologist who would become a member of the original Board of Trustees, steadfastly declined to speak, but she supported those who did. “I went with them to all those meetings, in my own car and everybody else’s, to hear all those speeches,” she said years later. “I ate more breakfasts than I care to think about.”[21]

The speakers were armed, in large part, by the findings of two studies – Colvert’s need report commissioned by the Fort Worth Chamber as well as another Chamber-sponsored effort designed “to determine what skills will be needed by local business and industry in the future and what courses in the technical and vocational fields should be offered by the college.”[22]

Many of those whom the college would directly benefit – its future students – were involved in the campaign. Among a long list of suggestions sent to the committee by Jim Vachule, a Star-Telegram editor, was that young people be a source of volunteers. A youth committee, he wrote, had been highly effective locally in Lyndon Johnson’s 1964 presidential campaign and in Willard Barr’s mayoral campaign. Youth committee members, he continued, should be available “as they may be needed to perform tasks such as put up signs, run errands, man telephones, distribute literature, etc.”[23]

Accordingly, the youth committee was formed in July. Its chairman was 17-year-old Tom Schieffer, known to the steering committee members through his older brother Bob, then a Star-Telegram reporter. Tom Schieffer was heading into his senior year at Arlington Heights High School, having been elected student body president in the spring.

Years later, as a member of the College’s Board of Trustees, Schieffer said, “TCJC’s was the first campaign – the first real campaign – I ever worked in. We got something like 200 kids down at the old Worth Hotel and got out a 20,000-piece mailing.”[24]

In addition to stuffing envelopes, teams of high school students fanned out to supermarket parking lots to place stickers promoting the junior college on automobile bumpers, hopefully with the owners’ permission. A mid-July youth rally was conducted in Fort Worth’s Forest Park during which bumper stickers were handed out along with yard signs hammered together by Boy Scouts. According to the Star-Telegram, rally attendees could expect “hot dogs, soft drinks and a-go-go music.”[25]

Generating enthusiasm among adults was important as well, and backers made an all-out effort to corral as many group endorsements as possible. Volunteers carried not only petitions and literature on the speaking trail, but also pre-prepared proclamations of support they hoped would be adopted, if not on the spot, then at least at the group’s next business meeting. Endorsements trickled in at first, only 12 having been secured as of July 5, but increased as the campaign gained momentum. Twenty-one groups were on board by July 13, and more than 50 eventually went on record supporting the junior college.

The most important endorsements sought were those of the presidents of TCU, Texas Wesleyan and UT-Arlington. As Bell had observed, the movement’s greatest opponent was ignorance. The urban junior college was largely an unknown quantity, and many voters asked why Tarrant County needed a fourth institution of higher education. Other people with allegiances to the existing universities feared a junior college might somehow hurt enrollment. This was particularly true in the case of UT-Arlington, which – as a state university – depended heavily on state appropriations based on enrollment.

Campaign leaders could – and did – go out of their way to explain the technical training aspect of junior colleges, something that existed only at UT-Arlington and there only to a small extent. They also pointed out the junior college would relieve crowding at the existing colleges. Such messages, however, would have more impact coming directly from the universities.

The university CEOs responded admirably. TCU Chancellor James M. Moudy addressed what he called the gap between high school and university educational programming. “This gap can be filled, in large measure, but the work of a genuine community college …,” he wrote. “The welfare of our community and, more important, the welfare of the people of our community requires that this gap be filled.”[26]

Dr. Law Sone of Texas Wesleyan was similarly supportive: “We feel that a community college will complement – but not duplicate – the splendid programs of higher education available at Arlington State College [UT-Arlington by this time], Texas Christian University, and Texas Wesleyan College,” he wrote. “A community college in Tarrant County will open the educational door to many young people who may not otherwise be able to begin their college work.”

UT-Arlington’s Dr. J.R. Woolf, had the best reason of the three to be uneasy, UTA’s tuition was much lower than at the private universities, and students of modest means – and especially their parents –might well be attracted to the even lower costs at a junior college. And a loss of students, as stated above, meant a loss in state revenue.

Woolf, however, came through to make it unanimous: “The establishment of a Tarrant County Junior College would not be a detriment to our existing senior colleges and universities, but would rather feed students into these colleges and universities,” he wrote. “But more important, I would say to you, is that it would enable the existing institutions to make a great thrust forward in the development of graduate degree programs and research activities which are so desperately needed in this area.”

Speculation over the years has been that Arlington Mayor Tom Vandergriff, a member of the Junior College Steering Committee, may have influenced Woolf’s support. There also might well have been a gentlemen’s agreement that any junior college campus in Arlington would be in the far distant future – as, indeed, it was.

Defining the junior college’s role from that of universities was all very well, some doubters persisted, but how long will it be before the junior college wants to become a university itself? People advancing this argument took a just-you-wait-and-see attitude, pointing to Lamar University, Midwestern State, Angelo State and UT-Arlington itself as examples.

Meeker took the lead in squelching such speculation: “We need a two-year college, not a four-year college,” he told the Star-Telegram, “and we will always need a junior college.” In the same article, he addressed the fear that a junior college would somehow cut into university enrollment. “For every freshman that the junior college may take – repeat, may take – from the four-year institution, it puts back two students in the junior and senior year-level work, time and time again,” he said.[27]

In addition, the Star-Telegram reacted to Meeker’s remarks with an editorial titled “A Permanent Junior College.” It called the specter of the junior college becoming a university “one of the most improbable fears” in the campaign. While pointing out that a 1964 Texas Research League study had warned about new junior colleges being “a foot-in-the-door device” en route to university status, the editorial observed that in instances where this had taken place in Texas “the calls for upgrading junior colleges … come from areas where the senior colleges sought do not exist.”[28]

With an election date now in view, the steering committee faced yet another round of signature gathering, this time for petitions to place on the ballot names of people seeking Board of Trustees positions.

Prospective trustees were chosen with an eye toward broad geographic and occupational representation. An attorney was thought to be needed for the board, as was someone from the medical profession, someone from organized labor and someone from industry. Racial integration was a given, and committee leaders recognized that having an African-American on the ballot would go a long way in gaining the support of that community at the polls.

Attorney Jenkins Garrett and physician Ardis Bell, both of whom had been devoted to the junior college idea from the beginning, agreed to be on the slate of candidates put forth by the steering committee. They would be joined by Delbert Adams, John E. Finn, Rev. Leonard L. Haynes, Edward R. Hudson and Dr. May Owen.

Adams, 35, came to Fort Worth in 1946 in time to join that year’s Paschal High School graduating class. Instead of going to college, he began working as a machinist for the Fort Worth branch of Convair Corporation, now part of Lockheed Martin. He became interested in the labor movement in the ‘50s and in 1964 was elected president of the Tarrant County Central Labor Council. Having missed his own chance at higher education, he was eager to help provide it to others. With a junior college, he said, “the children would get a better education and have a better life than some us have had before.”[29]

Finn, 46, was a native of Buffalo, N.Y. A graduate of the University of Buffalo, he taught school one year before entering the Army in 1941. He joined Bell Helicopter in 1943 as a personnel specialist and rose through the ranks before accepting a transfer to Bell’s Tarrant County plant in 1954 as director of industrial relations. His keen interest in post-secondary training opportunities for industrial workers led to his involvement in the junior college campaign. “I think it [the junior college] is a great institution,” he said. “To me, it is the most significant thing that has happened education-wise in the last fifty years.”[30]

Hudson, 62, was a native of Galveston and attended schools there and in Mineral Wells and Shreveport, La. He was attracted by both engineering and law and became a qualified surveyor before earning his law degree at the University of Missouri in 1926. He practiced law until 1935, when he joined his brother in the oil and gas producing business. Once asked why he agreed to be a trustee candidate, he said, “I am interested in colleges and particularly youngsters and specifically those who did not do well in high school. I believe we leave out a lot of good talent by all our high standards . . . I believe our role [as trustees] is to see that the college is properly staffed, properly financed, and to see that the curriculum is such that the high school drop out as well as the high school graduate can get a good education.”[31]

Owen was among the most highly respected members of the Tarrant County medical community. Her presence on the slate of candidates would give it more weight, but getting her to run turned out to be a chore. She was shocked, she said years later, when asked by a representative of the Chamber of Commerce to be on the ballot. “I said, ‘Oh, no, I just couldn’t do anything like that. First of all, the men wouldn’t like a woman there,’” she recalled. “He just went to the telephone and called Jenkins Garrett, and Jenkins Garrett said to me, ‘Yes, you’re the one we want.’ I couldn’t resist Jenkins. I think if he told me to stand on my head, I’d try to do it.”[32]

She had one important stipulation – no politicking would be required. “Mr. Garrett promised me that if I would let my name come up, I would not have to campaign,” she said. “Now, that’s the way they got me in.”[33]

Haynes rounded out what came to be known as the “Town Hall Slate.” Son of a tenant farmer in Jackson County, Texas, he attended what he called a “shack-of-a-school” and worked the fields with his father before a visitor convinced his family to send him to what is now Huston-Tillotson University. He earned a bachelor’s degree there and his Master of Divinity from Gammon Theological Seminary in Atlanta. At the time of the junior college project, he was pastor of St. Andrew’s Methodist Church in Fort Worth and a member of the junior college steering committee. His goal as a trustee was “to be a responsible agent of the Tarrant County Junior College District to see that we have the best facilities, and the best faculty and personnel.”[34]

Haynes was not, however, the only African-American on the ballot. Attorney L. Clifford Davis and Dr. Clyde Broadus, a dentist, joined in as well. Davis, later to become chief district judge for Tarrant County before leaving the bench for private practice, said he chose to run, in part, because he thought voters were not getting the whole story. The campaign, he said, was concentrating on a junior college’s value to the community rather than explaining how the district would be set up, including taxing and eminent domain authority.

Haynes and Broadus’ candidacies, however, were part of a more comprehensive strategy. “I took advantage of the position I had taken all along that you need more than one [candidate] if you want some options,” Davis said. “Since they were going to elect seven [trustees] and there were only going to be nine people on the ballot, we were sure there was going to be at least one [African-American] on the board.”

Author’s Note: All quotations lacking a parenthetical citation reference, such as the one above, are from interviews with the author or, in the cases of Chancellors Rushing and Roberson, interviews with the author or members of the TCC Archives staff.

The three had no animosity or intense competition. Indeed, both Davis and Broadus were members of Haynes’ church. One of their goals was to have an African-American elected countywide, which had never been done before, but they didn’t make a concerted effort to elect more than one. “Now, we could have said to our people, ‘Just vote for the three of us, because if you vote for seven of the nine that means you’re giving some of our opponents’ votes.’ We elected not to do that. We said, ‘Vote for everybody.’”

The paramount goal, Davis said, was to get the college established, and the thinking was that three African-American candidates could garner more support than one. “All of us had our spheres of influence,” he said. “I lived in one section of town, Dr. Broadus lived in another section, and Rev. Haynes in yet another. So you’ve got influences throughout [Fort Worth], and we were taking advantage of that.”

Steering committee members, knowing how important African-American support was to winning the election, tacitly supported adding the other two candidates. Indeed, they assisted at a crucial moment in the campaign. The deadline for submitting the trustee petitions happened to fall on July 4. According to Meeker, Tax Assessor-Collector Stewart refused to open his office to accept the petitions. Somehow, Meeker said, he and others gained access to the courthouse and used a machine to stamp the date on every petition.”[35] The Star-Telegram, however, had a different, less dramatic account, reporting simply that a clerk was on duty and stamped the petitions.

Davis and Broadus’ petitions met the deadline, as well. According to Davis, Town Hall Steering Committee members saw to it that backers of the two non-slate candidates had access to the courthouse, too. “They were seeking a lot of African-American support,” he said, “and their influence may have been important in getting that courthouse open.”

If Stewart, indeed, had refused to open his office, it wasn’t the first time, nor the last, that he would be a thorn in the campaign’s side. Two weeks earlier, he had appeared before Commissioners Court casting legal doubt on the petitions submitted to the Texas Board of Education. Since only property owners could vote on the measures calling for taxing authority and the issuing of bonds, he said, perhaps only the signatures of property owners should have been validated. His staff and petition workers had checked only to see if those signing had been registered voters. If property ownership was required, he said, the election would have to be postponed, thus missing the August 1 deadline.

Steering committee members were stunned but fought back. They enlisted the help of Assistant District Attorney Fred Fick to give a legal determination. After a day of research, Fick said he could find no legal requirement that petition signers must be property owners. County Judge Marvin Simpson gave his unofficial opinion that the election could take place “whenever the junior college people want it.”[36]

Still, Meeker wanted to remove any doubt. In early July, he consulted Robert Logan, a statistician at General Dynamics, and Dr. R.H. Talbert, a sociology professor at TCU, to see if they could suggest a method for validating the petitions as to the property ownership issue. Their solution was to take a sample – every 20th name on each petition – and check for property ownership. When Logan appeared with Meeker before the Tarrant County School Board on July 7, he said the analysis showed a 99 percent probability that at least 88 percent of the signatures validated a month earlier were from property owners. The board promptly voted unanimously to recertify the signatures.

The legality of the first wave of petitions had been determined, but valuable time had been lost. Brinkley’s steering committee had met June 30 and agreed to push the election back to July 31, the last date possible to beat the deadline. On July 8, the day after the school board vote, they put the question to the Commissioners Court only to find Stewart in their path once more. He said his figures showed the Town Hall Slate 308 signatures short of the required 2,500. Committee members countered that more than 4,000 signatures had been delivered and that 2,542 were from qualified voters.

Stewart asked that the election be postponed, as did a group calling itself the Citizens for Educational Excellence who pleaded for more time to submit its own trustee petitions. The court rejected both requests, ruled that enough signatures had been submitted both by Town Hall and by Davis and Broadus, and, by a 4-1 vote, set the election for July 31.

Anticipating a favorable vote by the court, Brinkley on July 8 had expanded the campaign’s leadership group, naming former Fort Worth Councilman Oliver Shannon, Richland Hills Mayor Paul Daniels and labor leader James Bertolina to help direct the activities of Meeker and his committee. This trio, in turn, appointed attorney Garrett Morris, later senior partner in a firm with Tom Schieffer, as an area coordinator. Morris then brought four co-chairs on board – State Senator Kennard, River Oaks Mayor Jimmy Walker, attorney Sterling Steves and Jesse Ward, past president of the Arlington Chamber of Commerce.

All this extra leadership, Meeker would say, resulted from a poll conducted for the Town Hall group by Richard Cookerly. The report, conducted on July 14, indicated support for the junior college, while widespread by geography and ethnicity, was not particularly strong. Only 18 percent of those surveyed said they were “strongly” for the measure, while 29.5 percent were “mildly” for and 24 percent “undecided.” The key to victory, Cookerly said, was to get supporters to the polls and to convince enough undecideds to get a majority. A light turnout, he said, could result in a defeat.

Accordingly, committee leaders marshaled volunteers to go door-to-door in precincts where opinion was favorable. Assisted by the Star-Telegram’s Jim Vachule, they prepared a pamphlet zeroing in on the cost – 90 to 95 cents a month in taxes on a $10,000 home in those days when $10,000 could buy a solid, middle-class house. Volunteers staffed telephone banks urging supporters to vote and, in an innovation for its time, Arlington Mayor Vandergriff recorded a message that was automatically telephoned to 20,000 homes. The age of the robocall had arrived.

As election day neared, both the Star-Telegram and Press ran prominent editorials urging a “yes” vote, but backers were worried. With only a few days remaining for absentee voting, only 128 people had cast ballots. The evening edition of the Star-Telegram on July 31 called turnout “sluggish,” with election officials at some precincts predicting a vote of only about 10 percent.

At last at 7 p.m., the polls closed, and some of the junior college backers gathered here and there to wait for returns. Owen remembered the evening vividly. “Jenkins Garrett had a group of us out to one of the country clubs, and afterward he said, ‘Now we’re going to the courthouse,’’ she recalled. “So, we went to the courthouse and watched the votes come in, watched them put the numbers on the board. I’d never been to anything like that before, and my eyes were bigger than saucers.”[37]

The numbers told a pleasing story. The front-page headline in the August 1 Press trumpeted, “All Jr. College Issues Approved by 2-1 Margin.” The Town Hall Slate easily won places on the Board of Trustees, receiving between 12,177 and 13,567 votes each. Broadus and Davis trailed with 9,147 and 9,042, respectively.

Broadus and Davis, however, had met their primary goal – turning out their community to vote for the college. Of the 15 precincts with the highest “yes” percentage, all but one were in African-American sections of the county. In the downtown Fort Worth precinct near the Ripley Arnold Housing Project, 100 percent of the voters approved.

The new trustees’ elation was tempered by one thought: Now that they had a college, they had to make it work. Ed Hudson noted that their long to-do list was headed by the search for a president. “After you get him,” Hudson said, “you’ve got just a jillion details to work out.”[38]

He could not have been more correct.

Chapter 3: Starting from Scratch

In case any of the newly elected trustees, basking in the afterglow of the successful election, were unaware of the tasks now facing them, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram saw fit to remind them in an editorial the following week. “The problem now,” it said, “is one of building, of starting from nothing, to erect a first class two-year college to serve the needs of the community as fully as they can be served. With this task we hope the new board will forge ahead with prudent speed.”[39]

The trustees hardly needed this call to arms. After watching the Tarrant County Commissioners Court officially canvass the ballots and declare the results, five of the seven trustees met informally to set the first official board meeting for Tuesday, August 10, in the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce offices.

Present at this initial meeting, in addition to trustees and reporters, were Hobby H. McCall and Ray Hutchison, members of McCall, Parkhurst and Horton, a Dallas law firm specializing in bond elections and sales for governmental bodies. Jenkins Garrett was selected unanimously to chair the meeting, and Hutchison, future husband of U.S. Senator Kay Bailey Hutchison, was charged with taking minutes.

Each trustee had already filled out the Oath of Office prescribed by state law, so the next order of business was to determine length of terms. Under state law, trustees were to serve six-year, staggered terms. They had to draw lots, therefore, to see who would serve how long. Garrett, Bell and Adams drew six-year terms; Owen and Finn four years; and Haynes and Hudson two years.

The board then elected officers. Garrett would serve as president; Finn, vice president; and Owen, secretary. The election of a treasurer was put off until a later date.

Garrett wasted no time making assignments. Adams was to take up the writing of bylaws and the design of a College seal. Hudson was tasked with financial matters, including temporary financing of operations, overseeing the selection of financial consultants, starting the process for levying taxes and selecting a bank in which to deposit funds. Finn was appointed to lead the search for a chief executive officer, with the board acting as a committee of the whole.

The trustees knew the community had considerable interest in where the campuses would be. Already, a letter to the Star-Telegram from Leon B. Blair had called for a location near downtown in “one of the blighted districts, perhaps along the North-South Freeway [I-35W]” so as to better serve “neighborhoods where the residents need to increase their ... skills and desire.”[40] And the same issue carried a story about the West Tarrant County Booster Club forming a 12-person committee to recommend a site – one, naturally enough, in the western part of the county. Accordingly, the board discussed site selection only in general terms but promised the process would be open with advance notice of all meetings given and citizen input welcome.

Before adjourning, trustees scheduled a second meeting for the following Monday night, August 16. In fact, however, they had already agreed to meet privately the next day with their consultant, C.C. Colvert, to discuss their first priority – selection of a president. They did not meet in closed session, or at least the meeting minutes do not so indicate, and it is likely neither the press nor the public were informed since Colvert intended to be very specific as to candidates for the presidency. He gave the trustees seven names, six of whom currently headed Texas junior colleges:

- A.B. Martin, Amarillo

- Marvin Baker, South Plains, Levelland

- Ben Jones, Navarro, Corsicana

- Anthony Hunt, Howard County, Big Spring

- Lamar Fly, Hill County, Hillsboro

- Travis McKenzie, Wharton

The seventh name on Colvert’s list was that of Dr. Joe B. Rushing who, although a native Texan, had left for Florida in 1960 to become the founding president of Broward County Junior College [now Broward College] in Fort Lauderdale. “He told us that the very best one was Joe Bob Rushing,” Bell would later recall, “but that we would never be able to get him.”[41]

Rushing, indeed, proved an elusive target. He was not interested in another job, being very happy with the one he had. “Beautiful location in Fort Lauderdale … a growing college … new campus just two years old, and I was prepared to spend the rest of my life there,” Rushing said years later. “Had a brand new house on the canal … the whole Florida bit.” He was polite, however, when telephoned by Finn a few days later and invited to Fort Worth to discuss the position, saying he was far too busy to make the trip.

Finn persisted. What was Rushing doing next Sunday? Maybe his crowded calendar had room for him to fly to Fort Worth for a talk and then back the same day. Rushing now was forced to be blunter, telling Finn he simply wasn’t interested.

Finn tried another line of attack. Perhaps Rushing could come that Sunday and meet with the trustees as a consultant. After all, he had recently started a junior college from scratch and could provide some valuable insights. And … oh, yes … his wife would be most welcome to accompany him.

This put the situation in a slightly different light. “Well, it won’t hurt anything,” Rushing remembered thinking, “and Elaine [the former Elaine Whitis whom he had met in college] can breathe some Texas air.”[42]

And so on Sunday, August 29, the Rushings flew to Fort Worth, were met at the airport by Finn and were whisked to Garrett’s home to meet throughout the afternoon with Garrett, Finn, Owen, Hudson and Bell. The conversation continued through dinner at Shady Oaks Country Club and then back at Garrett’s home almost until midnight. Rushing was struck by the trustees’ vision for what the college could be and passion about the good it could do for the community. “I realized that their dreams for the community college in Tarrant County were exactly the dreams I had for a community college,” he said, “and they were a group of people I wanted to work with.”

Both sides thought they were the cusp of a job offer, but neither side was quite ready to commit. Rushing wanted some time to think it over. Garrett and his colleagues realized that two trustees, Adams and Haynes, had not yet met Rushing. The latter was taken care of the following morning when the Rushings, having decided to spend the night, met the remaining board members before flying back to Florida.

The Sunday interview had constituted a board meeting, the minutes of which reported, “The board was favorably impressed.”[43] Indeed, they were. They had interviewed one other candidate – San Antonio College Vice President Clyde Nail – three days prior to Rushing’s visit, but there were to be no others.

Garrett called Rushing on September 3 and offered him the job. The offer was accepted, and an annual salary of $25,000 was agreed to. “And to tell you truth, Jenkins probably left a couple of thousand dollars on the table that day,” he said later. “I would have come for less money.” The deciding factors, he said, were the passion of the trustees, a more secure funding base than Florida could offer and a chance to return to Texas.

Rushing, born in 1921, was the eldest child of a hardscrabble farming couple in Brown County, Texas. When his father developed asthma, the family moved to nearby Comanche where – a year too young to attend public school – he attended a private kindergarten. His father’s death in 1927 led to a return to Brown County, where the family lived with his maternal grandparents.

He excelled in kindergarten to the point where his teacher gave him a note to pass along to wherever he would next attend school, which turned out to be a two-room school in tiny Antioch. The teachers there spoke with young Joe Bob, read the note from the teacher in Comanche and decided to start him in the second grade rather than the first.

The Antioch school was merged with the slightly larger school at Blanket, and Rushing graduated in 1938, intending to enter a business college in Brownwood. The pastor at his rural Baptist church had other ideas and convinced Rushing to attend Brownwood’s Howard Payne College. World War II interrupted his college career, but he completed his bachelor’s degree shortly afterward.

He began his career teaching high school chemistry but soon learned that “if anybody was making money [in education], it was the principal down the hall, where I certainly wasn’t.” He decided to go into school administration and, after earning a master’s degree at East Texas State while teaching in Mount Pleasant, landed a principal’s job in Ranger. While there, he taught chemistry at Ranger Junior College, saw the possibilities and enrolled in the junior college administration doctoral program at UT-Austin. After graduation, he went to Wharton Junior College as head of its adult education program and then back to Howard Payne as administrative vice president before taking on the presidency at Broward.

The TCJC board announced Rushing’s appointment September 5, and he was introduced to the public at a news conference four days later. His starting date would not be until November 1, but he was frequently in Fort Worth during the intervening weeks, assisting the board with its next major job – selecting sites for the two campuses.

Rushing officially began his TCJC tenure in a rented office in downtown Fort Worth’s First National Bank building equipped with second-hand furniture. “When I arrived there, the College didn’t own so much as a pencil,” he said later.

And, as the fledgling institution’s one and only employee, he didn’t have much help, either. The trustees, to be sure, were ardent in their support and gave invaluable service explaining TCJC to the community, but they didn’t know how to build a college. Rushing did, but he knew he needed another experienced junior college administrator. As it turned out, he already had one picked out – Jimmie Styles.

Styles, 33, was Rushing’s executive assistant at Broward. With a master’s degree and certification as an Educational Specialist, he brought a wealth of varied experience to Tarrant County. In fact, Rushing would later describe him as “a multi-purpose man.”[44] He knew academics, having taught in public schools and at the college level; knew computer systems and data processing; and had helped plan the physical layouts of schools while teaching in Savannah, Ga. The other big plus was that he already had Rushing’s respect and trust.

Styles began work November 12 as the College’s third employee, Rushing having already engaged Mildred Winters as his secretary. Styles soon had his own secretary, Lois Carmitchel, and this quartet constituted the entire TCJC staff through early 1966.      Later in November, Rushing and Styles, assisted by Colvert, drew up a blueprint for the College – not one defining physical spaces but instead a philosophical, yet intensely practical statement of what Tarrant County College was to be, what it would do, who would do it and how it would be done. Titled Overview and Guidelines, the bulky, mimeographed document was intended, as set forth in the Foreword, “for use of the administrative staff and designing architects as educational and facilities plans were developed for the first two colleges of the District.” With the dry wit so typical of Rushing, the Foreword ended, “Any originality of ideas expressed herein is probably accidental.”[45]

Several of those ideas dealt with the number and physical properties of the campuses. The number of sites, the document read, should depend on enrollment and educational programs. A campus enrollment of 3,500 to 4,500 full-time students was considered optimum, and no TCJC campus should exceed 5,000. The latter stipulation would be the cause of considerable merriment in years to come. The criteria for selecting individual sites included proximity to people to be served, accessibility, size [ideally no fewer than 150 acres], physical characteristics [shape, topography, soil conditions], availability of utilities as well as police and fire protection, and “acquisition in advance of need” – the necessity to track population growth and acquire needed land well in advance of development.”[46] Interestingly, cost was not listed.

Rushing and the board, however, did not wait for the Overview and Guidelines before starting the site selection process. At a meeting after Rushing’s press conference, the trustees hired Colvert to study the county’s population, including predicted growth, and make general recommendations on the location of campus sites.

One likely site presented itself almost immediately. Board members learned that tracts of federally owned land in the county might be declared surplus and acquired either free or at a deep discount. Specifically, the College was interested in land located about two miles east of I-35W just north of what is now I-20, the northern part of which was occupied by a U.S. Public Health Service Hospital. The board met October 13 with two men identified in the minutes only as Mr. Martin and Mr. Wynn representing the U.S. Department of Health, Education and Welfare. They told the board that such land could indeed be purchased at a discount. There were certain restrictions. The maximum amount of a transaction was 100 acres. Once land was acquired, construction had to begin within a certain time period. Buyers were to submit annual reports on use of the land, and such land could not be sold or used for rental property. The federal government would not retain mineral rights, a factor that would work to the College’s advantage many years later.

On November 3, the board conducted an open hearing to hear site proposals. Twenty-four were put forward, most costing from $1,000 to $6,000 per acre. Charles Brinkley, representing the northeast part of the county, listed 12 possible sites. A representative from North Fort Worth submitted sites there. River Oaks Mayor Jimmy Walker reiterated the locations that were previously advanced by the West Tarrant County Booster Club. Emmett McKenzie, representing South Fort Worth, offered a site at the 4700 block of East Berry Street near East Loop 820.

Other suggestions had been made by mail, including 250 acres at Loop 820 and what was then the Poly Freeway, 65 acres on two tracts near Crowley in far south Tarrant County, and a tract east of Marine Creek Lake. It was not reported at the time, but the Marine Creek site was owned by wealthy oilman and rancher F. Howard Walsh, whose representatives had already approached board members about donating the 150 acres.

Minutes of the meeting mention two other free land offers. One was 100 acres owned by rancher A.A. Allen five miles north of the intersection of I-35W and North Loop 820. The other was the federally owned site of 158 acres the board has already been considering. Since there was now no mention of a purchase price or the 100-acre cap, negotiations may well have been taking place since the October 13 meeting.

The board met the following night to hear Colvert’s report. He said the natural division of the county was in four quadrants defined north-south by I-35W and east-west by the Dallas-Fort Worth Turnpike and I-30. The area of fastest growth, he said, was in the southeast quadrant. Two board members, whom the meeting minutes do not name, responded that most of the growth in that sector was due to Arlington, which already had a university. It was later suspected, though never confirmed, that a gentlemen’s agreement had been struck between UT-Arlington and the junior college backers to at least postpone for some time any campus in Arlington.

The board then discussed each site. Most were ruled out as too expensive, too far from the center of the county, or lacking accessibility and utilities. One presented an unusual problem. “One man had a site in south Fort Worth divided by Interstate 35,” Rushing would recall. “He couldn’t quite figure how we’d get the two together, but he thought it was a great site, anyway.”[47] Nine eventually remained in the running, including the three offered as donations. Rushing and the trustees visited each of the nine on Sunday, November 7.

The next board meeting on November 11 featured an extended discussion of the sites, including a briefing from Eugene Carter and John Mason of Carter and Burgess, a Fort Worth civil engineering firm. They reported that the best bet in the northeast quadrant was “Site 10,” 188 acres of wooded land used mostly for raising horses and chickens. The site – future home of Northeast Campus – was bounded by what was then Texas 121, Precinct Line Road, and Harwood Road. One potential problem was that the land lay partly in North Richland Hills and partly in Hurst.

“Site 22,” the surplus federal land that would within two years be South Campus, was considered ideal. Not only was it a great location, but it would come to the College free. A drawback was that the Fort Worth Independent School District was also interested in the property, looking to put an athletic complex and high school there. The eventual solution came when the tract was divided by what is now C.A. Roberson Boulevard. South Campus was built on the western 150 acres, and a FWISD athletic complex on the eastern 125 acres. The high school, O.D. Wyatt, was built just south of the campus at the intersection of Campus Drive and Seminary Drive.

The Walsh family site, offered though not yet formally accepted, had promise, the consultants reported, but lacked good access and was distant from population centers. In its favor, however, was that Loop 820, when extended west of I-35W, would pass just to the south.

That November 11 meeting was also noteworthy for two actions toward the end. Garrett recommended the District appoint Tom Law, a principal in the Fort Worth firm of Law, Snakard and Gambill, as the College’s legal consultant. Once that was affirmed, Hudson recommended Weaver and Tidwell be retained as the College’s accounting firm. That motion also carried, and those two companies have maintained their connections with the College ever since.

In addition to evaluating sites, Rushing and the board were thinking about what would be built on them. They met November 15 to hear representatives from nine architectural firms give their opinions of the sites and how the campuses might be designed.

The board met again two days later to hear from three more architects and also from a three-man team – architects Morris Parker and Albert Komatsu and civil engineer John Mason – as to how much it would cost to build roads to three sites under consideration in the northeast and to prepare these sites for construction. They also authorized Rushing to make formal application for at least 150 acres of the federal land on Loop 820.

By this time, Rushing and Styles had a rough idea of what technical programs would be offered along with the academic curriculum – those classes that would transfer to universities. This, along with enrollment estimates, enabled Rushing to tell the board that each campus would require about 67 classrooms and laboratories of various sizes. He also laid down a precept that guided future CEOs and trustees from then on – that there should be a central administrative office separate from any campus. This would avoid any location from being considered the District’s “main campus.”

By December 1, the board was ready to make some key decisions. The initial campus – South – would be on the Loop 820 site, provided the land could be obtained from the federal government. Morris Parker and Associates was selected as the architectural firm, with Parker and Merv Croston the lead architects. The campus would be built, trustees agreed, at a cost of no more than $11 to $14 per square foot and would open in September 1967 – a scant 21 months away.

The decision for the second campus – Northeast – had required more discussion and some soul-searching. The property at Precinct Line and Harwood was among the most expensive at $2,500 per acre, and the site work – leveling and grading the land – would cost an additional $100,000. At the November 17 meeting, however, the trustees had decided that “the Board should not let $100,000 stand in the way when the primary aim was to find the best possible college site.”[48] The purchase was approved, Komatsu was named the architect, and the target date for occupancy was September 1968.

The third major decision was to accept the gift of property on Marine Creek Lake from the Walsh family as the site for what would become the third campus – Northwest. The board recognized, however, that the start of construction was at least three to five years in the future and depended on residential development in the area, accessibility of utilities and the completion of Loop 820 just south of the site.

As 1965 drew to a close, the Tarrant County Junior College trustees and their supporters could look back with considerable pride. They had convinced the voters to create the college. They had their president. They had sites for the campuses – at least for the first three. Yet, there was a shadow on the horizon. They had promised the first campus would open for business by September 1967. Could they deliver?

Chapter 4: Another Race Against Time

In a newspaper story announcing the campus sites, board President Jenkins Garrett said the timeline for the first campus would require the architects to “hit the ground running.”[49] Morris Parker and Merv Croston soon discovered that might not be enough. There was too much ground, they thought, and too little time.

Designers at the company told their bosses the earliest possible completion date was mid-1968. Parker and Croston checked with architects known nationwide for constructing colleges; all said the September 1967 deadline could not be met. The college stood firm and in late January 1966, at the end of a three-hour meeting, gave the architects “an ultimatum from the Board to get started or face replacement by another firm.”[50] They got started.

Rushing and Styles had not waited for the architects before tackling other aspects of campus construction. In early January, they compiled and sent out for bids a partial list of furniture and equipment that would be needed. They and 28 assorted trustees and civic leaders flew a chartered plane to Austin to lobby the Texas Highway Commission – successfully – to plan access roads on Loop 820 as well as a crossover on what would become Campus Drive. On January 10, Rushing, Parker, Croston and a team of trustees flew to San Francisco to tour existing junior colleges and take notes.

C.C. Colvert had been busy as well. In late January, he delivered to the architects a nine-page outline of space allocations for South Campus. A few weeks later, he followed up with the educational specifications. This 26-page document, an essential step in constructing any school or college, told the architects to design precisely how many of what and how big – so many classrooms of such-and-such sizes, same thing for labs and technical program areas, how many administrative offices and of what square footage, same for faculty offices, how much space for the registrar, bursar, financial aid office, library, maintenance facilities, student center, cafeteria, parking lots.

The total was 340,000 square feet, and the architects now had to allocate the space to various buildings. Parker and Croston estimated that with the educational specifications, or “ed specs,” in hand, five weeks would be needed to produce detailed plans, one month to secure a contractor and 12 to 14 months for construction. They would need good weather, no labor problems and a big helping of good luck to make the deadline.

Building a campus, however, entailed much more than planning. Plans would quickly involve purchasing, construction and staffing – all of which would require expenditures. Rushing knew all along he’d need someone to ride herd on the architects and contractor as well as handle the College’s finances, and he knew just whom he wanted – C.A. Roberson.

Like Rushing, Roberson was a West Texas small-town guy, born in a farmhouse near the unincorporated community of Veribest about 12 miles east of San Angelo. Farming, however, held no attractions for the young Roberson. “Early on,” he said years later, “I decided I didn’t want to do much with whether it rained or not.“

Roberson found he had a head for figures through his father’s general store. He graduated from San Angelo High School, attended San Angelo College for two years and then transferred to Texas Tech University where he earned an accounting degree and started graduate school with an eye toward becoming a Certified Public Accountant.

With only a six-week summer session to go before graduating, he was contacted by the Arthur Andersen accounting firm about a position but was very unenthusiastic about living in Houston. While home before the summer session began, he was told that Brian Wildenthal, who had become San Angelo College’s president in the years after Roberson’s graduation, wanted to see him.

Roberson said when they eventually met in Wildenthal’s office, “He looked across and said, ‘C.A., I want to make you business manager of San Angelo College.” Roberson demurred, saying he had no experience in such a role. Wildenthal brushed that aside. He had once been a business manager, he said, and he knew Roberson could do the job.

Roberson had another concern. “I told him, ‘You have to think about this: Just three years ago, I was a student here and not a very good student at that. And all these faculty members I’d be working with, they’re going to remember that lousy student.’” Wildenthal was unmoved, and the next fall Roberson began a 43-year educational career.

That career took him from San Angelo College to Sul Ross State to Odessa College. It was there in February 1966 that he was called by Rushing, who asked him to come to Fort Worth to help get this new college off the ground. The idea appealed to Roberson. “I thought this would be an opportunity to set things up the way we want,” he said. “And if we make a mess of it, it’s us doing it.”

Roberson’s official starting date was May 1, but he made numerous trips from Odessa to Fort Worth during March and April. The architects, using Colvert’s specifications, had already delivered the schematics – a plan showing generally what each building would look like and where each would be in relation to the others – and now worked on the preliminary plans due April 15. Normally, more time would have been required between schematics and preliminary plans, but time was in decidedly short supply. Thus, decisions that ordinarily would take weeks, Croston said, were made in an hour or less.”[51] Calling the board together to take action was not an option. Instead, the board delegated broad powers to Rushing.

The preliminary plans were completed ahead of schedule and shown to the board at its April 12 meeting. Trustees viewed more than 60 presentation boards showing various aspects of the 23-building campus, including floor plans and elevations. There were 13 building groups, each group consisting of one to four buildings. The general academic area – now the Academic Classroom Buildings – had four buildings, one each for English, history, mathematics and foreign languages. The fine arts group – art, music, and drama – had three buildings. The bookstore and a two-story Student Center made up another group. Faculty offices were in a four-building group, and the single Administration Building was a group of its own. The library was also a stand-alone group as was the Science Building. Buildings for Home Economics and Nursing made up the ninth group, and groups 10 and 11 contained physical education and electronics technology. Group 12 was given over to automotive and aviation technology, and the final group housed a building services unit and the campus power plant.

The campus presented a very long, low profile. Every building was single-story with the exception of the Student Center and Library. This was no accident. There was plenty of land, and single-story buildings could be built far more quickly.

The board members, impressed with the campus’ look and layout, approved the entire design, except for the Student Center kitchen. The problem with the kitchen, Roberson recalled, was that it was inappropriate for a community college. “Parker and Croston had worked with a guy out of Dallas named Harry Todd,” he said. “Harry Todd’s claim to fame was that he had designed the kitchens for the Olympics that were coming up in Mexico City. I looked at those plans and said, ‘This is never going to work. There’s not even a place to grill a hamburger.’ I mean, he was going to serve things like lobster Newburg and spinach soufflé.” The kitchen was redesigned and approved at a subsequent meeting.

Parker and Croston now had the green light to prepare the final drawings – the “bid documents” that would go to prospective contractors. Despite the short time frame for construction, the South Campus project had plenty of suitors. The media quoted Rushing saying the College fielded nearly 200 calls from would-be builders.”[52] The architects met the deadline for the final drawings – July 5 – and College officials conducted a pre-bid meeting with contractors and subcontractors the same day.

The board met August 5 to open and review construction bids. There is no record of how many were submitted or in what amounts. There is no doubt, however, that all were considered too high. The board rejected all bids and told the contractors to try again. Three bidders did, resubmitting lower bids, and on August 19 the board met again and awarded the contract to McCann Construction Company, whose CEO was former Fort Worth Mayor Tom McCann, in the amount of $8,617,455. The target date for most buildings was August 19, 1967, with the Automotive Technology and Aviation buildings scheduled to come on line November 8 and the Student Center and physical education buildings to follow by April 16, 1968.

By now, the College had not only the plans for its first campus but also the money to pay for it. At the March 3 board meeting, bond attorney Ray Hutchinson presented for approval a resolution authorizing the sale of $10 million in general obligation bonds – part of the $18.1 million approved by the voters the previous year – to be used toward the building of both South and Northeast campuses.

Before the actual sale in April, the nation’s money markets needed to be convinced that the fledgling college was a good risk. The usual practice in those days and for future College bond sales was for the CEO, trustees and financial advisers to travel to Chicago and New York to state their case to the major banks who might bid to be the primary buyers. These banks, in turn, would place the bonds for sale on the secondary market.

Rushing and Roberson lined up not only the necessary paperwork but also made airline, hotel and luncheon reservations for the trip. When the day came, Rushing drove to Love Field in Dallas to meet up with Jenkins Garrett, Ed Hudson and two local bank representatives. He had cut it close, arriving [in those far-away, pre-security screening days] about 15 minutes before flight time.

As the group approached the gate to check in, Rushing realized with horror that the plane tickets were sitting atop his piano back in Fort Worth. “I wondered how the board members would take this,” he remembered. “Had they hired an incompetent, or would they take it in good humor? And they did.” The airline was kind enough to quickly re-write the tickets, but Rushing took what he called an unmerciful ribbing the entire trip. “It made me feel much more comfortable with my board,” he said, “but I wondered if maybe a written contract might not be in order.”

The trip was a success. At their April 19 meeting, trustees approved the sale to a syndicate headed by the First National Bank of Chicago at the lowest interest rate bid – 3.63 percent. The third issue of the College’s new external newsletter, Momentum, said it was “a good rate … in view of the present bond market, and went on to say that the $10 million had been received and deposited in Fort Worth’s Continental National Bank where it was earning interest at 4.75 percent.”[53]

The College did not rely totally on bonds to build the campuses. The Texas Education Agency had funds to help construct facilities for vocational programs. In February, the board voted to apply to the state for status as an “area vocational school” so as to become eligible to receive grants. Five specific programs were required – automotive technology, aviation technology, nursing, electronic and office occupations.

Jimmie Styles designed these programs plus technical drafting and submitted the application. In reviewing it, TEA officials noted that South Campus’ plans did not include a facility for office occupations. No problem, TCJC said. At their March 21 meeting, trustees gladly changed the name of the Business Building to the Office Occupations Building to help secure the grant.

The change evidently satisfied the TEA, which in June awarded the College a grant of $596,816 toward the construction of five campus buildings, enough to cover half the costs. In August came an additional TEA grant of $197,934.

The College hadn’t waited on the primary construction contract before spending some of that money. The first contract for $13,577 was for a chain link fence to surround the property, separating it – as required by the federal land gift – from the hospital grounds. The second for $263,000 was more related to actual construction. The preliminary plans called for a network of tunnels, tall enough for a person to stand upright, to carry utilities to each building.

The tunnel network was well under way when McCann moved his 500-worker crew onto the campus site in September. Time was short, and one way the company made the most of what they had was to divide the campus into four areas, each with its distinct work team and supervisor. Each team wore different colored hard hats, and each worker had a badge in the same color. Materials delivered to the site had color-coded labels so as to be offloaded in the right spots. The architects had an on-site representative all day, every day. Roberson, who had been designated the official College contact, was a constant presence on the site.

McCann’s team approach kept the wheels humming. “The South Campus was probably one of the best organized of all our construction projects,” Rushing remembered. “We had a local contractor. We had local architects, good weather, and got that campus opened.”

Roberson agreed. “It was one general contract, and we were able to get their attention and keep after it,” he said. “There’s no way you can go and build a campus like we built South in 12 months and open it. I don’t know why, but you can’t do it. But that contractor [McCann] really put the effort in, and we had big liquidating damages if they didn’t get it done by a certain date … and they came through.”

By December 1, McCann could report to the board that South Campus was 18 percent complete. Early in May 1967, he told trustees he foresaw no problems opening in September. If the board was impressed, so was Dr. Jack Williams, Texas Commissioner of Higher Education. During a visit to the site in October, less than two months into construction, he told a reporter, “Tarrant County Junior College – eleven months from opening – is miles ahead of others and will set the stage for the rest of the state. This is the result of the excellent planning that has been done in your community.”[54]

Not everything, however, went according to plan. At one point, scaffolding in the Library gave way, and the roof collapsed. No one was hurt, and the incident might have passed unnoticed if someone hadn’t called an ambulance. “The ambulance attracted television and radio reporters and newspapermen, and it was quite embarrassing,” McCann said.”[55]

Later on, a jurisdictional dispute arose between members of two labor unions. The respective unions quickly reached an agreement, McCann said, because they wanted the favorable publicity that would follow if the project were brought in on time and on budget.”[56]

On June 15, 1967, the College accepted and began occupying the Faculty Office Complex, Administration Building and Office Occupations Building. Later that month, the Academic Buildings and physical plant facilities came on line. July saw the completion of the Nursing and Home Economics buildings and the technical program buildings. The Fine Arts Complex and Science Building were approved in August, and everyone could heave a sigh of relief. South Campus would be opened as promised for the fall semester.

The buildings, to be sure, were completed, but what about the furnishings? What about the faculty and staff? And, most important, what about the students?

Chapter 5: The Parallel Race Against Time

The September 1967 deadline wasn’t tight only for McCann Construction. The entire apparatus entailed in equipping, staffing and enrolling students was on an equally fast track. “It was a real struggle, but you can’t imagine how exciting it was,” said C.A. Roberson. “We were working until 10 or 11 every night, and there was no such thing as not working Saturdays.”[57]

Much of Roberson’s work, when not on the construction site, involved compiling lists of equipment and getting them out to vendors for bids. As noted, Styles and Rushing had compiled a partial list in January. But with the curriculum determined and the floor plans complete, Roberson could be specific – very much more specific. “Everything you were going to need, from microscopes in biology to clarinets for the band, you name it. Every pot and pan for the dining hall,” he said.

Not only did Roberson need to know that the band needed clarinets, but also that it needed a certain quantity of a certain quality that had to be sent out for bids, bought, paid for and delivered to coincide with the opening of the Music Building.

At least Roberson didn’t have to do it alone. Staffing began ramping up in September 1966, including the addition of Director of Purchasing Allen Smith. The key appointments, however, were made during the summer – Dr. Charles “Chuck” McKinney and Dr. R. Jan LeCroy.

McKinney was to be executive dean, the chief academic officer of South Campus. He became acquainted with Rushing while a doctoral student at Florida State University. After receiving his degree, he served as a dean at Mitchell College in Statesville, N.C., and at DeKalb Junior College in Clarkstone, Ga. On learning that Rushing was starting a new junior college in Texas, McKinney renewed the acquaintance and landed a job, starting August 1.

By then, construction on the tunnel system had already begun, and the final plans were ready for bid. “I literally saw it from the ground up,” McKinney said prior to his retirement in 1989. “I got here in time to make a few minor changes in the building plan although the plan was basically finished by the time I came.”[58]

LeCroy was a Fort Worth native but had lived wherever his father had construction jobs. He graduated from the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and served in the Army four years before joining the private sector with Reynolds Aluminum. His passion for education, however, returned him to college, and he earned his doctorate at UT Austin a month before joining TCJC.

LeCroy’s first title was assistant to the president, and his assignment was to coordinate institutional research. It was clear, however, Rushing was grooming him for bigger things. Board minutes prior to his arrival said he was to assist in planning Northeast Campus, and he had been on the job only a few months when he was designated as contact person for the campus architects and contractor. It was no surprise, then, when he was named executive dean in July 1967.

Still, LeCroy was only the fifth administrator hired, and opening day for South Campus was only 13 months distant. But in September, Allen Smith was joined by Dr. Philip Speegle as dean of student services for South Campus, Coleman Barnett as the College’s director of data processing [these days known as information technology] and Dr. Donald Anthony as director of admissions and records.

Over the next year leading up to the campus opening, more high-level hires took place. Both Paul Vagt, who was to head the Library, and Joe Zielinski, coordinator of counseling, came in February 1967. South’s dean of instruction Dr. Milton Smith and buildings and grounds superintendent Joe Page arrived in March. Four key positions were filled in June – Director of Financial Aid David Gardner, Director of Instructional Media Ken Hudson, Assistant Director of Admissions Charles Bay and Director of Community Services Don Newbury.

Newbury, a public information officer and journalism instructor at Sul Ross State in Alpine, had learned of Rushing’s reputation as a leader while an undergraduate at Howard Payne University in Brownwood.

On arriving at TCJC, one of Newbury’s primary jobs was pinch-hitting for Rushing in giving presentations to civic groups, service clubs and PTAs. “I averaged over 100 presentations a year for 14 years,” he said. “It was not uncommon to speak three times a day – breakfast, lunch and dinner.”

One of Newbury’s more successful public relations ploys also involved eating, but more the snack variety. Rather than handing out cigars when his first child was born, he bought a few dozen biscuits from the Piccadilly Cafeteria on Houston Street, slathered them with butter and his mother’s fig preserves and took them around, not only to co-workers but also to the Fort Worth Star-Telegram newsroom.

He did the same thing after his second child arrived, at which point newspaper staffers told him he didn’t have to wait on a new baby to bring more biscuits and preserves. So he and Rushing, every two or three months or so, would appear in the third-floor editorial offices of the Star-Telegram, whereupon all work putting out the evening edition would cease. The talk seldom dealt with the College but instead was more of a chat about issues of the day. As a result, however, Newbury and Rushing developed a valuable rapport with the reporters and editors.

In making hires such as Newbury, Rushing knew well that only so much could be gleaned from résumés or sometimes even in interviews and looked for two qualities in selecting administrators. He looked first for people who totally committed to the community college philosophy but not to the point to oppose all changes. Second, he wanted independent thinkers who, after careful consideration of input from colleagues, students and the community, could make a decision and take responsibility for it. “I think I can forgive a mistake a lot quicker than I can forgive failure to make a decision,” he said. “I would rather have a fellow I had to hold back than one whom I had to get behind and kick to move ahead!”[59]

It was a testament to Rushing’s evaluation of people that four of these early hires went on to become CEOs in their own right – LeCroy as chancellor of the Dallas community college system, Speegle as president of Odessa College, Newbury as president of Western Texas College and Howard Payne University, and Roberson at TCJC.

The newcomers had more than enough work to occupy all the burners – and they all seemed to be front ones – on the College oven, but they had a cookbook – the Overview and Guidelines prepared by Rushing and Styles. The Overview dealt with institutional purpose, the multi-campus philosophy, site selection and the campus development plan. The Guidelines covered curriculum and instruction, student services, staffing and finance.

The Overview set forth 12 premises on which the educational program would be developed and conducted. They pledged that the College would:

- Strive for academic excellence in every course

- Be noted for service to its constituents

- Promote creativity in teaching, research and an unending search for truth

- Instill in students the desire for lifelong learning

- Be a cultural center, promoting fine arts as well as liberal arts

- Be committed to moral integrity and democratic ideals

- Provide curricula designed to help students achieve economic sufficiency

- Promote civic responsibility and maximum self-realization

- Provide graduates able to work efficiently, ethically and effectively in their chosen career fields

- Offer curricula and activities in such a way as to be interwoven with the community

- Provide a broad range of courses adapted to the needs and interest of students

All the above were the sort found in just about every community college’s statement of purpose. The statement of multi-campus philosophy, however, reflected something of a divide within the junior college community. The Guidelines noted that the few – only about 10 – urban, multi-facility colleges operating in the mid-‘60s were pretty much split down the middle between multi-campus and multi-college.

The multi-campus approach, the one adopted by Tarrant, holds that the institution is one college with separate campuses. The multi-college organization – Dallas was a prime example – features separate colleges, each with a great deal of autonomy and each accredited separately, existing under a college district organization accredited separately from its colleges.

Rushing chose the multi-campus model, he said, to avoid duplicative structures, thus saving money, and to gain efficiency by centralizing some administrative functions. Why, ran the argument, should each campus have its own personnel office or admissions office or purchasing department?

He acknowledged, however, a “fine line” between campus autonomy and dependence on the central administration.”[60] As a result, the TCJC campus administrators were in charge of the delivery of the academic curricula [which, nevertheless, had been established on a Districtwide basis], the libraries and the majority of the student service functions, the notable exceptions being financial aid and the bursars, who handled financial transactions. These, and about everything else on campus, reported “downtown” – police, maintenance, food service and registrar.

Although the multi-campus operation was chosen for efficiency and effectiveness, Rushing many years after his retirement conceded that there was a personal aspect. “Well, I’ll have to admit to some ego here,” he said. “I like to be in charge and be known to be in charge.”

The campus chief executives, however, also liked being in charge and chafed in knowing that a large percentage of the employees on “their” campuses reported elsewhere. It was only into South Campus’ second year that Rushing could report to C.C. Colvert that McKinney had become more comfortable with the arrangement. LeCroy could never accept it. He would be named executive dean of Northeast Campus in July 1967 but resigned two years later to become president of Eastfield College in the Dallas district. Longtime faculty member and administrator Gary Smith recalled LeCroy saying, “I wanted to go someplace where I could make decisions.” Given McKinney’s and LeCroy’s restiveness, it is perhaps no coincidence that shortly after LeCroy’s resignation the title of executive dean was changed to president. Rushing became chancellor, and Roberson and Styles, vice chancellors.

The Guidelines are also notable for a well-researched, carefully calculated, meticulous yet wholly inaccurate prediction of student enrollment. Factoring in high school enrollments and graduation rates, county population growth and the presence of nearby universities, the authors predicted an opening day student body on South Campus of 1,948. In four years, the figures showed, enrollment would be up to 4,784. Subsequent events would render the forecasts, which extended to 1975, useless and, in the short term, caused on-the-fly adjustments in scheduling and facilities.

These predictions, however, had been made in November 1965. By the spring of 1967, reality had taken over. Trustees were told in May that applications had exceeded 1,000 and that counselors were scheduling advising appointments with prospective students.

The trickle of students that would within a year become a flood had begun in January when Jim Walraven from Burleson High School and Kathy King from Fort Worth’s Paschal High School were the first prospective students to apply. A few weeks later, they were joined by others, including Arlington Heights High senior Craig Adams.

Adams recalled making the trip downtown to the 14th floor of the Fort Worth National Bank building, where the College leased space to house both the District administration and, at least while construction lasted, the campus staff. He made application and was advised by Zielinski. He was surprised, then, when a call came about two weeks later asking that he return along with Paul Wright, Teresa Tarver and Sue Lee Alsobrooks to get their acceptances – personally – from Rushing.

These prospective students were applying for admission to a campus that – while it had buildings rising out of the ground, administrators and faculty being hired and a curriculum written – did not yet have a name, at least officially. Neither did its sibling to the northeast. In March 1966 at Parker and Croston’s urging, the board decided the campus plans should be labeled South Campus “for the present.”[61] Northeast Campus plans would later receive similar instructions.

Board members had considered following Dallas County’s lead of giving the campuses names that did not directly connect to the governing district – El Centro, Eastfield, Mountain View. They tossed around several ideas, among them Cross Timbers for the long, north-south topographical feature whose eastern border was more or less Tarrant County.

It was not until April 1967 that the board finally acceded to the wishes of the architects and engineers working on both campuses and made official what by now had become tradition – Tarrant County Junior College South Campus and Tarrant County Junior College Northeast Campus.

There was more to come. Not only were Adams, Wright, Alsobrooks and Tarver accepted, but they would be part of a select group of 35 to be registered in the summer, months before the start of classes, and charged with planning student activities and drafting a student handbook to deal with everything from discipline to dances. They had, he admitted, no clue as to what kind of activities might work best. “So we told ourselves that if what we tried didn’t work, we’d either change it or try something else,” Adams said years later. “Really, though, I don’t remember that we had to scrap anything.”[62]

Also among that first wave of would-be students were David Clinkscale and Ray Lewis. Clinkscale would go on to become not only one of the College’s first graduates but also one of its most distinguished and popular faculty members. Lewis would ultimately become a family practice physician in Fort Worth.

As a Burleson High senior, Clinkscale had college squarely in his sights, but not at TCJC. He had completed all the steps preliminary to enrolling at his mother’s alma mater, Southwest Texas State University, now Texas State. But as enrollment time approached, he and his parents began discussing options. “As we began to explore the possibility of my staying home,” he said, “obviously the monetary savings were significant – didn’t have to pay for a dorm or a meal plan. I could stay here and have a part-time job. Even paying out-of-county tuition, as I had to do, tuition was $6 an hour. Of course, that was a time at which the minimum wage was, I think, $1.25 an hour. But still, compared to a four-year school, it was a huge, huge bargain.”

All very practical, no doubt, but Clinkscale also had a more personal agenda. “I guess there was a rather romantic dimension to this,” he said, “because my girlfriend, who is my wife of soon-to-be 45 years, had told me that she was going to TCJC.”

Accordingly, he went to the downtown Fort Worth offices, riding in the elevator to the 14th floor with Newbury, who immediately hit him with a sales pitch. He filled out an application and was advised by Zielinski. “I remember being very impressed with how friendly everyone was,” he said, “even though I wouldn’t have been particularly aware of the term ‘student-oriented.’”

Lewis wanted to attend college after graduating from Fort Worth’s Dunbar High School, but the money wasn’t there. “My older brother and my sister had gone,” he said, “but I was the third in my family coming out [of high school] and we had to work hard to support my brother and sister, so there really weren’t any resources.”

However, Lewis said, a Dunbar teacher had been lined up to teach a Black Studies course at TCJC and told his students about the new college. “He told us it was an option for all of us who needed to go and were interested in going and that it was affordable,” Lewis said. “He said it was a good first step.”

Applications began to pick up – way up – after high school graduations in early June. The July 1967 edition of Momentum reported that fall enrollment estimates, which had already eclipsed the long-forgotten 1,948 prediction, had been revised to between 3,000 and 3,600. This meant South Campus had a parking problem before the first student set tire on campus. Architects, working from earlier estimates, planned for 700 spaces. The newest estimates would require at least another 500, and the Board of Trustees at its August 17 meeting approved an additional expenditure of $66,000. Whether the new lots would be ready in time was questionable, and it was evident that, if they weren’t, way too many cars would be chasing way too few spaces.

As prospective students began to arrive, so did the men and women to teach them. The March edition of Momentum told of 50 people being named to fill faculty and other professional positions for the first campus.

The Guidelines proclaimed that the College would seek out “superior instructors to fill every teaching position” and that the emphasis was to find “experienced college teachers who are committed to the junior college philosophy.”[63] The two key criteria were mastery of the subject matter and evidence of creative teaching ability.

The Guidelines took pains to say that public schools would not be plundered wholesale. Any faculty hired away from local high schools, it said, would be done only with the approval of the school involved. This might have been good community relations, but it was also sound educational practice. Rushing did not want a faculty overwhelmingly local but instead wanted one leavened with people from other parts of the country who would bring new ideas and innovative teaching methods. His goal, according to the Guidelines, was “a cosmopolitan faculty, both socially and academically.”[64]

The Guidelines may have set forth a hands-off policy toward hiring public school faculty, but it said nothing about raiding local universities. One such raid netted Gary Smith, who began as a biology teacher “since day one on South” and has been with the College ever since. It’s not just that he likes TCC, but that he also doesn’t like to do paperwork. “If you apply for other things,” he reasons, “you’ve got to do paperwork.”

TCJC had already picked up three biology faculty from UTA, and Smith made it four. “They called me one day and said, ‘You’ve got to come over here. We’re going to have a great time because in the universities it’s all run by the old, tenured professors who don’t want to change anything, and we sort of have free rein to do whatever we want to do.’”

As much as he might have wanted to be in charge, Rushing wanted to keep the reins, if not free, at least loose on the faculty. “We sort of laughed about him having ‘watch words’ every year,” Smith said. “But, what he said was ‘Be innovative, be creative and go as far as your creativity and energy will take you.’”

Dr. Anita Barrett was one of the faculty members moving over from the public schools – a move she had long planned. In 1965, while a teacher at Fort Worth’s North Side High School, she had worked with Lee Goodman, head of the Downtown Fort Worth Association, on a civic project and knew he was a key player in establishing the college. After the successful election, she went to visit him and said, “Lee, I want to work there.”

When the word was out that faculty were being hired, she went to see him to remind him of her intentions. Goodman promptly picked up the phone. “He called for Joe Rushing,” Barrett recalled, “but Rushing was out. He got Charles McKinney, hung up, and said, ‘You’re going to go over and see him right now.’”

Barrett protested. She was wearing flat heels, she said, and her hair was in a ponytail ... both inappropriate for a job interview in 1966. Goodman was unmoved. “He said, ‘You’re going over there right now,’ and the rest was history,” Barrett said.

Also part of the Day One faculty was history professor Larry Story, who came neither from the college or public school teaching ranks but right out of graduate school at UT-Arlington. He wanted a job teaching at a junior college, and his timing could not have been better. These were the years when new junior colleges were popping up every time one turned around – 72 would open in 1967 alone. “If you wanted a job at junior college, you could probably get one,” he said, “although it might not be at the one you wanted.”

The one Story wanted was TCJC. He knew Fort Worth and Tarrant County well from his UTA days, and it wasn’t far to his parents’ home. As he remembered it, his interview process – although not as informal as Barrett’s – was a far cry from what it would later become when the College grew larger and the job market tighter. “I think it was just two rooms downtown somewhere,” he said. “I talked to Dr. LeCroy and Dr. McKinney and just met Joe Rushing, I think. That was in the late spring [1967] or early summer, and I got the offer later in the summer.”

The final full-time faculty count was 113. The majority, to no one’s surprise, came from Texas, but Rushing’s desire for diversity was reflected in that others came from as far away as California, Washington, Florida, Michigan and Georgia. Twenty-five had come from public schools and a handful fresh from graduate study. A large percentage of those teaching academic, or “transfer,” courses had master’s degrees, and about a dozen held doctorates.

As September 18, 1967, the first day of classes, drew closer, the work of everyone – faculty, administrators, contractors – grew more frenzied. Tom McCann’s crews raced to put final touches on the buildings. Maintenance workers awaited those final touches so that they, in turn, could race to install furniture and equipment. Construction on the new parking lots went full bore.

The man at the eye of the storm was Joe Page, superintendent of buildings and grounds, who had been C.A. Roberson’s eyes and ears on the campus since coming on board in May. “We would never have gotten the South Campus open if it hadn’t been for Joe Page,” Roberson said. “He kept things moving. He knew exactly how large a staff we’d need, and he was in charge of installing everything from grass to toilet paper.”

Page had a reputation for being unflappable, a decided advantage when working for Roberson, who bombarded him with constant queries whether this or that could be done. At one point, Roberson remembered, Page finally replied, “C.A., if you give me enough time and enough money, I can move the entire Student Center six inches to the east.”

Nobody was giving out enrollment predictions any longer, at least publicly. Any such pronouncement would likely have to be revised within a few days. The announcement in May that applications had topped 1,000 also carried an exhortation that “all persons interested in attending the College, either full-time or part-time, are urged to apply as early as possible.”[65] But it was the rule then, as now, that huge numbers of junior or community college students enroll at the last possible moment. The existing counseling staff was overwhelmed after September 1, and extra hands had to be called in to handle the flood.

The influx wrought havoc with Dean Milton Smith’s carefully crafted class schedules. “He came almost literally running down the hill,” Gary Smith said. “We had to re-do our schedules. We didn’t have enough labs, and not anticipating that caused some disruption. I remember that my schedule changed completely during the first week of school.”

Work continued through the weekend of September 16 and 17. It likely was an exhausted cadre of faculty and staff who finally found their beds Sunday night, wondering what the next morning would bring. Whether or not they actually got much sleep is highly doubtful.

Chapter 6: Curtain Up!

In the Hollywood version of South Campus’ opening, the day would have dawned sunny and bright, birds singing merrily in the trees. In fact, it was raining heavily with gale-force winds. Birds wouldn’t have felt much like singing. And if they had, there weren’t any trees to speak of.

Actually, there had been heavy rain on and off for the previous two weeks. As a result, not only the new parking lots but also many of the sidewalks had not been finished. Given the euphoria shown by the board, administrators, faculty and students, it hardly mattered.

“It was the muddiest mess in the world,” Anita Barrett said. “And there was no cafeteria open, so they served hamburgers and hot dogs and whatever under the porte cochére over there at the Student Center.”

The downpour certainly didn’t stop Joe Rushing, who along with trustee May Owen viewed the first part of the first day from a car parked on the Campus Drive overpass at I-20. “I went out very early and watched cars streaming into the campus – a very muddy campus, by the way,” he said. “Dr. May Owen was with me. We sat there for the better part of half an hour just looking and realizing, for her, a two-year dream come true, and for me, of course, the culmination of a lot of work and planning over the past two years. That was one of the most outstanding days for me.”

It was for Owen, as well. During a brief dry spell, she and Chuck McKinney ventured outside the Administration Building. “She and I were standing out by the Carillon Tower,” he recalled. “The bells would chime, and the students were hustling to class, and she said, ‘My dream has come true.’”[66]

One of those cars coming to campus belonged to David Clinkscale. “I came over the overpass, and there was just this sea of cars,” he said. “They were spilling out of the parking lot. The parking lot was tiny compared to what we have today, and there were just cars everywhere. They were on the dirt and parked on the street. Just finding a place to park that first semester was mind-boggling.”

Parking the car was one hurdle. Getting from car to classroom was yet another. “Oh, the rain and the wind,” Clinkscale said. “The wind started blowing that first day of class and finally stopped maybe the last day of finals. There was mud everywhere. They hadn’t had any landscaping at all.”

The wind was just as bad. Clinkscale brought an umbrella, but as he stuck it out of his car window to open it, “the wind turned it inside out and pulled it out of my hand.”

Rather than chase the umbrella, he made it onto campus as best he could. Later, when he was in the Student Center, “someone came in with this bedraggled umbrella, laughing about it. And it was mine. It had wound up somewhere on the other side of campus.”

Gary Smith witnessed a similar event from a window in the Science Building. “It used to rain in Texas, you know, and the rain used to come in August and September,” he said. “And so we had students sloshing around in the mud. I remember looking out, and the wind and rain were blowing just as hard as they could. A young lady – a student – was trying to keep her umbrella steady. She finally decided, ‘The heck with it,’ and just threw it up in the air.”

All such hardships seemed to have been taken in the spirit of a grand adventure. “You didn’t hear much complaining,” Craig Adams said. “Rather, there was a spirit that this was new and a challenge for us.”[67]

The parking lots weren’t the only things full to overflowing. The late enrollment surge strained classroom space to bursting. “Every class was full – 30, 35 people,” Clinkscale said. “And there was such a vitality! Everybody sensed that this was something new – that we could be a part of building this. People felt like ‘We’re a part of something that nobody has been a part of before.’”

All was not sweetness and light. For Ray Lewis and his fellow Dunbar High graduates, it was their first experience in mostly Anglo classrooms. “There were a lot of students from other high schools in Fort Worth,” he said, “and those schools were still segregated for the most part, so I was able to [get to] know a lot of students from other schools.”

Initially at least, it wasn’t a comfortable experience for Lewis and the other African-American students. “We had a lot of struggles at that time to adapt to an integrated classroom,” he said. “It was pretty rough that year going in, and I understand it was for the instructors also to try to adjust to the black students coming on board.”

It was natural, therefore, that the African-American students banded together and formed a new club – the Black Student Union. “We had some opposition from the administration and the faculty,” Lewis said. “They felt like we really didn’t need the organization on campus, that they [existing clubs)] were adequate and open to black students. But it was a real cultural divide at that time.”

It was little wonder the African-American students felt the need to come together. The official ethnic breakdown for that first semester shows Anglo students made up 90.71 percent of the student body while African-Americans were at 9.21. Two “Oriental” students and one American Indian accounted for the rest. There was, as yet, no category for Hispanics.

When all the dust – or mud – had settled, 4,272 students had enrolled. It was thought to be a record junior college opening day enrollment, and the media duly took note. “Just imagine, starting from scratch and opening up with an enrollment two-thirds the size of TCU,” wrote Walter Humphrey, editor of the Fort Worth Press. “It’s worth seeing. It’s rolling.”[68]

Officials at the American Association of Junior Colleges in Washington said it probably was a record. They didn’t know for certain, but no one knew of anything having been higher. That was good enough for Rushing. “Nobody ever disproved it,” he said later, “so I guess it’s OK.

“I think that the students entering the campus that morning probably had different motives than the students entering now,” he said. “Many of them were there because it was the first opportunity they had to attend college. Many of them were there, I think, because it was a second chance. They had tried college somewhere, and it had not been successful for whatever reason.

“Very few, I dare say, were there because they wanted to be at Tarrant County College. It was a new institution – unaccredited, unknown. Why would they risk being in that first student body?”

But for many students, however, attending TCJC posed no risk because they had no choice – at least as far as higher education was concerned. “My family was by no means wealthy,” said Don Braziel, a 1967 graduate of Fort Worth’s Polytechnic high school. “Probably what you’d call lower middle class living in a small house in Poly. I’ve never gone to school when I wasn’t also working full time, so it was a matter of convenience and money.”

Like everyone else, Braziel remembered the mud and the overflowing parking lots, but he also especially remembers one of his faculty members – Gary Smith. “Well, he’s a friend now,” Braziel, still at the College as a surgical technology instructor, said, “but back then he was a bit arrogant and very hard line in his beliefs and thoughts. He was very much into evolution and taught it strongly. I was a good Baptist boy who went to church every Sunday. But when I was in school you never questioned the professor. If they said it, you agreed with it and tried not to bump heads. Now, these days, the students are much more vocal in their opinions.”

There was at least one celebrity among the initial class. Sharon Swift, who had been Sharon McCaulley when she won the title of Miss Texas and placed fourth in the Miss America pageant three years earlier, enrolled in music classes to further her career as a singer.

Another student, who enrolled with far less fanfare, was the kind of person for which the junior college was partially designed. Wayne Back, 73, enrolled in the Air Conditioning and Refrigeration program, not to pursue a degree, but just to learn how to repair the air conditioning units in apartments he owned.

Although the Fort Worth Star-Telegram reporter covering the first day was struck by a dearth of hippies and quoted McKinney as saying, “There will be a certain amount of conforming,” the student body reflected the turbulent and iconoclastic 1960s.”[69]

That was certainly Smith’s view and one he relished … sort of. “I am as conservative as you can believe,” he said. “But my favorite time dealing with students was in the ‘60s and ‘70s – those hippies. Politically and morally, we were on exact opposite poles, but they were so great because they were intellectually active. You could just make a statement in class like, ‘Here’s a book you ought to read sometime,’ and those students would go home and read that book, which was not a reading assignment.

“My department chair told me one time, ‘I need to call and make an appointment when I want to get in to see you because there are always students sitting in your office or out in the hall.’ You talk about student engagement today? We were really engaged.”

It wasn’t just the younger crowd who were engaged. “We had what I used to call – I was in my 20s – the ‘little old ladies,’ who were in their 30s and 40s,” Smith said. “And my little old ladies were just like sponges. The women’s movement was just beginning, and they were coming out of the home and saying, ‘Oh, my gosh, look what’s here.’ It had been all diapers and laundry.”

The student diversity made for some healthy, sometimes spirited discussions on events of the day, Clinkscale said. “There were hippies, but there were also cowboys,” he said, “and there was, to some extent, some tension there. Certainly the war in Vietnam was a topic that often came up, and we had not only those who were opposed to the war, but we had supporters of the war, too.

“Then, in my second semester, we had the assassination of Martin Luther King. So, it was a marvelous time to be going to college, but you did have some measure of those social tensions that were eventually going to pull the country apart.”

Rather than frowning on exploration of the controversial, Rushing welcomed it. “From the very beginning, the College seemed to have the maturity of a much older institution,” he said. “And I think it was because we had some very wonderful staff members, faculty and others who were not afraid to handle and could handle the controversial, whether it be controversial people or controversial ideas.”

Early in its history, using a grant from the Texas Commission on the Fine Arts, the College brought in a troupe of professional actors to act as a repertory company. The professionals took lead roles in four productions while the students played supporting parts and learned from the veterans.

“I encouraged this. We appropriated some College money. We got a grant,” Rushing said. “And I was very comfortable until I saw the first list of plays they were going to do.” One season would debut, for instance, with The Persecution and Assassination of Jean-Paul Marat as Performed by the Inmates of the Asylum of Charenton Under the Direction of the Marquis de Sade, better known as Marat/Sade, a bloody depiction of class struggle and suffering – pretty bold stuff for Tarrant County.

“But, when the reviews came out after the presentations,” Rushing said, “they were so overwhelmingly favorable that I never had any doubt again but what we could handle those controversial things.”

So it was that later, when a campus wanted to bring in a big-name entertainer and invite friends and supporters of the College as special guests, Rushing didn’t object, even though he thought perhaps the campus president had seen the entertainer only on television. “I don’t think he had any idea what George Carlin was like on stage,” he said. “Well, Carlin came, and within three minutes, I’m told, some of those friends of the College left, but that didn’t in any way keep them from supporting the College all the way, even to today.”

The classroom had controversy, too, not in the sciences, where Rushing had expected it to pop up, but in the humanities. One day, he fielded a call from a woman he knew slightly from church. “She had discovered a book her son brought home that was on the recommended reading list for English, and it was ‘absolutely disgraceful,’” he said. “Now, of course, her sensibilities wouldn’t let her tell me what the book said, but she let me know that it was awful and she really hinted strongly that I should go out there and take the book off the shelf and decide to fire whomever I wanted to. I let her talk for a while and then told her that I just thought that if I were in charge, every teacher of teen-agers and young people in this country would be required to read The Catcher in the Rye. Well, I’m sure I went on her prayer list that day and stayed there forever.”

Controversy was not limited to the students. In setting up the College, Rushing made no provision for a faculty organization. So the faculty, some of whom were young and feisty, decided to start one – the Faculty Association.

“The day we started it, all the administrators were off campus, and they thought we were trying to stage some sort of coup d’état,” Smith said. “We didn’t even know they were gone. We were just trying to find a time in the schedule to meet.”

Dick Harley was president. Smith was president-elect and would become the group’s second president within a year. Major issues on the table were policies on tenure and academic freedom. “All those things taken for granted now had not been established,” Smith said. “We were babies. The College was a baby.”

Discussions between the faculty and administration could grow heated. “It was getting pretty contentious,” Smith said, “and Dr. Rushing told us one time, ‘I’ve been staying up late worrying about the faculty and this Faculty Association thing, and I’ve finally figured out that I have better lawyers than you do, so I’m not worried about anything.’ But, to his credit, he did engage with us. Sometimes it was bare knuckles, but we were engaged. We were trying to find out where the boundaries were because the faculty wanted to have more say about their plight, so to speak, than the administration had historically wanted.”

Rushing, Smith said, thought the question was not whether there would be a Faculty Association, but what kind of group would it be and what was its place within the College. The solution came when the board established a Joint Consultation Committee, or JCC, that would eventually be composed of two faculty members from each campus Faculty Association. This body was designated the official conduit between faculty and administration on policy matters, including annual proposals from the faculty on salary and benefits.

Working together, the faculty and administration hammered out policies on tenure and academic freedom that were approved by the board in 1969. Not everything the faculty wanted, however, came to pass. And that, for Smith and likely many others, was a good thing. “Like I say, I was in my 20s, and if you think I’m foolish now, you should have seen me back then,” he said. “There were two things we tried to propose early on that makes me so glad there are some times when people don’t listen to you.”

One of the two was Social Security. Many faculty members wanted the College to opt out of Social Security, as had many local school districts, so that their paychecks would be larger. “Now that I’m old,” said Smith, “I’m glad nobody paid any attention to us.”

The second issue was unionization. “We actually talked about unionizing,” Smith said. “That was perhaps the third or fourth year.” By this time, Northeast Campus had a Faculty Association, and the two campus groups held a joint meeting where a union representative was invited to make a presentation. “Luckily, we didn’t go that way,” Smith said, “but early on, we thought that the only way we’d ever have any budgetary input was to go the union route because they were never going to listen to us as faculty.”

After the first week’s glow dissipated, South Campus settled into a routine of classes and student activities, of which there were many. TCJC was to be a “real” college with a student newspaper, yearbook, school colors, a mascot and the kind of on-campus activity normally associated with universities. In mid-fall, students voted to be known as the South Campus Chargers with colors of blue and gold. The yearbook would be titled The Carillon after the iconic tower, and the newspaper, which had been calling itself The Nameless One, became The Reflector – a bow to the pool at Carillon Tower’s base.

The Kappas, a women’s service club, held an Ugly Man Contest, the winner of which was Frank Cagel, not because he was particularly ugly, but because more of his friends dropped their loose change in his receptacle. In another campus vote, Glenda Graham was selected Miss TCJC, and Larry Roberts was chosen Mr. TCJC. Five Campus Beauties also were selected. Students modeled the latest fashions at Scarborough Faire, a style show sponsored by Neiman Marcus.

The administration encouraged such activities and even carved a special midday time from the class schedule to help foster them. “We had an activity period,” Larry Story said. “There was a break right in the heart of the schedule for the kids to get together for whatever reason, and we had all sorts of clubs and activities.”

Some activities were more serious than ugly man or pie-eating competitions. The Student Activities Office brought big-name speakers to campus, such as Texas gubernatorial candidates Preston Smith and Don Yarbrough. Future visitors would include Congresswoman Barbara Jordan, psychologist Dr. Joyce Brothers, feminist icon Gloria Steinem, consumer advocate Ralph Nader and attorney Melvin Belli, famous for having defended Jack Ruby, killer of Lee Harvey Oswald.

That first fall semester culminated in a December 6 celebration at which the campus was formally dedicated. The featured speaker was Texas Governor John B. Connally, who told students to apply their education “to promise, not protest; dedication, not dissent.”[70] Also part of the day’s activities were U.S. Representative Jim Wright and Texas House Speaker Ben Barnes.

It was a proud day for the trustees, most especially for Jenkins Garrett, who in his welcoming remarks said, “Our meeting today, just scant months since the junior college movement in this community began, is a tribute to the cooperation and support of countless people and organizations, local, state, federal agencies, news media, architects, contractors, lay volunteers and all that have had a part in this great thing.”[71]

There was more to come. A black-tie dinner Friday night preceded the opening of the campus’ first drama production, The Caucasian Chalk Circle. A special guest was actor Dan Blocker – Hoss in TV’s Bonanza – who came at the invitation of drama instructor Freda Powell, who had been Blocker’s first acting teacher when both were at Sul Ross State.

The festivities wound up Sunday with an open house. Despite blustery winds and near-freezing temperatures, an estimated 3,000 members of the public turned out to see the fruits of their votes two years earlier.

The new year – 1968 – brought a new semester, and 3,842 students were enrolled for classes, reflecting the usual drop in headcount from fall to spring. Facilities were now ready for three technical programs – medical terminology, aeronautical technology and automobile mechanics – to begin serving students. Outside the classroom, the big event was the College’s first musical, The King and I, with a large cast and spectacular costumes. It proved so popular that people without reservations had to be turned away despite adding some extra chairs.

The spring semester drew to a close with final exams in May. Administrators looked back fondly on what they considered a very successful opening year and were busy preparing for the next one, but South Campus had one more surprise in store. In August, Charles Williams and Albert McCord came to the Registrar’s Office and asked when the graduation ceremonies were. College officials were caught short, figuring no commencement would be needed until two full years of operation had passed. They had not reckoned on students transferring credits from other colleges as had Williams and McCord.

But Rushing and McKinney were nothing if not flexible and inventive. They rustled up some caps and gowns and conducted an al fresco commencement beside the Carillon Fountain. No diplomas had been designed, but the two new graduates each received letters, tied with blue and gold ribbons, saying the diplomas would be forthcoming as soon as possible.

It would have been natural for everyone – faculty, staff, administration and trustees – to have stepped back, paused, mentally taken a deep breath and reflected on what they had accomplished. But, there was no time. One campus had successfully lifted off, but a second was on the launching pad – Northeast.

Chapter 7: Encore!

The first child born to a family gets lots of attention. Each milestone is meticulously recorded – first word, first step, first lost tooth, first new tooth, first grade. Subsequent children? Not so much.

It was that way with Tarrant County Junior College Northeast Campus. No one wrote a dissertation on its establishment. No one kept a scrapbook. All the fanfare and hoopla surrounding the first campus had, for most people, obscured the fact that a second was in the works. It’s not that less work took place or that planning was not as careful or organized, but Northeast’s spotlight seems to have been smaller and less bright than its older sibling’s. Perhaps it was a case of what is being more immediately compelling than what will be.

In designing the new campus and taking it to construction, architect Albert S. Komatsu had a considerable advantage over Morris Parker and Merv Croston, who had done South Campus. Both firms received contracts at the same time – November 1965 – but Komatsu had 34 months before his campus was to open compared to his colleagues’ 22. This meant not only more time for planning but also for construction. Whereas South, because of the time crunch, featured mostly one-story buildings, Komatsu designed five of Northeast’s original eight buildings – Faculty Office, Library, Office Occupations, Science, and HPE – as multi-story.

Given the option of building vertically rather than horizontally, Komatsu presented the schematics to trustees on June 20, 1966, showing a campus much more compact than South. It was not so crowded, however, to prevent future buildings added within the general perimeter.

In November, Carter and Burgess, the firm doing civil engineering work on South, received a similar contract for Northeast. Two months later, the board reviewed and accepted the new campus’ preliminary plans. Board meeting minutes show no record of accepting the final plans and specifications, but on April 6, 1967 – at the same time trustees finally gave the campus its name – they announced bids for the primary construction contract would open May 25. When that day arrived, the campus hit its first – although minor – snag. As with South, all initial bids were considerably over the architect’s estimate and rejected by the board, which told the contractors to try again. They did, and on June 20 McCann Construction, with the low bid of $6,913,333, was awarded the contract.

A sizable portion of the campus would be built using $901,658 in federal Title I funds – $500,000 for the Library, $237,746 for the Faculty Office and Science Buildings, and $163,912 toward the HPE Building.

Helpful as the money was, it did present a problem. Since federal funds were involved, the College had to pay contractors on those projects at a wage scale issued by the U.S. Department of Labor. The problem was that two scales had been issued, depending on whether or not the construction was “heavy.” Labor unions naturally wanted TCJC to specify the higher scale to contractors seeking the work, but the U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development, which issued Title I funds, said it would approve either scale, leaving the choice to the College.

The choice wasn’t easy. Operating engineers working for one subcontractor on the South project had already gone out on strike over the issue, and board members knew adopting the higher scale might mean similar trouble on Northeast as well as increasing the project’s overall cost. On the other hand, adopting the lower scale would eliminate union contractors from bidding on the job. The board ultimately decided its primary duty was to the taxpayers and opted for the lower scale.

Even as Northeast’s construction went forward, so did its staffing. Here again, the newer campus had an advantage. Jan LeCroy had been named executive dean the previous July and in November had persuaded Don Anthony to change hats and move from director of admissions to Northeast dean of instruction. Anthony, in turn, began searching for division chairs, who were appointed in March – James Miles would head up Humanities, and department chairs Herman Crow and Kirby Cox would move from South to chair the Social Sciences and Science and Math divisions, respectively. Having the mid-level academic administrators in place would help speed up and streamline hiring.

Among the new faculty poised for the campus opening was Dr. Jane Harper, purloined from the French faculty at UTA. She had taught there for two years while working on her doctorate, but in her second year UTA was shifted from the Texas A&M to University of Texas systems. UT summarily decreed it would accept, throughout its growing system, no faculty doctorates from universities in Texas or in contiguous states.

Unwilling to abandon her studies, Harper chose to cast her lot with TCJC, but it really was not so much as matter of being pushed as being called. “I wanted to teach in America’s college,” she said. “I had an education, but I didn’t think anyone should have to have money to be able to be educated.”

Her children, she said, thought she was crazy. “Why leave this thriving, growing, emerging university to go to a fledgling junior college?” she said they asked. “But it fit me. It was absolutely the right move. I didn’t feel I reduced myself in any way professionally to work in a community college. I still wrote books. I still published articles. I still served on state, national, and international committees and organizations. I was on the executive council for the Modern Language Association. I did all the things that professors from the major universities do, but I did it from the reference point of where I thought I could do the most good for students.”

Another first-year hire – and one that would have enormous long-term consequences – was that of Erma Jean Chansler, who much later as Erma Johnson Hadley, became fourth chancellor of Tarrant County College.

Growing up in the tiny East Texas logging town of Leggett, higher education might have been the last thing on Hadley’s mind were it not for an invitation to participate in a weeklong Four-H Club retreat at Paul Quinn College. It was her first significant time away from home, and her mother hesitated in letting her go, but the 155-mile trip would commence a much longer journey. It opened the sixth grader’s eyes and mind to the world of college and the other worlds where that might lead.

After high school, Hadley enrolled in Prairie View A&M, the first in her family and one of a tiny number of African-Americans from Leggett to attend college. After graduation, she fulfilled a longtime ambition by becoming a teacher, spending four years at Turner High School in Carthage.

Her horizons, however, were larger. She wanted not only to be a teacher but a college teacher and in 1965 entered the graduate program at Bowling Green State University in Ohio, majoring in business and vocational education. As graduation neared, she wasn’t sure where she wanted to go, but she knew it wasn’t Ohio. “I didn’t want to stay in the cold climate,” she said.”

Ohio had become a center for business education, and the bulletin board at Bowling Green’s Graduate Placement Office was crowded with job notices. Hadley narrowed her search to California and Texas, sending in applications to colleges in both states. The three in Texas were Texas Southern, Dallas County and Tarrant County.

Late in 1967, she received a phone call [or a letter – she doesn’t remember which] from LeCroy. “It was real interesting because in those days you had to include a picture on your application,” she said. “So he knew I had a black face, but he was interested and asked if I would be interested in interviewing because they liked my credentials.”

Hadley replied that she couldn’t come to Texas until the winter break in December. TCJC would also be closed then, but LeCroy said he’d stay in town and wait for her – a good indication of how impressed he was. “So, I came for the interview here,” she said, “then went on home in Livingston. By that time, my family had moved to Livingston. And I went back to Bowling Green in mid-January, and I had a letter offering me a job. So I knew in January that I’d be coming here in September.”

The opening of South and the preparation of Northeast, however, were hardly the only things on the plate of TCJC administrators during 1967-68. There was, for instance, the process that if it didn’t go well would scuttle just about everything that had been done and been planned. This was accreditation, the lifeblood of colleges and universities without which their courses would not transfer to other institutions and their degrees would not be recognized as valid.

The process by which TCJC hoped to be accredited by the Commission on Colleges of the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools, or SACS, began less than a year after the College was a reality. In March 1966, Dr. Gordon Sweet, executive director of the Commission, visited Fort Worth for a two-day meeting with Rushing and board members at which they outlined both progress and plans. The College passed more milestones in upcoming months with approvals given by the Texas Education Agency and the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board and the granting of membership in the Association of Texas Colleges and Universities.

Once TCJC had been open a full year, it was eligible for designation as a Candidate for Membership in SACS at the organization’s annual meeting in Atlanta in December 1968. This set the stage for a formal visit by a committee consisting, not of SACS personnel, but of junior college administrators from throughout SACS’ 11-state region.

The visit took place in May 1969, and its oral report was highly laudatory. Rushing wrote that, while he heard many such reports, he had never heard one so favorable. The faculty came in for special praise. “Some of the committee members said they had never talked with students who held their faculty in higher esteem than the students at TCJC,” he wrote.”[72] The remainder of the report must have been almost as good because SACS at its annual meeting that December in Dallas awarded the College full accreditation.

Such milestones were to be duly celebrated, but the College still had to deal with the more mundane details of operating the institution – getting out payroll, purchasing items, setting the tax rates and passing budgets. For most of its first year, TCJC operated on a line of credit from the Fort Worth National Bank and did not pass a formal, annual budget until July 1966. That budget of $1,875,000, funded by a maintenance and operations, or M&O, tax rate of 7 cents per $100 property valuation and a sinking fund tax rate – the money collected to pay the interest on construction bonds – of 20 cents.

The following year’s budget, which included a vastly larger payroll, was $4,729,600 with both tax rates set at 20 cents. This total tax rate of 40 cents per $100 valuation might appear enormous compared with the 14.95 cent rate adopted in 2014, but the difference is in how property is evaluated.

Until the 1980s, methods of appraising property for taxation varied widely in Texas from county to county. In Tarrant County, the procedure often was for the tax assessor-collector, an elected official, to reassess residential property only when it changed hands or if underwent significant additions. Thus, if a family had occupied its house for 30 years, it was listed on the tax rolls for its value 30 years ago whereas the family next door that just moved into a comparable house would have the property listed at current market value. So while the 1967 tax rate seems high, it was levied on drastically under-appraised property. As a result, when the state later required annual appraisals at market value, total property values jumped and TCJC’s total tax rate fell to a little over three cents.

Even before the first TCJC campus authorized by the 1965 election opened, it was time for another election. The terms of office for Trustees L.L. Haynes and Ed Hudson were up in the spring of 1967, and both were re-elected handily. Two years later, it was the turn of May Owen and John Finn. They too won second terms without much trouble. These re-elections set the tone for future campaigns. Only rarely were incumbent board members defeated who sought another term.

Meanwhile, construction on Northeast hummed along. The March 1968 edition of the College internal newsletter Momentum confidently predicted the campus would open in September. That confidence was misplaced. Only days later, members of the Iron Workers Union walked off the job. It is unclear whether the strike resulted from the lower rate scale adopted by the board the year before, but its effect was to halt much of the essential work.

The strike dragged on more than seven weeks. Still, there was optimism for a September opening, even if all the buildings weren’t complete. “Contractors and architects have assured us that we will be able to begin classes on September 23 if there are no additional delays,” Rushing wrote.”[73]

It would be nip and tuck. Contractor McCann reported to the board May 15 that most of the buildings would be ready up to 45 days later than scheduled. But, while the labor unions might have been cooperating, the weather wasn’t. In all, between strikes and storms, 124 workdays were lost on the project. Just three days before the scheduled opening, Rushing bowed to reality, announcing that all Northeast day classes would meet during the fall semester on South. The few evening classes could still meet on Northeast after the construction workers had left.

How much effect this decision had on registration is not known. The official figure of 3,199 students for Northeast – more than 1,000 fewer than South the year before – may have been due to some day students electing to withdraw, unwilling or unable to make the journey to South. Still, the total enrollment – South had 5,245 students – represented a 74 percent increase over the previous fall.

Those Northeast students attending South probably felt little hardship, but it was a logistical nightmare for faculty and staff, with schedules turned topsy-turvy and classrooms stretched to the bursting point. It was especially hard on Northeast faculty, who had to find office space in nooks and crannies. “We had cubicles in the library assigned to us,” said Harper. “I got lucky; I got a closet. It was in a great spot – close to the library and the language lab. It was wonderful, and I felt special.”

The Northeast faculty, thus scattered about South, some of them having to scurry back to Northeast for evening classes, had little time to form any kind of collegial bond. “We didn’t know one another,” Harper said. “But our administrators did a very, very good job of attempting to reach beyond that hurdle. They had meetings. Dr. LeCroy had meetings in his home for us and had small groups of us – small enough to feed and converse with – periodically at home, which gave us an opportunity to hear one another’s names and to see who was who and who was teaching what. I know they tried very, very hard, and that was one of their best activities at making us feel like we belonged.”

The students tried hard at belonging as well. The South Campus Reflector shared quarters and column inches with colleagues from Northeast, whose pages of news were labeled “The Times (Between).”

By December, C.A. Roberson could report to the board that all Northeast buildings would be ready for the spring semester except HPE. The faculty and students would then have a home and begin to get to know one another. “There were striking differences in the expectations of students from those in universities,” Harper said. “We had lived on campus at universities. They were our home. We absorbed everything from right around us there on campus.

“At TCJC, there had to be special efforts to bring students together, to give them a feel of being college kids. You had to learn to bring them out of themselves, to give them a look at something new in the world and tell them it was OK to look beyond what their family thought.”

Hadley found striking differences of a different sort. She had been a product of segregated schools until graduate school, but even the integrated classes at Bowling Green had not prepared her for what she found that first fall semester. “I had not given any real thought to it,” she said, “but when I walked into my classroom the very first day, I saw not one black student, not one Hispanic student or anything. They were all Anglo. I wasn’t exactly surprised by it, but I guess I was a little taken aback. I didn’t know anything about Tarrant County, so I had no idea that the population out there [in the northeast sector] was as white as it was.”

The spring semester kicked off February 1 when Trustees Finn, Adams and Bell used a Bunsen burner to sever a ribbon stretched across the main entrance of the Science Building. As Roberson promised, all the buildings were ready except for HPE, and activity classes had to be conducted in a church gym nearby.

The hectic academic year came to a close with final exams in May, followed by the first – at least the official first –  Commencement in the South Campus gym. A total of 107 graduates heard an address by North Texas State University President John J. Kamerick and then marched across the podium to receive their diplomas – which by now had been designed –  from Rushing.

Finally, trustees, administrators and faculty had time to reflect on what had been accomplished in less than three years since the 1965 election. There had been obstacles along the way and bumps in the road, but few in that Commencement audience were likely remembering those as they looked at the proud new college graduates.

Two campuses had been successfully opened, but those responsible could not afford to rest on their laurels too long. TCJC and Tarrant County were booming. Plans were already being made to expand the just-completed campuses and to build a third – Northwest.

Chapter 8: Northwest Makes Three

TCJC’s South and Northeast campuses sprang to life quickly, sort of like mushrooms popping up overnight. Northwest Campus was more like an oak, developing from an acorn to a sprig to a sapling and finally to a majestic tree. It took an awfully long time, but it was worth the wait.

What finally opened in 1975 goes back to November 1965 when, along with all the other proposals for campus locations, the F. Howard Walsh family offered 150 acres of the College’s choosing of ranch property in the northwest sector of the county. The Board of Trustees talked it over November 22. The lightly populated area had no immediate need for a campus, but it was right next to where the northwest part of Loop 820 – now known as the Jim Wright Freeway – would be built. So, the thinking went, the College could hold onto the land – or at least the offer – and bide its time until the new freeway brought in the population to support a campus. That meant that a campus was five to 10 years away.

On December 1, the board accepted the Walsh gift with the stipulation that land development depended on more residential growth in the area, the accessibility of utilities and the completion of Loop 820. The offer merited only two paragraphs deep into a December 8 Star-Telegram story that focused mainly on the selection of sites for the first two campuses.

A more formal announcement of the gift took place in February 1969, more than three years later, but the acreage had increased to 193. Why the extra 43 acres? The original 150 acres selected by the College was a picturesque parcel on Marine Creek Lake’s eastern shore about halfway between the cities of Lake Worth and Saginaw. When the land was surveyed, however, it turned out 40 of the acres sloping down to the lakeshore were in the 100-year floodplain. Parking lots could be constructed there, but not much else.

College officials and board members went back to the Walshes, asking for more acreage. Howard wasn’t too keen on the idea. “He was one of the world’s greatest guys, but he could grumble at you,” Rushing said. “And he was kind of grumbling around, saying, ‘Well, we gave you 150 acres.’ And Mary D. [Mrs. Walsh] said, ‘Howard, shut up! You know you’re going to give it to them anyhow.’ So we got the additional 40 acres.”

It would be another two years before TCJC thought the conditions ripe to build the new campus. But, though it now had the land, it didn’t have the money. It was time for a second bond election – not only for Northwest Campus construction but also for additions to the rapidly growing South and Northeast campuses.

On July 31, 1971, the Board of Trustees formally called for a $21 million bond election to take place Sept. 21. Some $13 million was earmarked for the new campus. Northeast would get an additional classroom building, a technical-vocational building and additions to the Faculty Office Building and Student Center. South planned additions to the library, faculty office complex and bookstore, plus a new technical-vocational building and a multipurpose teaching complex – the Rotunda.

As in 1965, the College ran an aggressive campaign headed by a blue-ribbon executive committee. Jenkins Garrett and Rushing were co-chairs. Accounting executive Lloyd Weaver was general chairman with C.A. Roberson his assistant. Others on the committee included future Fort Worth Mayor Mike Moncrief, Arlington Mayor Tom Vandergriff and three people who would become much more familiar names to TCJC – Azle businesswoman Audrey Trammel, community leader Pete Zepeda and United Auto Workers officer Loyd Cox.

The measure didn’t have the almost 2-1 margin of the first election but still was approved by a healthy 7,492 votes to 5,273. Three months later, the College sold $6 million in bonds toward construction of the new campus, and Preston Geren of Fort Worth was named the architect. Geren’s design was a clear departure from the traditional college campus consisting of separate buildings. Instead, all 308,000 square feet, except for the gymnasium, would be under one roof, three wings branching off a central node. The exterior had a distinctly modern look, and the complex’s appearance was very impressive, especially when viewed from across the lake.

The board approved preliminary plans in April 1973 and in January 1974 awarded the primary construction contract to Gilmore and Walker, Inc., which submitted the winning bid of $6.9 million. Site work on the campus started within days, and the target completion date was September 1975.

Rushing and the trustees wanted something out of the ordinary for a February 14 groundbreaking ceremony and at last decided, since the campus was to have an agriculture program, to break ground with a plow drawn by two mules. Behind them, holding the reins, were Rushing and Ardis Bell, now vice president of the board.

“Well, of course, Joe Rushing had been reared on a farm, and he knew how to use a mule to plow,” Bell remembered. “I didn’t, but I grabbed ahold as if I knew what I was doing, but that was quite a thrill all right.”

A year later, in February 1975, work on the campus proceeded on schedule. The main building complex was roofed over except for the Node and the bridges connecting it to the three wings. The parking lots were paved, and lighting was being installed. Director of Planning Wayne Wilks was confident the campus would open for classes in the fall.

The campus acquired a president that same month when Dr. Michael Saenz, academic dean at Laredo Junior College, was named to the post. A Laredo native, Saenz held two master’s degrees from Texas Christian University, where he was a member of the Board of Trustees, and a doctorate from the University of Pennsylvania. “He has a brilliant educational background and is uniquely qualified to serve this new campus with distinction,” Rushing said.[74]

With the projected campus opening only six months away, Saenz worked quickly to assemble a staff. He didn’t have to look far for his deans. Dr. Judith Carrier, director of special services on Northeast, came over as dean of student development services, and Dr. Ray Van Cleef, dean of student development services, was the new dean of instruction.

Carrier came to TCJC in 1971 after years of teaching in Burleson – where the young David Clinkscale was her student – and at Arlington’s Sam Houston High School. She was a counselor at Northeast in 1972 when Don Anthony, who had become president in 1969 after LeCroy’s departure, told her he wanted to put more women in administrative posts and sent her to a conference in Florida to get some training.

A few months later, Rushing came to her with an offer. “It’s time to think about women and about senior citizens,” she remembers him saying. “It’s not going to be long before I’m there.“ He offered her a choice of two positions – director of counseling or director of special services, such services to encompass women, minorities and seniors. She chose the latter.

She served in that post through the summer and fall of 1974 and the spring of 1975. “By that time, the Northwest was opening and Mike Saenz ... I guess I was doing OK because he hired me as dean of students,” she said.

Van Cleef and Carrier began to flesh out the staff. Max Newcom would move from South’s registrar to the same position on Northwest. Wilks would combine the bursar’s duties with those he already had as director of planning. Rachel Johnson was to be division chair of General Education, Glenodine Pippin moved from Northeast as chair of Career Education, and Bob Claussen oversaw Learning Resources. Joe Rode, who had caught Carrier’s eye as a counselor and assistant professor of psychology at Northeast, would be director of counseling.

Saenz now had a staff, but – like LeCroy before him – he didn’t have a campus. At the May 15 Board of Trustees meeting, Roberson said a labor strike had stopped construction for several days. District and campus administrators would meet with architects and engineers to determine in what order buildings might be completed once work resumed.

The trouble was that work didn’t resume – at least for a long while. Roberson reported in June that the strike had dragged into its seventh week, and it soon became evident that a September opening was out of the question – at least on the campus. But, just as there had been a temporary fix for Northeast, a Plan B was put into effect for Northwest. Students would attend classes in TCJC’s new building at Meacham Field airport – constructed to house the Aeronautical Technology program – and at Boswell and Castleberry High Schools. The administrative offices were in space that had been leased back in the spring in Monnig Oaks Shopping Center in the town of River Oaks.

Despite such a piecemeal arrangement, 973 students enrolled for the fall 1975 semester, most in evening classes. That helped push the College’s total enrollment over 20,000 for the first time although there were enough withdrawals before the official census date to bring the final figure to 19,494.

To bring some sort of camaraderie and cohesion to his far-flung faculty and staff, President Saenz started a newsletter named The Circuit Rider after those judges or Methodist clergymen who used to travel on horseback from place to place dispensing either justice or the Gospel. The Circuit Rider’s purpose was to spread the news.

Saenz, always an optimist at heart, was making the best of a difficult situation. “Even if we had been on our own campus this fall,” he wrote, “we would have been located in several areas quite distant from one another. . Since we are spread out over four or five distinct places, the greater the need to maintain a feeling of oneness, of belonging to the group, of knowing each other as best we can. … For that reason, the Circuit Rider has come into being.”[75]

Even as they worked from various places, the Northwest Nomads, as they called themselves, kept an eye on the home that would be theirs in the spring semester. They would drive past the campus to check construction progress but were naturally curious to see what the inside looked like as well. Finally, at Saenz’ urging, Roberson arranged a day – Friday, November 14 – when they could visit the campus interior in small groups, taking care to stay together and out of the workers’ way.

Evidently, however, some people had not waited for the organized, guided visits and nosed around the site on their own. Saenz was obliged to write, “Some of us may have to exercise a little bit more patience as the workers strive to get everything in order.”[76]

The anticipation of the campus’ spring opening did much to minimize any difficulties caused by the hither-and-yon arrangement of the fall. “I don’t think it was so very difficult because we were all so excited to be going into a new place,” Carrier said. “I wasn’t aware of any major problems we had. We didn’t have any student activities that first semester because there really wasn’t any place to have any activities. But we were out recruiting heavily throughout the community. I felt like we all worked together pretty darn well.”

Moving-in day finally arrived on Wednesday, December 3. Temperatures in the 30s failed to put a chill on the excitement of moving into offices and classrooms. “We didn’t have any heat in the Student Center,” Carrier said, “but you’ve never seen a happier group in your life – just thrilled to be there.”

“Most of us remember so vividly how bitterly cold it was when we first got to our new offices,” Saenz wrote. “We also remember that from time to time the electricity would go out, and there we would sit in the dark. Rooms with telephones and offices with some equipment were also some of the things for which we longed.”[77]

The excitement carried over to the first day of spring semester classes. “The students were excited,” Carrier said. “The faculty, the administrators all felt like there was nothing that we couldn’t do. You just didn’t hear people complain because we were there!”

The campus was formally dedicated in ceremonies on April 9. The principal speaker was Dr. Dana Hamel, chancellor of the Virginia Community College System and president of SACS. However, it was John Anderson whose presence was to be best remembered. Anderson, deputy director of the American Bicentennial Committee, presented a certificate and flag to Carrier and named Northwest Campus an official Bicentennial Campus. Actually, it was the only such campus, he said, as no other campuses were schedule to open in 1976.”[78]

The faculty, staff and students at Northwest had even more to be proud of in January 1977 when the American Institute of Architects selected it for display at its annual meeting. The architects, Geren and Associates, came in for another accolade when they were chosen to receive one of four 1976 awards of excellence from the Texas Society of Architects.

There were honors, too, for the benefactors who had done so much to make the campus possible. In February 1979, the Northwest library was formally named The F. Howard and Mary D. Walsh Library. Speaking at the dedication ceremony, Ardis Bell praised the couple “not for isolated instances of generosity, but instead for their ongoing support of educational, religious, cultural and civic endeavors.” [79]

Northwest students were more ethnically diverse than those on sister campuses, largely because of a much larger Hispanic enrollment, but there weren’t as many of them as had been expected. Enrollment for spring 1976 was 1,586, but it would be the fall of 1982 before Northwest topped 3,000. Part of the problem in the first year was that Loop 820 had not been fully completed. “We were going on access roads and little trails to get into the campus,” Carrier said.

Later, however, it was apparent that the area around the campus was not growing as fast as had been hoped or predicted. “It did take a long time,” Carrier said, “but Saginaw ISD began to grow, and Azle and all of those came along. But all of those cities surrounding Northwest were pretty small.”

Chapter 9: Meanwhile, the ‘70s

While the building of Northwest Campus took up the most time, effort, money and headlines, plenty went on elsewhere at TCJC, including new board members, a new campus president, acclaim for a teacher and a far-reaching administrative appointment.

First, however, there was some unfinished business from the ‘60s. Northeast Campus had only become fully operational in the spring semester of 1969, and construction was still going on the following year, so it was decided to wait until the fall of 1970 when the new Fine Arts Building was complete.

The ceremony took place September 28 with Colonel John Glenn, the former astronaut and future U.S. senator, a special guest. Hundreds of visitors toured buildings during an open house, and there was a formal dinner prior to the opening of Little Mary Sunshine in the Fine Arts Building theater. All these festivities took their toll on staff and student volunteers who put their own spin on TGIF by declaring a TGITAD day – Thank Goodness It’s Tuesday After the Dedication.

The necessity for a new campus and for additions to the older ones was reflected in enrollment. The combined campus totals exceeded 10,000 for the first time in fall 1970, an increase of more than 17 percent over the previous fall. The growth kept climbing – 12,086 in 1971, 12,479 in 1972, 13,460 in 1973, and 15,513 in 1974.

More students meant more faculty and staff meant more money was needed. The budget for 1970-71 climbed to a bit over $10 million and by 1974-75 was $16.5 million. Tax rates remained steady at 20 cents for maintenance and operations and 20 cents for debt service.

The original Board of Trustees stayed intact through the successful bond election of September 1971 but then suffered its first loss, and a big one. At the December 16 board meeting, Jenkins Garrett read his letter of resignation. It hadn’t been an easy decision, but he could not pass up the opportunity of leaving one institution he loved for another that he loved just as much. He was told that Governor Preston Smith was to appoint him as a member of the Board of Regents of The University of Texas System.

Garrett’s loss was keenly felt. He had been, Rushing said, the guiding force behind the establishment of the College. “I think that reason the leadership of the community, of the county, was so quick to get behind the college movement is because they knew and they trusted Jenkins Garrett,” he said. “And they knew if he was an advocate for something, it had to be worthwhile.”

Garrett was also a major force after the College was formed. “I give him more credit than almost anyone else in the way that the board shaped up in terms of its responsibility,” Rushing said. “He had an understanding of the importance of keeping the policy-making part of the College separate from the executive function.”

To illustrate, Rushing tells of a board meeting toward the end of Garrett’s tenure when a salary proposal for the upcoming year was presented. At one point, Garrett interrupted to ask how the proposal would affect a specific member of the history faculty. Rushing replied that he had the information on each faculty member in a folder in front of him. Garrett got up, went to Rushing’s seat and was handed the file opened to the appropriate page. Barely glancing at the file, Garrett gave it back to Rushing and said it was not the board’s function to set individual salaries.

“And so, now, I’m not sure, but I’m almost certain that Jenkins didn’t just forget.” Rushing said. “He simply wanted to teach us one more lesson before he got off the board.”

Garrett may have left the board, but he continued to be very active with TCJC and was constantly consulted by board members and administrators. For decades, up until his death in 2010, virtually no major decision was made – from building a new campus to changing the name of the College – without someone inquiring, “What would Jenkins Garrett think about this?” In 1990, the College would acknowledge his contributions by renaming the South Campus library in his honor.

Garrett’s resignation was hardly a surprise to the board. His fellow trustees had been informed of his intentions well in advance and had his successor waiting in the wings. At the same meeting at which Garrett announced his resignation, Fort Worth attorney Edward W. Sampson was appointed to take his place. With Garrett gone, John Finn was elected board president, and Ardis Bell was vice president.

The resignation and subsequent appointment would be the first of several in the history of TCJC’s Board of Trustees. Board members have historically placed considerable value on cohesion and have wanted a voice in selecting who sits among them. Trustees, therefore, instead of simply saying they will not run for re-election, have usually resign their positions, giving their colleagues the opportunity to appoint someone who can then run for re-election as an incumbent.

This was not to be the case, however, with Delbert Adams. At the initial meeting of 1972, he submitted a letter announcing he would not be a candidate in the board election later that year. So it was that the April 1 ballot featured Bell and Sampson running for re-election and an open seat. Even though there were 23 candidates for the three positions, there would be no runoff. Bell and Sampson were re-elected handily, Bell with 65 percent of the vote and Sampson with 77 percent. The race for the open seat was tighter, but Loyd Cox – like Adams, a labor union official – outpolled seven rivals, winning with 52 percent of the vote. Running third in that race was Pete Zepeda, who would be heard from thereafter.

The board makeup underwent another change in November 1972 with the death of Ed Hudson, the trustee to whom the others turned for financial expertise. The board at its first meeting of 1973 appointed automobile dealer Bill McKay to fill Hudson’s seat.

More new faces would be seen at the board table. Haynes resigned in January 1975 so that he and his wife could move to Los Angeles to be near their daughter and her family. “Rev. Haynes is a man of unusual insight and great stamina,” Rushing said. “He was one of the forerunners who dreamed of the opportunities for all citizens provided by a junior college, and his leadership on the Board has been exemplary.” [80]

Roberson also had praise for Haynes: “He was not the type of person who was going to be walking down the middle of the street protesting something,” he said, “but he, in his quiet way, was letting you know that he expected everything to be run legal and above board.”

Harold A. Odom, an officer with the regional office of the U.S. Public Housing Administration, was appointed to Haynes’ spot on the board.

The next change on the board occurred in January 1976 when Finn, who suffered a severe heart attack the previous fall, found it necessary to resign his seat. Bell was elected board president, an office he would hold 38 years, and Audrey Trammell, who had been a key volunteer in the 1971 bond election campaign, was appointed to Finn’s place.

Trammel, however, would face election in only three months. She led voting in a four-way race on April 3 but was well short of a majority and in an April 24 runoff would face 26-year-old Gwendolyn Morrison.

Morrison, convinced to run by leaders in Fort Worth’s African-American community, was something of an unknown quantity. Everyone knew her husband Ben, who had been a Democratic Party precinct chairman at 21 and had run unsuccessfully as a Republican for the Texas legislature in 1974. Everyone also knew her mother-in-law, renowned gospel singer Francine Reese Morrison. “But they didn’t know who I was,” Morrison said. “I was just Ben’s little wife.”

It wasn’t as if she was a complete political novice. She had helped Ben in his campaign and worked hard to help elect Texas Senator Betty Andujar. She also belonged to two Republican women’s clubs and attended a church where a dozen precinct chairmen also worshipped.

Morrison’s first step was to select which spot to run for, all TCJC trustees being elected at-large at the time. Her first thought was to run against May Owen, but that was quickly nixed by friend and Republican Party activist Anna Mowery, who said she should run against Trammel.

Her campaign was based on fliers signed by precinct chairmen and mailed to people who had voted in past TCJC elections and on personal appearances. She never hosted a campaign event of her own but “went to other people’s functions.” She also made appearances at many African-American churches, asking the pastors beforehand if she could say a few words to introduce herself and tell the congregations of her aspirations.

Her hard work paid off. Trammel led the voting in the April 1 election with 5,685 votes, but Morrison ran a strong second among the other three candidates with, 5,495, forcing a runoff on April 13. In that election, she won by 181 votes out of 6,853 cast.

The changes kept coming. Odom died in November 1977 and in January 1978 was replaced by Clay Berry, Jr., a prominent Fort Worth insurance executive. Berry had been approached by Sampson, who asked if he would be interested in serving on the board. “Quite honestly, I wasn’t that familiar with TCJC. But Ed and I had been friends, and I guess he thought I might be of service at the board level.”[81]

Berry’s concept of the College was of a place primarily serving low-income students who were there to learn technical-vocational skills. “Of course, my eyes were opened to the fact that the College is performing far broader responsibilities and performing them well,” he said.” [82]

Then, later that spring, Sampson chose not to run for election. The balloting on April 1 saw Cox, Bell and Berry re-elected along with a newcomer, Fort Worth printing company owner John Lamond who would occupy Sampson’s Place 3 spot.

Lamond was used to public life, having served two terms on the North Richland Hills City Council before running for TCJC’s board. He had become interested in the College through a city council colleague, Norman Ellis, a department chair of mid-management on Northeast Campus. “I wanted to continue to make a contribution and had been very interested in the [TCJC] board and began to try to analyze it and see if I could bring something positive,” he said.” [83]

So from 1972 to 1978, five of the original Board of Trustees who oversaw the establishment of TCJC and the building of the first two campuses had departed through either death or resignation. Only Bell in Place 2 and Owen in Place 7 remained.

Instruction took new directions as well. One had a small beginning that would evolve into a teaching mode that would dramatically change the College educational experience. A single sentence in the “TCJC Short Takes” section of the November 1970 Momentum told of a new course, Man and His Environment, underway on South Campus. What the item didn’t say was that the course was offered over television.

South Campus President Charles McKinney believed distance learning had great potential and convinced Rushing his campus should offer a pilot instructional television – ITV – course using video materials leased from outside developers. Students could view the lectures from home over KERA, the area’s Public Broadcasting Service outlet, or in the campus library. Instructor Martin Mattingly would make and grade assignments and do the testing.

“Dr. McKinney, Martin and everyone else involved thought that class would attract probably 30 people, and 300 signed up,” said Dr. Carolyn Robertson, later the director of distance learning. Instructional television clearly had a future.”

A few years later, Dallas County Junior College began to develop courses in English, government and history with TCJC picking up some of the cost. “Because of that,” Robertson said, “we got to use those courses for a good number of years without having to pay lease fees. But enrollments grew. Ed Windebank was director, then Jack Pirkey, and by the time I became director in 1980 we had either 12 or 13 ITV courses.”

The ITV courses would grow in number and enrollment but would remain a fairly small part of the educational enterprise through the 1980s. It would be in the ‘90s with the advent of the home computer that distance learning started becoming the behemoth it was by 2015.

Another major change in the College’s educational offerings involved non-credit classes and programs. Non-credit had been a part of TCJC’s mission from the beginning but seemed to have trouble finding a niche in the College’s organizational structure. It reported first to campus presidents, then to Vice Chancellor Styles.

The impetus for change came when the state decided to provide funding for occasional non-credit courses – the ones consisting of job training. Clarence “Sam” Krhovjak, a director of special projects in TCJC’s unit, proposed to Rushing an organizational model similar to one pioneered by the San Antonio community college district with a focus not only on non-vocational and job-training classes but also career training partnerships with business and industry.

Rushing agreed and in 1976 created the Community Campus of which Krhovjak was named provost – a position equal in rank to the other campus presidents – in August 1977. Krhovjak soon named campus directors – Aubrey Sharpe at South, Robert Cull at Northeast and Ambrose Adams at Northwest. The director’s titles would later be changed to deans and finally to vice presidents.

The new organization boomed in the late ‘70s, starting training programs – some of them grant-funded – with businesses and governmental entities throughout the county. The avocational, “fun and games” courses weren’t neglected, and the College began running ads in the Star-Telegram that took up multiple pages and listed hundreds of courses from bridge to belly dancing.

Senior citizens could take advantage of a wide variety of courses – as many as they wanted for a small fee. On the other end of the age spectrum, one of Community Campus’ most successful programs – College for Kids – was begun at the instigation of Erma Hadley. It quickly spread to the other campuses, and within a year or two there were long lines of parents each spring seeking places for their children.

The College administrative organizational chart would also change during the decade, and what would eventually be the most far-reaching move took place in January 1973 when Erma Johnson Hadley moved from teaching into administration.

It was a time when the federal government was putting pressure on colleges and universities to comply with anti-discrimination laws, including adoption of an Affirmative Action plan, or face the loss of federal funds. C.A. Roberson needed an equal opportunity officer, and his eye settled on Hadley.

Hadley was already making her mark as a voice for equality. Early in her Northeast Campus career, she told President Don Anthony that he was discriminating against her.

Taken aback, Anthony asked how. “Because there are 100 of us [faculty] on this campus and there are four like me,” she remembers saying. “When you call a faculty meeting and we get into that auditorium, you can stand down there and count one-two-three-four. If you only count one-two-three, you know one of us is missing. I don’t ever have an opportunity to play hooky. I need you to have some more people like me so I can play hooky some time.”

Anthony knew that there was a serious issue underlying the joking manner. If he could find more African-American faculty like Hadley, he told her, he’d hire them. Hadley asked if he was serious and, being assured that he was, said she’d start looking. “So, I started helping him look for black teachers at the time, and he was true to his word,” Hadley said. “If they were any good, he’d hire them.” Such faculty as Daisy Dubose, Liz Branch and Patsy Gray thus were drawn into the TCJC family.

When Hadley’s department chair, Glenodine Pippin, first told her of Roberson’s interest, she demurred. She loved teaching, she said, and had no wish to move to a downtown administrative job and didn’t even want to talk to Roberson about it. Roberson, however, was persistent, calling Pippin and asking her to talk to Hadley once more.

Hadley declined once more, but Pippin had a persuasive argument. Hadley was always, talking, she said, about how the College should do more in the way of diversity. Well, this was her chance to do something about it. “She told me I couldn’t let this opportunity pass me up. So I did think about that. Absolutely, I did,” Hadley said.

Roberson could be persuasive as well as persistent. If she took the job, he said, he’d guarantee she would not lose her tenure and could return to the faculty if she so chose. Moreover, he said, this federal mandate might go away, so he would make her assistant director of personnel in addition to the equal opportunity title.

Hadley agreed to take the position but had one final question: Was this a real job, or was Roberson hiring her just because she was black? “And I think that kind of took C.A. by surprise,” Hadley said. “Then he laughed and said, ‘I guarantee you this is a real job.’’

Hadley recalled that, months later when she spent endless hours crafting the Affirmative Action Plan that the board adopted in February 1974, Roberson looked at her and asked, “Still think this isn’t a real job.”

But another job was on the horizon. When the director of personnel resigned, more than 100 people applied for the vacant position. Roberson asked Hadley to help him screen the applicants. She gave him 10 to 12 names, from which he selected five or six interview possibilities.

Days later, Roberson said he was ready to make a decision. He reviewed all the applicants but decided not to interview any of them. Hadley asked if he wanted her to start over with a new applicant pool. No, was the answer. He wanted to give the job to her.

Just as before, Hadley objected. She wasn’t ready, she said, and there was still so much she didn’t know. Roberson was unmoved. You can learn, he told her, and she was named director of personnel in March 1975.

Roberson was in for a new job of his own, or at least a new title – executive vice chancellor. Rushing was increasingly active in national organizations, including the American Association of Community Colleges and the National Endowment for the Humanities, which involved considerable travel. He needed someone to be in charge when he was absent, and that someone was Roberson. The new title, Rushing said, “will more clearly define his responsibilities. He is the chief administrative officer during my absence, and virtually all administrative matters are channeled through his office.” [84] Henceforth, the College organizational chart would show Cabinet members reporting directly to Rushing but also with a dotted line through Roberson to the chancellor.

Hadley’s and Roberson’s weren’t the only significant promotions in the mid-1970s. In April 1975, Don Anthony resigned as president of Northeast Campus to accept a position as vice president for academic affairs at Texas Eastern University in Tyler. He was succeeded in July by Herman Crow, who had served as campus dean of instruction since 1973. Replacing Crow as dean in December was Raymond Hawkins, who had been director of community college programs at the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board in Austin.

Meanwhile on South Campus, Dr. Jim Worden was named dean of instruction. After earning his doctorate at Northern Colorado University in 1968, he had moved back to his native Wisconsin to teach, “but I had forgotten what winter was about.” [85] He joined TCJC in 1972 as Northwest’s assistant dean of students before moving to South as dean of student development services the next year.

Enrollment continued to climb, reaching another milestone in fall 1974 with a count of 15,513. But just as it appeared the College would never stop growing, it encountered its first decrease in fall 1976, dropping from 19,537 to 19,103. Rushing said the decrease was caused by “smaller high school graduating classes and diminishing enrollment of veterans.” [86] The decline proved short-lived, however, and enrollment rebounded.

After more than a decade in existence, Tarrant County Junior College was starting to make its mark beyond the county’s borders. Rushing was appointed a member of the National Endowment for the Humanities Council in 1976. Morrison was named to the Higher Education Coordinating Board by Governor Bill Clements in 1979 but would have to resign later when the state ruled she could not serve both on that body and on TCJC’s board.

One of the most satisfying honors came to a faculty member. The Minnie Stevens Piper Foundation of San Antonio had given awards annually since 1958 to ten outstanding college or university teachers. TCJC had nominated faculty since the ‘60s but finally had a winner in 1977 when Gary Smith, then chair of the Science and Mathematics Department on Northwest Campus, was named a Piper Professor. Rushing summed up the College’s pride when he said, “I know of no distinction which should be more valued in recognition of outstanding teaching.” [87]

Things were looking good. A tiny – but eventually to grow much larger – cloud appeared on the horizon in 1979 when the board learned a statewide drop in enrollment, coupled with a tightening state budget, would mean a drop in appropriations, but the future appeared brighter when the 1980s opened with a fall enrollment of 22,026 students. TCJC, just 15 years into its existence, thus had passed UT-Arlington and was the largest institution of higher education in Tarrant County.

Chapter 10: Growth and Change

The 1980s brought no new campus for TCJC – the only decade in the College’s first half-century that didn’t happen – but there was plenty else going on, including construction on the existing campuses, a new downtown Fort Worth home and changes at the very top of the organizational chart.

It’s not that enrollment wasn’t growing, but the growth was much slower than in the boom years when both the College and the campuses were new. The 22,026 of fall 1980 was a record, but the decade produced an average annual increase of only 2.7 percent until 1990 when 27,942 students – another record – signed up for classes.

Growth in credit classes, however, wasn’t the only factor putting a squeeze on campus facilities. The non-credit Community Campus had hit its stride, and classroom space on all campuses was at a premium. New programs, some requiring specialized facilities, were begun. In addition, some facilities on the older campuses – South and Northeast – passed the 20-year mark and started showing their age.

Conditions were crowded, too, at the central administrative offices. TCJC had long since taken up the entire 14th floor of the Electric Service Building and had begun to spread throughout the floor below. The Community Campus’ growing staff was housed on the first floor of an office building at 600 Texas Street. Clearly, a new facility was needed, and the College didn’t have to look far to find a good – and available – location.

The area of downtown between 8th Street and Lancaster Avenue had long been known in Fort Worth as “Lower Main,” and the often-heard saying was that Lower Main got lower and lower with each passing year. It never had a savory reputation, and its liberal sprinkling of bars and brothels earned it the nickname “Hell’s Half-Acre.”

By the 1960s, most of the saloons and salons had closed, but the area had steadily declined as evidenced by the growing number of empty storefronts and derelict buildings. It wasn’t a particularly attractive front door to downtown, and the city fathers decided to do something about it, forming the Chamber of Commerce Development Corporation and Fort Worth Foundation, Inc. In the decade’s early years, the foundation bought up a large swath of the area, much of which was used to build the Fort Worth Convention Center and later the Fort Worth Water Gardens.

By 1981, the foundation’s only remaining parcels were 32,500 square feet on a block bounded by 14th and 15th Streets on the north and south and Houston and Throckmorton Streets on the east and west, plus a smaller 16,800-square-foot piece across Throckmorton. TCJC wanted to build its new headquarters on the larger site and use the smaller for parking. The $765,200 purchase was contingent on the College also acquiring a 7,200-square-foot triangle immediately south of the main tract and also on the willingness of the City of Fort Worth to close 15th Street so that the main tract and triangle could be combined. The board approved purchase for $75,000 of the triangle in September, the city approved the street closure, and the sale was completed.

Still, one issue needed resolving. Part of the large block was not owned by the foundation and belonged to Ernie Ladd of Ladd Uniform Company, who was reluctant to sell. Since this area was designated for parking, construction was well underway when a deal was finally struck in April 1982, and TCJC bought the 7,500-square-foot site for $200,000.

While the need for office space drove the new building, it would be designed as an educational facility as well. Rushing was quick to say the new facility would not be a full campus like El Centro in Dallas but would, after a comprehensive market analysis, offer on a modest scale classes designed to appeal to downtown workers.

“I think this is the one chance we have to try this,” Rushing said. “Economically, it’s not feasible to fire up a whole plant for a relatively small number of students. But with the right kind of planning, the instructional parts of the new facility could be designed for continuous use even at times atypical from most colleges.” [88] The board chose Geren and Associates as the architect in October 1981, approved the plans the next January, and in March awarded the construction contract of $2.2 million. The time frame for construction was short. The lease with the Electric Service Building would expire at the end of April 1983, and the College wanted to be moved by then. Despite some weather delays, a move-in date of March proved do-able.

One of the few snags proved to be not the building but the parking lot to be built next to it on the corner of Lancaster and Throckmorton. Fort Worth leaders were embroiled at the time in a dispute over Interstate 30, whether the portion that ran through downtown, presently an overhead above Lancaster, should be relocated or the overhead expanded. The Texas highway department, anticipating the possible overhead expansion, told the College not to build its parking lot because it might be necessary to hoist large loads of material over the parked cars. The College countered that it needed the lot and that the overhead construction might not even take place. At last, a compromise was reached where the college could build the lot but then temporarily vacate it if the overhead plan went through. It never did.

By the fall of 1982, everything had been pretty much decided except for the building’s name. The board took care of that on September 16, but not all the trustees were on board with the decision.

The discussion involved naming the facility a “center,” or perhaps naming it for a person. Trustee John Lamond, turning to the Bible for inspiration, said he would do King Solomon in reverse, combining two things instead of cutting something in half. He moved the name May C. Owen Tarrant County Junior College District Center be approved.

Owen was quick to object. Calling the building a center was fine, she said, but she didn’t favor naming it for someone, particularly herself. “And,” she added, “where in the world did you get ‘Macy’?” Lamond repeated his suggestion only to be told by Owen that she had no middle initial. “Good, Dr. Owen,” he responded, “You just saved us $5 on the sign.” [89]

District and Community Campus employees spent the following February boxing up their offices, and the move to what quickly became known as the MOC took place March 3 with the formal dedication April 19. Classes were offered as promised starting that summer, but the idea never really caught on, even though MOC employees worked downtown sidewalks prior to the fall semester handing out schedules. The classroom space gradually gave way to offices, and the transition was complete by 2010.

Meanwhile, lack of instructional space was becoming a more critical issue on the campuses. Rushing told the board in October 1984 that 380,000 square feet would be needed to handle enrollment growth. The question, he said, was whether to put this space on the existing campuses or build a new campus. In addition, some existing facilities were in need of renovation or repair.

At the next month’s meeting, the board was presented three alternatives. The first, estimated to cost $18 million, provided only for repair and renovation with no new space to be constructed. The second would accomplish the repair and renovation plus the addition of new space with a price tag of $49.7 million. The third would take care of existing facilities, add limited new space at the campuses and build a new campus. Estimated cost was $60 million.

The board requested more specifics, which were provided the following April. Northwest Campus would get new facilities for computer science, math and engineering technology, plus new classroom and faculty office space. South would have new space for business, auto mechanics, office occupations and computer science, a new performing arts hall and additions to the Nursing and Electronics buildings. Northeast would receive new classrooms and faculty offices, auto service labs and a new police academy with a firing range. Also the package would fund repairs and renovations, new furniture and equipment, updated heating and cooling systems, and new roofs for South and Northeast.

Money to buy land for a new campus was also part of the plan. This would be particularly attractive to voters in southeast Tarrant County as it was widely assumed that the campus would be in the Arlington-Mansfield area.

Voter support would be needed. The May Owen Center was funded from TCJC reserves, but that pocket was nowhere deep enough to accomplish such a large array of projects. The College would need a third bond package. After a few months of debating and fine-tuning the proposal, the trustees on August 13 called for a $50 million bond election to take place September 28. As with the two previous elections, this one passed handily, 3,736 to 2,426.

The first of the new buildings to come off the drawing board was the Regional Police Academy on Northwest, a pet project of Rushing’s, and he took part personally in the planning. One question involved the firing range. Rushing favored an indoor range, climate controlled with no noise problem or chance of a stray bullet escaping. However, an open range – even one partially covered with baffling – was cheaper to build.

Rushing wanted to prove his point by finding an indoor range that could accommodate 12 firing stations. By chance, there was one at his former college in Broward County, Florida. He and three staff members visited the facility and, while it was very nice, something didn’t look right to Rushing. He asked the director how many people could shoot at one time. Only six was the reply because that produced the limit of toxic fumes the exhaust system could handle. “We came back,” he said later, “and planned an open range.”

The same issues of firing range safety and noise cropped up many years later. Over the intervening years, range instructors found that, although extremely rare, a stray round could escape through the open spaces. Also, despite architects’ prior assurances to the contrary, shots could indeed be heard inside the main campus building more than 300 yards to the north.

These weren’t considered front-burner issues until the Eagle Mountain-Saginaw school district decided to build its Chisholm Trail High School on Northwest College Drive directly across the street from the Police Academy. With the high school grounds only about 400 feet away, parents worried, it was much more likely that a bullet accidentally fired between the baffles into the air might injure a student when it fell. Consequently, the College built a new firing range – indoor and with an appropriate exhaust system.

As Rushing said prior to the bond election, the building program would be stretched over several years. A $1.4 million contract was awarded in July 1986 for Northeast’s Communication Arts Building. Two months later came a $1.8 million contract for the police academy to be named the Criminal Justice Training Center. March 1987 saw the $3.3 million contract for Northeast’s Arts and Technology Building, followed the next month by the $1.7 million Automotive Building on South. Construction began in the summer of 1988 on the final two new buildings – the $2.1 million Performing Arts Center on South and the $1.6 million “B Wing” classroom extension on Northeast.

At the same time the College was selling bonds from one election to fund all this construction, it could retire the bonds that made the first buildings possible. The final payment on the original 1966 issue – $98.15 – had been made, and the physical bonds, by law, had to be destroyed. Accordingly, one agenda item of the June 19, 1986, board meeting took place in the lobby of the May Owen Center when the bonds were formally burned by founding trustees May Owen and Ardis Bell. They were assisted by two students – Misty Garcia and Jeff Chancellor – who were born the year the bonds were first issued.

Issuing new bonds and retiring old ones were not the only financial news of the 1980s. The College’s total tax rate dropped dramatically – from 45 cents per $100 valuation in 1980 to 3.472 cents in 1980. It wasn’t anything TCJC did that brought about the change, but the creation in 1980 of the Tarrant Appraisal District or TAD, which was part of statewide property tax reform. Before, property appraisal was the province of each county’s tax assessor-collector and varied widely. The new legislation required all property be re-evaluated at fair market value, including some, mostly residential, that may not have been evaluated for decades. The result was a huge increase in Tarrant County’s property valuation, and governmental entities could get the same revenue with a far smaller tax rate.

Another financial milestone wasn’t recognized as such at the time. The portion of TCJC’s 1985 budget derived from state appropriations was about 70 percent. That would become the high-water mark for state funding, which then began to dwindle. While the amount the College received from the state continued to rise, it almost never managed to keep pace with enrollment. By 2015, the percentage fell to a near-record low of 19 percent.

With the state’s share of funding declining, the gap had to be made up elsewhere, and the only two choices for the College – other than reduce educational services, which was never considered – was to raise tuition or taxes ... also unpalatable. The Board of Trustees had called the bond election at the same 1985 meeting it was to enact the tax rate. To ask the public to approve bonds just when their taxes had been increased would have been poor strategy. But the board had foreseen the problem and in May had raised student tuition for 1985-86 from $4 per semester hour to $8. It was the first tuition increase in College history and, in Gwen Morrison’s opinion, “was traumatic to most people.” Only two years later, a second increase from $8 to $10 was deemed necessary.

The other major financial action of the 1980s had nothing to do with taxes or tuition but with philanthropy. From the beginning, Tarrant County Junior College was philosophically opposed to actively seeking private financial support, unlike its counterpart in Dallas, which had a well-established foundation. Some board members, notably Bill McKay, maintained that fundraising should be the province of private schools, and that state-supported institutions should rely on appropriations, tuition and – in the case of junior colleges – taxes.

The combination of less state support and McKay’s resignation from the board in 1986, however, opened the way for trustees at their meeting of November 19, 1987, to authorize forming a foundation. Its purpose would be twofold. First, it would seek private donations, such funds not to be used for operating expenses but rather for “extras” such as professional development, faculty and staff recognition, and student scholarships. Second, it would be a vehicle for accepting donations from foundations that wished to help the College but whose practice was not to donate to public institutions.

The foundation would be known as Friends of TCJC, and trustees approved the articles of incorporation on October 20, 1988. It took more than a year to work everything out, including securing nonprofit status from the Internal Revenue Service, but on November 15, 1989, the TCJC board named 14 members to the foundation’s board. Three – Roberson, Rushing and Bell – were directly associated with TCC. Community members were architect Preston Geren, accountant Robert Fernandez, former trustee Jenkins Garrett, educator Morris Holmes, civic leader Virginia Miteff, physician John Freese, businessman John Stevenson, developer Herman Smith, civic leader Allan Ryall [widow of Edward Sampson], developer Dixon Holman Jr., and attorney James Cribbs.

The Friends of TCJC never had a paid staff and was only modestly successful in raising money. The foundation would become dormant in the mid-1990s but would be revived in 2001 under the name Tarrant County College Foundation. Operating expenses and staff salaries have been funded by the College under a Memorandum of Understanding. As of November 2014, the foundation had almost $20 million in managed assets.

McKay’s wasn’t the only departure from the Board of Trustees during the decade. Loyd Cox resigned in May 1982, and it was eight months before trustees agreed on a replacement, appointing Pete Zepeda, who had been on TCJC’s bond election committee in 1971 and had run for the board the next year. Zepeda, founder of the Fort Worth Mexican-American Chamber of Commerce, thus became the first Hispanic to serve to the College’s Board of Trustees. He filled the last two years of Cox’s term and then won a full term in 1984, defeating Jo Ann Reyes in a runoff.

The board didn’t take nearly as long to find a replacement for McKay, appointing Tom Schieffer after only a month. Schieffer, a Fort Worth attorney, had been involved with TCJC from the very beginning – actually even before the beginning, serving as chair of the youth committee working for passage of the founding election in 1965. “What this campaign taught me,” he said later, “was that if you can educate people, take to them a good, solid message, they will listen and do the right thing.”

That campaign was the first for Schieffer, but not the last. In 1972, at the age of 24, he won the first of three terms in the Texas House of Representatives. He was no stranger to the Capitol, having worked as an intern for Senator Don Kennard, but it was different being an officeholder instead of an office boy. “Suddenly, I was much more handsome than I used to be, much wittier and just so much more charming than I had been when I was running errands for the mailroom,” he said.

He went into private law practice but stayed abreast of state politics and knew well the financial challenges facing TCJC and other higher education institutions. “It’s the most severe I can recall,” he said. “The oil industry provided Texas with a cushion for a long time and gave us a sense of security. That’s changed, and it’s changed for a good, long while, I think.” [90]

The next resignation was that of John Lamond in August 1987, who wrote to Bell that it was one of the hardest decisions he’d ever made. At its next meeting, the board appointed Dixon Holman Sr., whose son, Dixon Jr., would later join the foundation board.

Like Schieffer, Holman was a former state legislator who had gone into private law practice as well as real estate development and also served as a state district judge and a partial term as a member of the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals. He was familiar to sports fans throughout the Southwest as a football official and, at the time of his appointment as a trustee, was an instant replay official for the National Football League.

The next board departure had been anticipated for some time, but that didn’t make it any easier to bear. Dr. May Owen, who reluctantly had run for the board in 1965, had grown increasingly frail in body though her mind was as sharp as ever. She died on April 12, 1988, at the age of 96. At the board’s regular monthly meeting a few days later, the agenda had only one item – a proclamation lauding Owen for her “strength of character, profound faith in education, and deep wisdom.” [91]

The timing of Owen’s death, just a month prior to a trustee election, made it impractical to appoint someone in her place. Instead, Rushing, Roberson, board members and Jenkins Garrett huddled to talk about prospective candidates. At some point, someone put forward the name of civic leader and community volunteer Louise Appleman. Garrett looked up quickly. “Do you think we could get her?” he said.”  [92]

As it turned out, they could, but it wasn’t easy. Appleman found running for office as onerous as had Owen, her predecessor. “I found it very distasteful personally,” she said. “The only thing that kept me going was trying to keep the larger goal in mind.” [93]

Actually, she had to run twice. The open seat drew three other candidates and, while Appleman led the voting by a comfortable margin, she did not have a majority and had to win a runoff election against Gary Waller.

A native of Corpus Christi, Appleman was a nurse by training and experience, which included a time in the emergency room at Dallas’ Parkland Hospital. She moved to Fort Worth in 1964 after marrying attorney Gordon Appleman. No stranger to the College, she had taken several non-credit courses, her son Michael was a former student, and she used TCJC as a selling point as a relocation specialist working with clients interested in living in Fort Worth.

The board had one more change in the decade. After only two years as a trustee, Holman received appointment to an unexpired term as a state district judge and, as such, could no longer serve TCJC. His replacement, appointed on January 19, 1989, was Tom Demarest, owner of an Arlington auto dealership, who was recruited by fellow trustee Berry, a classmate at Fort Worth Paschal High School. Demarest confessed he didn’t know much about TCJC, but he liked what little he knew. One of the mechanics at his dealership was an Automotive Technology graduate and a second was a student in the program.

Changes within the top levels of College administration also marked the ‘90s. The first was the departure of Director of Communications Don Newbury, who resigned effective March 31, 1981, to become president of Western Texas College in Snyder. His successor was Bill Lace [author of this book], who had the new title director of college relations. The Fort Worth native and former Star-Telegram staff member, he had been director of the news service at UT-Arlington before joining TCJC.

The next change to the Chancellor’s Cabinet was an addition rather than a replacement. Sometime in the spring of 1981, Rushing called Erma Hadley into his office for a talk. He told her, she recalled, that while C.A. Roberson was a financial whiz, he replied in terms of cost every time Rushing talked to him about an initiative involving employees. Rushing needed someone whose sole responsibility was to look after employees, and he was going to make Hadley that person. The title would be vice chancellor for human resources.

One of Hadley’s first questions was, “Does Mr. Roberson know about this?” No, answered Rushing, but that would be taken care of now that he and Hadley had talked.

Hadley realized it would not be an easy transition. Roberson would not like her being raised to the same level on the organizational chart, she told Rushing, and would be upset about surrendering his authority over a key administrative function. Rushing readily agreed, but said, Hadley recalled, “But he loves you. He’ll get over it.”

Hadley was right. “We were both very uneasy about the new arrangement,” she said. “Somebody had been your boss all these years, and now he’s not. And in many ways, he’s like your peer.”

Rushing also was right. Roberson did get over it ... eventually. “Gradually, he and I got to a better place,” Hadley said. “I was not nearly as reluctant to have hard conversations with him, and he was not nearly as possessive about the power.”

Rushing made the announcement April 30, and it capped off a very good six months for Hadley who the previous November had been appointed to the prestigious and powerful D-FW Airport Board. Long recognized as a leader in Fort Worth’s African-American community, she was now seen as very much a major player in the wider community. She blended an air of supreme competence and confidence with a bearing that bordered on the regal. She was the kind of person whose presence was felt in a room five minutes before she actually arrived.

Hadley wasn’t the only TCJC administrator to gather honors during the decade. Rushing was elected chair of the Association of American Community and Junior Colleges in 1981, and in 1986 was listed in a study funded by the Exxon Educational Foundation as one of the nation’s 100 most effective college or university CEOs.

Chiefly, however, the ‘80s was a decade remembered most for faculty honors. One day in May 1984, David Clinkscale – a member of the original student body now teaching government on Northwest Campus – saw President Michael Saenz at his classroom door. “My first thought was, “Oh, golly, what’s happened,’” he said. “Then he grabbed me and started pounding me on the back and congratulating me. Then it dawned on me that it must be the Piper.”

It was, indeed, the second Minnie Stevens Piper Professorship for a TCJC faculty member, and Clinkscale was overwhelmed or, as he sometimes told his students, “whelmed over” and found it difficult to finish his lecture. “Needless to say, when I went back into the class, I couldn’t quite bring my attention fully back to the role of the governor’s staff.” [94]

It had been seven years since Gary Smith had been TCJC’s first Piper awardee, but the third was not long coming. Duane Gage, Northeast Campus associate professor of history, had been nominated so often that when it occurred again in 1985, he laughed it off with a comment about always being a bridesmaid.

But, no longer. In May, a letter arrived from the Piper Foundation informing him of his selection. He said when he told his wife Nancy Ann, “she kind of squealed. She knew I’d gone through this before, you know, a time or two ... or three.”

Gage thought it especially significant that TCJC had Piper Professors two years running, only the seventh time in 29 years an institution had back-to-back honorees. He called it “a reflection of the entire school. I’ve always sensed the level of excellence for our faculty, and I’ve simply tried to measure up to that.” [95]

Fully as significant – possibly more so since the recognition came from colleagues – was the award program established by Rushing in 1986. It called for one faculty member from each campus, each year to be presented the Chancellor’s Award for Exemplary Teaching, honorees receiving a plaque and a sizable stipend.

“Tarrant County Junior College is a teaching institution,” Rushing said. “Success in teaching has been achieved by many, and the work of some is marked by excellence. It is my feeling that the College should have its own system to recognize those who have demonstrated the highest levels of excellence in teaching.” [96]

First to receive the award were Jim Nichols, fire technology, South; Gary Smith, biology, Northeast; and Mike Cinatl, interpreting for the deaf, Northwest. More than 100 of their present and future colleagues would be Chancellor’s Award winners, and the list includes several who went on to become deans, vice presidents and – in the case of Elva LeBlanc and Tahita Fulkerson – campus presidents.

But the 1980s will also be remembered as the end of an era. In the spring of 1988, Rushing privately told his board and later his Cabinet members that he planned to retire effective at the end of the next year. He requested the news go no further, saying that he would announce his decision to the College family at graduation in May.

While the news had doubtless leaked out to some extent, Will Rogers Auditorium became very quiet, save for a few crying babies, when Rushing, after some remarks about the importance of graduation, said, “And certainly for me, this is a graduation of some importance, because, you see, it will be my last one. A year from now, someone else will be presiding in my place, and I will be in the audience.” [97]

Louise Appleman was one of the many to whom Rushing’s announcement was a shock. Commencement had occurred during the time between the regular board election and her runoff, so she decided to attend just to get the flavor of TCJC’s ceremony. “So, there I was, sitting back in the audience listening to Dr. Rushing,” she said, “and all of a sudden – ‘What? What did he just say? He’s doing what?’ I was wondering what I’d gotten myself into.”

As his retirement date neared, Rushing received praise, recollections and congratulations from friends and colleagues across the country:

“He’s earned respect and recognition from virtually every sector of our society, placing his noted trademarks of competence and concern not only in academe, but also in the military, our community, and in public service. Accordingly, his exemplary service has been recognized at the national, regional, and state levels – this, in addition to the praise he’s received right there in our hometown.” – Jim Wright, speaker, U.S. House of Representatives

“The thing I remember best is that, from our very first meeting, his concept of a junior college was basically the same as that of the founding trustees – one of the finest community colleges that could be built. Joe has always been totally dedicated to the community college concept, and he inspired those who worked with him as well as those of us on the board.” – Jenkins Garrett, founding president, TCJC Board of Trustees

“Joe has the ability to surround himself with such capable people – his vice chancellors, for instance. And, second, he has the ability to relate well to people at all levels of society. I think that Joe could relate very well to a prince and a pauper and the same time.” – Dr. J. Ardis Bell, president, TCJC Board of Trustees

“In August 1969, when I interviewed for the position with Joe Rushing, he said, ‘I am not promising you a rose garden. It gets lonely at the top, but it will be interesting work.’ Years later, a permanent rose sealed in a glass paperweight found its way to my desk. In stressful times – there have been a few in these years – I look at the rose and am reminded that he told it like it was.” – Mrs. Edith Kelley, Rushing’s executive secretary. [98]

The Board of Trustees didn’t take very long or look very far for Rushing’s successor. At their meeting of September 15, 1988, trustees named C.A. Roberson effective immediately on Rushing’s retirement. In making the motion, Gwen Morrison said, “I am happy to move that we call upon one of our own.” [99]

“I enter this position with the feeling that, with the faculty and the staff we have and by using a team approach,” Roberson said a few days later, “we can get the job done. I certainly can’t do it myself. No single person has that much talent, ability or brainpower. It’s got to be a team approach with everyone working together.” [100]

But the College wasn’t through with Rushing just yet. At a black-tie banquet in his honor on his final day as chancellor, Bell unveiled a large color architect’s rendering of the new theater building on South Campus and told the audience it would be named the Joe B. Rushing Performing Arts Center. Rushing was both pleased and relieved. He was delighted with the honor but throughout the dinner had been uneasily eyeing the draped picture, afraid it would turn out to be a portrait of him. He had been embarrassed when his former college in Florida had commissioned a bust be made in his likeness and didn’t want the situation repeated.

The board had not actually taken a vote on naming the facility since they would have had to do so with Rushing present, which would have spoiled the surprise. Instead, they made an informal decision that was made formal at the next meeting.

Roberson’s promotion to chancellor meant someone else would oversee the College’s finances for the first time since 1966. There were two highly qualified inside candidates – Director of Business Services Joe Ed Spencer and Director of Finance Jim Whitehead. Roberson agonized over the decision but in January 1989 named Spencer vice chancellor for business affairs. Whitehead retired less than a year later, and his assistant director, Nancy Chang, moved into the director’s seat.

Spencer came to TCJC in 1968 from the dean of men’s position at Sul Ross State in Alpine where he had known Roberson. He served as South Campus bursar, came to the District Office as director or purchasing in 1974 and was made director of business services the following year.

One additional high-level change occurred before the decade ended. In April, South Campus President Chuck McKinney sprung a surprise of his own. He had visited the Caliente Hot Springs Motel in Nevada the previous year, fallen in love with the 12-room facility and learned that the elderly owners were looking to sell. He had planned to work eight or 10 more years, but said, “such a place might not be available in eight or 10 years, so I went ahead and decided to do it at this time.” [101]

McKinney’s retirement at the end of May opened the way for Dean of Instruction Jim Worden, who was named to the South presidency in August. The decision was highly popular with the campus faculty and staff. “I’ve been totally overwhelmed by the response of people after the announcement,” Worden said. “The support of the people, not just on South Campus, but in the entire district, has made me feel very humble.” [102]

The 1980s thus ended with the College headed toward a record enrollment with a new chancellor and a new campus president. The next decade would present a great opportunity in a fourth campus and a great challenge in the decline of state support.

Chapter 11: Arlington at Last

A few weeks after the 1965 election that created Tarrant County Junior College, the Board of Trustees’ consultant, Dr. C.C. Colvert, presented the findings of his demographic study intended to guide campus site selection. The southeast sector, he said, would be the fastest-growing area and should be considered. He was quickly told that the area already had a college – UT-Arlington.

It has been long suspected there was a hands-off deal between TCJC organizers and Arlington leaders, whose support, including that of UTA President Jack Woolf, was needed for the election. So, Arlington waited ... and waited.

By the mid-1980s, however, Arlington’s time had come. Its population exceeded 250,000, and another 50,000 lived in fast-growing Mansfield. So, when the TCJC bond election of 1985 specified money for a new campus, it was pretty much a given that it would be in Arlington ... but where?

The task of finding a site fell to C.A. Roberson. His inclination was to seek something in the city center, but nothing that size was available. “We probably waited a little late,” he said, “because if you started out to buy 150 acres, it was kind of hard to do.”

He looked at the largely empty Forum 303 shopping mall. It had plenty of square footage and parking, but it was so far east in Arlington that it was almost in Grand Prairie.

He also talked with the Arlington ISD about possibly buying the Workman Junior High School site. The large tract north of East Arbrook Boulevard between Collins and Center streets had once been the home of Bowie High School, which had been converted to a junior high when Martin High School was built to the west in 1982.

“The public schools was offering to sell us that building,” Roberson said, “but I couldn’t see that we had enough land there. It was [built as] a high school, and we would have had tremendous renovation there. It just didn’t fit.”

Another idea for the campus site came from O.K. Carter, editor and columnist for the Star-Telegram’s Arlington edition. He thought the campus should be built on land just north of the railroad tracks running through downtown Arlington. “I thought it would be kind of a bookend,” he said years later when a member of the College’s Board of Trustees. “You could have had the community college to the north, UTA to the south, with downtown Arlington in between. It would have done a lot to vitalize Arlington’s downtown.”

He floated the plan past several members of the Arlington City Council but said, “It didn’t get much traction.”

Roberson had investigated one additional site. It lay in far southeast Arlington about two miles south of Interstate 20 and just to the west of where Texas 360 would eventually be extended from the north. When realtors showed him the land, part of the farm once owned by the English family, “I said, ‘It’s just so far out here and all, and I just don’t think this is what we want. I want something up nearer the center of Arlington.’”

When nothing else panned out, however, city and school officials invited Roberson to lunch and urged him to reconsider the southeast site. “They explained what was going to happen, how the city was going to grow in that direction, and what was happening down in Mansfield and how that whole area was going to grow,” he said.

He was convinced to take another look and arranged a meeting with the Dallas real estate developer who held title to the property. “He was one of these fellows with his shirt unbuttoned and a gold chain hanging around his neck – a real wheeler-dealer,” Roberson said. “And right in the middle of our conversation about us buying it, he said, ‘Well, I’m sorry. I’ve got another appointment,’ and just got up and left.”

Roberson didn’t give up. Digging a little deeper, he discovered the developer was heavily in debt, having borrowed from several banks to acquire the land. His largest creditor was a bank in Austin, and Roberson decided to pay a visit. “I went by and started talking to the fellow there about buying it,” he said, “but he didn’t seem very interested in talking to me.”

Roberson still didn’t give up. The more he thought about the land, the better it seemed to suit the College’s needs – plenty of land, the promise of good access and a location in the heart of a prime growth area. He continued to talk to the banker, who at last said, as Roberson recalls it, “Well, just how are you going to finance this?”

When Roberson replied that the money was in the bank, “you’ve never seen such a conversation turn. Immediately, I was the most important guy in their lives.”

On July 16, 1987, the board voted to offer about $25,000 per acre for 123.5 acres. But, while the College was ready to purchase the land, it wasn’t that easy. When time came to close, it turned out the property owner had used it as collateral to borrow even more money. Eventually, Roberson said, a deal had to be worked out with eight banks, some of them in Canada, none of which were going to get all their money back. Attorneys from all eight descended on the May Owen Center to squabble over who was to get what of the $3,087,500 purchase price, but the transaction was finally closed.

Arlington officials were ecstatic about getting a campus. “We anticipate it will be a boon to that section of the city in a number of ways,” Mayor Richard Greene said, adding it would serve as a magnet for development, provide another focal point for education and training, and give the city “one more feather in our caps when we talk about the excellence of education available in Arlington.” [103]

The College had to temper the enthusiasm with a dose of reality. It had the land for a campus but not the money. Another bond election would be necessary, and the timing would depend on construction of the Texas 360 freeway, or at least the service roads, so that the site would be accessible.

Then, too, there was the uncertainty of the Texas economy. Funding for new colleges and campuses was normally appropriated before they opened on the basis of anticipated enrollment. If money was tight, as it appeared it might be, such funding might not be approved.

When the College said Arlington and Mansfield would need patience waiting for the campus, it wasn’t kidding. Almost six years would pass before Texas 360 construction reached a point where board members could, on May 19, 1993, vote to order an August 14 election for bonds with which to build the campus.

As usual, since other parts of the county might not support an election only to build an Arlington campus, there was something for everybody. Enrollment had almost hit 30,000 the previous fall, and space was scarce, particularly in chemistry and biology labs. “This is one area in which we cannot simply add classes to meet the demand,” Roberson, now chancellor, said. “When the labs are full, they’re full. And our science labs are running from eight in the morning until 10 at night.” [104]

Board president Bell conceded that, with the economy in a slump, it might not have been the best time to call a bond election, but he said the board had little choice. “I’m confident the people of the county know us, respect the job we’re doing, realize the bargain they have in TCJC, and will support us on August 14.” [105] Bell’s confidence was well-placed. Led by Arlington voters, 82 percent of whom supported the measure, the bond election sailed through, 10,112 to 4,391.

Anticipating the result, Roberson and his staff had been busy on the educational specifications for what was now being called the Southeast Campus, and these were presented to the board in October. In November, the board completed a three-month process by naming architects, engineers and contractors for each College facility. The Arlington firm of Vestal, Loftis, Kalista/Architects was chosen for Southeast Campus with the civil engineering duties split between Schrickel, Rollins and Associates and McDonald and Associates.

On January 20, 1994, the board heard and approved the new campus’ general design as outlined by Howard Vestal. The campus would be under a single roof rather than have separate buildings. The main, two-story building was to run east-west with the front facing north. Vestal said the campus as planned would contain 371,500 square feet, expandable to 500,000.

“It’s a shopping mall for learning,” Vestal said, “with all the same appeal department stores would have for us as we traverse malls. That’s the kind of environment we want for the special centers and academic features in our educational complex.” [106]

In November 1993, Roberson recommended to the board that the new campus use a construction management firm who would work with various subcontractors rather than having a general contractor as at the other campuses. The following February, a board committee recommended the firm of Thos. S. Byrne of Fort Worth manage the project.

Years later, Roberson acknowledged that using a construction management approach was “a basic mistake. We hired one firm to manage it, rather than take a bid from one general contractor. As a result, we were dealing with this company and taking many bids, like electrical and plumbing and structurally – all of this. And this company we were dealing with, that we had selected to be the management firm, sold out about six months into the job ... And we had all sorts of trouble keeping all of those people, all of those subcontractors organized and moving.”

In addition, construction boomed across North Texas, and the cost of materials rose. At their June 1994 meeting, trustees were told of overruns on Southeast Campus and that “value engineering” – construction speak for reducing space and using less expensive materials – would be necessary to keep the project under budget.

Even though site work on the campus was well under way, there had been no formal groundbreaking ceremony, but it wasn’t for lack of trying. Two large public events had been planned, but both were rained out. Finally, on a cold, wet December day, about 50 people gathered at a weather-beaten frame house next to a pond at the property’s southeast corner. Standing ankle-deep in wet grass, they applauded as trustees used ceremonial shovels to break a very muddy ground, whereupon everyone hurried inside to get something hot to drink.

Costs continued to increase. In February 1995, trustees were told the projected total cost overrun for the campus was $2 million. In August 1995, the board approved three change orders totaling $130,000. In November came a report that work on the façade and roof would be about a month behind schedule. Another problem popped up in December when it was reported that the successful bidder on the Southeast Campus Maintenance Building had not submitted the required bid bond. The board then voted to reject all bids and rebid that part of the project.

In February 1996, Roberson gave a detailed update on Southeast Campus construction, and the news wasn’t good. There were difficulties, he said, with a specific contractor and “delays incurred as a result of the construction management process.” [107] It appeared that the campus, or at least a good portion of it, might not be ready when the fall semester began.

Southeast Campus did, however, now have a president. It had long been the buzz around the College that the position would go to Dr. Judith Carrier, Northwest dean of instruction and student development services. For once, the buzz was right. Carrier was named president December 1. She was supposed to begin her new duties at the first of March but was so excited that she jumped the gun.

“People come up and ask me, ‘How can you wait until March 1 to start,’” she said when interviewed for TCJC’s Projection newsletter. “Don’t put this in the story, but I already have.” [108]

Many of those early, unofficial duties doubtless involved answering and making calls from and to people who wanted to transfer to the new campus. Not surprisingly, many would move there from Carrier’s Northwest base, including Tahita Fulkerson, who was to be dean of instruction; Brian Bankhead, registrar; Bryan Stewart, chair of the Math, Science and Technology Division; Pert Durapau, director of student activities; and Mike Cinatl, coordinator of career and employment services. Faculty and administrators from South and Northeast also made the move. Meanwhile, on Northwest, President Saenz made Joe Rode dean of student development services and Elva LeBlanc dean of instruction.

People weren’t the only things the other campuses were losing. The rising cost of Southeast Campus was being felt throughout the District. Roberson told the board in April that a proposed new classroom building on South would be eliminated and roof replacement on Northwest was curtailed. These and other reductions in projects that had been part of the bond election were not well received by the campuses affected.

At the next month’s meeting, trustees heard that Southeast construction had fallen further behind from a shortage of skilled workers on the job site, and also that Carrier and her staff were making contingency plans in case part of the campus was unfinished at the start of classes.

Carrier, however, was not going to wait for the fall semester. She was determined that classes would start in the summer and worked out an arrangement with the Arlington ISD to hold them in temporary buildings on the campus of nearby Barnett Junior High School.

The new president made a special point to identify the campus’ first student, something now possible with computer registration. The lucky winner was Sherry Sassone, a recent TCJC graduate who had enrolled in an extra math class preparatory to transferring to UT-Arlington. When Sassone arrived, she was surprised to find herself the guest of honor at a small party and presented a goody bag that included her course textbook. Anticlimactically, her class ended up being canceled because of low enrollment.

Carrier also set out to ensure Southeast Campus was a visible presence in the community with an entry in Arlington’s annual Fourth of July Parade. She rode atop the back seat of a red convertible while faculty and staff walked behind, holding red, white and blue umbrellas and handing out literature.

Meanwhile, some serious finger-pointing occurred over the campus construction. Architects claimed the delay was caused by Guild Electric, which in February 1995 was given the campus electrical and fire alarm system contract. Accordingly, at a special meeting on June 3, 1996, trustees approved a motion that the “board terminate the contract of Guild, Inc. under article 14.2 of the general conditions of the contract” and that “the president of the board be authorized to add by amendment to the contract of the construction manager the completion of the electrical work on the Southeast Campus.” [109]

In August and again in September, the board was told that the deficit in Southeast Campus’ portion of the Building Fund, about $2 million, was Guild’s fault and that the money should be recovered from the firm’s bonding company. However, Guild and the bonding company, Amwest Surety Insurance Company, demanded an arbitration hearing. After attorneys for Guild and Amwest produced an internal memorandum wherein a Byrne employee acknowledged that his company had a faulty schedule, the case was decided in Guild’s favor. The arbitration panel “entered an award against TCJC requiring payment of substantial sums to Guild and denying all counterclaims of TCJC against Guild and its surety, Amwest Surety Insurance Company.” [110]

TCJC’s recourse was to seek these funds from Byrne and enacted a resolution demanding arbitration. Finally, in its April 6, 1999 meeting, the board approved a settlement whereby neither the College nor Byrne admitted any wrongdoing. However, Byrne and its parent company, Jonathan Avila Company, Inc., were to make “payments and contributions totaling $675,000 over time to the Tarrant County College District. A substantial portion of the payments received will be utilized to create the ‘Thos. S. Byrne Scholarship Fund’ to fund scholarships for academically qualified but economically disadvantaged students.” [111]

By this time, Southeast had been open more than three years and was already short on space. It had been designed for about 5,000 students, took in 3,993 in its first semester, and by the spring of 1999 had reached 6,580. By 2013, Southeast became the College’s second-largest campus with 15,257 students.

It hadn’t been a perfect opening. Most of the west wing was still under construction, blocked from the rest of the campus by a plywood wall across the main hallway. Some classrooms and labs lacked furniture. Some chairs that managed to arrive had yet to be assembled.

Time would fix such inconveniences. The problem for which there was no immediate solution was that, in the eyes of Carrier and Dean of Instruction Fulkerson, the campus was simply too small. Carrier had identified potential trouble spots in June 1996, the first time she walked through the under-construction facility with Roberson. There wasn’t enough space, she thought, in the Counseling Center for students waiting to be helped. She found the library too small. The value engineering process had so reduced the administrative area that the deans’ offices were on the second floor, separated from the president’s office.

The separate locations of the offices weren’t the only problem. “We had been told to order furniture for our administrative offices and were given the dimensions of the room,” Fulkerson said, “and when the furniture was delivered, it wouldn’t fit into the rooms, they had been made so small.”

But even office locale and space issues were small alongside the problem most vexing Carrier and her staff – very little room existed outside classrooms for students. Southeast Campus had been planned using Northwest as a template. Accordingly, it did not have a student center per se as did South and Northeast. Instead, like Northwest, it had a small space outside the food service area and a large ballroom that could be divided. But, as Carrier pointed out, “Where would the students eat if we were having a program? Yes, you could divide it [the ballroom], but the way they put the divider in, you could hear from one side to the other.”

About the only places students could congregate were the Commons area where the two primary hallways joined or in the halls themselves. The construction that sealed off about a quarter of the campus only exacerbated the situation. Students gathered in the Commons but also in halls outside classrooms, and keeping them quiet was a never-ending chore.

It didn’t help that some students resisted efforts to temper their volume and were confrontational with staff and sometimes with one another. “That first year, we had truly a surprising number of students who were in gangs,” Fulkerson said. “I hadn’t expected that. The advisers and faculty helped settle that, and by the second year those students who had been identified as gang members either were serious students or were gone.”

Carrier was committed to giving faculty and staff senses of pride and of ownership. Even with all the hiccups, the campus opened and operated with a spirit of excitement, anticipation and great fun. “We decided we had everything we needed to be successful,” Carrier said. “We didn’t have everything we wanted and wouldn’t in the future, but we had what we needed to be successful.”

When lack of space created problems, which was always, Carrier involved the entire campus in deciding who got what. “We had a total campus session,” she said. Various departments and functional areas described their needs after which discussion centered on whose needs should take priority with student needs always being the primary criterion.

Carrier also focused on giving the community the same sense of ownership. “She was a consummate campus president,” Fulkerson said. “She invited every group in Arlington that needed a place to come, and we all had to work on Saturdays because we had these groups meeting.”

The campus also reached out to public schools and was the first to go full-bore after dual credit, through which high school students could take classes that carried both high school and college credit. It partnered with nearby elementary schools, bringing children to campus on Saturday mornings for enrichment classes. Fulkerson especially remembers a reception attended by the youngsters and their parents. “One little boy walked in,” she said, “looked up with great authority at his parents and said, ‘I want you to see my college.’”

Southeast Campus proved one of the College’s greatest success stories. Arlington and Mansfield had waited patiently for a campus and, when it came, embraced it wholeheartedly. “We were received by the community immediately,” Carrier said, “because we were, and are, their community college.”

The campus was formally dedicated on November 10, 1996, a bare two weeks after the west wing finally opened. Speaking to a standing room crowd in the Commons, former Arlington Mayor Tom Vandergriff, who had played a major role in the establishment of the College, said, “I don’t think any of us could have foreseen how large TCJC would become and the impact it would have on our community.” [112]

Board President Bell recalled the decision to build the first campuses elsewhere, knowing an Arlington campus would come someday. “Someday has finally arrived,” he told the audience. . “Dreams do come true. We are standing in one at this moment. It’s taken a long time to become reality, but we all know that the best things in life are worth waiting for.” [113]

Chapter 12: Toward a New Century

As Southeast Campus was built, opened and grew, the rest of Tarrant County Junior College was finding its way through a dramatically changing financial, political and administrative landscape. By the end of the 1990s, three new faces were on the Board of Trustees, four men had occupied the chancellor’s office, and TCJC wasn’t even TCJC any longer.

Trustee Tom Schieffer’s prediction about a decline in the state’s support of higher education was coming true. In the mid-1980s, about 70 percent of TCJC’s budget came from state appropriations. Ten years later, it was 49 percent, including an 11 percent drop over the past five years. By decade’s end, it would hover around 30 percent.

Appropriations had long been the strongest leg of the three-legged financial stool on which the College perched. The weakening of this leg put great pressure on the other two sources of revenue, property taxes and tuition/fees. It was no surprise, then, when both rose steadily during the decade. The total tax rate for 1990 was 3.472 cents per $100 valuation. Ten years later, it was 10.461 cents, although about half of that was because of an innovative method of funding major projects that will be dealt with later.

The board, however, found it more difficult to raise taxes than before. State law now provided a way for voters to negate a tax increase if it exceeded a certain percentage. The key was the “effective tax rate,” which, if applied to the current year’s property valuation, would net the same revenue as the preceding year. If a governing body proposed a tax rate more than 3 percent above the effective tax rate, it must hold public hearings. If it proposed a rate more than 8 percent above, voters could petition for an election to roll back the rate, not to the effective tax rate, but to the previous year’s rate. It was a gamble few taxing entities chose to take.

TCJC wasn’t among those rolling the dice, but it came close. Facing a $450,000 decrease in appropriations and having to use almost all its reserves to balance the budget, trustees proposed a rate 7.9 percent above the effective tax rate – just enough to avoid the chance of a rollback.

It was perhaps a mixed blessing that enrollment, even with Southeast Campus opening, was flat and even down during the decade. The fall of 1990 saw a record 27,999 students sign up, and the headcount rose to 28,349 in 1991 and 28,515 in 1992 before starting to fall off. Enrollment dropped as low as 25,274 in 1996 before starting to climb once more. Had the College been growing rapidly at the same time state support was shrinking, it would have put even greater pressure on other revenue sources.

TCJC wasn’t the only community college losing enrollment. In fact, the trend was the same throughout the state and nation. Junior/community college enrollment had always been and continued to be very dependent on the national economy and job market. In good times, when jobs are plentiful, enrollment goes down. In bad times, with jobs scarce, people enroll to upgrade job skills or learn new ones to gain employment. So it was that the years leading up to the dot.com bust of the mid-‘90s were lean ones.

Texas had no caps on community college tuition, however, and TCJC’s board, like others across the state, reluctantly placed more of the cost of education on students’ shoulders. Tuition for Tarrant County students living in Tarrant County had originally been $5 per semester credit hour, but when the state passed legislation making $4 the minimum for community colleges, TCJC lowered its rate to that amount.

The College was almost 20 years old before the first tuition increase was enacted, $4 to $8 per hour, in 1985. Economic realities, however, ensured that others would follow more quickly. Thus it was that tuition rose steadily with $2 increments in 1987 and again in every year of the 1990s except 1991 and 1994. The tuition rate of $12 per hour in place at the start of the decade more than doubled to $28 by its end.

The tuition increases and other changes were enacted by a Board of Trustees that was itself undergoing change. Not only were new members chosen, but the entire process of their election had changed.

The board had been briefed in spring 1989 that more and more public governing boards – cities, school districts, community college districts – were moving away from at-large membership to single-member districts. Indeed, some boards were pushed into the change through local elections and by state legislation.

The changes occurred because it was believed that at-large elections made it difficult for African-Americans and Hispanics to be elected to boards in many parts of the state where Anglos had a wide majority. Their odds would increase, it was reasoned, if council or board districts could be created in which minority voters were in the majority.

TCJC trustees had not seen fit to make the switch, but Representative Garfield Thompson of Fort Worth announced prior to the 1991 legislative session that he intended to file a bill mandating single-member districts for the College. Legislators could not specify individual colleges or other governments in such legislation, but they got around the prohibition by “bracketing,” so a bill would include only one entity. Thompson, for instance, wrote his bill to apply only to junior colleges in Texas counties containing two cities over 100,000 in population. Tarrant, with Fort Worth and Arlington, was thus the only county affected.

TCJC trustees, sensing that change was inevitable, decided to beat Thompson to the punch. On July 18, 1991, they adopted a resolution calling for a single-member district plan to be submitted in October. They named a seven-member advisory committee – each trustee naming his or her representative – to craft the plan. Dr. David Pillow, as the board president’s nominee, would chair the committee whose other members included Ben Morrison [Gwendolyn’s husband], Garrett Morris [Schieffer’s law partner], and Kristen Vandergriff. This was the first official College duty for Vandergriff, daughter-in-law of former Arlington Mayor Tom Vandergriff, who also would be on the bond election campaign committee in 1993.

In theory, the committee’s job was simple – to divide the county into seven districts, each of which had to be contiguous – within a single defined area – and roughly equal in population so that all were within 10 percentage points either way from a population equal to one-seventh of the county. In practice, it was a bit more complicated since the committee wanted a map that would have an African-American district and a Hispanic district yet would still look after the interests of incumbent trustees.

Assisting the committee was Tom Carr, an attorney who had guided several school districts through a similar process. The committee also brought in a demographer who produced three maps – “A,” “B” and “C” – showing different district configurations. Various committee members found something objectionable about each map, so the demographer came up with versions “D,” “E” and “F.” These too failed to pass muster.

No one, it seems, had given the demographer specific instructions to, if possible, have each proposed district contain the home of a current trustee, so that board members would not have to run against one another. This was almost impossible since Clay Berry and Tom Schieffer lived fairly close to one another in northwest Fort Worth, but the problem was solved when a very busy Schieffer chose not to run for re-election. He had been part of a group purchasing the Texas Rangers Baseball Club in 1989 and in 1990 was made the partner in charge of building what would become The Ballpark in Arlington.

Schieffer’s decision broke the logjam, and plan “G” was approved by the board on October 10, 1991. The remaining six trustees each had “their” district, and the seventh – District 5 taking in south Arlington and Mansfield – would be an open seat in the 1992 election.

Normally, an open seat would draw a bevy of candidates, but in this case there was only one – Gary McClaskey, a 12-year veteran of the Arlington ISD Board of Trustees. McClaskey had intended to seek a spot on TCJC’s board two years earlier but stayed on when the AISD changed superintendents. This year, fortunately for him, the College now had single-member districts, and he lived in the one with no incumbent.

As a school board member, McClaskey had “watched these kids in high school who didn’t go on to a four-year school. They were wasting away, and TCJC gives them every opportunity in the world.” [114]

Two more changes occurred on the Board of Trustees in the ‘90s. The 1996 election brought a surprise when Robyn Medina Winnett narrowly defeated District 1 Trustee Pete Zepeda, 1,430 votes to 1,308. It was only the second time in College history that an incumbent trustee had been defeated, the first having been Audrey Trammell in 1976.

Winnett, at the time a Fort Worth ISD social worker, had the honor of being the first, and so far the only, TCJC graduate elected to the board. “I believe in the power of education and what TCJC does,” she said. “I graduated from TCJC myself in 1986. I know first-hand TCJC’s commitment to the county.” [115]

The other change came about the following year when Clay Berry, at the August 21 board meeting, announced his retirement after 20 years’ service. He said he was retiring then so that the board could appoint someone who might then run for a full term in 1998.

“Someone” turned out to be Robert J. “Bobby” McGee, chairman and CEO of Texas Commerce Bank in Fort Worth and also CEO of KBK commercial finance corporation. He was approached about going on the TCJC board by Trustee Louise Appleman who, along with Erma Hadley, was on the Board of Directors of Texas Commerce Bank. He also was a good friend of Clay Berry.

“Junior colleges are very important to me,” McGee said. “In fact, if it weren’t for San Antonio Junior College, I might not be where I am today.” [116]

Admittedly “kind of a goof-off” in high school, McGee felt insecure at SAC, having been told he didn’t belong in college. An instructor, however, gave him encouragement and much more. He “helped me go to The University of Texas, helped me decide how to approach that ... what I might be good at ... what I wanted to do. Made some phone calls for me.”

The greater share of important personnel moves, however, came among College administrators. One of the first came in 1991 when Roberson appointed Dr. Elva Concha LeBlanc to direct the Institutional Self-Study required for reaccreditation. A native of El Paso, LeBlanc graduated from high school in Fort Worth where she was once told she wasn’t college material. Determined to prove otherwise, she enrolled at Northeast Campus and compiled a distinguished academic record before moving on to the University of North Texas, from which she eventually earned her doctorate.

LeBlanc was coordinator of the Child Development Program at Northeast when tapped by Roberson to spearhead the journey toward reaccreditation by SACS. Over the next two years, she and a faculty-staff team turned critical eyes on every aspect of College operations. The result was a Self-Study so large – 14 volumes – that a member of SACS’ visiting committee joked, “It’s probably the only self-study in history off which one could bungee-jump.”117 [117]

Throughout the process, LeBlanc retained her Northeast Campus duties, thus holding essentially two concurrent full-time jobs. “First,” she explained, “I assumed that when the Self-Study was done, I’d be back there. Second, I felt I couldn’t ask people to do extra work above and beyond their regular responsibilities if I wasn’t willing to, also.” [118]

Most of the recommendations, areas needing improvement cited by the SACS committee, involved “institutional effectiveness,” the requirement that an institution must do strategic planning, implement and evaluate its outcome, and use the results to improve. The recommendations were no surprise to LeBlanc and Roberson, and Roberson quickly moved to address them by appointing LeBlanc director of institutional effectiveness, a position reporting directly to the chancellor.

College officials considered the recommendations more than offset by the six commendations bestowed by the committee. “When a committee gives a commendation, that’s something special.” [119]

The six areas singled out for praise included TCC’s student newspaper, The Collegian – somewhat ironic in that the publication’s creation five years earlier had stirred some controversy. Heretofore, each campus had its own newspaper, but in 1987 the administration – looking at enrollment numbers and printing costs – decided to have one Districtwide newspaper housed at Northeast.

Northeast and Northwest students seemed to take the decision in stride. Not so South Campus. The next issue of South’s Reflector had a photo of staff members wearing black armbands. The accompanying editorial called the move “callous,” “tragic” and “criminal.” [120] Student journalists Rick Smith and Tammie Price went before the Board of Trustees to appeal, but to no avail.

The SACS commendation was taken as an additional affirmation that the decision had been correct. The previous spring, The Collegian had been named one of the top student newspapers in the state – community college or university – by the Texas Intercollegiate Press Association, and the paper has continued to rack up honors regularly over the years. Even so, however, campuses other than Northeast sometimes complain that the paper’s home base gets more than its share of coverage.

With the reaccreditation process safely and successfully behind them, some high-level administrators looked toward retirement. Jimmie Styles was the first, announcing in the summer of 1993 that he would retire on August 31. He had been the College’s second administrative employee, joining his old boss, Joe Rushing, in November 1965. He admitted to being emotional about leaving but said, “I can’t be down about my retirement. It’s been too much fun. We’ve accomplished too much for me to be sorry about leaving now.” [121]

As Styles went out, Jim Worden moved up, being named vice chancellor for educational affairs – the first time the College designated an overall leader of the academic program. The faculty had long wished for such an office, but Rushing had always maintained that he, as chancellor, had that role.

The other major change that September was to Erma Johnson Hadley. It didn’t involve a promotion, exactly, but did bring a new title – vice chancellor for administration – and new duties. In addition to the personnel department, she would oversee the admission and records function previously supervised by Styles.

Roberson’s advancement to chancellor had wrought a change in his relationship with Hadley. “He said, ‘I need you to do more than just human resources,’” she said. “And that’s when I became vice chancellor for administration. So it was like coming all the way back around to when he hired me [in 1973] when he was my boss. And then when he became chancellor, he was my boss again and gave me more responsibility.”

Meanwhile, Worden was to hold down both the vice chancellor and South Campus president duties until a successor was named. That took place in January 1994 when Dr. Oswell Person was appointed. Person was no stranger to TCJC, having been director of library services on Northeast from 1982 to 1989. He then left for Lansing Community College in Michigan where he was dean of student and academic support. He was excited about his return, saying, “We’re all about learning – students, faculty, administrators ... it doesn’t matter. If we keep that focus, I think we’ll be all right.” [122]

Herman Crow was the next to make a move. The Northeast Campus president, who had been in the original South Campus faculty in 1967, retired on February 28, 1995. His exit was memorable. At the reception in his honor, he appeared in graduation regalia – cap and gown. Asked why, he said he thought it was only proper considering his academic career.

Toward the end of his farewell speech, however, he said that, while he had loved his career with TCJC, it was time for a change. With that, the lights in the room went out, replaced by a whirling kaleidoscope and the sound of rushing wind. When the lights came back on, Crow’s cap and gown had been shed and he stood – obviously ready for retirement – in a blue velour warm-up suit.

With Crow gone, veteran administrator Tom Stover, Northeast’s dean of instruction, was named interim president until a replacement was named. It took most of the calendar year, but after a nationwide search, Roberson appointed Dr. Larry Darlage, who at the time was vice president for instruction at Brookhaven College in the Dallas system. He took office at Northeast on March 1, 1996.

After receiving his doctorate in chemistry, Darlage had accepted a research fellowship at the University of Florida only to find that research was really kind of boring. He really enjoyed teaching while as a graduate assistant, so he became a chemistry teacher at Pikeville College in Kentucky before joining Brookhaven in 1978. Even though his career thereafter was in the administrative arena, he retained his love of the classroom and managed to teach a chemistry class almost every semester at Northeast until his retirement in 2014.

The administrative metamorphosis reached the highest level two months later when Roberson told the Board of Trustees that he would retire at the end of August. As with the search eight years earlier to replace Joe Rushing, there was an obvious inside candidate – Erma Hadley. This time, however, the trustees decided on a national search for Roberson’s successor, and since that person likely would not be able to take office until sometime in the spring, they needed to name an interim chancellor. They wanted someone who was not interested in the job on a permanent basis and quickly settled on Jim Worden from South Campus.

At the end of the May 16 meeting when the board officially accepted Roberson’s retirement, Hadley gave each trustee a sealed envelope. Onlookers assumed it constituted an application. Hadley doesn’t remember the envelopes and says she never actually applied for the chancellorship. But she was interested in the position and had decided to test the waters. She scheduled what she calls “a pretty in-depth conversation” with each trustee in his or her home or office.

She found the waters chilly. “I didn’t get the response that I wanted,” she said, “but I never did officially apply.” She was disappointed to find some of the board members “quite patronizing” and recalls that one male trustee – she’s unsure who – said, “I just don’t think she’d make a good chancellor. She’s a politician.”

In June, the board President appointed a search committee chaired by Clay Berry and consisting also of Gary McClaskey and Gwen Morrison. In July, the board voted to hire the search firm of Paul Ray Berndtson, which selected Dr. Linus Wright, a former superintendent of the Dallas ISD, to guide the process.

Hadley said Berndtson never contacted her, but Morrison remembered that Hadley received at least one letter from the company. Morrison remembered the letter vividly, calling it a “maximum insult” because Hadley’s first name had been spelled “Irma.”

“She should have gotten consideration,” Morrison said, “and Don Newbury should have gotten consideration. I was really appalled that he [Wright] thought we didn’t have anybody who was currently or formerly with us who could be considered.”

So upset was Morrison that she resigned from the search committee, but she wasn’t the only one irate. On September 19, a large, mostly African-American contingent crowded into the May Owen Center boardroom to display their displeasure at what they considered a snub of Hadley. Their spokesman, TCJC alumnus and State Representative Glenn Lewis, recounted Hadley’s qualifications and said she could compete fairly with any outside candidate. Another speaker, Tarrant County Commissioner Dionne Bagsby, said, according to the meeting minutes, “that the importance of a town-gown linkage would make the selection of Mrs. Johnson logical because of her extensive community involvement.” [123]

Board members did not respond and, through it all, Hadley stared straight ahead. She displayed no emotion outwardly but internally was in a turmoil. “I was so embarrassed,” she said, “and I tried to get them not to do it.” Her supporters, she said, even told her she should file a lawsuit. “File a lawsuit?” she said she told them. “Are you serious?”

African-American faculty were upset, as well. South Campus’ Robert Davis told the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, “We, as African-Americans are appalled, insulted, disheartened and enraged with Linus Wright's recommendation to eliminate [Hadley], a 28-year Tarrant County Junior College veteran, from the list of candidates."[124]

Hadley said she was disappointed by the entire episode but not angry. “I mean, who wants to work for somebody who doesn’t want you to work for them?” she said. “That was my attitude about it. I was not bitter at all about it. I was disappointed because they didn’t think I was ready for the job, and maybe I wasn’t.”

On December 18, the board released the names of seven finalists – Walter Bumphus, president, Brookhaven College in the Dallas system; John R. Gilliland, president, Metropolitan Community College, Omaha, Neb.; Queen Randall, chancellor emeritus, Los Rios Community College, Sacramento, Calif.; Leonardo de la Garza, president, Santa Fe (N.M.) Community College; E. Jan Kehoe, superintendent/president, Merced (Calif.) Community College; Sanford “Sandy” Shugart, president, North Harris College, North Harris-Montgomery Community College District, Texas; and Gwendolyn Stephenson, chancellor, St. Louis (Mo.) Community College Center. Bell announced that the finalists would be interviewed in January.

In the meantime, though, the board had to deal with another situation – a sad and shocking one – that resulted in additional controversy. Interim Chancellor Jim Worden had complained of feeling ill at a South Campus holiday party on December 10. He went home, napped in a lounge chair and died in his sleep.

After a memorial service in the South Campus Student Center on December 13, trustees went into executive session to debate on Worden’s successor as interim. Just over a half-hour later, they emerged and voted to appoint Darlage. The selection came as a surprise to the TCC community since Darlage had been with the College only 10 months. Some members of the Chancellor’s Cabinet were visibly angry while talking in the parking lot after the meeting.

They weren’t alone. Morrison had abstained on the vote for Darlage, upset at what she thought was a decision made in advance and one that constituted another rebuff of Hadley. “The guys on the board had gotten together and decided they were going to appoint Larry as interim chancellor,” she said. “I was shocked. Larry had just gotten here, and we had lots of experienced presidents and staff people here.”

In retrospect, she acknowledged that the appointment was a good one. “He was the perfect person for that,” she said. “He was kind of a peacemaker and really just kind of tried to hold things in place and let people do their jobs.”

Louise Appleman concurred. “Those others would have been possibilities [for permanent chancellor] because of their seniority,” she said, “and Darlage had no baggage, no history — just a nice guy who could hold things together while we figured it out.”

Indeed, Darlage, with his easy manner and ready sense of humor, quickly put most people at ease. He was known across the College for his large collection of neckties based on The Beatles’ songs and films. For his first board meeting as interim chancellor, he chose one that he said summed up his feelings – Help.

But for the African-American communities, internal and external, the selection was salt in a fresh wound. Davis came before the board at its January 16 meeting to voice his concern at the image of TCJC he said was being projected. He introduced community member Velma Ausbrook who cited Hadley’s elimination from consideration as chancellor, a perceived lack of concern for African-Americans during the chancellor search and Morrison’s resignations from the search committee and from her position as secretary of the board.

Morrison, indeed, had mailed a letter to Bell during the Winter Break resigning as secretary, but at the board meeting of January 11 trustees voted not to accept her resignation and she remained in office.

Meanwhile, the board still had to settle on a new chancellor. The list of finalists had shrunk to six when Gilliland pulled out. One reason for his withdrawal, he said, was the reaction of African-Americans to the search process. The remaining candidates were interviewed on January 4 and 5 in executive session, and Bell announced at the December 16 meeting that Kehoe, De la Garza and Stephenson were the finalists.

The three were interviewed on January 25 in a four-hour session on Northeast Campus. Each candidate rotated among the board, the Chancellor’s Cabinet, and a group of faculty, staff, and students, after which they returned to their respective hotels. The board met in closed session during lunch and at length dispatched a representative to bring De la Garza back to the campus. He met with trustees until shortly after 3 p.m., when the board went into open session and unanimously voted that he should be the College’s third chancellor.

De la Garza was a multi-generation Texan whose family roots were more than 200 years deep in South Texas. He grew up in Beeville and earned an associate degree from Bee County College before going on to a bachelor’s degree at St. Edward’s University in Austin and a doctorate in community college leadership from UT-Austin.

He spent 10 years at Austin Community College, rising to the position of vice president for academic affairs, then returned home to Bee County as executive vice president. He then spent two years as president of El Paso Community College and two more as president at Santa Fe before being lured back to Texas.

De la Garza said he welcomed the move for two reasons. “On the one hand, I’m coming back to my Texas roots,” he said, “and on the other I’m coming to an institution that has an exciting future ahead of it. TCJC is considered to be truly one of the bellwether college systems in Texas, if not the nation, and I plan to maintain and ensure the continued excellence of the system.” [125]

Board President Ardis Bell said de la Garza’s experience in a multi-campus community college and his familiarity with Texas were key factors in the hiring. “We feel he fits the pattern we need here,” he said. [126]

Despite his praise for TCJC, de la Garza was coming into a situation less than ideal. Decreases in both enrollment and the level of state support, along with the cost of opening Southeast Campus, had put the squeeze on the College’s finances. Even with increases in both tuition and tax rates, the 1995-96 budget was extremely tight. The amount budgeted for equipment, for instance, was far below the amount expected for such a large college.

The use of reserve funds to achieve a balance had become the norm. The board was told in May that fiscal year expenditures would exceed income by about $450,000 and that this amount would have to come from budgeted reserves to achieve a balance. In 1996-97, the amount from budgeted reserves would grow to about $600,000.

In de la Garza’s view, TCJC had been too conservative over the years, especially in regard to its maintenance and operations tax rate, which was among the lowest in the state. This was a revelation to board members. “We were so accustomed to operating in debt that it never occurred to us, or at least to me or anyone at the table,” Appleman said.

Morrison also was unfazed by the use of reserves. “No, because it was like our vision was very contained,” she said. “We were doing well with the vision that we had in place and really, if you look at where we were then compared to the other institutions in the state, we were doing pretty well. And so I think everybody was just very comfortable with where we were.”

One trustee not in the comfort zone was McGee, who thought that the College should be more aggressive. “I was pretty clear that we were underspending relative to other communities in the state of Texas,” he said. “And it was my view that Fort Worth should compare itself to other communities, and we should strive to be the best. And it wasn’t OK if we were just doing a little better than what we had done in the past in Tarrant County if that wasn’t as good as Dallas or Houston. We should be striving to be number one, and we should put the resources behind it to be number one.”

Morrison was correct, however, in that TCJC’s finances, while not perfect, were no worse and, in fact, much better than most other Texas community colleges. The traditional funding model had been at least adequate when state appropriations footed most of the bill, but those days were over. Much of de la Garza’s first year was given over to finding a way to make the College more solvent in the new landscape.

Not that there wasn’t anything else on his plate. He had been on board only three months when Oswell Person, less than three years into his presidency at South Campus, resigned to take a similar job at Oakland Community College in Michigan. Tom Stover, who had done one turn as an interim president, was called into service for another.

De la Garza appointed an advisory committee to screen applications and send him a suggested list of finalists. That list included two longtime TCJC administrators – Anita Barrett, South’s associate dean of instruction; and Carolyn Robertson, director of distance learning. They were joined by Ernest Thomas, vice president of student development at Brookhaven in Dallas; Donald Green, interim president of a New York community college; and Steve Maradian, director of a University of New Orleans technical center in Orange, Texas.

De la Garza’s eventual choice was Thomas, who took office in February 1998 making him the second campus president hired away from Brookhaven in two years. He was physically imposing, as might be expected of a man who went through Washington State on a football scholarship en route to his degree in sociology. His deep voice matched his size, and his eloquence – especially when delivering an invocation – led colleagues to nickname him “The Rev.”

There was much more to Thomas, however, than met the eye or ear. He followed up his bachelor’s degree with a master’s from the University of Massachusetts and a doctorate from UT just a short distance from where he grew up in East Austin. His easy humor belied a keenly analytical mind, and he came to be a go-to person when knotty problems or innovative initiatives needed scrutiny.

He was equally adept at making employees at all levels comfortable in his presence. “Communication is the key,” he said. “We must work together and practice the ‘we’ rather than ‘I.’” [127]

Meanwhile, de la Garza had gotten a grip on TCJC’s financial practices and was ready to bring forth a proposal that would stamp him as an innovator – Pay As You Go.

TCJC, along with every other community college in the state and perhaps in the nation, used general obligation bonds to finance major capital outlay such as construction, repair and renovation of buildings. If, say, a new campus was needed, the college went to the voters for authorization to sell bonds in the amount needed to build it. The downside was that the bankers who bought the bonds charged interest that, over the life of the bonds – up to 30 years – could amount to a hefty expenditure by the college’s taxpayers depending on the interest rate.

De la Garza’s plan was to avoid the interest by financing major capital outlay from maintenance and operations tax revenue. A portion of such revenue would be set aside each year in a fund earmarked for such purposes. The fund would hopefully grow to the point where it could finance construction on an ongoing basis.

The plan was simple and elegant, but if it was so simple and elegant, why wasn’t anyone else doing it? First, to raise enough money would require using a large portion of the maintenance and operation rate, which would mean a sizeable increase in the M&O tax. TCJC would need a hike that would net far more than the 8 percent that would trigger a possible rollback election.

The College had three things in its favor. First, the M&O tax rate of 3.908 cents was among the lowest of among Texas colleges, and the size increase still would leave it under the state average. Second, the District was property- rich, its total valuation ranging among the top five in Texas community colleges. Third, the trustees were convinced of the plan’s merits of the plan, were willing to take a risk and had among them a banker – McGee – who immediately saw the plan’s potential and could influence the others.

At a planning workshop on August 6, 1998, de la Garza told the board he would propose an increase of at least 3 cents and possibly as much as 5 cents to the current 3.908 cent rate. With the trustees seemingly amenable, he went for the higher number in his August budget proposal – an M&O rate of 9.011 cents that, when combined with the debt service rate of 1.630 cents, yielded a total rate of 10.641 cents, an increase of almost 85 percent.

The board might have been ready to sign off, but what about the public?. State law required a public hearing, which was set for the 17th. Fifteen people showed up to address the board, but not before a bit of comic opera. Although the May Owen Center address is 1500 Houston Street, most of the foot traffic comes through the 14th Street entrance, and it’s that entrance the College police leave that entrance unlocked after business hours for board meetings.

The meeting had just started when the officers on duty in the lobby heard a loud pounding on the Houston Street doors. A group of would-be speakers had just arrived and were furious at finding the doors locked, thinking they had been purposely shut out of the meeting. They were quickly admitted, and seemed to accept profuse apologies from trustees.

Only six of the 15 speakers spoke against the tax increase, but it couldn’t really be called a valid endorsement of the plan since six of those speaking in favor were either TCJC faculty or students. Ten days later, the board approved the increase, and Pay As You Go was a reality and would play a major role in the College’s development in years to come.

The funding model wasn’t the only example of the new thinking that de la Garza brought to TCJC. By 1999, only 19 of the more than 1,200 two-year institutions were still going by the name “junior college.” Of those 19, 16 of which were in Texas, TCJC was second in size only to St. Petersburg (Fla.). De la Garza thought it was high time for a change.

Trustees and administrators were supportive, but hesitant. What would Jenkins Garrett think? What would Joe Rushing think? It turned out that Garrett had no objection, and Rushing thought the change was way overdue because of the word’s negative connotation. “I won’t ever quite forgive the guy whom came up with that term ‘junior,’” he said, “but it had that stigma for a very long time.”

The logical alternative was Tarrant County Community College, but some thought that TCCC might be confused with the Tarrant County Convention Center. Tarrant Community College was a possibility, but de la Garza thought that the strong connection to the county should be preserved. He recommended Tarrant County College, and the board agreed, approving the change on February 18.

Although the new name would not become official until the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board received notification, College switchboard operators the next morning began answering calls “Tarrant County College.”

If trustees and administrators worried that it might take a while for the name to catch on, they needn’t have. A week after the board’s action, de la Garza and a staff member went as guests to a Student Publications luncheon. When they told the restaurant hostess they were with the Tarrant County Junior College party, she said, “Oh, you mean TCC.” [128]

About the only downside to the change was that many community people jumped to the conclusion that the College now would offer bachelor’s degrees and become a university. They were assured that such was not the case.

The new name necessitated a new logo. The blocky TCJC, with symbols denoting individual campuses, were not only incorrect but had been around more than 10 years. The College, now officially TCC, hired a graphic design firm to find a new image. Most of their suggestions were variations on a star – a device used, logically enough, by many Texas institutions.

The best of the bunch was a multicolored star with “Tarrant County College” or “Tarrant County College District” stacked to the right. It was pleasing, but not exactly exciting. It fell to someone on the College Relations staff, graphic designer Susan William, to provide the spark. She took the static, straightforward star and turned it on the vertical axis, shortening the points on the left and elongating those on the right. The effect was to impart action to the figure, giving it a forward thrust.

Trustees gave approval in August 1999, and with a new name, new logo and a new funding model, TCC headed into a new decade. It would be one of great growth and grave difficulties.

Chapter 13: Toil and Trouble

The first decade of the 21st Century should have been the brightest in the College’s history and, indeed, some great things took place – a huge upgrade in information technology, spectacular enrollment growth, a beautiful fifth campus, honors for programs and faculty, a bold financial aid program. And yet, the years from 2000 to 2009 may be remembered chiefly as ones of turmoil in which the public’s confidence in TCC was severely tested.

At the top of the agenda for the new century was an upgrade of the computer system. The College had purchased a new IBM mainframe in 1981, but what had sufficed for three campuses and 22,000 students wasn’t enough for four campuses and an enrollment approaching 30,000. Not only did the old system lack capacity, but most of the software had been done in-house and some of its functions didn’t communicate well with others.

Chancellor de la Garza had started the process of selecting a new administrative software package in the late 1990s, appointing a committee to research alternatives. Representatives from various areas – finance, financial aid, libraries, human resources, admissions and records – researched the three major vendors – PeopleSoft, SCT and Datatel – and made site visits to community colleges using each of the three.

The committee presented its findings to de la Garza, but the selection of a system would have to wait on someone to oversee its implementation. The choice was Maria Shelton, chief information officer for the Fort Worth ISD, who began her tenure on February 1, 2000. She was in time to work with the committee on its final report and to advise de la Garza, who then made site visits of his own to speak with the CEOs of each prospective vendor.

The process took more than a year, but Shelton could announce to the Board of Trustees on March 22, 2001, that the Colleague system offered by Datatel would best fit the College’s needs. Trustees approved the contract on May 16, and the implementation got under way.

Administrators of the various departments involved knew it wouldn’t be easy. But even though colleagues who had been through it had told them what to expect, they were not ready – nor could they have been – for the enormity of the task. But with Shelton in the lead, the members of Project BESTT [Building Excellent Service Through Technology] worked through the myriad difficulties, enduring the snide remarks of frustrated users who referred to the system as Datahell. It would take years, but at length most of the kinks were straightened, and TCC employees were comfortable with the system.

Meanwhile, a familiar face had departed when Joe Ed Spencer retired in June 2000 after 32 years with the District. He had been ready to retire three years earlier but stayed on at de la Garza’s request. “Quite simply, I’m not sure another person will walk through the doors of TCC as committed and dedicated to the College as Joe Ed Spencer,” the chancellor said to more than 200 attendees at the farewell reception. [129]

The business affairs slot was not the only vacancy near the top of the organizational chart. Although faculty leaders repeatedly urged de la Garza to name someone to Jim Worden’s old position of vice chancellor for academic affairs, he had not done so. Some functions Worden had supervised, such as institutional research and curriculum design and review, reported directly to the chancellor.

After Spencer’s departure, the chancellor announced he would defer seeking a replacement. Some business affairs functions, such as accounting, finance, business services and purchasing, would report directly to him. Others were assigned to Cabinet members. Bill Lace, who had been named executive assistant to the chancellor in 1997, would handle board elections. David Wells, a veteran Community Campus administrator who had succeeded Sam Krhovjak as provost in 1996, had oversight of all facilities added to his duties.

Some board members were uneasy that two such important posts remained vacant and worried that de la Garza was taking too much responsibility on himself. At least twice, they addressed their concerns in assigning the chancellor’s annual goals, but it would not be until 2003 until the business affairs post was filled by Rudy Gonzales, who had been in an equivalent position at San Jacinto College in Pasadena, Texas.

But if de la Garza was overextended, it certainly didn’t show in TCC’s performance. Thanks to Pay As You Go, the College received an AAA bond rating. Enrollment boomed, exceeding 30,000 for the first time in fall 2002. The dedication of the state-of-the-art Fire Service Training Center the same year drew widespread media attention. A study showed TCC students, on average, had earned a 33.5 percent rate of return on their investment and that the College’s annual expenditures contributed $107 million to the local economy.

The board welcomed new faces in 2002 and 2003. The first was very familiar, as was her name. Kristin Vandergriff had twice served on the board’s redistricting committee and, when Tom Demarest announced that he would not seek re-election because of poor health, decided to run for his seat. Her opponent was Jose Gonzales, and she was stung when Gonzales received the Star-Telegram’s editorial endorsement. “It put a fire in my belly,” she said, stepping up her campaign.[130]

Vandergriff won easily with 80 percent of the vote. On May 15, her father-in-law, Tarrant County Judge Tom Vandergriff, administered the oath of office, after which he quipped, “As you can tell, my son married above himself.” [131]

The following January, Gary McClaskey resigned from the board as a result of his plans to move out of the county. To replace McClaskey, the board appointed Randall Canedy, president of Frost Bank in Mansfield, who was familiar with the College through his service on the Southeast Campus Business Advisory Committee. He would fill the remainder of McClaskey’s term and be elected a full term in May 2004.

The board members joined de la Garza as innovators in the decade’s early years. In 2002, as they called for a protocol for their annual chancellor evaluations, they also decided to take an introspective look at themselves each year. Under the plan, spearheaded by Bobby McGee, the board would establish its goals each August, work toward those goals over the fiscal year, evaluate their progress at a summer retreat and finally use the evaluations to formulate the next year’s goals.

It was much the same process used for the chancellor’s evaluation but with an important difference. Trustees would not be evaluated on an individual basis. Instead, the board would evaluate itself on how well it performed as a group. It was, insofar as could be discovered, the nation’s only self-appraisal process by any college or university governing board.

“As trite as it sounds,” McGee said, “if you don’t know where you’re going, any path will get you there. For us, as a board, to be effective, we had to lay out in advance what we wanted to do and then measure to see how far down that path we’ve come.” [132]

Certainly, there were thorns among the roses during these years. TCC followed a national trend in 2000 by outsourcing the campus bookstores. Wallace’s Bookstores Inc. was selected as the vendor over Barnes & Noble and Follett. Wallace’s went bankrupt in 2004, however, and Follett would take over in 2006.

State funding, or lack of it, posed a much more serious problem. The Texas legislature had grown steadily more conservative and was reluctant to increase present revenue streams, or create new ones, that would enable the state to fund growth. Colleges and universities experiencing rapid enrollment growth were particularly vulnerable. Appropriated funding might increase but not at the same rate as enrollment.

TCC was a case in point. The College enrolled 26,698 students in 2000-01 and received $39.4 million from the state. By 2006-07, the funding had increased to $43.4 million, but the number of students jumped to 53,343. Enrollment had gone up 14.4 percent while state appropriations grew by only 10.1 percent.

The state added insult to insult in 2003. TCC was supposed to receive $40.2 million for 2002-03, but all state agencies were notified in January that appropriations would be cut by 7 percent. This cut was a severe blow to higher education. The fall semester was finished and spring was under way, so the bulk of the money was either spent or committed.

Even worse was notification that all state agencies should expect a decrease of about 12.5 percent for the next two years. It didn’t turn out to be that much, but appropriations did fall $580,000 in each of the next two years while enrollment continued to climb.

Chancellor de la Garza informed the board in February 2003 that he and the administration would find a way to live within the budget and do so without compromising quality and, if possible, without raising taxes or tuition. But it wasn’t possible, at least as it involved tuition, which increased $1 per semester hour from 2002 to 2004. During the same period, the total tax rate went from 10.641 cents to 13.938, but that was an entirely different story – one that would come to dominate the decade.

The story had begun in the late 1990s when de la Garza met with David Wells, Joe Ed Spencer and George Richardson, director of the physical plant. According to Wells, the original topic was finding a way to expand the May Owen Center. One thought was to expand the building over the enclosed existing parking lot, go up two more stories and build a walkway over Throckmorton Street to a four-story structure, including a parking garage, to be built on the parking lot there. “After a few weeks, George had some drawings of what might be done,” Wells said, “but we didn’t have enough land across the street to build a parking garage.”

The next step, Wells said, was to see if there was land adjacent to the May Owen Center and its parking lots that could be purchased. “There wasn’t,” he said, “and so then began the discussion about building a downtown campus.”

The need for a campus was clear to administrators and, eventually, to trustees. Enrollment was growing, space on the existing campuses was growing tight, there was a growing residential presence downtown and there was a large underserved population – mostly Hispanic – living just north of the Trinity River. The four existing campuses were either outside or on Loop 820, circling downtown like a donut. It was time, TCC said, to fill the donut hole. The projected opening date was 2006.

The Pay As You Go model would have been hard put to generate enough money to build a new campus – at least with the existing overall rate of 10.641 cents – but de la Garza and the trustees believed the model was still workable. They likened their approach to a child saving up to buy a bicycle or a family putting aside money for a vacation. They rejected the traditional bond election method of financing and decided to seek a three-cent tax increase to fund the new project.

Reaction was mixed. Most people, especially the downtown business community, thought the new campus was a good idea, but the plan would amount to a 31 percent tax increase. The Fort Worth Star-Telegram considered the proposal too vague. No site had been identified, an editorial said, and consequently, there was no firm price tag. An unnamed “district official” had put the cost at anywhere from $25 million to $75 million. “TCC officials should first pin down a site and determine what campus facilities would be needed,” the editorial said. “The trustees then could consider how to finance the project and whether a substantial tax-rate increase is needed.”13^3 [133]

Columnist and future TCC Trustee O.K. Carter had a different objection, namely that voters would have no say in the decision as they would in a bond election. “There’s really no way to say no [to the new campus]. Or yes,” he wrote. The Pay As You Go system, he continued, might save millions in interest, but “unfortunately it also bypasses a critical component of the democratic political process, permission by the electorate to proceed.” [134]

The College’s plan entailed some risk. The proposed increase was far above the rollback rate, meaning a sufficient number of registered voters could force an election to cancel it. If the required public hearing was any indication, there was considerable opposition. Nine of the 13 speakers opposed the plan, and of those in favor, two were directly connected to TCC. When the proposal approached a final vote on August 29, all seven speakers argued against it. Still, the tax increase passed unanimously, and – even though TCC administrators feared the worst – no petitions were circulated calling for a rollback.

With funding for the campus now secure, the College began searching for a site. The parameters were wide. It could be in downtown Fort Worth or at least close to it. Buying an existing facility was an option, but so was building one from scratch.

There was no lack of suitors. De la Garza, Spencer, Wells and other administrators looked at the Inspire Insurance Solutions building on Burnett Street in the heart of downtown.

Two sites on Lancaster Avenue were said to be available. One was the classic Beaux Arts Post Office Building dating from 1931. However, the part of the building fronting Lancaster – the part with the ornate, longhorn-topped columns outside and the magnificent marble interior – was not part of the package. What TCC officials toured was the no-frills, decidedly grim working space behind the elegant public spaces.

The other Lancaster Avenue property was the giant Texas and Pacific Warehouse just a block west of the Post Office. Also dating from 1931, it had an imposing exterior and was large enough at 580,000 square feet to house a campus. The interior, however, was full of massive concrete pillars designed to bear the weight of tons of goods shipped in or out. Remodeling costs would have been prohibitive. The lack of adequate parking space was a drawback at all three sites.

Building a campus came to be considered the best option. One of the spots available for new construction was the area nestled in the northwest corner of the intersection of I-30 and I-35W. It formerly housed a vacant automobile dealership building that had been leveled in 1986 by a natural gas explosion. History aside, the site was simply too small for a campus.

The same was true for a tract owned by the wealthy and politically influential Bass family. This site, adjacent to the City Center office building complex, reportedly was urged on the College in 2003 by Ed Bass, who had led the development of Sundance Square and the Bass Performance Hall, showpieces of downtown Fort Worth. But the size of the site, only 11 acres, would have forced the College to construct high-rise buildings with little room for expansion. Talks were discontinued around the beginning of 2004.

That withdrawal left two sites as the top contenders. One was a tract east of the Tarrant County Courthouse that stretched around the south bank of the Trinity River along Bluff Street and Samuels Avenue. It had plenty of space and a commanding view of the river from high atop the bluff, but there were drawbacks. The site was long and narrow, unsuited to a compact cluster of buildings. It also had, smack in the middle, an elementary school considered a cultural and architectural treasure. Incorporating it into the campus plan would be a challenge.

The other site still in the running was also along the river but on the north shore west of the Main Street Bridge and south of the old TXU generating plant. Star-Telegram columnist Mitchell Shnurman wrote that “to many, the TXU location had the edge.” He cited the “potential beauty of the waterfront property” and added “it could become a catalyst for development along that part of the Trinity.” [135]

Most outside observers, however, thought the bluff site was the likely choice. It could be accessed directly from downtown and would generate retail traffic there. It was something of a surprise, then, when on May 19 College officials informed Tom Struhs, who controlled most of the bluff property, that the proposed deal was off.

Only two days later, Star-Telegram readers learned the site west of the Main Street Bridge had also been rejected. Schnurman had learned from several sources that TCC was considering building on both sides of the river, using a pedestrian bridge to connect five acres owned by the Bass family just east of the Courthouse with TXU property to the east of the bridge. He wrote on May 21 that it was “an audacious idea that could make the TCC campus an architectural landmark designed around and over a river and scaling the bluffs. The unusual split-campus configuration would also pull the Trinity into the fabric of downtown and would knit the school into the county’s largest employment base.” [136]

The story also said de la Garza and board members had met with renown Vancouver architect Bing Thom, known for his work on urban waterfronts, who showed them potential models of the campus. The trustees, he wrote, “were astonished by the creativity.”

What Schnurman did not yet know – and very, very few in Fort Worth did – was that TCC’s plans were about to be merged with something even more grand in scope – the Trinity River Vision. This project, spearheaded by Congresswoman Kay Granger of Fort Worth and architect James Toal, would reroute the main body of the river north and then east, leaving the portion between downtown and the TXU property an elongated town lake. This lake and the river would, in effect, create an urban island of more than 800 acres primed for development. The Trinity River Vision was unveiled in mid-June. Its architect, not coincidentally Bing Thom, was present and said the plan was uniquely Fort Worth. "If it looked like any other city, I wouldn't have taken the project." [137]

The plan that the Star-Telegram termed “grand” got even grander later that summer. In addition to the five acres purchased from Ed Bass, the college bought another 1.75 acres along Belknap and Weatherford streets. One of the small businesses dislodged was Pendary’s World of Chiles and Spices, the oldest retailer in the downtown area.

The Board of Trustees was lining up other factors besides real estate. At the August 26 meeting, the partnership of 3D/International and the Projects Group was selected to manage the project. Then, on September 16, trustees selected another partnership as architects – Bing Thom’s firm and Gideon-Toal of Fort Worth.

On October 29, 2004, with downtown Fort Worth as a backdrop, a group of about 200 elected officials and other dignitaries gathered under a tent on the river levee to get their first look at a concept model of the new campus. Even those who had inklings of the plan seemed stunned by what they saw – a below-ground entry plaza leading through a walkway to a cluster of buildings that, in turn, lead to a pedestrian bridge over the river to a second group of buildings atop the levee. The announcement accompanying the unveiling said TCC had thus far spent $38.37 million for 55 acres and was in negotiations for three additional parcels. The 500,000-square-foot campus would cost an estimated $135 million to construct and would open in September 2008.

The Star-Telegram’s Schnurman called the plan “a jewel of a campus” and wrote, “Already it’s the kind of architecture that makes you shake your head and say, ‘Can they really do that?’ ... You can bank on it becoming a Fort Worth icon.” [138] And a Star-Telegram editorial said that, while it had been known mostly as a “sleepy, unimaginative institution,” College officials now “made clear that they want to climb bluffs, ford streams and take a leading role in promoting the grand visions for remaking the Trinity River.” [139]

The months after the big announcement were largely taken up with matters other than the downtown campus and, indeed, plenty had been going on. In May, there was celebration at the news that Eduardo Aguilar, associate professor of art at Northwest Campus, had been named a Minnie Stevens Piper Professor. He thus joined Gary Smith, David Clinkscale, Duane Gage and Laura Woods as TCC faculty members so honored.

The College was also in the middle of a major planning effort. Months of work bore fruit in November with board approval of a massive Facilities Master Plan, but administrators realized that the other half of the equation was an Academic Master Plan still in the developmental stages. Eventually, both plans would be merged in the Institutional Plan, one of the few among the nation’s community colleges and one hailed as a model for others to follow.

Part of the Academic Master Plan would be a new degree. Since its founding, TCC had only two associate degrees – Arts and Applied Science. They would be joined by the Associate of Arts in Teaching, a program offering freshman- and sophomore-level education courses to students who planned to transfer to universities seeking bachelor’s degrees and teaching certificates. The first classes were offered in the fall semester of 2005.

To help create and implement the Academic Master Plan, de la Garza completed his academic team. At the annual fall breakfast for all employees in 2006, he introduced two new campus presidents and one new vice chancellor. Elva LeBlanc took over the Northwest Campus presidency from Michael Saenz, who had retired earlier in the year. Tahita Fulkerson, who had moved from Southeast to the May Owen Center as an associate vice chancellor in 2003, was president-designate of the downtown campus, and the faculty finally had another chief academic officer – Dr. Roberto Aguero, whose title was to be vice chancellor for teaching and learning services.

Aguero came to TCC from the Dallas County Community College District, where he had also been chief academic officer. His past stops included the presidency at Austin Community College and a vice presidency at Argosy University in Dallas. As part of the shifting administrative landscape, he would hire three associate vice chancellors – academic affairs, continuing education and student development services. For the first time in College history, the credit curriculum, continuing education and student services would all be housed in the same administrative structure.

At about the same time, Southeast Campus launched SureStart, a program where at-risk students put together in blocks of classes took advantage of group counseling and the encouragement received from one another to achieve a success rate in developmental courses far above the College average. The brainchild of Southeast counselor Penny Matthes, the program produced tangible results at little or no cost and in 2006 received one of the coveted Star Awards from the Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board.

The decade’s midpoint also saw the College – and much of Tarrant and surrounding counties – take advantage of a new revenue source courtesy of the Barnett Shale, a geological formation from which natural gas could be extracted by a process known as hydraulic fracturing, or “fracking.” In February 2005, the board authorized Chancellor de la Garza to begin the process of leasing mineral rights owned by the College for the land under every campus except Northwest.

Income from the leases could have been used to augment operational funds to help offset reductions in state appropriations, but de la Garza had what he thought was a better idea. Since the money was outside the normal College funding streams, he would put it to a special use – scholarships for students. The result was the Stars of Tomorrow, a program combining mineral rights income with state and federal financial aid to provide up to $4,000 over six semesters to every high school graduate in Tarrant County who met academic and financial need requirements.

The Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board took note of all the positive developments at TCC and singled out the College for a Recognition of Excellence at its April 2006 meeting. De la Garza and six trustees in attendance heard the Coordinating Board cite such factors as the College’s steps to keep tuition low, the Stars of Tomorrow program and the Pay As You Go funding strategy as having led to the award.

But the positives were hard put to cancel out the negatives, almost all of them having to do with building the downtown campus and its effect on other campus projects. Construction costs were rising, and an ambitious five-year Capital Improvement Plan approved in November 2004 was facing financing problems before it was two months old.

At a workshop on January 27, 2005, trustees were shown three options. The first carried a price tag of $304 million and could be entirely funded through Pay As You Go. The second had more projects at $367 million, but there was a period of more than a year when Pay As You Go would be insufficient and about $48 million would be needed from other sources such as tuition revenue bonds, certificates of obligation or special-purpose bonds. The third option entailed more construction projects, but the amount of extra financing required would be up to $95 million.

De la Garza spoke in favor of the third option, telling the board that, even with the extra financing, the plan would be less expensive in the long run because of the increased costs. But the trustees, principally Bobby McGee, thought extra financing such as revenue bonds went against the spirit of Pay As You Go and wanted much more information before they were implemented. Later the same evening, at the regular board meeting, de la Garza instead proposed the first option, which was approved by the board. TCC and the downtown campus were now firmly wedded to Pay As You Go.

Chapter 14: Storm Warnings

A few months later came the first wave in a rising tide of bad news about the downtown campus and its cost. Bing Thom and the other project architects completed preliminary drawings showing a campus that, while striking in design, presented construction difficulties not foreseen when the $135 million estimate was given. The new estimate was $170 million, but included only construction, not “soft costs,” such as architect’s fees and site work. The total project cost, as given to the Board of Trustees on August 5, was $234 million, but that did not include about $30 million paid for the land. The College could still afford to build the campus at this price, but only if the plan was scaled back through the value engineering process.

August 2005 was also noteworthy in the downtown campus story for an event 550 miles to the southeast when, on the 29th, Hurricane Katrina hit New Orleans and the levee system failed, flooding 80 percent of the city. Much of the blame, rightly or wrongly, fell on the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the agency responsible for levee design and construction.

TCC’s campus plans called for the first phase of buildings north of the river to be constructed on top of the levee. This would entail Corps approval, as would the sinking of piers in the river to support the bridge. Prior to Katrina, said David Wells, “We had every indication from the Corps of Engineers that there was going to be no problem, no difficulty with the construction of the bridge over the river and the campus on the north levee at all. Their comment to us was, ‘If you meet our requirements putting piers in the levee, then we will approve it.’”

Katrina changed the picture. “When that happened,” Wells said, “the Corps immediately became much, much more conservative in their allowances of people to do anything that would impact levees.”

Nevertheless, the College and its project management partners felt good enough about receiving Corps approval to proceed with a groundbreaking ceremony, but they were so skittish about the levee that they did not want even ceremonial shoveling to disturb it. Instead, some dirt was trucked in and spread in a rectangle outside a large pavilion.

The ceremony took place on Saturday, June 10, and was combined with a “Family Festival,” complete with food, games, face painting and musical entertainment for TCC employees and their families. “Not only is this a groundbreaking moment for the Tarrant County College,” said Fort Worth Mayor Mike Moncrief, “it’s a groundbreaking moment for the city of Fort Worth. Today, we celebrate a renaissance that will forever transform the area north of downtown.” Congresswoman Granger added that “this campus is the future of the community.” [140]

Just two months later, the price went up again even as the campus’ scope was going down. Alra Reeves of the Projects Group told trustees on August 16 that inflation in the construction industry had risen to an average of 8 percent in 2005 and was predicted to rise at an annual rate of 11 to 12 percent over the next two or three years. Greg Rittenour of The Projects Group then reported that even though value engineering had trimmed about $22 million from the project, including the delaying of two buildings, the Guaranteed Maximum Price – the one that would go into the construction contract – was now estimated at $179.7 million.

The public became aware of the potential difficulty with the Corps of Engineers in a November column by the Star-Telegram’s Schnurman. “Without [Corps] approval,” he wrote, “the design may have to be altered significantly, and it’s possible that the walking bridge would have to be delayed for up to eight years, or until the bypass channel is completed for the Trinity River Vision.” He quoted Michael Mocek of the Corps’ Fort Worth office as saying, “We couldn’t allow anything that could raise the risk of flooding.” Mocek added that he knew of no such projects as TCC’s campus having been built atop levees. [141]

The Corps showed the extent of its concern in January 2007, telling TCC that before a formal request for approval could even be submitted, it must agree to build a huge retaining wall, or “land dam,” on the levee’s north slope to protect it during construction. The wall, as eventually planned, would be 400 feet long, three feet thick and 83 feet high. Seventy-five of those 83 feet would reach below ground into bedrock, and the rest would be above ground. The project would cost $3.4 million.

In March, TCC announced that negotiations with the Corps and other delays meant the campus would open for the spring 2010 semester rather than fall 2008. “This puts us in a more realistic completion schedule than we had in the beginning,” Wells told the Star-Telegram. “No one could have anticipated the effect Katrina would have on the efforts by the Corps of Engineers on flood-plain permitting.” [142] But notwithstanding the Corps’ reluctance to give a green light for construction on the river’s north side, construction began on the south side.

The next blow fell in May when de la Garza told the board that “cost/time issues of inflation, market conditions, schedule delays and additional construction” would increase the total project cost to $297.5 million, an increase of $63.5 million. [143] Only four trustees were present at the meeting – Winnett, Canedy, Morrison and Vandergriff – but they seemed frustrated and were full of pointed questions. How long might the College have to wait on the Corps decision – said to be coming in September – and still retain the integrity of the project? How sure are we that Corps approval will happen? If the Corps does not approve, what’s the liability to contractors already working on the south side of the river?

Canedy said the College and its project managers should have sat down with the Corps earlier and that steps needed to be taken to prevent such occurrences in the future. Nevertheless, he moved that the increase be approved, and his motion passed unanimously. “It’s a significant increase, and it causes me heartburn,” Canedy said later. “We just can’t have any more. We need to keep this thing tight from this point forward.” [144]

Board members weren’t the only ones troubled by the cost. Negative letters published in the Star-Telegram increased in volume and stridency. Even Schnurman, one of the project’s most enthusiastic backers, shared Canedy’s heartburn. “TCC may be building a jewel of a campus in downtown,” he wrote, “but it’s paying dearly in money and credibility.” [145]

The next roadblock was not long coming, but it wasn’t cost. It was the design – or at least that’s what some people thought. Some governmental and business leaders near the ongoing construction – chiefly, Ed Bass – suddenly and unexpectedly decided they didn’t like the below-ground plaza and walkway and wanted the design changed.

With construction on the site well under way, Trustee Louise Appleman wondered why the objections had popped up so late in the game. All the major stakeholders, including Bass, had been briefed and seen the campus model. “This train left the station three years ago,” she said. “It’s been a very public process. We regret that people feel left out.” [146]

Appleman wasn’t alone in questioning the timing. “The statute of limitations on revisions, especially by outsiders, should have expired long ago,” Schnurman wrote. “But when Ed squawks, people balk.”  [147]

For his part, Bass said, “So we’ve all been Rip Van Winkles. Well, Rip Van Winkle wakes up and sees something that’s not good. Do you say, ‘It’s too late. You have to live with it for 100 years.’ Or do you say, ‘Wait. Let’s try to do something. Let’s try to improve on it.’” [148]

The College nevertheless agreed to a three-day workshop where the design would be reviewed by a team of three experts. Donald Gatzke, dean of the School of Architecture at UT-Arlington was the chair, and was joined by Fred Kent of New York’s Project for Public Spaces, David Lee of Stull & Lee in Boston and Alan Hantman of Hantman Associates in Washington, D.C. The whirlwind study called for the team to tour the site on Wednesday, June 13, interview the stakeholders about their objections on Thursday and present their findings on Friday morning.

The panel praised Bing Thom’s design and conceded that a two-day look was hardly sufficient to form a well-reasoned opinion. Nevertheless, they recommended that the plan be modified to eliminate the walkway and build the plaza at street level. “In our collective experience, we could only think of a few examples of great public places that happened below street grade,” Lee said. “As a public space, there needs to be as much space at street level as possible.” [149]

De la Garza was diplomatic in his response, saying the College would consider all recommendations but added that any delays would mean greatly increased costs. Bing Thom was far less subtle. “It is a difficult time for me,” he said. “A lousy time for me. The design knowledge takes a little longer.” [150

TCC officials thought the design question should have a public airing and scheduled a special board meeting for July 10 at Northwest Campus. De la Garza said trustees wanted to get all possible input before making a decision. McGee said whatever the decision, it needed to be made quickly. “It’s really important that we get this campus open as quickly as we can,” he said. “We feel tremendous pressure not to allow costs to grow out of control on the campus. This would be easy if we had an unlimited budget.” [151]

The meeting took place before a nearly full house in a lecture hall at the Fire Service Training Center. David Wells led off with a history of the project to date and said the plaza had never been planned as a gathering place but rather a campus entrance and the start of a walkway leading to and across the bridge. Bing Thom followed with drawings showing that the buildings south of Belknap would not interfere with views of the courthouse and that what some critics had called a “tunnel,” conjuring up visions of a narrow, dark place where all sorts of mayhem lurked, was actually 60 feet wide, 24 feet tall and well-lighted.

After Gatzke’s comments reiterating the consultant’s views and Thom’s rebuttal, representatives from downtown interests were invited to comment. Fifth on the list was Bass, who spoke without notes for 20 minutes, outlining the various objections, proposing alternatives and saying, “You can’t ignore that you’re coming into an urban, dense part of the city. The College has to acknowledge that it is becoming part of downtown.” [152]

In all, 17 people spoke for and against the plan, but the most surprising opposition was not to the design, but to the campus itself, and it came from someone who had been at the heart of the effort to establish the College in the first place – Larry Meeker. He called the new campus’ cost “extravagant” and told the board to stop construction on the downtown campus, sell the property, and “get back to the purpose of affordable education.” If more space is needed, he said, it should be built on the existing campuses. “Is this logical?” he told the board. “Is this the most cost-effective use of taxpayers’ dollars? It scares the britches off me.” [153]

Trustees originally said they would announce a decision at their regular meeting July 17, but they put the meeting off a week, saying they wanted more time for input. In the meantime, the Star-Telegram and its readers weighed in on the controversy. Most of the letters didn’t deal with the design, but with the cost, using such terms as boondoggle, Xanadu and fiasco. One letter, however, expressed something that TCC administrators had been saying among themselves, writing, “Will the Bass family pay for any cost overruns that the college incurs for a delay?” [154]

The newspaper itself sided with the college. Schnurman wrote, “The original design by Vancouver architect Bing Thom is simply better, much better than anything Bass and his consultants have offered up.” [155] And an editorial said that, after “considerable deliberation and discussions with key figures,” the newspaper had concluded “that Thom’s concept of a gateway descending below street level is necessary to make the split-campus concept work.” [156]

Not everyone in the media was on board. Rich Connor, writing in the Fort Worth Business Press, said his problem wasn’t with design specifics but with the project in its entirety, calling it “grandiose ... No one says that a community college has to be a campus of modular housing units or house-trailers, but it does not need to spend $300 million for a Taj Mahal ...” [157]

Such sentiment struck an exposed nerve with board members and especially with McGee, who recalled how inspired he had been by the campus and buildings when he attended UT-Austin. “If we need that kind of inspiration for people who start out at four-year institutions, we need it more for those who might walk in the door initially and not be sure they belonged here,” he said. “So having a place that was inspirational was part of that plan from the beginning.”

At the board meeting, trustees were told a redesign would mean tens of millions in added cost and a delay in opening of up to 18 months. After presentations by Wells, de la Garza and Thom, and after additional comments by the public, including Meeker, the board voted unanimously to stay with Thom’s design. “I looked very hard, like every other member of this board, at what our options were,” Canedy said. “I cannot come away with the belief that a civic – at street grade – plaza is better than what we have designed right now.” [158]

Bass did not attend the meeting but said in a statement, “I regret that the college has chosen to ignore the concerns of the downtown community and the advice of those with knowledge and experience in building in the urban setting. The college administration was never receptive to the workshop process and resisted hearing any of the advice it generated. In the end, they had no more concern for their downtown neighbors than they have for the taxpayers.” [159]

More than a year later, Canedy, reflecting on the downtown campus project, said, “It seemed like every time we turned around, there was another obstacle.” [160] Sure enough, the September board meeting brought more bad news. The trustees, who had hoped for a Corps of Engineers decision that month, heard from Wells that the submittal had not been made in July as planned because of “special issues, including various engineering, hydrology and environmental concerns.” [161] He said the target date for submittal was now December 15.

The news laid down yet another layer on a growing blanket of frustration. McGee was especially disturbed, saying there should be a point at which the College should take stock of the project and its cost and see if alternatives existed. As he recalls it, one project management team member answered him. “I’ll never forget these words,” McGee said. “‘You’ve already started this project. You don’t have any choice.’ And I remember saying, ‘I assure you we do have a choice. I assure you we do.’”

And, as events unfolded, they did.

Chapter 15: Change of Plans

When Trustee Bobby McGee said the board had a choice about the downtown campus project, contrary to what the construction management team thought, he might not have known exactly what that choice was. It didn’t take him very long, however, to find it.

McGee said he was “steaming” as he drove home from the meeting. He had not fully realized until this meeting that construction had begun on the river’s south side with no assurance of Corps permission to build on the north side. He was angry that the board had been told it had no choice but to continue the project. It was like telling the subcontractors, he said, “that they had an unlimited, unrestricted ability to raise the cost of the project.”

But, as he exited I-35W and made the curve west onto I-30, he happened to look to his right. The lights in RadioShack’s impressive national headquarters complex were on, and a light promptly came on in McGee’s head. He knew RadioShack had incurred financial difficulties since opening the complex, on the river west of TCC’s site, in 2005 and had sold it to KanAm Grund, a German real estate investment trust. He also thought that, since real estate prices worldwide were falling, the German firm might be willing to sell it.

After receiving very reluctant permission from the board’s Land Committee, of which he was a member along with Appleman and Vandergriff, and with de la Garza’s knowledge, McGee called Dan Feehan, then-RadioShack chairman of the board, and broached the idea that the College could buy the complex and lease back part of it to the company. Feehan dismissed the idea at first but warmed to the notion as McGee explained what he saw as the benefits. At last, he said he would talk to RadioShack management and get back with McGee ... which he did less than 24 hours later. Yes, he said, the company was interested, and negotiations began.

“We had the capital to do it without having to sell the property we had,” McGee said years later. “It wasn’t our plan, but buying that property was cheaper, by a factor of two or three, than completing what we already had. So we would be money ahead if we kept the land that we had and occupied the RadioShack campus. And we’d be miles ahead if the real estate market and the economy healed up and we could later sell the real estate.”

The College hired a Dallas commercial real estate broker, Jeff Swope, to conduct talks with KanAm Grund, but cost was only part of the picture. “In the spring of 2008, [we] met with the board to discuss the possibility and brought in Chuck Nixon of Jacobs [Engineering] at the time to help evaluate the facility to make sure it could be used as or renovated as an educational facility,” Wells said. “By that time, in the spring of 2008, we also brought in Gary Preather and Joe Bosley and David Hoelke [from TCC’s physical plant team] into the discussion to look at it as a facility we might be able to operate. Tahita [Fulkerson] had been named as president of the campus, and so she and her team also came into the conversations.”

“We had to be so secret about it because it was a real estate dream come true if it worked,” Fulkerson recalled. “When we came over, we kind of had to walk like we belonged here to see what it was like. When we walked into the East Fork building, there was cubicle after cubicle as far as the eye could see on those huge floors. Some of them had never been used. They still had tags on them. The chairs had never been sat in. RadioShack had just overextended itself so much.”

Fulkerson’s “if” was not inconsiderable, so work had to continue on the river’s south side of the river entailing, predictably, increases in cost. In January, Wells presented to the board three change orders totaling more than $10 million and bumping construction costs to $208 million. Furthermore, he said, more than half the project contingency fund of $22 million had been encumbered.

The news set off another round of negative publicity, especially from the Fort Worth Weekly, a self-described alternative newspaper known for its snarky tone but also for its solid investigative reporting. The January 30 issue featured a 5,000-word cover story in which writer Betty Brink reviewed the project in detail. One of several project opponents she interviewed was Meeker, still angry over the board’s decision to stick to the original plan. “This time I’m out to stop this campus,” she quoted him as saying. “What we don’t need is an expensive monument to administrators’ egos. Putting hundreds of millions of dollars into concrete and a giant hole in the ground instead of into kids and teachers is unconscionable.” [162]

Meeker put his money where his mouth was. He took out half-page ads in newspapers and then turned his attention and his checkbook toward the Board of Trustees, vowing to work to defeat them at the polls. His first opportunity would be in May 2008 when Winnett, Bell and Vandergriff were up for re-election. Winnett did not draw an opponent, even though some people in her district were sounded out about running, and was declared re-elected on April 16.

Bell, the patriarch of the board, was now 84 and ready to lay aside the burden after 43 years on the board, 36 as its president. He announced in February he would not run for re-election. Two candidates subsequently filed for the open District 2 seat – Conrad C. Heede, a Bedford real estate agent and a Rotary Club colleague of Bell, and Joe Hudson, a Hurst business analyst and a former member of the Arkansas legislature. In District 3, Vandergriff was opposed by Jerry Pikulinski, a labor economist and a veteran of multiple unsuccessful campaigns in Arlington.

Meeker bankrolled both Hudson and Pikulinski to an extent never before seen in TCC board elections, donating $16,000 to Hudson’s campaign and $11,000 to Pikulinski’s. The big bucks were only partially successful. Hudson defeated Heede, 3,996 votes to 1,774, but Vandergriff outpolled Pikulinski, 2,770 to 1,709. Heede said afterward, “I just feel like the election has been purchased by Mr. Meeker. I just love Tarrant County College, and I just wish I could have been on the board.” [163]

Meanwhile, Swope was bringing the two sides together on price, and the inspection crew of Nixon and TCC technical and educational folks were concluding that the RadioShack deal was looking like a winner. It was a good thing because, as Canedy had said, the College no sooner seemed to jump one hurdle than another was put in its path. Back in November, the Corps issued a report saying the project might have “adverse effects” on four historical areas – the levee, the Courthouse, the Main Street Viaduct and the bluff. Working with historical and environmental groups, TCC managed to address the concerns, and the Corps in February released a favorable draft environmental assessment.

At last, on March 28, the College delivered the final permit application to the Corps’ regional office in Dallas, which would review it and, if no problems were found, forward it to Washington, D.C., for additional review and final approval. How long that would take was anyone’s guess.

But only about a month later, the Trinity River Vision Authority and the Fort Worth Streams and Valleys Committee raised an objection to the retaining wall. They had no problem with TCC building the wall if the Corps required it, but they wanted assurances that the wall would be demolished when the levees were decommissioned on completion of the Trinity River bypass. Until the matter was settled, the College could not get approval from Fort Worth’s Downtown Design Review Board to build the wall.

In June, all this – the wall, the levees, the bridge, Corps approval – would become moot. A deal had been struck on the RadioShack purchase, and the announcement was set for Wednesday, June 25. The College had wanted to proclaim that the deal would result in a cost savings, but it turned out that the $238 million purchase price plus the $80 million anticipated for renovations came to more than the total for the original design. So instead of cost savings, the announcement would cite “cost certainty.”

The Board of Trustees met at 8 p.m., went into a closed meeting and emerged an hour later to unanimously approve a motion to purchase the RadioShack property. later that day the news release went out and Wells, de la Garza and Appleman, now board president, met with the media to go over specifics.

The deal included all buildings, all furnishings – including RadioShack’s part of the art collection – and mineral rights. Classes would begin in fall 2009 in two buildings – East Fork and Trinity. TCC would also occupy RadioShack’s “Store 1,” converting it to an “Idea Store,” and would convert an area next to the parking garage as a Science Wing. RadioShack would occupy Clear Fork and West Fork for a five-year period, and the two entities would share the parking garage. A few weeks later, the board formally gave the new site a name – Trinity River Campus.

In terms of square footage, TCC came out ahead. The original plan as eventually built out would have been about 750,000 square feet. The RadioShack complex, when fully occupied, would be about a million square feet.

Reaction from the downtown community was positive. “I almost fainted,” said Jim Lane, a member of the Tarrant Regional Water District board. “What a brilliant idea for a college campus. It’s a phenomenal deal.” [164]

Tarrant County Administrator G.K. Maenius called it a “good decision” and added, “It ensures there will be a viable downtown campus for Tarrant County College in a great location.” [165]

Not everyone was pleased. Connor wrote in the Business Press, “The waste and the overkill on this TCC campus project symbolizes a school that has lost its way and strayed from its mission.” [166]

And Betty Brink in Fort Worth Weekly wrote, “It appears to be a sweetheart deal for everyone – except the taxpayers ... who are looking at a whopping $528 million outlay [including the cost of completing construction on the south side of the river] for a junior college campus.” [167]

Within TCC, there was a feeling of relief but also one of regret. De la Garza wrote, “The way is finally clear – not only in terms of what the College District will do, but also what it will cost. ... And finally, I confess to some degree of sadness over what might have been. ... On the day of the announcement, I was asked how I felt about letting go of the original plan. My answer was that it ‘hurt my heart a little.’ It still does.” [168]

Wells had much the same reaction. “Yes, it was a good option,” he said. “My preference would have been to finish the facility that we started. I think that we would have had as dynamic, as attractive a campus, if we had finished that, as you would see anywhere. But I have to admit that I think we had a good deal that kind of fell in our lap – the RadioShack thing – and it was a smart move.”

The downtown campus story was by no means over. Trustees would have to wrestle with the question of what to do with the partially constructed south complex on the bluff and endure another barrage of public criticism over the cost. But before that could be addressed, an entirely different controversy cropped up.

Tension had been increasing between board members and Chancellor de la Garza for more than two years. Some stemmed from trustee frustration over the constantly escalating cost of the downtown campus. “I remember that between when we began and when we got to that meeting on South Campus that the numbers weren’t forthcoming and weren’t accurate,” McGee said. “I began to believe that the chancellor wasn’t being straight with me.”

McGee cited an instance when the Coordinating Board furnished a wide variety of statistics on community colleges and invited colleges to choose ones they thought most appropriate in compiling a set of measurable objectives. “There was large resistance to this idea,” he said. “I remember at a closed session where the chancellor just basically turned to me and said, ‘This isn’t going to happen’ after we’d been working on this whole process for two years.”

But there were other contributing factors. Morrison said some trustees “felt overly managed.” She resented what she called an “iron curtain” that she sensed had been dropped between trustees and the chancellor’s staff. She had always felt free to call staff members with questions, but de la Garza made it known that he preferred contact with board members be routed through him.

The major conflict, however, had arisen after the board asked de la Garza for copies of the annual evaluations of all members of the Chancellor’s Executive Leadership Team, or CELT, as the Cabinet had now been redesignated. Trustees wanted the evaluations to get an idea, well in advance of any retirement by the chancellor, which present executives might be considered as a replacement.

When de la Garza failed to comply in a timely manner, the board, starting in 2006, held up any formal evaluation or salary increase. It also did not, as had been customary, extend his three-year contract. According to McGee, the chancellor, after putting the board off for more than two years, told the trustees sometime during spring 2008, a few months before his contract was to expire, that he had finished the evaluations but that he would not give them to the board. De la Garza told trustees, according to McGee, that if they wanted the evaluations, they would have to request them under the Texas Open Records Act. “It was astounding, simply astounding,” McGee said. “It was also insubordination.”  [169]

In executive session on June 19, a week before the RadioShack deal was announced, the board had what McGee called “a very vigorous and long debate,” after which it voted unanimously to give the chancellor a one-year contract with a salary increase to $325,000 on the condition he provided the requested documents. [170]

Over the next week, de la Garza seemed upset and insulted by the board’s action. He told staff members repeatedly he would resign rather than accept a one-year contract.

So it was that on June 25, the RadioShack purchase wasn’t the only vote taken by the board. The executive session agenda item said the board would discuss “personnel matters” and “consultation with attorney on pending or contemplated litigation” as well as “real property,” all three permissible under the Texas Government Code. But after the RadioShack resolution had been adopted at 9:05 a.m., Appleman, rather than adjourning the open meeting, recessed it and at reconvened at 10:39 a.m. She then restarted the executive session.

By this time, McGee and Hudson left the meeting. McGee later said he did not realize the executive session would be continued. Hudson said he did know that another session would be held but added, “We had already decided what the contract would be, and we had described what was expected of the chancellor. I just thought it would be a wrap-up of that.” [171]

When the open meeting reconvened shortly after 11 a.m., the five remaining trustees voted, 4-1, Winnett voting no, to amend their action of the previous week, changing the length of de la Garza’s contract to three years.

Hudson cried foul, saying he didn’t know trustees “were going to reconsider the chancellor’s contract.” [172] And McGee said, “If I had known the chancellor’s one-year contract was going to be changed into a three-year one, I would have stayed and voted no, and so would Hudson. We would have only needed one more vote to defeat this, and I think I could have gotten one.” [173]

For her part, Appleman said she told the entire board that, after a recess, the executive session would continue “to revisit the issue of the chancellor’s contract.” [174] Furthermore, the posted agenda carried the sentence, “The personnel discussion may address aspects of the routine annual evaluation of the chancellor.” As to why the sudden change, Appleman said years later that the board feared a lawsuit and that she felt the College “needed him to finish that campus and get us in there.”

The personnel crisis was, for the time being, averted, but the College faced a new challenge. It now had a ready-made facility for the new campus, but what was it to do with the partially made old one?

Chapter 16: Fallout

Indeed, the question of what to do with the partially constructed campus on the bluff tempered somewhat the euphoria of the RadioShack purchase. On September 2, the board met to discuss options, which were essentially two – “shell,” or put a protective enclosure around, the complex and put it up for sale or complete it for College use. Whatever their decision, trustees were told, it needed to be made quickly. Otherwise, construction workers would be moved to other jobs.

Another meeting on September 24, however, produced no decision, except that the unfinished buildings should be protected. Instead, faced with several options for finishing the project, trustees decided to halt construction and bring in a consultant to evaluate real estate holdings and to provide hard figures for the project completion.

The consultant, Robert Kembel, president of Dallas-based Huffhines Communities, collected opinions from developers, real estate brokers and engineers, then reported to the board in October that selling TCC’s land north of the river and attempting to finish and sell the buildings to the south would be a “huge mistake” given that the nation was then slipping into a deep recession. [175]

It would be February before Kembel presented the board with three options and the cost for each. The first two, long-term shells, would cost an additional $43 or $46 million depending on whether the interior was climate-controlled. The third was to complete the buildings as planned, including the plaza, for an additional $103 million, after which it could either be used by TCC or sold. Kembel said, however, that selling would be a poor choice. The complex had been designed as a teaching facility, he said, and extensive remodeling would be necessary to convert it to an office building. After extensive debate, the board voted 4-3 to complete the complex, with Hudson, Winnett and McGee voting no.

That vote, however, did not settle the question of whether the facility would become part of the College. Trinity River President Fulkerson was asked to recommend how the complex could best fit into the campus educational program. She reported on May 15 that the building would be best suited as home to the College’s health professions programs, which had always been scheduled to move downtown from the South and Northeast Campuses. Locating them on the bluff site would provide them with 70,000 square feet as opposed to the proposed 44,000 at Trinity River and the 32,000 they currently occupied. This, Fulkerson said, would give the programs more room for growth. As to cost, Kembel said designing the site for the medical field programs could be done within the figure he gave the board in February.

After the presentation, Morrison moved that the project be completed and that health professions programs, as described, be housed there. McGee wasn’t convinced, saying the College was finding a need for the buildings rather than responding to an existing need. He addressed what he called a “credibility problem” and said there was “a perception ... by many that the College District has not been as transparent in its activities as it might have been.” [176] Winnett and Hudson also voiced concerns, and all three voted against Morrison’s motion, which was approved 4-3. In October, the complex was designated as Trinity River East Campus.

TCC’s downtown campus drama was now mostly played out. It had been, as the Star-Telegram’s Schnurman called it, “a financial black hole and a PR nightmare.” When all the costs to date – land, engineering, architects, legal fees – were added up, the 130,000-square-foot project had cost $203 million, more than $1,500 a square foot. But Schnurman proved to be prophetic when he urged the community to take a long view. “Years from now,” he wrote, “what will matter most? That they finished it the right way.” [177]

But the seven-year grind had taken its toll, especially on the trustees’ relations with one another and with the chancellor. De la Garza, in fact, had more than enough. Earlier in the year, he had informed Appleman, through his attorney, Neal Adams, that he wanted to negotiate an end to his contract. Those negotiations neared completion in June, and rumors began to circulate that the chancellor and College would part ways. The board deliberated for more than two hours in executive session on June 18, after which Appleman called for a special meeting on June 22.

The meeting began at 6 p.m. with Appleman inviting members of the public to speak, a departure from the norm since TCC did not at that time have a standing agenda item for public comment. Three people spoke in favor of de la Garza and one – Larry Meeker – against, after which, at 6:24, the executive session convened and the negotiations began.

They went on until after midnight – de la Garza in his office and the trustees in their conference room. As attorneys for the two sides shuttled back and forth, everyone else – faculty, staff, reporters and other spectators – drank coffee, milled about, read, checked their email, drank more coffee and speculated.

Finally, at 12:04 a.m., trustees and chancellor resumed their seats at the board table. Trustee Randall Canedy then read a resolution that the College was willing, subject to a formal written agreement, to amend de la Garza’s contract so that it would terminate on June 30, one week away. He would be paid the remainder of his three-year contract plus any other monies due him – a total of $700,000. The vote was 7-0 in favor.

“This decision was probably timely and important in an effort to bring conciliation to the board,” Appleman said after the meeting, and de la Garza said, “If there was a time to leave on a high note, this is it.” [178]

De la Garza remained proud of his 12-year record, including the downtown campus saga. “We all make mistakes,” he told the Star-Telegram. “It comes with being human. But in terms of this campus being downtown, and having the visions, if I had it to do over again, I’d do it the same way.” And columnist Bob Ray Sanders wrote, “Despite the critics, he leaves a legacy of accomplishments that cannot be denied.” [179]

When the board met again on June 29, it was in an atmosphere far more relaxed from that of the previous week. “It feels ... different,” McGee said. “Like a cloud has lifted.” [180] Nevertheless trustees had another major decision to make – who would be interim chancellor?

Appleman asked each CELT member to send her their résumés as well as list their first and second choices for interim chancellor. After an executive session lasting almost two and a half hours, they voted to give the post to Erma Johnson Hadley.

Hadley, never lacking in confidence and not one to be shy about her own abilities, had put forward her own name as best suited for the job but thought it was a long shot. “I knew that the majority of the CELT members were not going to say Erma Johnson Hadley,” she said. “I knew that, going in there, I was going to have three [CELT] votes. So I was shocked. I was very shocked. As a matter of fact, I think I sat there for a moment and didn’t say a word.”

It wasn’t unanimous. McGee voted no but hastened to explain that it had nothing to do with Hadley, for whom he had the greatest respect, but out of his belief that the board should have considered outside candidates. The next morning there sat on Hadley’s desk – in the chancellor’s office – a huge arrangement of yellow roses bearing a note from McGee.

This upheaval closed – almost – a chapter in TCC’s history that, while often painful, was also filled with accomplishments. The decade had seen enrollment leap 71 percent to more than 44,000. A beautiful new campus was about to open. Construction was ramping up a few blocks away on its sibling, and while the cost had been exorbitant, the College still was as fiscally healthy as any in the state.

But there was now a new leader, one determined to prove herself to the board and have the “interim” tag removed. If people both inside and outside TCC thought there needed to be some changes made, they were about to get their wish. And it wouldn’t take very long.

Chapter 17: Full Speed Ahead

Erma Johnson Hadley’s first message to the faculty and staff as interim chancellor sought to reassure them that, despite the recent tumult, their College was strong – financially, academically and, most important, in the dedication and commitment to service of the men and women of TCC. Much work lay ahead, she said, and then she outlined what part of that work would be.

In making the appointment, the board gave Hadley five goals:

- to work closely with internal and external communities,

- to complete the District’s strategic plan,

- to complete preparation of the annual budget,

- to successfully complete the SACS report for the new campus, and

- to complete, as feasible, scheduled construction projects.

She would accomplish this, she wrote, with the assistance of her executive leadership team – the CELT – but that group was in for some rapid changes. The first spot she filled was her own, naming Bill Lace interim vice chancellor for administration. Then, just a few weeks after her appointment, she had two more vacancies as chief academic officer Robert Aguero and Rudy Gonzales, his financial counterpart, submitted resignations.

Hadley swiftly appointed David Wells to fill the academic role, and his former title, vice chancellor for operations and planning, was changed to vice chancellor for real estate and facilities. That post would be filled in January 2010 by Nina Petty, who was intimately familiar with the RadioShack complex having helped oversee its construction when an employee there from 2000 to 2006 and then consulting with the firm that renovated it for TCC.

The chief financial officer position took a bit longer, but in the meantime was in the capable hands of Associate Vice Chancellor Nancy Chang. As with Petty, Hadley went outside academe, appointing Mark McClendon, formerly of NRG Energy, as vice chancellor for finance. Finally, when Lace was able to take the “interim” from his title, his former role of executive assistant to the chancellor went to Reginald Gates, who bore the new title of vice chancellor for communications and external affairs. It was a homecoming of sorts for Gates, who had been an officer for the Fort Worth Metropolitan Black Chamber of Commerce before moving to Dallas to head up the Black Chamber there.

Hadley couldn’t wait – as if she’d want to – for her team to be complete before tackling the five goals. Indeed, she had already started on the first – working with internal communities – in her Projection magazine message. In reality, however, the angst within TCC over the top-level friction didn’t go much beyond the May Owen Center staff and the CELT.

Whatever the faculty and staff might have felt about the changes, they had to be happy with the 2009-10 budget proposal that contained an across-the-board five percent salary increase. The salary proposal, coming as it did at the bottom of the Great Recession, drew sharp objection from the Fort Worth Star-Telegram, which called it excessive and intimated that Hadley was trying to curry favor with College employees to further her chances of becoming permanent chancellor. The notion that Hadley could buy the support of the faculty and staff was considered something of a cheap shot within the College, especially since the proposal was in line with the salary increases of three and five percent, respectively, of the two previous years.

Hadley did, however, take steps to forge a new relationship between administration and faculty, not as a ploy for her advancement, but because she knew moving the academic program forward after many years of relative inertia would require an unprecedented partnership.

Hadley had come a long way, but she knew that the road ahead – one leading the College in new directions in the name of student success – would be long and dotted with potholes. TCC’s operation would need to fundamentally change. And change, especially in academe, begets resistance.

She was well aware of where that resistance lurked. Interviewed shortly after being named chancellor, she said, “I know that our faculty want the best for our students, so I will count on them and work very closely with them to determine how we best meet these students’ needs. It will take all of our working together to focus on student success.”[181] And the key to working with the faculty was building a new relationship with the Joint Consultation Committee, or JCC.

Under Chancellors Rushing and Roberson, the JCC had never met regularly with top administrators. De la Garza did institute monthly meetings during the fall and spring semesters but on a limited basis. The chancellor and CELT would meet privately in the early afternoon, and then the JCC members would be called in for their part of the meeting. Normal procedure was for the chancellor and CELT to be on one side of the rectangle and the JCC on the other. That changed dramatically under Hadley, as JCC President John Crawford found out at the first fall 2009 meeting.

“Erma scared the ever-loving dickens out of me,” the now-retired South Campus accounting professor said. “We come back in the fall, and it’s ‘No, you don’t sit at the back. Take your places at the table.’ Then I look up, the chancellor walks in and there’s an empty chair beside her. She hollers at me and says, ‘John, you come up here. This is your seat now.’”

Crawford and his colleagues soon discovered that the new arrangement was much more than window dressing. “When she [Hadley] had questions about whatever we were discussing, she’d lean over and ask me,” he said. “All of a sudden we were involved in the budget process, involved in a lot of the decision-making.

“We went before the board and made presentations, which to my knowledge had never occurred. It became a more interactive, congenial atmosphere and a way to communicate with upper administration.”

The extent of their involvement was something the JCC members had not planned on. “It went from being maybe an hour or two a month when I was president-elect to 30 or 40 hours a month when Erma was chancellor,” Crawford said. Many of those hours came in the summer when the CELT and JCC held marathon sessions on the upcoming budget.

Crawford’s successor as JCC president, Kristina Miranda, also from South Campus, said the new arrangement provided learning experiences for both sides. “The amount of work was surprising,” she said, “but it was a very enlightening process because you saw how the whole beast works and to be involved in those discussions was nice.

“I think our voice definitely matters. There are a lot of times in that room when they [the administrators] are not aware of what’s happening in the classroom with the boots on the ground, as they say. They don’t see what’s in the anthill. They’re doing the planning, but they don’t see the butterfly effect of what it’s doing in the classroom.”

This new togetherness, however, didn’t always mean that the administration and faculty were hand in glove on every issue. “I think there’s still a big divide, and there probably is always going to be,” Miranda said. “I think teachers as a whole, wherever I’ve taught, we’re good complainers.”

Working with external publics, though, was trickier, and there was much work to do. The College’s credibility, operationally at least, had taken a tremendous hit over the past few years. The general public had been subjected to a steady water-torture dripping of bad fiscal news through the media, and community power brokers, heretofore steadfast in their support of TCC, were now having doubts.

“I spent hours and hours in the community, visiting with people – especially those who had been so critical of what we were doing with the downtown campus,” Hadley said years later. Fortunately, the situation had been mitigated during the controversy by Hadley’s relationship with community leaders who quietly sought her out.

One such inquiry had come from then-Fort Worth Mayor Mike Moncrief. “I said, ‘Oh, Mike, things can just get out of kilter sometimes. We’ll be fine,’” she recalled. “That was the kind of conversation I’d have with people sometimes.”

Part of Hadley’s approach to external publics was persuading the board to be more open and transparent in its deliberations and decisions. Within two months of her appointment, College policy was revised to include archiving of meeting minutes on its website and live-streaming video of all board meetings with viewers able to see supporting materials for all agenda items. The changes stemmed from a suggestion by Trustee Joe Hudson, who said after their passage, “You have done well beyond anything I have hoped for.” [182]

All overtures toward the public, however, wouldn’t have been worth much unless she accomplished the board’s fifth goal, putting the house in order insofar as construction was concerned. The first step was putting to rest some insinuations that Austin Commercial, construction firm for the downtown campus project, had unduly benefited from Change Order No. 3, authorized in 2007. At the board meeting of September 17, 2009, Al Linley of Huffines Advisory Services explained that the additional funds paid to the firm resulted from delays in the project and that the $3.5 million going to Austin was based on the company’s monthly overhead during a contract extension from July 2008 to September 2009.

Linley and Hadley assured the board that no undue monies had been paid to Austin Commercial, but Hadley noted that, while the board had authorized the chancellor [then de la Garza] to negotiate and sign the change order, trustees had never actually seen it. She promised that future change orders would be brought to the board president and vice president at a minimum, even in extraordinary circumstances. In addition, the trustees said they wanted in the future a thorough legal review of all major contracts and modifications.

The explanation satisfied the board but did not completely stop outside grumbling. Several months later, the Fort Worth Star-Telegram issued an open records request for documents dealing with payments made during the course of the project, including those in Change Order No. 3. But, after an investigative reporter spent weeks going over the materials, which filled most of a trailer on the construction site, nothing was found that generated a newspaper article.

The controversy that had taken such financial and emotional tolls over the previous three years came to a quiet end early in 2010 when Linley presented the board with two proposals from Austin Commercial. The first was a new guaranteed maximum price of $133.2 million to complete the project, but with the design still subject to modification. The second was a lump sum of $129.9 million for completion of the project as presently designed with no changes. The board, not surprisingly considering all that had gone before, opted for the lump sum. The total project cost was now locked in, and there was even better news. It was $6 million less than the figure approved the previous May.

There was no celebration, but there had been plenty of that down the street from the construction site the previous fall when the Trinity River Campus finally opened. It had been a long wait for Tahita Fulkerson, who had been named president-elect in August 2006. Like de la Garza and David Wells, she had felt relief at the purchase of the RadioShack complex but also sadness and a bit of frustration that the original plan was not to be. “It was hard because we had worked so hard to develop the scheme for the other location,” she said. “I had worked with all of the programs that were going to be transferred. We had exchanged ideas. We were working as hard as we could, and then Katrina blew out the levees, that plan had to be scrapped and we started all over.”

But there was precious little time to fret over what might have been. She had just 14 months from the purchase announcement to help guide the renovation, hire a staff, build a schedule and all the myriad chores involved with opening a campus. But it wasn’t as if she hadn’t done it before, helping Judith Carrier open the Southeast Campus 13 years earlier. And as a matter of fact, she said, it was easier this time around.

“Even though I was working hard, I was more relaxed,” she said. “There was something about the atmosphere because we had lived [officed] here for almost a year before it opened. So when it opened, we were ready. Maybe I was relaxed because of what happened at Southeast, but it was not as nerve-wracking to me as opening Southeast was.”

At the start of 2010, the new campus had a staff of six. Following her from Southeast were Executive Secretary Sharon Maxwell and Dr. Bryan Stewart, who was to be vice president for academic affairs. Dr. Robert Muñoz would head continuing education, Adrian Rodriguez would be VP for student development services and Angel Garcia was coordinator of community outreach and service learning.

Together, they charted what the campus would be – not only the practical nuts and bolts of staffing, scheduling and room assignments, but also the abstract. As renovations progressed, Fulkerson saw the need for a campus philosophy. Fortunately, there was one at hand that could be tweaked to fit the occasion.

Stewart and Rodriguez had, while attending a conference in Orlando, Fla., paid a visit to Disney World and were so impressed with the excellence of the operation that they bought a book on the Disney philosophy. Drawing from Disney’s fundamental precepts, they, along with Fulkerson and the rest of the administrative team, came up with seven campus hallmarks:

- An unshakeable focus on student learning,

- Service and community engagement,

- Strong, open communication,

- Professional and personal growth,

- Multicultural competence and language acquisition,

- Interdisciplinary collaboration and

- Wellness.

Many of these would need to wait until the campus opened, but some aspects could be put into place beforehand, such as interdisciplinary collaboration. Fulkerson had made a decision, somewhat dictated by remodeling costs and floor space, that faculty would work in cubicles instead of having private offices. Such an arrangement, however, also encouraged interaction and collaboration.

“The faculty loved the cubicles,” she said. “Also, we did not put them into departments. We put them in interdisciplinary groups. So, there’s an esprit de corps, I suppose, for the reading teacher and the art teacher and the geology teacher and the Spanish teacher. They’re all up there on the same floor, and they’re all buddies and have floor competitions, not departmental competitions.”

Even as Fulkerson and her team were busy building the faculty and staff, Jacobs Engineering and Beck Construction were making the renovations needed for them and their students. The basic footprints of Trinity and East Fork, the two primary buildings the College would occupy at the outset, were such that several of the basic facilities normally found in a comprehensive college campus would not, at the outset at least, be present. There was a world-class fitness center and a small studio that could be used for dance or yoga, but there was no gymnasium or swimming pool, thus limiting physical education classes. There was a large lecture hall with tiered seating but no theater as such. Art and music offerings were likewise curtailed by a lack of studio space.

At first, the marriage of college and corporation seemed made elsewhere than in heaven. “RadioShack basically did not want us here,” Fulkerson said. “Their people were surly because they felt betrayed. They weren’t angry at us; they were angry at the world.”

But the enthusiasm of the staff and wide-eyed wonder displayed by the students in a handful of summer classes seemed to rub off on the corporate side of the house. “The RadioShack people started warming up,” Fulkerson said. “They saw that we were not sinister, that we weren’t going to destroy their building.”

Conversely, in sort of a pleasant unintended consequence, the rubbing off went both ways. Fulkerson reports having heard from students impressed by sharing the parking garage and hallways with people in suits carrying briefcases. One student remarked that most of the students seemed to dress a bit more maturely than at other campuses. “The place has inspired some professionalism or at least some seriousness in the students,” Fulkerson said.

Indeed, the esprit de corps Fulkerson hoped for was highly in evidence during a small handful of classes in summer 2009 and the run-up to the fall semester. But fall would not bring an avalanche of students, as with Southeast Campus. “For that first fall,” Fulkerson said, “we weren’t able to market enough. We were not able to get into the public schools.”

She and her staff pulled out what stops they could, however. There were several successful and highly publicized “Rock Enroll” events, billboards went up throughout the county largely aimed at the Hispanic community and several faculty rushed through training for distance learning so that those classes could be added to the schedule. Their efforts paid off when doors opened in the fall to about 3,900 students, and the total would grow to more than 9,000 by 2014.

It had been a long and sometimes very difficult gestation period, but the new baby arrived healthy. And it was with a mixture of relief and enormous pride that the administration and faculty gathered in full academic regalia on October 23, 2009, for the formal dedication that made Trinity River Campus the newest star in TCC’s firmament.

The campus opening was just as much a triumph for Hadley as for Fulkerson and her staff. The interim chancellor had checked off at least part of one of the goals assigned to her. Almost without a pause, she took aim at another one.

“About a month later [after the opening] I thought, ‘I can do this job,’” Hadley said. “And one of the things they had on the list for me to do was to complete the strategic plan that Dr. de la Garza had started.”

She found not much had been done besides an outline of the largely staff-driven process to be followed. So she dumped the outline, hired a consultant, kick-started the new process and put it into overdrive.

The consultant was Jim Cross, head of the Fort Worth-based Cross Group. He initially presented Hadley a timetable calling for the strategic plan to be developed, created and finally approved by the Board of Trustees sometime during fall 2010. He quickly found out what many at TCC knew all too well: You have your timetable, and Erma has hers. If the two don’t match, then yours is about to get much shorter. “I gave them only three months to do this,” Hadley said. “They really delivered.” [183]

Why the hurry? It went beyond Hadley’s admitted penchant for wanting things done at warp speed. “The reason I put so much pressure on them,” she said, “was because by this time I was feeling that I might could make this thing [the chancellorship] work, so I wanted the strategic plan done in short order. I wanted the board to see that I could really deliver.”

Over the next few months, more than 1,100 individuals – faculty, staff, students, elected officials, community leaders – were asked what they would like to see TCC look like in five years. The answers – more than 15,000 comments gathered online and from 34 focus group sessions – were filtered through an internal team and distilled into a framework around which they coalesced into three broad goals:

- To support student learning and success through excellence in teaching and learning, support services, flexible instructional delivery systems, student engagement, learning outcomes assessment and dynamic curricula.

- To ensure affordability, accessibility and diversity reflective of the community.

- To promote institutional effectiveness through continuous improvement, collaboration with and service to the community, employee engagement, professional development and optimal environment conducive to quality teaching and learning.

The goals formed the foundation for 29 specific strategies – everything from developing an academic master plan to lowering textbook costs to implementing a comprehensive marketing plan. But, while the strategies seemed to point in many directions, they all had the same target. “The mantra for our entire strategic planning initiative is student access and success,” said David Wells. [184]

Still, it was a large plateful, and to make it bite-sized, each strategy was assigned “owners” responsible for guiding it to completion. Furthermore, Hadley insisted that there be not just periodic progress reports but a system whereby instant snapshots were available.

Accordingly, Mike Eke, director of process improvement and projects, devised a dashboard showing red, yellow or green for the objective status, schedule status and overall status for each strategy. Green meant the strategy was meeting or exceeding objectives, yellow meant the strategy was 10 percent or less below objectives and red signified the strategy was greater than 10 percent below expectations. As of May 2015, 12 of the strategies were green across the board, two were a mixture of green and yellow, five a mixture of green and red, and only one – the perennial problem of developmental education – showed all red.

The strategic plan’s completion and its approval by the Board of Trustees on April 15, 2010, enabled Hadley to pretty much check off everything on the board’s to-do list. The budget had been approved; Trinity River Campus was open and its SACS report completed; construction projects, while not completed, were underway and under control; and Hadley’s outreach efforts were mending fences.

She had been out to convince the trustees she was capable of heading the College, and the board took note. They had been moving slowly through the selection process, issuing in September 2009 a Request for Proposals to engage a search firm and then conducting workshops in November and December to determine qualifications for a new chancellor and finalize a job description.

In December, the board had reviewed proposals submitted by search firms and agreed to invite the four highest-ranked companies to come in for interviews. But in January, the process took a far different course. The trustees decided to post the job description, receive and review applications themselves and narrow the list of candidates before deciding whether an outside search firm was needed.

No, they decided, there was no need. At the February meeting, a motion to name Hadley the sole finalist passed unanimously. Since Texas law requires at least 21 days pass between the naming of finalists and the final selection, it would not be until the March 11 meeting that the board could make it official, and Erma Chansler Johnson Hadley, the self-proclaimed “little girl from Leggett,” took her seat as the fourth chancellor of the Tarrant County College District.

Chapter 18: Looking Out, Looking In

The early years of the decade brought not only a new chancellor but also a new spirit of innovation and experimentation. The College brushed the cobwebs from its academic program and, for the first time in many years, turned a critical eye both outward toward whom it could serve and inward toward how better to serve them. TCC was going places and going there in a hurry.

There remained, however, a few blemishes from the downtown campus adventure. While morale within the faculty and staff was high and standing in the community was rising, the strife within the Board of Trustees had left wounds unhealed. Bobby McGee declined to run for re-election in 2010, saying, “I was worried that because I had been so rigid about some things that it might be more difficult for the College to move on with me around.” Randall Canedy also decided against another campaign, thus TCC, for the first time since 1965, had two open seats.

There was no lack of candidates. In District 4, McGee’s spot, attorney William Greenhill, who had been recruited to run by Trustee Louise Appleman, faced businessman Dick Varnell. Five hopefuls crowded into the District 5 race – TCC Foundation board member Pat Admire, energy consultant Joe McHaney, John Jenkins of the Dallas Parks and Recreation Department, former Star-Telegram columnist and sometime TCC critic O.K. Carter and real estate broker Gerry Ghearing.

Greenhill, son of former Texas Supreme Court Chief Justice Joe Greenhill, won easily, capturing 61 percent of the vote. No candidate in District 5 won a majority, so Carter with 37 percent and Jenkins with 32 percent met in a runoff, Carter winning with 52 percent to Jenkins’ 48.

The election of board officers at the June 23 meeting was unprecedented in College history. Appleman’s leadership had been questioned during the previous year by McGee, Joe Hudson and Robyn Winnett. Winnett went as far as to call for her resignation during the 2009 meeting that signaled Chancellor de la Garza’s departure. A year later, though wishing to remain president, Appleman found herself short of a majority. The key vote, ironically, was that of Greenhill, her protégé, who seconded Winnett’s motion that Hudson, who had served on the board only two years, be elected. “It was a hard vote for me,” Greenhill said, “but it was the right vote. ... It is time for new leadership and a shift in philosophy for the board.” [185]

Hudson had not been looking to become board president and favored a system of annual elections that might result in the presidency going to various trustees from time to time. State law, however, mandated that officer elections be held only in years following trustee elections. In April 2011, Hudson resigned the presidency so that someone else could have a turn.

Board Vice President Kristin Vandergriff took over as interim president at the June board meeting and expressed a desire to serve as president until 2012, when a new trustee election would trigger a new officer election. Greenhill, however, said he also was interested in becoming president and, at the August meeting, was elected over Vandergriff by a 4-3 vote. It was the first contested election for board president – or for any other board office – in College history. After having only three board presidents in its first 46 years, TCC had now had three in 40 months.

Such internecine struggles at the top had little impact on the troops working on the campuses. The Vision 2015 Strategic Plan was being implemented. Enrollment was booming and, in the fall of 2011, would top 50,000 credit students for the first time. And one campus, Northwest, was about to send TCC’s education mission in a new direction – early college high school.

Texas’ early college high school program had been authorized by the Legislature in 2003 as an outgrowth of the dual credit program that had gained great popularity in the 1990s. Under dual credit, students could take classes at their high schools taught by college faculty. These courses counted toward high school graduation and also earned the students college credit.

The early college high school concept was that a public school district would partner with a college or university in establishing a school, either on the college campus or as a school within a school at the ISD, that would enroll students who otherwise might not graduate from high school. The typical model called for a small group, usually no more than 100, to enroll in ninth grade. They started with high school courses taught by public school teachers and gradually moved into college classes alongside the regular college students. At the end of four years, they would, if successful, graduate with both a high school diploma from the ISD and an associate degree from the college.

There had been talk around 2005 about an early college high school partnership between TCC and Fort Worth ISD with the school to be located on the downtown campus. Discussions failed to produce an agreement, and the notion languished until revived by a telephone call.

Amy Moore had been a dual credit student at Northeast Campus while at Keller High School and also took classes at Northwest the summer before starting at Texas A&M. Later, while teaching advanced placement government in the Birdville ISD, she was intrigued when she saw an opening at Northwest for an academic support coordinator, part of whose duties would be dual credit. She applied and was hired in 2008.

“The very first call I took in my coordinator position was from a Lake Worth High School counselor calling about starting an early college high school,” Moore said. “When I talked to [campus President] Dr. [Elva] LeBlanc about it, we weren’t in a position to do that, but when we were in that position, we sought out that relationship with Lake Worth because they had sought us out in the first place.”

Actually, Northwest wasn’t so much in a position as it was put in a position. The Texas Education Association had been holding meetings throughout the state – informational sessions for public school districts on early college high schools – and one had been at Northwest. TEA officials had heard about the campus’ efforts to forge dual credit partnerships with the ISDs and suggested that, if there was to be an early college high school, Lake Worth might be a good partner.

At the same time, Chancellor Hadley had learned more about early college high schools and was itching to start them at TCC. At a CELT meeting, LeBlanc said, “She asked who would be interested in starting an early college high school, and then she looked at me and said, ‘Elva, how about you?’”

LeBlanc returned to campus and huddled with Joe Rode and Gary Goodwin, vice presidents of student development services and continuing education services, respectively. The vice president of academic affairs position was open at the time, but Delbert Derrett, a retired divisional dean from Northeast, soon came in as interim and joined the discussion.

Make that discussions – plural – because there were plenty of questions. How and how soon could approval be obtained from the Lake Worth school board, TCC’s board and the TEA? What would be the school’s structure? Where would the funding come from?

But although questions were plentiful, time was not. LeBlanc announced at the February 2010 board meeting that Goodwin would take the project’s lead and the school would open in the fall. Goodwin had taught in junior high and high schools in Iowa, and his continuing education budget had more flexibility than did the academic side of the house. Additionally, LeBlanc said, “He’s very creative, and I think he was interested in doing something different.”

Goodwin became a road warrior over the next few months, attending Lake Worth and TCC board meetings and making frequent trips to TEA’s offices in Austin. “We had to move ninety to nothing in terms of filling out applications, connecting with the public schools, getting support from them,” LeBlanc said. Trustee Greenhill, whose district at that time included Northwest, was very helpful, she said, as were a couple of the Lake Worth board members.

There was another big question – where, physically, would the school be? That entailed hurry-up meetings with TCC’s facilities crew to install two modular buildings and with information technology to get them wired up with computers.

There was also much to be done in the Lake Worth schools, and it needed to be done before school was out for the summer. Lake Worth administrators took on the job of identifying who the first class of students would be. Prycilla Luna, then an eighth-grader at Lucylee Collins Miller School, remembers being called to the office one day. “They told me about it [the early college high school], and I had to decide whether I wanted to apply or not,” she said. “In the beginning, I was a little skeptical because I wouldn’t be going to a regular high school and the transition was going to be into a different environment. But in the end, I was willing to give up anything to get ahead.”

Luna’s decision was made easier because practically all the students going to Northwest Campus would be kids she had grown up with and gone to school with since kindergarten. Also, she said, “I guess it was the kind of person I am. I’m not really into the whole social stuff.”

LeBlanc and Moore, who had been appointed principal of the newly named Marine Creek Collegiate High School, met frequently with their students-to-be and with their parents, explaining how things would work. The parents were supportive, but some of the faculty at Lake Worth High School – people like coaches and directors of the band and choir – were less so. “They were not happy about it because it meant a significant cohort would be moving to Northwest Campus and they wouldn’t have access to them during the day,” LeBlanc said. “We had to be ready to respond to that.”

Moore’s biggest problem was staffing. “We started with part-time staff we shared with Lake Worth,” she said. “So the teachers were only there for two class periods a day. This wasn’t really their home campus. They had two different administrators. They had two different sets of policies. That was unique for all of us.

“The students’ concerns, I would say, was their high school experience. They were young; we were very new. Their classes took place in those two modular buildings, and their lunchroom was in a modular building, as well. So I always like to say they had kind of a cabin fever. They didn’t have that passing-period experience you have in high school. Their concerns were more like, ‘I’m not necessarily feeling like a high school student. I feel these increased expectations that are being put on me, and I’m missing out on that so-called high school experience.’”

The academic expectations, indeed, took some getting used to. “I remember taking my first college course,” Luna said, “and I made a C. I cried. Everything, academically wise, was very different. In middle school, I was taking pre-AP classes, but they weren’t up to par with how TCC’s classes were.”

For Luna, as for many if not most college students, it wasn’t just how to manage the course content but how to manage time. “I didn’t know how to balance everything,” she said. “It wasn’t until my sophomore year that I started picking up everything.”

The students, some as young as 14, weren’t simply thrown into a college environment. They spent virtually all their freshman year and much of their sophomore year in what Moore called the Modular Village. Only slowly did they move from high school courses into those college courses that carried dual credit. And when they began to integrate in classrooms with the older students, it provided an unlooked-for benefit. Intermingled with people more grown up, they grew up themselves.

“It worked really, really well,” Moore said. “We found out that since their peers were now older and more mature, they [the MCCHS students] didn’t want to act inappropriately or embarrass themselves in front of that older population, so they handled themselves more appropriately than might have been expected.”

That first freshman class, wearing uniforms LeBlanc called “preppy,” numbered only 46, but 100 would have been unrealistic considering Lake Worth High School’s enrollment of only about 600. Most didn’t persevere the entire four years, some because of academics, others because they wanted the regular high school experience of pep rallies and Friday night football. But 13 of the 46 successfully completed the high school and college programs and were part of TCC’s Commencement in May 2014. The ceremony, among about 1,000 other graduates before a full house at the Fort Worth Convention Center, made Luna “a bit scared, but we deserved it in a lot of ways because we put in a lot of work. It wasn’t like graduating from a normal high school.”

Others in Luna’s class made it through four years, earning their high school diploma but needing more courses for their associate degrees. A separate ceremony was conducted on campus for both sets of graduates, and Moore was a proud observer. She had taken maternity leave during the spring 2013 semester and was back more than a year later to see her chicks all grown up. “Some of them were unrecognizable,” she said. “It made me emotional to see that they’d made it because it was a journey for all of us.”

Moore and Luna had the same message for students offered a chance at early college high school. “I would say, ‘Go for it,’” Luna said. “I mean, the whole high school experience is important, but getting ahead and actually doing something at that young age has meant a lot to me. I’m very proud of it.”

What it meant to Luna was that at age 18 she entered Abilene Christian University as a junior majoring in biology with an eye toward medical school. Living away from home was an adjustment, she said, “but MCCHS did prepare me for the academic stuff.”

Even before Luna and her classmates completed their freshman year, another TCC early college high school was taking root, this one at the new Trinity River East Campus, home to the health occupations program. Three entities came together – TCC, the Fort Worth ISD and the University of North Texas Health Science Center – to establish TABS, the Texas Academy of Biomedical Sciences. With a slightly different model than MCCHS, students begin as juniors rather than freshmen, getting the opportunity to work with some of the world’s most advanced medical education technology.

Hadley said at an April 2010 board meeting that she would be happy to see all five TCC campuses have early college high schools, and happy she was. Northeast opened its early college high school with the Grapevine-Colleyville ISD in 2013 and Southeast its school with the Arlington ISD in 2014. South Campus opened a school-within-a-school model in Everman the same year and opened its own on-campus school with the Fort Worth ISD in fall 2015.

Parallel to the development of the first early college high school, TCC was embarking on another major initiative that had not been on Hadley’s checklist and for which the College was decidedly late to the party – Achieving the Dream, or AtD. Established by the Lumina Foundation and seven partner organizations in 2004, AtD’s mission is to help community colleges increase student success through evidence-based institutional improvement. Assisted by coaches, member colleges, who use hard data rather than intuition, formulate and implement strategies aimed at bettering specific outcomes such as graduation rates and course completion. In 2015, AtD had more than 200 member colleges, but in 2010, TCC was the only large community college in Texas not participating.

The spark came, once again, from Elva LeBlanc. She remembers a day in 2004 when she was president of Galveston College. Her administrative assistant called her attention to a letter from the Lumina Foundation, telling her it sounded like one of her speeches. The letter was a request for membership application in Achieving the Dream. With the deadline only days away, LeBlanc hunkered down, wrote the proposal and sent it in. Shortly afterward, Galveston was selected as one of the original 22 AtD colleges.

When LeBlanc assumed the Northwest Campus presidency in 2006, the ATtD staff contacted her to see if TCC, one of the largest community colleges in the nation not yet involved, would be interested. It wasn’t. “At that time, everyone’s focus at Tarrant County College was on the Trinity River Campus,” she said. “No one wanted to be distracted from that.”

By 2009, however, Trinity River was well on its way to opening, and Hadley had become interim chancellor. The AtD staff contacted LeBlanc and asked if another try might succeed, so LeBlanc approached Hadley about Northwest applying for AtD membership. LeBlanc’s proposal was timely, but – just as with early college high schools – Hadley would not be content to limit a program to one campus. If this was something that would help Northwest students, she wanted it at all campuses.

LeBlanc wasn’t TCC’s only champion for Achieving the Dream. It had taken more than 30 years for the first chief academic officer to be named, but there still had never been a District administrator charged with coordinating student services. Hadley was determined to remedy that situation and did so when Dr. Joy Gates Black became vice chancellor for student success in March 2010.

Gates Black came to TCC from the Dallas system, where she had been vice president for student success [a trending title for student development services] at Eastfield College. She had also been an administrator at San Antonio College and at Los Angeles City College. She had been involved in Achieving the Dream along the way and wondered why TCC was absent from the roll.

“Things were different then,” she said. “We were focused on building and doing things, but we weren’t really focused on our students.”

Hadley, meanwhile, was getting a crash course on AtD. She attended an organization meeting in Seattle where people descended on her, extolling the benefits of the program. She returned determined to bring TCC into the fold but met with some resistance from people who didn’t see the need and thought they could do by themselves what AtD preached. As Gates Black recalled, Hadley said, “Folks, I hear what you’re saying, but we’re going to do this.”

Which, coming from Hadley, meant “We’re going to do this NOW.” Before the month was out, Gates Black and Associate Vice Chancellor for Grants Development Jacqueline Maki had the membership application in the mail. It was, of course, accepted, and on July 6 Hadley announced to the College family that details would be forthcoming at the Chancellor’s Employee Appreciation Breakfast in August.

The PowerPoint presentation shown at the breakfast painted a picture – not a very pretty one – of how TCC compared with the other large Texas community colleges on a variety of criteria. If Hadley had intended to deliver a wake-up call, she certainly succeeded. Most of the criteria shown were classroom-based outcomes such as course completion, student retention and success in developmental education. The faculty saw the finger of blame as pointing to them.

“There was definitely that feeling,” said Kristina Miranda, South Campus biology instructor and former JCC president. “There’s no humanity in data. You can’t just look at those numbers to determine my success and never even step in my classroom.”

Faculty concern bubbled up the next day when the AtD Core Team and Data Team met jointly at the Trinity River Campus. South Campus’ David Clinkscale identified the elephant in the room. If student success is to be measured at least in part by grades, he said, and if faculty give grades and are going to be held accountable for success, might not faculty feel some pressure in give inflated grades?

Hadley vehemently denied any such pressure would be applied and continued to do so. Still, the cloud never entirely dissipated. “Even though the chancellor says, ‘Oh, we know you would never do this. You would never give away grades,’ there’s that pressure,” Miranda said. “If it comes down to keeping my job, maybe I’ll be a little easier or maybe a student I wouldn’t normally give a break to, I’m going to give a break.”

The extent of faculty resistance was no surprise to Hadley. “No, I wasn’t surprised by it,” she said. “Disappointed? Yes. But surprised? No. It’s not just our faculty, but how faculty people feel in general. The first thing that popped into their minds – and perhaps rightfully so – was, ‘You want us to water down the curriculum. You’re wanting us to give away grades.’ That’s what they saw.”

Another common faculty response was that they were already doing innovative things to achieve student success. “My response would be, ‘I know you are. Some of you are. There are pockets of some really great things going on, but I’m talking about the masses here now,’” Hadley said.

Hadley knew that AtD’s success depended on her constant, direct involvement – attending and staying through every long meeting. “If you think that it didn’t almost wipe me out, having to go to every meeting and having to listen to all the naysayers,” she said. Many faculty members, she said, saw the need and potential of the program, “but the majority of the faculty members didn’t.”

Faculty jitters were largely calmed, however, when the priorities and intervention strategies – the scope of work – dealt mostly with student development services rather than with faculty. The first priority was a comprehensive first-year experience program, and the interventions included mandatory new student orientation, a new advising procedure to include faculty advisors and specifically assigned advisers for each student, and strengthening of the new Transition to College Success course mandated for FTIC, or first year in college, students.

The second priority was to increase student success in the beginning or “gateway” courses in math, government and English. This would be done by implementing an Early Academic Alert System to warn students, and their advisers, before they reach a point of no return, and by revising the math curriculum and analyzing alternative instructional methods currently in use.

It took the entire 2010-11 academic year to arrive at the plan, and implementation began in the fall of 2012. But executing the plan was only part of the process. The College also had to design and implement a parallel plan for gathering data to see if the interventions were having any effect. This meant the existing three-person research staff was in for some serious beefing up. By late spring of 2012, the department had grown to 16 with more to come.

In a report submitted to AtD in March 2013, TCC graded itself on how well it had adhered to the movement’s five key principles. Committed Leadership scored a 4.5 out of a possible 5.0. Other scores were 3.8 for Use of Evidence to Improve Policies, 4.0 for Broad Engagement, 4.0 for Systematic Institutional Improvement and 3.7 for Equity – elimination of achievement gaps between ethnic groups. To address Use of Evidence, more research professionals were employed, pushing the number to 21 and the information technology system was strengthened to better analyze the data collected. Among the steps taken to increase ethnic equity, TCC created the position of director of diversity and inclusion and instituted such programs as the Men of Color Mentoring and South Campus’ Family Empowerment Center, which provides help for at-risk students whose family situations threaten their chances for success.

There had been some noticeable achievements. Successful completion of developmental math courses by FTIC students had gone from 49.9 to 51.1 percent, developmental reading from 67.6 to 71.4 and developmental writing from 61.8 to 63.7. The success rates in gateway courses climbed, as did course completion rates, retention and completion of degrees and certificates. The increases were small in most cases, but TCC had known from the start that the needle would be hard to move and that success would depend on small increments building on one another.

The degree of success enabled TCC to apply for recognition as a Leader College. Such recognition required evidence of improvement over a three-year period. In its application on May 15, 2013, the College pointed to successful completion of developmental math among Hispanic students from 25.5 percent in fall 2007 to 31.0 percent by fall 2012 and similar success in developmental reading, 47.0 percent to 52.5 percent.

In July, the College was notified it had been accorded Leader College status, and the news was announced with great fanfare – literally, by a music faculty band – at the Chancellor’s Employee Appreciation Breakfast in August. Shortly thereafter, an AtD Leader College flag flew below the TCC banner at each of the campuses.

It was hardly the end of the road. “We’re now at the point where AtD is going to require more of a Leader College,” Gates Black said. “No more futzing around. You have to show huge improvement, and that means you have to be willing to look at things on a huge, global scale.”

Accordingly, the College embarked on an admittedly ambitious program termed the Wildly Important Goal, or WIG. The overarching WIG is to increase course completion because as Gates Black said, “When you have course completion, everything else falls in behind it.” Supporting the greater goal were three specific WIGs, each of which calls for 20 percent improvement by 2026:

- to increase course completion for TSI [Texas Success Initiative] students requiring developmental courses,

- to increase course completion for students on academic probation, and

- to increase fall to fall and spring to fall retention rates [students staying in school] for both of the above groups.

Gates Black said although people are “freaking out” over the scope of the goals, they need to learn to think big. “Even if we get only to 12 [percent], we’ve increased,” she said. “Don’t stay with three. Don’t stay with what’s comfortable. We have to get people at TCC out of that comfort zone.”

That includes the faculty, who heretofore had been largely unaffected by AtD. That, said Hadley, would change. Leader College status, she said, came about mostly because of “support services we have wrapped around students” and “beefing up our research so that we would really know what was going on.”

On the minus side, TCC was told by its AtD coaches, was a lack of involvement of the general faculty. “The faculty members kind of relaxed because they were left alone,” Hadley said. “Now you’ve got Achieving the Dream and performance-based funding [from the state] coming in together. Something is going to have to be done differently by the faculty.”

One clue as to what this portended came at the April 15, 2015, Board of Trustees meeting. The increased involvement of faculty in student advising had been one of the key strategies in the original proposal, but efforts to get more faculty participation on a voluntary basis had only modest success. But at the meeting, when trustees reported on recommendations coming out of discussions at an AtD conference, one of them was a policy change calling for part of a faculty member’s required office hours to be in an accessible student advisement setting. This would mandate a practice previously only encouraged.

The Achieving the Dream initiative at TCC hasn’t been easy and isn’t likely to get easier any time soon. Still, Gates Black said, it’s well worth it. “It’s been beneficial to us in so many ways,” she said. “It’s forced us to get data and use date and trust what the data says.

“Probably the most important thing is that it’s just been a vehicle for us. If we had not had AtD, what would we look like today? A whole lot of things would never have happened. We’re now in a position of being visionary rather than reactive. It exposed all of the College, including the Board of Trustees, to where we need to go and what we need to do.”

Although AtD remained a burr under the saddle of many faculty and staff, others acknowledged, perhaps reluctantly, that it was needed. “I see a lot of positive that has come out of it,” said John Crawford, “not necessarily Achieving the Dream, but the changes that we made to how the organization interacts with students. We’d be the same old TCC that we were 10 years ago if we hadn’t sat down and looked at the data and information.”

“This is a sea change,” said Northwest Vice President for Student Development Services Joe Rode. “I think we were dying, and we didn’t know it.”

Achieving the Dream opened a new era at Tarrant County College, one not only of introspection – taking a hard look in the mirror – but also of exploration, breaking through the boundaries of self-satisfaction. Good enough was no longer good enough. The lid had been lifted on what was possible and what needed to be done to make the possible happen. It was a time of change, and it had just begun.

Chapter 19: Goodbyes and Hellos

The sea changes and their accompanying turbulence that were to mark the years leading up to TCC’s 50th anniversary were preceded by other transitions less choppy – rather like a tide ebbing and flowing – but perhaps more important in the long run. Included were new trustees, new high-level administrators and – at long last – a new campus in name if not in fact.

The most sweeping change stemmed from a conversation between Erma Johnson Hadley and her Dallas County counterpart Wright Lassiter in early 2011 regarding a plan to offer early retirement to a sizable chunk of his workforce. Hadley saw that a similar initiative at TCC might free up salary funds for new hires and other uses and to make it possible to “repurpose” some administrative positions to accommodate shifting priorities.

The plan, presented to the board in early March and approved later that month, would be offered to full-time, budgeted, benefits-eligible employees 65 years or older with at least 10 continuous years of full-time service at TCC or to employees whose age plus years of creditable service under the Texas Teacher Retirement System, as of January 31, 2011, was 80 or higher, or whose age plus years of creditable service under the Optional Retirement System was 80 or higher.

Those eligible for the Voluntary Separation Plan, which quickly became known as “The Buyout” across the College, would need to sign an acceptance letter by May 13. Their employment would end no later than August 31, and they would receive an amount equal to 80 percent of annual salary. Some 270 members of the faculty, support staff and administration were eligible, and it was estimated that about one-third would accept and that those would be spread evenly across the three employment classifications.

The distribution estimate was not too far off the mark, with 46 administrators and technical personnel, 35 faculty members and 41 support staff taking the plunge. The total of 122, however, represented 45 percent of those eligible. Among those departing were some, like South Campus Dean Anita Barrett and District Director of Program Development Faye Murphy, who had been with the College since the beginning. The group’s total years of service was more than 3,000.

Four of the retirements came from members of the Chancellor’s Executive Leadership Team, or CELT. For Maria Shelton, vice chancellor for information and technical services, there was no decision to be made. She had announced the previous fall that 2010-11 would be her final year. She was joined by Vice Chancellor for Administration Bill Lace, who ended 30 years of administrative service to join the faculty as a journalism adjunct.

Two retirements came from campus presidents, one expectedly and the other decidedly not. South’s Ernest Thomas had gone on indefinite leave for personal reasons earlier in the semester and had announced on May 3 that he would retire. The surprise announcement, however, came just hours before the deadline when Judith Carrier, a fixture at TCC since 1971 and founding president of Southeast Campus, said she would join the exodus. Much of Southeast’s huge success was due to her seemingly inexhaustible energy as she sought to make “her” campus excel in every respect while at the same time ceaselessly bringing it to a place of prominence in the Arlington-Mansfield area. In many eyes, Carrier was just about the least likely candidate for the buyout.

Lace’s vacancy was the first and easiest to fill with the ideal candidate already practically one of the family. Angela Robinson had since 2000 represented TCC in employment and labor matters when a partner in the Law Snakard & Gambill law firm. As such, she already knew much about TCC, including where all the bodies were buried. Indeed, she had occasionally helped wield the shovel.

In May 2011, Hadley pounced on a suggestion that Robinson be brought in-house as vice chancellor for administration and general counsel. Her appointment, which took effect September 1, resolved two issues for Hadley. It provided a highly knowledgeable person to whom the Human Resources Office would report, and it answered the Board of Trustee’s call for an in-house attorney in the face of hundreds of thousands of dollars annually in legal costs.

The search for a new chief information officer took a bit longer, with Joe Bosley serving as interim until the selection of Tim Marshall, who took office in February 2012 as vice chancellor for information and technology services, a title later changed to vice chancellor for institutional intelligence and technology. Marshall came to TCC with more than 25 years experience in the technology area with Brevard Community College and the Orange County Public Schools, both in Florida.

The search for new presidents for South and Southeast Campuses began in summer 2011 and saddled two CELT members with extra duties. Joy Gates Black went to South as interim, and David Wells stepped in for Carrier at Southeast. Within six months, however, both positions were filled. Dr. Peter Jordan was named South Campus’ fourth president on November 14, the same date as Dr. Bill Coppola on Southeast. Both were to take office as of January.

A native of Barbados, Jordan had spent 30 years in higher education in New York at City University of New York and LaGuardia Community College. Coppola was from closer to home, having earned his master’s and doctorate at the University of North Texas. He spent 12 years in the trenches as a full-time faculty member before going into administration at the Dallas County Community College District, Maricopa Community College in Phoenix and finally to the Lone Star College System in the Houston area, where he was director of academic partnerships and initiatives prior to his appointment.

The changes to the Board of Trustees were triggered on June 18, 2011, when Joe Hudson stepped down as president. “I felt I had accomplished what I promised my constituents I would do,” he said, citing as an example new policies designed to make the workings of the College more open and transparent. [186] He had been frustrated, however, in attempts to bring about other changes – annual election of board officers and a requirement for a supermajority vote for approval of high-dollar items – that ran counter to state law.

At the same meeting, Vice President Kristin Vandergriff, having moved up as interim president, announced she would seek the post on a permanent basis. Old scars hadn’t yet faded, however, and Bill Greenhill announced that he, too, would be a candidate. The vote was taken on August 18, with Greenhill elected on a 4-3 vote. In addition to his own vote, he was supported by Hudson, O.K. Carter and Robyn Winnett.

In September, Hudson resigned from the board altogether, and his colleagues sent out a call for people interested in taking his place. The search turned up two likely candidates – Conrad Heede, whom Hudson had defeated in the 2008 election, and Dennis Slechta, a retired business owner from Colleyville. They were interviewed in a special meeting on October 20, and Heede was elected at the regular meeting that followed.

The most welcome arrival during this era was TREC, the sparkling new Trinity River East Campus, born at last after a long, painful and expensive gestation. Residual bitterness was set aside ... well, almost ... and Hadley was very much the proud parent, playing tour guide, sometimes on an almost daily basis, just before and after classes began. The City Council, Water District Board, business leaders, health care executives and chambers of commerce heavyweights all trooped through the facility.

The show and tell was part of a concerted effort of a mandate given to Hadley by the Board of Trustees to, in her words, “restore confidence in Tarrant County College. I spent hours and hours and hours in the community, visiting with people – especially the critics who had been so critical of what we were doing with the downtown campus.”

Indeed, prominent on the visitor lists were those who had, publicly or privately, denounced the project. “I had a running list of people who had called me or emailed or written me and fussed at me for going on with the project,” Louise Appleman said, “so they were at the top of the invitation list and, to a man, they agreed that it was a beautiful site and it was a functional site for students. You can’t walk into that smart hospital or any of those classrooms and not be impressed with what’s going on there.”

Near the top of Appleman’s list was Ed Bass, who had attempted to have the campus design altered long after construction had begun. “He came in and, not only was he so impressed with what he saw, he had Johnny Campbell, president and CEO of Bass’ Sundance Square development, come back and look at our utility building – that squat building – because it’s attractive,” she said. “You’d never guess that’s where all the innards are. And he wanted Johnny to see it and understand it and bring the engineers for future projects at Sundance.”

Larry Meeker, prominent in the College’s formation in the ‘60s, was one of the critics not at the party. Hadley invited him, Appleman said, but he declined. According to Appleman, Hadley then tried a little cajoling, telling Meeker he’d like the complex if he saw it, to which Meeker replied that was exactly what he feared.

Those who did tour TREC were suitably impressed. “Absolutely, overwhelmingly fantastic,” said Texas Comptroller Susan Combs, in town to view some of the smart hospital’s virtual “patients” purchased with a Jobs and Education for Texas grant. [187]

Area architects, even some who remained unsold on the below-ground plaza, such as John Roberts and UTA Dean Donald Gatzke, nevertheless gave the buildings high marks. Lee Hill, president of the Fort Worth Chapter of the American Institute of Architects, called the campus “one of the most high-end education buildings I’ve ever seen. I think it’s very nice.” And Joe Self of FIRM817 praised the connection of downtown to the river and wasn’t bothered by the modern design. “Every city needs more than one voice and more than one vision to make it a great city,” he said. [188]

Lots of folks liked that vision. Downtown Fort Worth Inc. presented TCC its annual Trailblazer Award for its environment-friendly aspects and said the plaza “creates a series of pleasant microclimates.” [189] Later, the campus was named one of “The Lone Star State’s Top 13 Buildings to See in 2013” by Architizer.com, an international architecture blog. [190]

The Star-Telegram’s Bob Ray Sanders, a longtime fan of the project, except for the cost, wrote, “Although it is an ultra-modern, futuristic design of concrete, steel and glass, it does not clash with its surroundings. The man-made waterfall – its roar surprisingly soothing – adds a perfect touch to the campus and to downtown in general. It was great to see students lunching and studying at its base, just a stone’s throw from the serene Trinity River.” [191]

Like Sanders, others praised the look of TREC even though the price tag remained a sticking point for some. Trustee O.K. Carter called the campus “excessive in terms of cost and style,” but nevertheless called it “a terrific building.” [192]

Fort Worth Weekly reporter Betty Brink raked over the ashes of the controversy, writing that it cost “a staggering $1,476 per square foot to build – more than three times what experienced real estate executives say such a facility should have cost.” But she went on to say, “The oddly angled gray structures are flooded with natural light by the addition of huge glass windows that bring warmth to the building’s earlier coldness. ... The sunken plaza with its walkway to the river, which had drawn criticism from downtown players such as Ed Bass, is open and airy, not the dark, foreboding “tunnel” that its critics envisioned.” [193]

But TCC had not built the Trinity River East Campus for outside voices, rather for the critics who most mattered – its students – and they were equally appreciative ... and demonstrative. “Students were in the hall dancing – seriously,” said Joseph Cameron, TREC’s dean. “People are excited because they get a brand new place to learn.” First-year nursing student Valeria Greenwood said, “It’s beautiful. It’s just gorgeous.” [194]

And, echoing the sentiments of former Trustee Bobby McGee, another nursing student, John Combs, said, “The more attractive the facility, the better people you will attract for your program. A lot of people look at that and say, ‘Man, I want to go to school there.’” [195]

Chapter 20: Upsetting the Applecart

Trinity River East Campus’ opening softly shut the door on years of very public discontent with TCC, but Achieving the Dream had opened another area of contention – this one internal. Although largely unpopular with faculty, AtD had not yet had much direct impact on the what, when and how of teaching. That would change with the move to common textbooks for each course and with TCC Connect, which would dramatically restructure the workplace for many teachers.

The faculty’s vexation was hardly a surprise because for decades they had been pretty much left alone. C.A. Roberson’s expertise was finance, not academics. Leonardo de la Garza’s focus was on construction. It was Erma Johnson Hadley who put teaching and learning – TCC’s core function, after all – under the microscope. She didn’t much like what she saw and set out to change it, no matter whose comfort zone was invaded.

“I realize the faculty hasn’t always been pleased with the way I lead the college because I am absolutely focused on student success,” she said. “And when I look at the data, I know that we must change something. We must. I know that if we continue along the path that we’ve been following, it is not going to be good for our students.”

Common learning materials – the same textbook used Districtwide for each class – had been discussed on and off for years as an academic issue. Faculty members had wide latitude to use texts of their choosing, which sometimes caused problems for students. Students taking, for instance, U.S. History I might have to buy another book when they took U.S. History II because that instructor used a different text.

The problem was intensified as students became more mobile, enrolling on multiple campuses to get the right courses at the right times. There were stories of students being told they couldn’t take the second part of a course at one campus because they took the first part elsewhere. Students sometimes couldn’t buy all their books at one bookstore but would have to go to each campus in which they were enrolled. Such practices flew in the face of the cherished notion that TCC is “one college.” How much better it would be, the discussion went, if every course used the same book, no matter where it was taught.

Discussion, however, was as far as it went. Top administrators knew that any move toward common texts was certain to ignite a firestorm of opposition from the faculty, many of whom had been using their favorite books in all their subsequent editions for decades. Some instructors, in fact, had authored their own books, thus providing a source of income, although all had to go through the prescribed approval process. Academic freedom was also sure to come up. To be sure, choosing textbooks would be in the hands of faculty, not administrators, but the loss of personal prerogative would be seen as an infringement on faculty rights. The District leadership had neither the interest nor the courage to face such a battle.

The landscape changed under Hadley. Achieving the Dream had prompted the College to identify and work to remove barriers to student success, and textbooks had become an increasingly difficult obstacle, cost having become a larger factor than student mobility. The American Enterprise Association reported in 2013 that increases in the cost of textbooks had been 500 percent greater than increases in tuition over a 30-year period. Even students whose colleges had modest tuition, such as TCC’s $55 per semester hour in 2014-15, routinely found their textbooks ran far more than the $165 they paid for a three-hour course.

“Nobody was happy with the price of books,” said Southeast Campus President Bill Coppola, who led TCC’s initiative in its second phase. “We weren’t happy. The students weren’t happy. Parents weren’t happy when they’re paying $160 for a course in tuition and $245 for the book ... of which the student might use four chapters and couldn’t sell back.”

The solution for many students was simply not to buy their textbook or other classroom materials. Predictably, their grades suffered as a result. Hadley realized something needed to be done and in February 2012 corralled the campus presidents to discuss how to implement a common textbook plan with a dual goal of lowering costs and ending practices that led to unnecessary purchases and shopping difficulties. Her strategy was that the presidents name two faculty members from each discipline who would meet, select perhaps three books per course and distribute them to faculty teaching each course for a vote.

Hadley’s initial timeline, in keeping with her open-throttle style, was that the process would be implemented during the upcoming fall semester. The campus presidents were hesitant. “I had two – maybe three – of the presidents who thought I was crazy,” Hadley said. “They said, ‘You can’t do this,’ although not in those words. They decided how they wanted to do it, and I said, ‘OK, you all do it’ and I went ahead and left it alone.”

The presidents quickly realized that a fall implementation was impossible because Follett, the company operating TCC bookstores, had an April 1 deadline for fall semester decisions. They also thought that full implementation, taking in TCC’s hundreds of courses, was too big a bite. They proposed a fall 2013 launch and a phasing in of the plan, with the first wave of courses being those with the highest enrollments – English, math, history, government, etc. Hadley, somewhat reluctantly, agreed.

At this point, Hadley says, the presidents gave over control of the process. “What they ended up doing was letting [Vice Chancellor for Finance] Mark [McClendon] run everything,” she said. “They didn’t want to do it.”

Putting McClendon in charge probably seemed like a good idea at the time. After all, one of his responsibilities was oversight of the campus bookstores. A finance person who had come from the private sector, however, McClendon had little experience working with faculty and who was, in Hadley’s words, “a close-to-the-chest person” who was slow to communicate progress.

“You know, sometimes it’s the message, and sometimes it’s the person delivering the message,” said Joy Gates Black, named vice chancellor for student success and academic affairs after David Wells’ 2014 retirement. “And in this case, Mark clearly wasn’t the right person to deliver the message.” Indeed, she added, the faculty seemed more receptive – though still unhappy – when Coppola took over the project.

McClendon agreed. “It would have been fine if the process [initially] had been led by the faculty,” he said. “We then found our way to a process that had much more involvement from the faculty and the presidents.”

But it was probably McClendon’s place on the organizational chart rather than anything he did or failed to do that upset the faculty. It was the perspective that the finance office was in charge of what they considered an academic activity.

“He may be a very smart man,” retired accounting professor John Crawford said of McClendon, “but he doesn’t understand what we do or how we do it. I think this issue has done Erma a lot of harm.”

Such comments drew a chuckle from McClendon. “I’m the best known CFO, within my college, of any in the country,” he said. “Just about every faculty member knows my name.”

Actually, he said, the job fell to him by default. “Erma tried to give it to the JCC. They wouldn’t touch it,” he said. “Then she gave it to the presidents, and they gave it to me.”

Furthermore, he said, he was never involved in choosing any books. That was done by faculty members appointed by their campus presidents. “But we didn’t have the presidents involved,” he said, “and sometimes the faculty they appointed didn’t have the respect of their peers.”

No matter who was in charge, said South Campus’ Kristina Miranda, faculty bridled at being told what to do. “With the common curriculum [an earlier project that prescribed a single set of learning objectives for each course], we [the faculty] didn’t make much of a push,” Miranda said. “But when you start telling me the tools I need to use, that’s a problem.”

Another faculty sticking point had to do with the rationale behind the project. The Board of Trustees in August 2012 had given Hadley a list of goals for the upcoming year, one of which was to “develop a plan for alternative textbook products that will significantly reduce costs to the students – one district textbook adoption for each course, or an e-reader or a combination of the two.” [196] After the start of the subsequent fall semester, Hadley was asked in meetings with faculty members to square the textbook project with Achieving the Dream. If data should undergird all decisions, they asked, where was the data showing that common textbooks saved students money?

“I got that question a lot, and I told them I didn’t have any,” Hadley said. “What I do have is data showing that students don’t buy textbooks, which is enough for me.” She added that other data, such as the number of students who have to buy new books when changing campuses or even changing instructors on the same campus, convinced her that “we can do a better job for students. We think we can save the students money, and we did.”

The figures bear her out. According to data from TCC’s Office of Business Services, students realized savings of $295,000 in fall 2013, an average of $13.36 per book for the 16 courses chosen for that semester. When more courses were added the next spring, savings reached $335,000. Total savings through the spring 2014 semester were estimated at about $1.2 million and 686 courses – 97 percent of TCC’s inventory – had common learning materials.

Still move savings will be realized, McClendon said, as more textbooks move from bound to loose-leaf versions that students can put in three-ring binders. And the real savings, he said, will come when textbooks shift from hard copy to e-readers, but "the faculty don't seem quite ready for that."

Despite the initial success of the program, Hadley heeded the grumbling and tapped Coppola to lead the textbook effort starting in fall 2013. Asked how that particular hot potato landed in his lap, he said, very judiciously, “The chancellor invited me to participate in the expansion of the common textbook initiative, and I gladly accepted the opportunity.” Whether this was tantamount to an offer from Don Corleone, he didn’t say.

But Hadley wasn’t just shooting in the dark when she chose Coppola. “She knew I came from a system [Lone Star College] that was much more evolved than this, and she asked me to take charge. She said the presidents have a much closer relationship with the faculty than people at the District office.”

Coppola began by pulling together a Common Learning Materials Implementation Team including campus presidents and vice presidents for academic affairs, Director of Business Services Kathy Crusto-Way, and JCC representatives. At the first meeting, he began by saying there was a general recognition that the process used for Phase I was “unsustainable.”

“I was given a charge for Phase II, and the charge was that we want to have 100 percent of our courses have common learning materials,” he said. “But when you meet a goal, you have to start over on another goal. What I was doing was developing a continuous process for the selection of common course materials that would evolve over five or 10 years into something different. The thought processes that we had was that we needed a group of individuals for each discipline who could continually work on this – not just ad hoc people pulled together when it was time to make a decision.”

Thus were born the Academic Curriculum Teams, or ACTs, made up of two faculty members from every discipline from art to welding. Each team would have, as part of its charge, the oversight of selecting textbooks and other materials from those courses. Each team would have a divisional dean as a liaison to the Implementation Team, relaying information and carrying forward team recommendations. Originally, the dean liaisons were not to have been former faculty in the team’s discipline, but that changed over time when the teams said they’d prefer a discipline colleague, if possible.

Initially, getting a faculty member to serve on an ACT could be a hard sell. The textbook project was very unpopular, and faculty didn’t want to be seen as joining the dark side. “That was why, when I was writing the charge for the ACTs, I made sure that textbooks weren’t the only thing on the paper,” Miranda said. “Something like the ACTs was way overdue. If anything good came of the textbook thing, that was it, and we have Bill Coppola to thank for it because he was the one who really designed those.”

Coppola claims no such credit. His former college, Lone Star, had somewhat similar bodies called Academic Curriculum Councils. Other community colleges such as Dallas County, he said, have such systems. “They really are teams,” he said, “because they’re groups of people whose whole mission is to improve their disciplines, collaborate on changes in their discipline, collaborate on best practices across campuses.”

Eventually, he said, faculty wanted to be picked for the ACTs because they saw it as a chance to grow as individuals in addition to helping the College and their discipline. Administrators value them as resources to tackle curricular and other discipline issues. “When curriculum issues come up, we throw them to the ACTs and say, ‘Let them solve the problem,’ instead of throwing them at administration [such as campus vice presidents and deans] to give them the solutions they have to implement,” Coppola said.

The common learning materials project was by no means over, but the ACTs had provided the method through which materials could be evaluated and changed, if needed, on a regular basis. In addition, interest grew in the area of open source materials – books, articles and other items available to be put online free as a substitute for textbooks.

“Everyone around the country is watching us and can’t believe we have 97 percent of our courses with common learning materials,” Coppola said. “But it didn’t come without its pains. It didn’t come without give and take. This was a marriage, and the chancellor was wonderful about understanding that the bottom line was to save students money.”

At the start of 2014-15, elements of the faculty were still at a slow boil, but the target was no longer common textbooks. They didn’t like it but acknowledged it was a done deal. Besides, they had an even bigger bone in their throats – TCC Connect – a new administrative structure taking in e-learning [distance education], dual credit and the Weekend College.

TCC had been, if not a pioneer, at least at the forefront in distance learning, wherein students viewed lectures on videotape or over public television, coming to campus only for orientation and to take examinations. Offerings weren’t terribly extensive – the videos were expensive to develop and produce – but students liked the convenience and enrollments swelled through the ’70s and ’80s.

Distance learning really took off in the ’90s with the advent of the home computer. Courses were far less pricey to develop, and TCC faculty began to craft their own online versions of existing classes. E-learning classes were also increasingly accessible to students with the advent of smartphones and tablets.

Many students thought, mostly erroneously, that online classes would be easier given that one could set the time, place and pace, doing classwork if they so desired at midnight in their jammies. Faculty also were attracted to online classes in part because of convenience, less time on campus being required.

E-learning had begun at TCC on South Campus and long remained housed there. It had television production facilities enabling videos to be shown over TCC’s public access channel after the growth of cable TV. Most of the faculty came from South, and all e-learning enrollments were credited to that campus regardless of where the faculty member was based.

South’s e-learning dominance sparked some sibling rivalry with the other campuses. Presidents and deans looked askance at “their” faculty teaching fewer face-to-face classes, spending less time on campus and teaching students who would be credited to South’s enrollment. One campus president actively discouraged faculty from entering the e-learning arena. It would not be until the late ’80s that the rules changed to credit online students to the faculty member’s home campus.

E-learning was working well but mostly served as an alternate class delivery system for students already at TCC or nearby institutions. Hadley saw enormous room for expansion into totally online degrees that could be offered statewide or even worldwide. Many community colleges had already taken such an entrepreneurial approach. Could TCC join them?

Dual credit also had come of age. Made possible by the Texas Legislature in the early ’90s, the program allowed for high school students on recommendations from their schools to take courses – sometimes on community college campuses, sometimes in high schools – that would count toward both their high school diplomas and a college transcript.

Students loved it since they could enter college with a healthy number of credit hours already in the bag. Parents loved it since it not only gave their kids a leg up but also did so at relatively modest community college tuition rather than university rates. About the only people against dual credit were high school Advanced Placement teachers who saw their potential students siphoned off.

Two factors led to a dual credit explosion in the mid-’90s. State legislators had been leery of the program’s growth because, in their view, it involved double-dipping. Colleges received contact hour funding for the students, and high schools received funding for them as well since they counted in average daily attendance. Some lawmakers explored ways to cut back expenses to the state, but all proposed solutions to limit public school or college income would make both sides less willing to participate in what was by now a very popular program. Eventually, lawmakers were persuaded that paying for college credit at community college rather than university rates would help the state in the long run, and they passed legislation in 1995 permitting the dual funding.

As dual credit grew – 20,791 enrollments in fall 2013 – it became an increasing burden on the campus deans and department chairs. Teachers, almost all of them adjunct, or part-time, faculty had to be found, evaluated and hired – frequently only days before the start of a semester and sometimes afterward when high schools added new class sections. School calendar conflicts arose. For instance, TCC held classes on the three days prior to Thanksgiving when the public schools had off the entire week. High school students taking college classes found it difficult to work around extracurricular activities such as field trips or University Interscholastic League competitions. Centralization of the e-learning administrative functions would lift the campus load.

The third leg of the stool that eventually became TCC Connect was something that, while common in many community colleges, was absent at TCC – the Weekend College.

Evening classes had been a staple ever since the College opened as one of its primary demographics consisted of people working during the day, but the move into weekend classes had been slow.

In 2010, Chancellor Hadley began to chivvy the presidents about making better use of space. According to Gates Black, she told them she was tired of hearing pleas for more buildings and more classrooms and that they should better utilize the space they had. Specifically, she wanted a weekend college, which she defined as course offerings enabling students to earn degrees by attending only on Friday nights, Saturdays and Sunday afternoons.

“Well, they didn’t want to do it,” Hadley said. “Larry [Darlage at Northeast] and Tahita [Fulkerson at Trinity River] finally agreed to try it on their campuses, and then the other three campuses picked up weekend classes.”

Later, soon after making the decision to place e-learning and dual credit under a new administrative structure named TCC Connect, she looked at the array of weekend classes. She was unsure if it included enough variety to constitute a degree. When she asked, Elva LeBlanc at Northwest said her campus had more courses. Gary Smith, vice president for academic affairs at Northeast, claimed the largest number of students.

Hadley decided to find out for herself. Armed with class schedules, she searched every TCC degree plan to see if any could be completed solely by weekend attendance. She saw that – probably – a fine arts degree was possible on Northwest and that a biology degree might be available with the addition of two or three more courses.

“What about the others?” she said. “See, they hadn’t given all that much attention to a degree. They were just offering courses. So I said I’d just put Weekend College under Connect and let them keep their weekend courses.”

Thus evolved the system whereby weekend classes held students enrolled in Weekend College, a highly structured program capable of producing a graduate in 18 months, and also contained students taking weekend classes in addition to others throughout the week or online.

At the June 2013 board meeting, Dr. Carlos Morales was introduced as the first president of TCC Connect. Morales had developed and was chief academic officer of a virtual campus in his native Puerto Rico. He had also held positions at universities in Pennsylvania and New York.

Morales’ task was to bring Connect’s three entities under one structure and integrate that structure into the existing fabric of the College. No one during his interview process said it would be difficult, but he got the idea. “It was kind of implied,” he said. “With any new endeavor, you prepare yourself for a percentage of things you need to address in a particular way because of the organizational culture, the stakeholders or the history of the institution.”

Problems were minimal with Weekend College and dual credit. Both had operated largely with adjunct faculty, and Connect’s administrators would take over the scheduling, employment and evaluation of the faculty. Each campus would have a coordinator of dual credit, taking over from the deans the job of working with school districts – except for the relatively small number of dual credit courses taught on the campuses.

At first, the faculty had few problems with TCC Connect, even the e-learning piece in which full-time faculty were most heavily involved. Hadley initially decided to keep the program intact as far as faculty teaching part of their full-time workload online. In the months preceding the fall 2014 semester, the word was that full-time faculty teaching e-learning would report to their home campus for face-to-face classes and to Connect for online. No one, however, was quite sure how that would work. Would online assignments be made by campus deans? Would full-time faculty have to apply to Connect for classes and be interviewed? If so, by whom? Would the instructor be evaluated by separate entities? Who would make tenure decisions?

Everyone wanted answers, but Morales and the campus presidents didn’t have them. “We encountered a lot of stakeholders who wanted to know things,” he said, “but we were in a phase where we did not have all the details. It was in the very, very early stages and, again, there were many, many complexities in terms of reporting structure, in terms of position IDs.”

Morales and the presidents tried to keep faculty informed on what was very much a work in progress. Morales held three town hall-type meetings at each campus. Chief academic officer David Wells had numerous meetings to keep the other presidents abreast of TCC Connect decisions so that they could field questions from their faculty. The problem was that those decisions weren’t final and often had a very short shelf life.

“At each meeting, the information changed. That makes it hard,” said Trinity River’s Tahita Fulkerson. “We run out and tell the faculty, ‘Your loads are going to be different in the summer.’ And then, within three weeks, that’s changed, and we have to go back and say, ‘Your loads are not going to be changed.’ So I think that in our rush to communicate sometimes, we communicate drafts that have not been polished.”

TCC Connect administrators, Hadley said, “were out all over the District telling them [faculty and academic administrators] things that we really didn’t have answers to yet. Instead of them saying, ‘We’re working on it. We don’t know,’ they said, ‘We think it’s going to be so-and-so,’ and they would take that and run with it.”

What they ran with was that faculty could continue to teach online as part of their normal workload. “I said, ‘No, you can’t,’” Hadley said, “and that’s when all hell broke loose.”

The abrupt shift was the end result of the divisional deans’ reaction to responsibilities for full-time faculty being split between the campuses and TCC Connect. Like the presidents, they didn’t want to give up even partial oversight of “their” faculty.

“So some of the divisional deans got together and said, ‘Well, we’ll fix her. We just won’t let our faculty teach online. We’ll pull them all back to campus, and then she’ll have to go out and find other people to teach,’” Hadley said. “And I said, ‘Aha! Great idea.’ I hadn’t even thought of it, and it was they who gave me the idea.”

Hadley’s decision was that full-time faculty, with very few exceptions, would teach their full load of 15 semester hours in face-to-face classes on campus. If they wanted to teach online, it would be at the discretion of TCC Connect and at their very much lower adjunct faculty pay rate.

For some, Hadley’s dictum meant that unless they taught for Connect under the new rules, they would be forced to abandon the online courses they had so carefully constructed and sought to perfect over the years. For others, it was an all-out invasion of their comfort zones. They had become used to the flexibility online teaching provided. They didn’t have to be on campus as much, which left time for other pursuits.

Before making her decision, Hadley had gathered data on just who was teaching online and to what extent. The supposed limits to online teaching – limits which were understood practice instead of firm policy – were that faculty with a full load of five-courses could teach a maximum of two online as well as one of two “overload” classes – those in excess of the full load paid at the adjunct rate.

“I got it [the data] and was flabbergasted,” Hadley said. “I had no idea that our full-time faculty was teaching so much of distance learning. It was not at all unusual for people to have three sections online. And we had 13 or 15 who had everything online.”

While many faculty who had taught part of their full-time load online were infuriated with Hadley’s ruling for personal reasons, others took issue on grounds of academic quality. They reasoned that if full-time faculty left the online ranks in droves, it would leave TCC’s e-learning component staffed to an overwhelming extent with part-time faculty – less experienced, lower paid and without any great commitment to the College. They saw the move as a step toward making TCC Connect an online cash cow. “Have they even stopped and thought about what the hell they’re doing?” asked Crawford. “Or are we just rushing to be the Western Governors College of Texas or something?”

To this kind of question, Morales does have the answers. Admittedly, fall 2014 was sort of bumpy. Demand for online faculty was high, and many full-time faculty who had been teaching online stayed on the sidelines. TCC Connect administrators, “discipline coordinators,” were having a tough time finding new part-time faculty and had to enlist the help of campus deans. But things seemed to smooth out in spring 2015. Instead of the very high percentage of “true” or non-full-time adjuncts teaching online, full-time faculty were teaching 58 percent of the sections.

“That has really settled down,” said Gates Black. “In the fall, there was still a little bit of angst on the part of the faculty, and they were kind of opting out. Now that they’ve settled down and they see that TCC Connect is still part of TCC, they’re willing to teach. In the spring, we did not have problems.”

“We are teaching with much the same faculty as before, so where is the issue on quality if everything is the same?” said Morales. “The only thing that’s changed is that the playground is now labeled TCC Connect.”

Quality in individual courses, he said, comes from “peer groups,” teams of full-time faculty from each campus who bring both their subject matter knowledge and teaching expertise to the task of building a course template for others to follow. As to faculty quality, TCC Connect faculty must meet the same educational standards as on-campus faculty. New faculty are mentored and evaluated by both students and discipline coordinators. “It will have to come down to the data, looking at the data on who’s being successful with students and who is not,” Gates Black said. “I will tell you, and Dr. Morales will tell you as well that he looks at this keenly. If there are people who have not been successful, then he’s not going to invite them back.”

Morales went out of his way to assuage the concerns of administrators on other campuses that TCC Connect was draining away their students. He knew that, given student enthusiasm for online courses, he could add many more sections. But he knew also that this would adversely affect the campuses, so he limited offerings for fall 2015, hoping to strike the right balance.

He also was aware that headcount isn’t everything and that opening the virtual doors to all comers would not be doing some students any favors. Many flock to online courses thinking that they’re somehow less rigorous when, in fact, they can be more demanding, especially with students who may lack motivation and have poor time management. To keep such students from getting in over their heads, a readiness assessment, Smarter Measures, is administered on which first-time online students must achieve a certain score before they can enroll.

Many faculty, however, remained doubtful and, in some cases, angry. One faculty member teaching the full load entirely online in order to attend to a full-time business threatened to sue. In spring 2014, passions overflowed to the extent that the Faculty Associations on both South and Northeast Campuses approved a motion to seek a no-confidence vote on Hadley’s performance. The measure got little support from the other campuses.

The votes meant little since, according to Faculty Association bylaws, a no-confidence vote requires a petition signed by at least 10 percent of the membership. The faculty seeking the vote evidently were not willing to go on record since no petition was circulated. Also, after material critical of Hadley was sent anonymously to the media, no one was willing to be quoted in a Fort Worth Weekly story except JCC Chair Robert Edmonds, who criticized his colleagues’ going to the media as “not the way we can get things done as a faculty.” [197]

Controversy aside, it was evident that TCC Connect was headed for an increasingly major role in the College. Spring semester enrollment figures presented at the February 2015 board meeting showed for the first time the number of students attending only TCC Connect classes, and its headcount enrollment of 15,260 made it, at a single stroke, the largest campus. Five associate degrees and 15 certificates of completion in business and information technology were now available totally online and, Morales said, “The student is not required to step onto TCC premises at all.”

Veteran faculty members may cringe at such a statement, but Morales cites numerous studies showing no significant difference between online and face-to-face courses. Online classes are no longer the coming thing – they’ve arrived. Such is the wave of higher education, and TCC seemed determined to ride it.

Chapter 21: The Wraparound

One should never try to be all things to all people. Good advice, perhaps, but Tarrant County College tries pretty much to do just that. The faculty and staff know that the sink-or-swim theory of higher education doesn’t work very well in community colleges. Throw TCC’s students in the deep end, and many will sink.

That attrition would be costly, both to the students and to the community. And so, to keep students afloat until they can swim on their own – and to bring greater opportunities to those already able to navigate college waters, the College offers what it calls “wraparound” services, ministering to students’ needs whatever they be – academic, financial, personal – and on whatever level they are – high-ability or those so underprepared, scholastically and otherwise, that they need what Chancellor Hadley was fond of calling lots of hand-holding.

Of the dozens of programs that served special students and special student populations, these are some of the most outstanding.

Academic Boot Camp

Developmental courses, formerly called remedial, have been available from the first for students not ready for college-level work. But what do you do for would-be students who aren’t even ready for developmental? TCC’s answer is Academic Boot Camp.

Boot Camp began life in 2013 as the Academic Enrichment Program, but Chancellor Hadley began calling it boot camp and that’s what it eventually became. The program takes prospective students whose scores on the Texas Success Initiative, or TSI, placement test or whose Adult Basic Education levels are too low for developmental courses in reading, math and/or writing and undertakes to get them up to a ninth-grade level.

The program, free to the students, was originally funded by a $250,000 grant from Fort Worth’s Sid W. Richardson Foundation but is now part of each campus budget. It’s overseen by Larry Anderson, director of workforce services in the College’s Community and Industrial Education, or CIE, branch.

Anderson likens it to a “one-room schoolhouse with students taking math, reading and language arts at the same time.” Since it’s open entry, open exit with students studying at their own pace on the PLATO online learning platform, there’s a constant in-and-out flow. The program operated with part-time faculty through spring 2015, but Anderson was hopeful full-time faculty would be included in the 2015-16 budget.

When Boot Camp students finish the program, which may last weeks, months or an entire semester, they take or retake the TSI test. Anderson said about 27 to 30 percent of the students achieve the ninth-grade level necessary to move on to developmental courses, but that doesn’t necessarily mean they fall by the wayside. They are urged to re-enroll in Boot Camp, enroll in non-credit CIE courses or enroll in credit courses that don’t require success in developmental courses. A study by TCC’s Office of Institutional Intelligence and Research showed 61 percent of the Boot Camp students in fall 2014 were enrolled the following spring. “What I’m constantly telling the campuses is ‘retain, retain, retain,’” Anderson said.

Some of the non-credit programs are short-term career education programs. “Sometimes we counsel them that college may be a long time off and suggest career training,” Anderson said. “That way, they can start a career and maybe loop back into college later.”

The 27-30 percentage sounds low, Anderson conceded, but has to be seen in light of the extent to which students are underprepared. “We have students who have graduated from high school or who have their GED [General Educational Development] diploma who come in and find out they’re performing at a fourth- or fifth-grade level,” he said. “That’s a long way from ninth grade. These aren’t ‘bubble’ students who are just on the edge.

“It can be a very long process for some students, but our job is to take them wherever they are and guide them to whatever pathways to success fit their particular circumstances.”

Plus 50 Encore Completion Program

Entering college is tough enough if one’s just out of high school. Imagine what it’s like for people whose last experiences in education were in the era of overhead projectors. To help older students overcome their understandable jitters, TCC in 2014 joined the nationwide Plus 50 Initiative.

Plus 50 was established by the American Association of Community Colleges in 2008 to target people over 50, bringing them once more into a learning environment, helping them select the right training or degree program – with emphases on health care, social services and education – and providing necessary support, which is the hardest part.

“It’s critical for colleges to have supports in place to help baby boomers acclimate to college successfully so they can successfully complete training programs in these high-demand fields and get back to work,” said the AACC’s Mary Sue Vickers. [198]

TCC’s program dates from 2012 when it was awarded a grant from the AACC to become one of the 100-plus colleges selected to participate. In 2014, the College was selected as one of 12 colleges nationwide and the only one in Texas to be a part of the AACC’s Back to Work 50+ program, for which a second grant of $115,200 in scholarships was received.

Knowing that a friendly face and kind voice can be just as meaningful as the information imparted, TCC uses a “concierge” approach, giving every student a single point of contact. “Plus 50 adult learners can appreciate the ‘concierge’ concept and approach to the delivery of support services which will ensure their successful training and return to the workforce,” said Dr. Jackie Washington, vice president of community and industry education on Northeast Campus. “We hope to identify and provide support which successfully navigates the Plus 50 students around any barriers to the successful acquisition of credentials required to equip them for the current competitive job market.” [199]

Another source of comfort and information for enrollees are current students who volunteer as Plus 50 Navigators, helping newcomers in everything from searching websites to searching the campus library.

One 50 Plus student, Gloria Santos, was grateful for that hand-holding. “I didn’t know anything about computer basics or anything about computers,” she said. “I was really terrified.”

Santos overcame her qualms, earned her Office Assistant I certification, snagged a part-time job in the Plus 50 office on campus and now is aiming at Office Assistant II and a full-time job. She urges others thinking about participating in the program to “not be afraid to try it. It’s very helpful, convenient and it opens lots of doors. Once you’re in and you take your classes, you’re confident of doing what you want to do.”

CARE Teams

TCC believes firmly in prevention over cure, but it applies the latter not in ounces, but in BITs – psychospeak for behavioral intervention teams. However, the College instead chose to call the project CARE Teams since, as Northwest Vice President for Student Development Services Joe Rode said, “that sounded a little more ... well, a little more caring.”

CARE Teams – Consultation, Assessment, Resources, Education – were brought to TCC by Adrian Rodriguez, Rode’s counterpart at Trinity River Campus, who saw the need as soon as he arrived in 2009 and put the first team together. Rode followed as soon as he learned of the project, and by 2013 there was a team on every traditional campus, and plans are underway to add TCC Connect to the mix.

Every team consists of, at a minimum, the VP for student development services, a campus police officer, a representative from Disability Support Services, the director of counseling and a faculty member. Their objective, in addition to defusing potentially harmful situations, is to, in Rodriguez’ words, “create a culture of caring.” [200]

The teams meet weekly to discuss present cases and to update and review past ones. They keep up with literature on campus violence and in 2013 received training from Scott Lewis, president of the National Center for Higher Education Risk Management, as well as training under a grant established to help prevent student suicides.

The CARE Teams and other BIT teams on campuses across the country are good at what they do. Rode cited an FBI white paper that said BITs have “done more to prevent campus shootings than they [the FBI] could even dream about.

“We’re the boots on the ground. We see the students. We read their emails [sent or forwarded to them]. We get their blogs. We see what they write on essays in English class about killing their brothers or sisters or coming up here and committing mass homicide.”

Are they working at TCC? “We had 43 cases on this campus last year,” Rode said. “Now, the good news is that not a single student committed suicide or attacked anyone or set off a bomb or machine-gunned anyone.”

The team’s work, however, goes far beyond the team. Rodriguez’ culture of caring is intended to take in the entire campus community, especially the faculty, who are urged to refer incidents to the team. “This is a way to report students in our classrooms who seem to be in psychological or emotional distress,” Rode said. “We tell the faculty, ‘You’re our eyes. You’re the ones who will see the students we need to be visiting with.’”

The faculty are appreciative of having a vehicle with which to recommend help for troubled students. “I have referred students to the CARE Team who were in need of emotional and social support,” said Christi BlueFeather, associate professor of English at Trinity River. “All members from the top down helped me feel safe and the student in question valued. Mr. Rodriguez saw me immediately and explained the CARE Team process while making sure I had support to best impact our overall student success.

“I would strongly recommend the utilization of the CARE Team for all of TCC. When we observe students in crisis or coming close to the borderline, it is our responsibility to report to the CARE Team. Having been supported by the CARE Team, I know firsthand that this system works!” [201]

Stars of Tomorrow

It wasn’t planned, but Chancellor Leonardo de la Garza could not have scripted it any better as he stood before a meeting of the Tarrant County legislative delegation in January 2007. It was the delegation’s first meeting of the session and was noteworthy because of the presence of Senator Chris Harris, not normally an attendee.

Harris, known for aggressiveness bordering on belligerency, was on a mission to discover how state colleges and universities lucky enough to have found themselves on top of the rich Barnett Shale natural gas deposits planned to use their windfall income from drilling leases and royalties. Such income, he reasoned, should be taken into consideration when making appropriations requests to lawmakers.

After Harris posed his question, de la Garza explained that, at his suggestion, the Board of Trustees had voted to place all such income into an endowment, the earnings from which would fund a scholarship program for high school graduates throughout Tarrant County. Harris’ attitude at once flipped from confrontation to congratulations.

A year later with the details worked out, the Stars of Tomorrow program was announced. It was open to all graduating seniors in the top half of their class whose families were at or below specified income thresholds. The income ceiling for a family of four, for instance, was initially $57,000. Depending on how much federal or state financial aid students received, they could receive up to $4,000 per semester for a maximum of six semesters.

“Instead of wondering what today’s students could become,” said Trustee Robyn Winnett, “I can now look at them and see what they will become. The future is now much brighter for them all.” [202]

Mineral rights income wasn’t the only Stars of Tomorrow funding source. Industry pitched in too with American Airlines, Cabela’s, Chesapeake Energy, Coca-Cola, Dale Operations, FACTS Management, Follett, Nextwave Broadband and Thos. S. Byrne all making handsome donations.

De la Garza hoped that “this is only the beginning” and that the program could eventually pay tuition for “every member of every graduating class in Tarrant County.” [203] That lofty goal seemed far in the future, however, when the price of natural gas fell from just over $13 per MMBtu [one million British thermal units] in June 2006 to just under $3 per MMBtu in May 2015.

Still, however, the fund is healthy enough to where in fall 2009 the $57,000 threshold was increased to $77,000, making many more students eligible. Since the first awards in fall 2008, TCC’s Stars of Tomorrow have received $1,511,174 in awards.

Chancellor’s Emerging Leaders

When the nearly 40-year-old Velvet Trotter was asked along with some other students to stay behind after an orientation session in January 2015, she at first thought maybe it was because she was “old,” but the others were younger. Each was handed a flier – something about leadership.

“Have any of you seen this?” she asked. None had.

“Are any of you going to do this?” None were.

But Trotter thought, “Well, why not?” And it turned out to be a great decision.

She thus became one of the Chancellor’s Emerging Leaders, a program established in 2011 by Hadley to “offer an engaging experience for qualifying students to achieve their educational and professional goals.” [204]

The CEL program targets first-year-in-college students who fail all three portions of the Texas Success Initiative test and need help navigating higher education and convincing themselves they can handle it.

Trotter fell mostly into the latter category. “I couldn’t go to college,” she said, “because college was not for someone like me. I was ‘too dumb.’”

CEL is a modified learning community with students taking the same class – Learning Frameworks – though not at the same time and not at the same campus. The only time they get together is at four workshops.

“Workshop No. 1 is basic communication,” said Alexandra “Alex” Holloway, the program’s coordinator. “We teach students to find their own communication styles, how they relate to others and encourage them to stand up and ask others for help when they need it.”

The other first-year workshops deal with goal setting, time management and financial literacy. A representative from Wells Fargo does the financial piece, emphasizing the importance of budgeting, maintaining good credit and saving for retirement. “I wish I had had all that when I was a freshman in college,” Holloway said.

Second-year students have two workshops on job readiness where they not only learn about things like résumés and interviews but also about specific career fields in which they are interested. For the last, Holloway said, community and business leaders come from throughout the county. “These are people in top leadership positions,” she said, “like vice presidents of the JPS Health Network and Burlington Northern Santa Fe, school superintendents and police chiefs.”

Second-year students are used to mentor newcomers, and all CEL participants regularly interact with the chancellor and their campus presidents.

The program is designed to go beyond students’ years at TCC. “I follow up with them continuously,” Holloway said. “We have a closed Facebook group where they can keep in touch with friends they’ve made and where we can alert them about more opportunities at TCC. They know the door is always open for them.”

Trotter said the program helped her self-image. “My first semester, I made four A’s and a high B,” she said. “I pretty much beat up on myself for that B.” She made another B in the summer of 2015, but “I was not as rough on myself. I have a 3.7 grade point average – not too bad for a single mom with three kids.”

She thought she gained leadership skills and looked forward to mentoring new students. “I want to help other people be the best they can be,” she said. “It’s just about having a serving heart and realizing that they’re going through what you went through. They’re hopeless, and you’ve got to fill them with that hope.”

Family Empowerment Center

Just as it takes a village to raise a child, so it takes every member of a family to help a member through college, particularly if higher education is not a part of their family history. That’s the concept behind the Family Empowerment Center, or FEC, established at South Campus in 2013.

“Education is a family affair,” said Dr. Ernest Thomas, the former South Campus president who came up with the idea. “Much of the decision-making process in going to college or getting ready to go to college – skills necessary to be academically successful and information on navigating the bureaucracy – starts in the home. And many times, in homes where people have not had the opportunity for college – there’s a void in that information.”

To help fill that void, the FEC, instead of dealing mainly with the student, provides services encompassing the entire family, including nutrition, financial stability, transportation, financial aid, parenting skills, legal aid and many others.

“When you talk about families,” Thomas said, “you talk about dynamics that may include unemployment, drugs and alcohol, domestic abuse, teen pregnancy.”

Certainly, the FEC staff has neither the time nor expertise to provide such an array of information. To that end, Gladys Emerson, South Campus vice president of community and industrial education, has used her contacts to pull in assistance from partners such as United Way, Fort Worth Housing Authority, Texas Hunger Initiative, Tarrant County Bar Association, JPMorgan Chase Foundation and a dozen or so others.

Sometimes family members learning how to nurture their college student wind up as college students, themselves. The single mother there to help a child enroll may well discover a TCC educational program that can change the direction of her life, as well.

Not only the Center’s services, but the physical facility itself, housed in a renovated wing of the faculty office complex, caters to the whole family. There are conference rooms, classrooms, a demonstration kitchen and even a child activity room in which kids 2 to 6 can play educational games while parents watch on a large TV monitor.

Most of the problems brought through the Center’s doors are financial, said coordinator Nicole Minor, South’s director of college access and community outreach, with hunger and transportation rounding out the top three. “Our students have a difficult time managing what little they have,” she said. “One of the things I realized very quickly was that our service area contains more predatory lenders than opportunities for healthy meals.”

The Center strives to overcome what Minor calls “generational curses,” when family members, not understanding the time students must put both in attending classes and studying, expect students to get a job, perhaps full time, to help out. Then, too, some students use up their financial aid prematurely to help family finances.

Whatever the problem, the Family Empowerment Center is ready to help solve it. “It’s designed to approach that whole family as a one-stop shop,” Thomas said, “addressing every aspect of that family with regards to helping them and empowering them to pursue higher education.”

WINR

The year was 1977. Alice didn’t live here anymore, Helen Reddy was roaring and Tarrant County women seeking to emerge from under the shadows of fathers and husbands had a place to go for education, advice, comfort and support – the Women in New Roles, or WINR, program at South Campus.

WINR was the creation of Emily Lunday Garrett who had begun to see more and more older and divorced women signing up for her psychology courses. At the same time, in her role as a counselor, she saw many of these same women struggling with the turns their lives had taken and seeking a new direction. She started the program as a way to fuse the educational and counseling components.

Garrett understood full well what the women were feeling, having just been through her own divorce. “It’s funny,” she once told an interviewer, “because I never would have started the WINR program if I hadn’t been married to a jerk.”[205]

Garrett retired in 1988, but the program continued and flourished under Professor Triesha Light, coordinator until her own retirement in 2015. “She [Garrett] was brilliant, creative and very student-oriented,” Light said. “Emily believed strongly that we can make a difference in this world. ... She brought smiles, a caring heart and a shining light for all to see.” [206]

Garrett died in 2013, and a scholarship in her name was established at the TCC Foundation.

The program encompasses two credit courses – Psychology 2315: Psychology of Adjustment and Psychology 1300: Learning Frameworks/Career Focus. Included in and augmenting the studies are career planning and job search development – résumé writing, mock interviews, referrals and making connections with prospective employers.

Everything in the program revolves around three questions, Light said. “It starts with that journey into self and helping a woman answer ... Where have I been? Where am I now? Where am I going?” [207]

The program, expanded in 2002 to include the Northeast and Southeast campuses, has served more than 4,800 students. Success stories are legion. “I owe my life to that program,” said Karen Zapata, who went on to be a Truman Scholar and earn a master’s degree at UT-Arlington. “I was coming from a very dark place, but they accepted me and they helped me. I am eternally grateful.” [208]

The basic mission of WINR – helping students deal with major life changes – has not changed, but the program’s clientele has. What has been sauce for the goose has proven beneficial to the gander, as well. Students in the program now are almost 50 percent male and the name of the program has, of necessity, been changed to Winning in New Roles.

Cultivating Scholars

In April 2015, the Dallas-Fort Worth Chapter of the American Chemical Society listened to a report about a study on the relative amount of fatty acids in butter from corn-fed cows vs. grass-fed cows. Bovine fodder aside, the most impressive aspect of the presentation was the presenters – Victoria Nguyen, Mitzy Hernandez and Stephen Phillips – all TCC South Campus students.

“It is highly unusual for the ACS to hear a presentation by undergraduates,” Divisional Dean Carolyn Robertson told the Board of Trustees. “For them to be community college students is practically unheard of.” [209]

The students were part of the nationwide Cultivating Scholars program developed by the Council for Undergraduate Research, a non-profit organization founded in 1978 to support and promote high-quality undergraduate student-faculty collaborative research and scholarship. It was begun by a group of chemists in private liberal arts colleges but has since grown to include all disciplines at more than 650 colleges and universities.

At South Campus, for instance, students enroll in special research-oriented sections of chemistry, biology, education, engineering, English and psychology. They can tackle a topic by themselves or work with a partner or in groups. A project can be cross-disciplinary, with participants from different classes.

Students select topics, pursue and cite quality research, develop a thesis, compose abstracts on how to develop the topic and finally undertake their own research using creditable sources.

“What we hope to instill in students is the ability to select quality research material and then be able to identify the credibility of the published material,” chemistry instructor Martha Gilchrist said. [210]

Judy Lane’s English class project, for instance, allowed her to do in-depth research on her favorite author. “It was fun, but it was also challenging,” she told trustees. “I was exploring the life and writings of J.R.R. Tolkien [The Hobbit, The Lord of the Rings], and the project forced me to see the material in a new light. I made new connections between facts, and it was fun to have an ‘aha’ moment.”[211]

Projects from Land and Nguyen were among 64 presented on posters on November 20, 2014, at South’s second annual Cultivating Scholars event. Three presentations were judged Best in Show, and their student researchers each received $250 scholarships.

Transfer Centers

When a community college student is looking to transfer to a university, there’s lots to be learned from the school catalog ... or the website ... or from a visiting recruiter. But there’s nothing like being on the campus to get the flavor of the place. That’s why TCC’s Transfer Centers take them there.

Talk about going the extra mile!

“It’s kind of like testing them out,” said Laura Escamilla, coordinator of the Trinity River Campus center. “You get a feel for it. Is this the place you see yourself?”

Different TCC campuses have different approaches. Trinity River was the first to get in the campus visit mode with its “Trinity River on the Go.” Most of the time, they didn’t go too far – TCU, UT-Arlington, North Texas, Texas Wesleyan, UT-Dallas.

“The farthest we’ve gone has been to Tarleton State in Stephenville,” Escamilla said. “But I just got an email and found out we’re going to Texas A&M for the first time. They’ve been kind enough to charter a 50-passenger bus for us.”

The trip to College Station would be, of necessity, a down-and-back affair. Anything overnight would require far too much in waivers and paperwork to say nothing of expenses to students. Also, the trip was a cooperative venture in that, while the bus left from Trinity River, it carried students from multiple campuses.

Lots of planning go into these road trips. “We provide the marketing, the transportation and a little bit of guidance,” Escamilla said. There also has to be coordination with other campuses and with the universities. Instead of just showing up, the Transfer Centers try to tie into an event already on the universities’ calendars.

“I always try to connect with a program they [the universities] have going,” she said. “For example, UTA has the Maverick Express, and UNT has its Transfer Open House. They’ve already put a lot of time and effort into planning a great event at their school, so why don’t we just connect with that?”

Students like the idea of going to visit the university campuses in groups, she said. Sometimes, TCC students who live in Arlington will drive to downtown Fort Worth to take the bus from Trinity River back to UTA. “There’s some comfort that there’s someone with them because they’re kind of scared to go by themselves.”

Northeast Campus has a slightly different approach. The university visits are the third of three segments in the Northeast Transfer Academy. The first session, Transfer Essentials, has the Transfer Center staff give out essential information on such basics as application deadlines, admission requirements, scholarships and financial aid. The second, Getting Interactive, is where the would-be transfers hear directly from representatives from area universities. It’s only in the third session, Tour de Transfer, when the students hit the road.

The university visits are more than walking the tree-shaded paths or touring the buildings. The students can also meet and talk with students and faculty in the specific programs they’re considering. That, said Escamilla, is what students rate highest about the experience.

Sometimes, the TCC students fall in love with the universities. Sometimes, they don’t, but that’s OK. “Sometimes that particular school might not be the best fit for them,” Escamilla said, “but the overall experience lets them know they really want to transfer somewhere.”

First Choice

TCC is justly proud of its graduates, the thousands of men and women who have gone on to be everything from doctors to dancers to drill press operators. The College was their springboard to success.

But TCC takes special pride in a very special group of graduates – students for whom success is measured in the ability to socialize with others, to live independently, to get and hold jobs. After all, these students – graduates of Southeast Campus’ First Choice Program – exemplify TCC’s mission to serve the educational needs of the entire community.

First Choice was launched in 1997 when Dr. Carrie Tunson, Southeast’s vice president for community and industry education, was approached by a group of parents whose special-needs children had few options after graduating from high school. With the help of such organizations as Tarrant County Mental Health and Mental Retardation, the Association for Retarded Citizens [ARC] and Goodwill Industries, Tunson put together a program “that creates a pathway for individuals with special needs to increase their quality of life by enhancing academic, living, social and employability skills...” [212]

The program is offered in four modules in keeping with the needs and abilities of the student. Module 1 – First Choice – teaches social and personal contact skills leading to the ability to live independently. Module 2 – Vocational Choice – is for students who want specialized training leading to employment. A special subset of the module is linked with Southeast Campus’ Culinary Arts Program and teaches the basics of the food service industry.

Module 3 – Developmental Choice – has courses to develop reading, writing and math skills with an eye toward helping the students transition to the regular college credit courses TCC offers. Other classes deal with practical math skills, money management, art, geography and history.

The final module – Collegiate Choice – further prepares students to move into the regular College curriculum, taking on such topics as goal setting, memory and learning, note taking, reading and marking textbooks, preparing for and taking exams, and practical information on applying for college and financial aid.

First Choice is all about providing opportunities for young people with few options, and an opportunity is all they seek.

“All we want for our special children is to give them an opportunity to reach their maximum potential in skills needed to allow them greater independence,” said parent Lawrence Odum. “That’s the key – independence.” [213]

Men of Color Mentoring

The program’s name says it all in terms of what it does. Why such a program exists at TCC is also pretty much self-evident when one looks at the numbers. Of the 1,410 first-time-in-college African-American and Hispanic males who enrolled in TCC in fall 2010, only 44 percent remained as students a year later – far less than any other demographic.

“They represent the most marginalized group in our society,” said Dr. Anthony Walker, director of student success and completion. “Of all our students, they’re the ones who need help the most.”

They receive that help one-on-one, thanks to men from the TCC faculty and staff – most, but not all, men of color themselves – who volunteer their time as mentors. They act as friends, counselors, confidants, tutors, monitors and cheerleaders – doing whatever it takes to help the students achieve success both academically and in terms of pride and self-worth.

In addition to working with their mentors, students choose from a variety of group events ranging from guest speakers to a 3-on-3 basketball tournament.

The MCM effort began as the African-American Male Mentoring Program in fall 2013 on Trinity River Campus. It started small with just 13 students, but those students wound up 19 percent more successful in their courses – success defined as making a grade of C or better – than those African-American students not in the program. Funded partially by a federal Title III grant, the program was broadened to include Hispanics and eventually spread to all five campuses.

Results have been encouraging. In fall 2013, participating African-American students were successful in their courses at a rate of 64.9 percent compared to 57 percent for non-participants. Hispanic participants had a success rate of 77.2 percent compared to 67.7 percent for those not in the program.

Less encouraging are the numbers of participants. The program grew from 103 students in fall 2013 to 118 the next fall, but that represented only a tiny fraction of the male student population. Getting young men into the program appears to be as difficult, or more so, than having them achieve success once there.

“That’s it,” said Student Success Coordinator Fred Sandifer, who runs the program. “That’s the tough part – getting them into the program.”

To recruit, Sandifer visits campuses on the days student clubs meet in the Student Center to attract new members, sets up his own table and buttonholes likely looking candidates as they pass by. “Some tell me, ‘No, I don’t want to do that,’ but I can be real persuasive.”

Often, he’ll ask the prospect where he’s walking and then walk with him, waxing eloquent about the program’s benefits. Once he can get them to a meeting, hearing from program graduates about what MCM did for them, they’re usually on board.

The students who take the plunge are vocal in their praise. “I walked into the room where they were having their meeting,” Kameron Gilliam recalled. “It was very, very inspiring. The program helps you be a better person, a better man – more focused.”

Would Gilliam have succeeded without Men of Color Mentoring? “I’m going to go 50-50 on that,” he said, “but it sure helped to have someone extra, someone to motivate you.”

Children’s Center

Crispin Cortez’ son Jared was no sooner born than his dad signed him up for college. Not Harvard or Yale, but Tarrant County College — the Children’s Center at TCC Northeast Campus, that is.

“That’s just how good of a school it is,” the Haltom High School vice principal said. ]214]

Indeed, the reputation the Center has built since opening in 1974 is such that applicants generally must spend at least two years on a waiting list, and being a TCC employee doesn’t allow you to cut in line. It’s first-come, first-served, and even former Chancellor C.A. Roberson had to wait his turn before his granddaughter could be enrolled.

The Child Development Program, for which the Center is a student laboratory, was one of Texas’ first and came in response to a growing need. “This was a changing time when mothers were going back to work and child care centers were opening up,” said Dr. Faye Murphy, the program’s first coordinator. “The state was saying, ‘We’ve got to have training for these people.’”

Part of the state’s program requirements called for a laboratory school where students could work with children. TCC’s Center was funded by the 1971 bond election, and Murphy was charged with the design. “We carefully analyzed what it took to have a children’s center so that you could pay your expenses,” said Murphy, who retired in 2011 as District director of program development. “We did a lot of studying and determined that we needed spaces for 92 children.”

The Center’s capacity is now about 50 children because of the stringent teacher-student ratio required for accreditation by the National Association for the Education of Young Children. “The requirements for accreditation are much higher than those the state has for licensing child care centers,” said coordinator Pati Cates. “For instance, we have only five two-year-olds to every teacher while the state allows 11 per teacher. I feel sorry for those children. I feel sorry for the teachers, too!” [215]

Far from being just a babysitter, the Center is a school where the children learn along with the TCC students but in a different way. “We know that children learn through play, so it’s all ‘play days’ with real materials,” said former Coordinator Kathy Morrison. “We have no worksheets and no coloring sheets.”[216]

“Not anything and everything goes, you understand,” Cates said. “We are a controlled environment – structured with clearly defined learning areas ... but within that environment, we have flexibility. The teachers listen to the children and encourage and extend what they are interested in.”217 [217]

Field trips are included but without having to leave the campus. Children might visit the College print shop, library or a science lab – even the president’s office. “You remember Dr. [Herman] Crow?” Murphy said of a former Northeast president. “He would smile all over himself when he saw the children coming.”

Cornerstone

Kelly Powe’s sisters, she said, were very, very gifted.

“I was not,” she said, and so when a South Campus friend recommended the Cornerstone Honors Program, “I thought that looked really good.”

But Cornerstone held other attractions for Powe aside from dealing with sibling rivalry. There was that scholarship, $500 per year for two years. Also, she said, “It provided an opportunity for me to grow my mind. I now see the world in a different light.”

Cornerstone began in 1991 as a humanities-based program with students together in honors classes. It foundered later in the decade when funding for both scholarships and faculty stipends were reduced and also lost part of its focus when students majoring in engineering or the sciences were added. These students, instead of being together in honors courses, could turn regular sections into honors sections through extra work or projects.

All the above led to Cornerstone disappearing late in the ’90s at every campus except Northwest. “I wasn’t here then,” said Dr. Eileen Preston, Northwest biology teacher and Cornerstone coordinator, “but from what I know about Northwest Campus, I can tell you it flourished here because of faculty and staff support. We have faculty who believe in this program and want to teach in this program.”

Cornerstone’s revival to become Districtwide once more, Preston said, came from Chancellor Hadley. “I saw this as something a student demographic on every single campus could benefit from, and she agreed,” Preston said. “We have all these amazing programs for developmental education, but every campus has students who were honors in high school who are very gifted. We need to have something for everybody.”

The new Cornerstone Program still has a humanities emphasis with special sections offered in humanities, philosophy, history, psychology and government, but other courses can get an “honors” transcript designation through a contract to complete extra, more rigorous assignments.

So why should a prospective student choose a community college honors program instead of going into one of the area university programs? “You want to know?” Preston said. “Fifteen credit hours at TCC costs about $825. Fifteen credit hours at TCU costs about $19,000, and even at UTA and UNT you’re looking at close to $5,000.”

On top of those savings, she said, TCC Cornerstone graduates frequently score major scholarships into those area university honors programs.

Powe was in the first wave of graduates after Cornerstone was revived at South. She came back to TCC in fall 2015 to get a few more courses under her belt before transferring to UT-Arlington to complete a mathematics degree.

Cornerstone, she said, “made me think out of the box and to be better in considering the opinion of others. It’s nice to be able to have an intelligent conversation without it turning into an argument.”

Visions Unlimited

It’s a long road to college graduation, but Melissa Bates’ road was longer than most.

After graduating from high school in 1998, Bates wanted to attend college but was needed at home to care for her sick mother. When her mother died in 2004, “my whole world fell apart.”217

She had no income and had to sell her mother’s house to pay debts. She stayed with various friends and family members, trying to find a job but with no luck. She attempted suicide and, by 2006, was homeless.

While working in the soup kitchen at Fort Worth’s Union Gospel Mission in 2007, she heard about Visions Unlimited, TCC’s new program for the homeless. “I jumped at the chance,” she said. “I have been literally going ever since.” [218]

Visions Unlimited grew out of the Gulf Coast hurricanes of 2005 when the College was looking for a way to help evacuees who made their way to Tarrant County. The best thing TCC had to offer them was education. Psychology faculty members Glenda Nichols and Dorothy “Tina” Jenkins worked with Union Gospel Mission, the Salvation Army and the Presbyterian Night Shelter to find people they thought could make the transition from homeless person to college student. Bates was one of them.

Visions students take two classes in their first semester – Psychology of Adjustment and Learning Frameworks. The first emphasizes communication, life skills and personal development. The second applies theory to practical aspects such as career interest inventories, study skills, resumes and mock job interviews. At the same time, students are exposed to college life – everything from library research to leadership conferences.

“When you are homeless, the goal is survival,” Jenkins said. She likened Visions Unlimited to a life preserver, figuratively telling students, “Take hold of this.” [219]

Of the 141 students who have entered the program, 73 percent successfully completed the first two courses and 70 percent enrolled at TCC the next semester. Bates was the first to earn a degree and was singled out for praise at the Commencement ceremony in May 2010.

“Sometimes, you have to go through the hardest things in life to reach the best thing in life,” she said. “If it wasn’t for my mother dying, I’d still be home taking care of her.” [220]

Bates was the first but not the only person from Visions to persevere to graduation. “We have people going through the finish line,” Jenkins said. [221]

One of those people, LaDoris Pope, not only went through the finish line at TCC but kept going. She’s now working on her master’s degree in psychology and is also helping out in a grant-funded position as a Visions Unlimited coordinator.

What did the program mean to her? “In one word, I would say, ‘everything,’” she said. “And I say ‘everything’ because I was broken into a million pieces and looking for a way to put myself back together. The program came along and equipped me with the tools I needed to do that.”

Heather Zipper also reported a life-changing experience from Visions, but it might well affect more lives than just her own. “Recently, I graduated from the University of Texas at Arlington with my Bachelor of Social Work,” she said. “My now 8-year old-son said, ‘Mom, congratulations on graduating!’ So, not only has it changed my life but has also left a legacy for my family. My son gets to grow up knowing it's possible to go to college.” [222]

Supplemental Instruction

When TCC students are having a tough time in a particularly difficult course, the best source of help may be the person in the next seat – not a classmate, but someone who’s been there, done that.

That’s the surprisingly simple premise of Supplemental Instruction, or SI, a program where students can turn to someone who has taken that same class under the same teacher and been highly successful. It’s peer tutoring but with a twist. The SI leaders, as the student aides are known, sit in and take notes on every class and lab, and then meet in scheduled sessions with students who need a concept explained or part of the teacher’s lecture clarified.

Campus SI coordinators in choosing leaders don’t necessarily look for students who breezed through the course without breaking a sweat. “I don’t always hire those students,” said Northwest SI coordinator Ryan Ferguson, “because they don’t necessarily understand what it’s like to have a professor lecture to you for an hour and have no idea of what they said.”

Ferguson is a been-there, done-that kind of guy himself. He was an SI leader at the University of North Texas and coordinated UNT’s SI program before joining Northwest in 2014.

Not every course has an SI leader, he said. “TCC looks for courses with high enrollments in which at least 30 percent of the students have grades of D, F or W – courses where we get the biggest bang for our bucks – biology, math, chemistry, economics – stuff like that.”

The SI program grew from a summer faculty project that led to a committee studying how the program worked at other colleges and universities and might best work at TCC. One committee member was Dr. Amy Mullen, Northwest associate professor of biology, who uses SI leaders in her anatomy and physiology courses – historically among TCC’s most difficult.

“It’s been fantastic,” she said. “The students have very much enjoyed it and benefited from it. I’ve seen better engagement in class, and I’ve seen that students are interacting with each other more. Not only are they attending SI sessions, but SI is encouraging them to form their own study groups.”

The best thing about the program is that it works. Dr. Chris Darville, director of student learning success, piloted the first program at South Campus and now directs it Districtwide. “I think we have a wonderful program,” he said, “Last spring, students who participated in SI had a 75.2 percent success rate as compared to 59.6 for non-participants.”

Darville is almost as proud of quantity as he is of quality. The national SI center in Missouri ranks TCC, with slightly more than 100 SI leaders, as the nation’s fourth-largest program and the largest among community colleges. And there’s plenty of room for growth, he said: “We’ve had nothing but support from the board, the chancellor and Dr. Gates Black. We’re digging deeper into the data, seeing how we can obtain some smarter metrics. Once we have that, I don’t think we’ll have any issue with expanding the program.”

* * *

The extent to which TCC goes out of its way to provide services to students is impressive. But is it too much? Could the wraparound turn into a protective cocoon, insulating the students from the realities they will find later at universities and in the workplace?

“Not at all,” said Vice Chancellor Joy Gates Black. “For the most part, the services we provide only provide equity, which enables students to compete on the same level as other students. By creating equity, we empower students to become self-advocates.”

Chapter 22: Fifty Years and Counting

Aside from the textbook and TCC Connect flaps, the years leading to the College’s 50th anniversary in 2015 were, for the most part, placid and productive. Enrollment rose. Another reaccreditation milestone was reached. New facilities – Centers of Excellence – opened, and more were on the drawing board. Turnover on the Board of Trustees and in the top administration was minimal and orderly. TCC became debt-free for the first time in its history, and the Great Recession’s end brought more funding from both the state and tax levies.

And yet below all the positives, there ran an undercurrent of uncertainty. Faculty remained distrustful of administration, the board seemed to lack cohesion and – most alarming of all – the chancellor’s health posed questions for the future.

The nationwide recession that began in 2008 provided a jump-start to enrollment, continuing a pattern consistent over the decades for community colleges. As the economy worsens, community college enrollments rise as more people go back to college for training or retraining.

Thus, TCC enrollment, which had increased slowly after 2000, took off in fall 2008, jumping 12 percent to a record 44,355 for credit classes. The growth continued, breaking the 50,000 mark in 2011 and reaching a record 50,765 in 2013.

As the national economy rebounded, TCC’s enrollment – as usual – declined but only slightly, and the first day of classes in fall 2015 saw a headcount of 51,669, and the census date figure was 51,705, another all-time high.

Just after the record enrollment of 2013 came another success when a team from the Southern Association of Colleges and Schools Commission on Colleges made its decennial descent on TCC for a reaccreditation visit. The previous visit in 2003 had resulted in seven recommendations. Steven Hagstrom, the Northeast Campus library director who had been named SACS liaison and director of the Institutional Self-Study, vowed he would resign unless fewer recommendations came this time around.

He need not have worried. The committee handed down only four recommendations, and three of those dealt with planning and institutional effectiveness – areas in which the College knew it was deficient. Hagstrom’s job was safe, but then it had never really been in danger. He retired, as planned, the next spring.

TCC had not waited on the SACS committee’s recommendations before going to work to improve the planning process. The College in October 2011 had commissioned a study by the BOKA Powell consulting firm to forecast the future for TCC and to point the way toward a plan of work.

BOKA Powell’s Tom Dyer presented the company’s initial findings in March 2012. Enrollment, he said, would grow rapidly, exceeding 150,000 by 2030, and the College needed to start planning for such an eventuality. Additionally, the present Facilities Master Plan and Academic Master Plan should be fused into a single Institutional Plan. The board eventually adopted this recommendation and created an Institutional Planning Committee as a standing part of board structure.

Dyer gave his final report in September 2012. The forecast enrollment growth, he said, would require “significant expansion of space and optimum utilization of off-campus instruction through dual credit and distance learning.” [223] Dyer used maps of each campus to indicate where the expansion should be, and they were, indeed, significant, taking up most of the $375 million the study’s 14 recommendations were estimated to cost.

This figure was met with an element of sticker shock – little wonder since the board was still smarting from the Trinity River East Campus price tag. Other elements of the study, however, took root and became integral parts of the Institutional Plan. Innovation Forums, for instance, were established on each campus as places where people could take an idea they thought would make TCC a better place. Ideas could be captured and processed to see if they had merit and would fit in with the overall plan.

Ideas ranging from new buildings and degrees to tweaks of counseling procedures would be subject to a DREAM score, with points given for Diversity, Relevance, Engagement, Access and Metrics. A project’s DREAM score would govern its priority.

“What is so appealing about the Innovation Forum is that it allows us to reduce costly duplication of effort and build opportunities for collaboration that span campus and office barriers,” Chancellor Hadley said. “The ability to identify similar ideas and pull their creators together early in the incubation process will allow Tarrant County College to gain the full benefit of our wealth of knowledge and expertise.” [224]

Not all new facilities, the study said, should consist of classrooms, labs and such. Dyer said since studies have shown that students who spend time on campus interacting with each other and with faculty tend to be more successful, TCC should have more “sticky spaces” – places where students could go to be with one another or by themselves for studying or any other activity.

The notion of sticky spaces struck a responsive chord with trustees, who voted to dedicate income from a $2-per-semester-hour tuition increase to fund more of them. They would receive a report in July 2013 that South Campus had 35 such spaces, Northeast and Northwest 33 each, Southeast 31, Trinity River 29 and Trinity River East 20.

Sticky spaces were by no means the only additions to facilities. Construction projects from 2013 on focused on “centers of excellence,” buildings or complexes dedicated to a family of academic and technical programs that would draw students from throughout the county. One such complex was already in place with Trinity River East Campus having been renamed the Trinity River Campus East Center for Health Care Professions.

Northwest was the next to have a center, but it wasn’t on the campus proper. Officials at Hillwood Properties, creators of Alliance Airport, had long wanted TCC to build a facility at the airport to house Northwest’s Aviation Maintenance Technology Program and a new Professional Pilot Program, but trustees balked at the cost, estimated at about $90 million.

Eventually, however, a 163,500-square-foot Alliance facility owned by Bell Helicopter came on the market and was snapped up by the College for a comparatively modest $16 million. On September 17, 2014, after about $4 million in renovations, officials cut the ribbon, opening the Northwest Campus Center of Excellence for Aviation, Transportation and Logistics. It would house the aviation programs – Avionics Technology, Airframe Maintenance, Advanced Composite Technology and Professional Pilot Training – but also the Logistics and Supply Chain Management programs.

The opportunity to buy the facility came at exactly the right time, Hadley said. “We just didn’t have the money to invest in order to do it the way we wanted,” she said. “Along comes the opportunity to buy this facility from Bell Helicopter. It was an option we could not afford to pass up. We are very pleased to present this facility to the people of Tarrant County. We have indeed built for the future.” [225]

South was to follow. After five years of planning and construction, the South Campus Center of Excellence for Energy Technology opened in fall 2015 to house existing programs in Construction Management; Heating, Air Conditioning and Refrigeration Technology; and Construction Management; as well as new programs in Oil and Gas Technology and in Renewable Energy.

In addition to housing classrooms and labs, the CEET will be a classroom in itself. Recognized by the U.S. Green Building Council with the highest level of LEED certification, the building is constructed in such a way that its energy-saving infrastructure is clearly visible to students.

“We wanted the building to be a teaching facility itself, rather than just classrooms and labs,” said Jeff Rector, who teaches air conditioning and refrigeration. “We wanted the building to actually show students what we are talking about in the classroom.” [226]

Northeast Campus was next in line. Trustees and administrators for years had been batting around the idea of a performing arts center that would replace the outmoded and outgrown Fine Arts Building. The City of North Richland Hills was eager to partner with the College to share the performance space and was ready to kick in $7.2 million to help build the surrounding infrastructure.

Trustees initially greeted the idea the same way as they had the Alliance Airport project – too expensive and too soon after the downtown campus controversy. Talks between TCC and North Richland Hills officials continued, however, and by fall 2015 the project seemed to be off life support. One change in the plan, important from the College’s point of view, was that the Center of Excellence for Visual, Technical and Performing Arts, as it was to be named, would be constructed on the campus instead of immediately to the west across Grapevine Highway. This would require a modification of Richland Hills’ Tax Increment Financing, or TIF, Zone, the mechanism to raise the $7.2 million, but the city seemed willing.

In terms of the Board of Trustees, TCC stayed off the public’s radar after contentious elections in 2008 and 2010. Neither Louise Appleman nor Gwendolyn Morrison drew an opponent in 2012, but the contentious election came when it was time for the board to choose officers. Robyn Winnett nominated Greenhill for re-election as president, but  somewhat unexpectedly, Morrison nominated Appleman. When the vote came, Appleman was elected with her vote and those of Morrison, Vandergriff and – in a turnaround from 2010 – O.K. Carter. Since four votes were a clear majority, there was no call for a vote for Greenhill. Thus the board presidency in the space of four years had gone from Ardis Bell to Appleman to Joe Hudson to Greenhill and back to Appleman.

Then – thanks to Texas politics – all trustees got an extra year in their terms. Holding primary elections and possible runoffs in every even-numbered year meant that county election administrators would be hard put to conduct other elections, such as those for community college trustees. These other governmental entities, thanks to legislation in 2011, had an option of moving from even to odd years, which TCC did.

As a result, the election that normally would have been conducted in May 2014 was put off a year. Conrad Heede and Kristin Vandergriff were elected without opposition, but Robyn Winnett, whose lack of attendance and participation had been a concern to her colleagues, chose not to run. Her District 1 spot was taken by former student Teresa “Teri” Ayala, a contract manager for HP Enterprise Services, who outpolled Josh Barber, another alum, 3,555 votes to 2,454.

“I was truly blessed to have parents who valued education,” said Ayala, an adjunct instructor in addition to being a former student. “We must collaborate with elementary, middle and high school pyramids to implement parent-university programs that provide families with effective tools to help them grow through education.” [227]

The board election had gone off smoothly, but the subsequent election of board officers at the May 21 meeting indicated some unhappiness with Appleman’s leadership. Morrison nominated Appleman for re-election as president, but Heede nominated O.K. Carter. Appleman was elected, getting her own vote plus those of Morrison, Vandergriff and Ayala.

There were more less-contentious changes among the College’s top administrators. David Wells retired at the end of March 2014 after 35 years of service. He had the unusual distinction of having been on the Cabinet/CELT in three distinct roles – Provost of the Community Campus, Vice Chancellor for Operations and Planning Services and Vice Chancellor for Academic Affairs.

At the next board meeting, Hadley announced that the offices of academic affairs and student success would be rolled into one under the leadership of Joy Gates Black. It was a move made possible, Gates Black said, by Achieving the Dream. “That was really our vehicle for helping us to look at things differently,” she said. “It really put us in a different mindset of how we might help our students to succeed.”

That mindset resulted in so much close collaboration between academics and student services that Gates Black and Wells used to joke that they were joined at the hip. “We have created these cross-functional teams as part of Achieving the Dream with staff and faculty working together,” she said, “and she [Hadley] felt that it was time to put the two [areas of responsibility] back together because you can’t work in isolation.”

The other two changes came at the presidential level. Larry Darlage retired at the end of August 2014 after 18 years leading Northeast Campus. His retirement, however, lasted only from 5 p.m. August 31 to 8 a.m. September 1 when he took over as principal of Crown of Life Lutheran School in Colleyville. “My wife says, ‘I married you for better or for worse, but not for lunch,’” Darlage said of his “retirement.” [228]

Darlage’s replacement was Dr. Allen Goben, a 25-year veteran of community colleges whose previous positions had included the chancellorship of Western Governors College-Missouri and the presidency of Heartland Community College in Normal, Ill. Himself a community college alumnus and first-generation college student, he held degrees from Iowa State University, Drake University and his doctorate from the Community College Leadership Program at UT-Austin.

The other presidential change came on July 31, 2015, the very day of TCC’s 50th anniversary. That was the last day on the job for Dr. Tahita Fulkerson, founding president of Trinity River Campus, who had begun as an adjunct English teacher on South Campus in the early 1970s and then spent 35 years as a full-timer as faculty member, department chair, dean, vice president, associate vice chancellor and, finally, president.

She recalled how the final appointment came about. In 2006, she was working with the architects designing the downtown campus, coordinating their work with the faculty of the technical programs to be moved from other campuses. Finally, she said, when the plan was near completion, “We got it all together, and then he [Leonardo de la Garza] asked me if I would be the president. I was shocked because I hadn’t had that as a goal, but it happened, and it’s been terrific.” [229]

The job of filling Fulkerson’s shoes went to Dr. Sean Madison, who came to TCC from the presidency of the Judson A. Samuel South Campus of Broward College in Florida. He also spent several years at Miami Dade College. He held degrees from Morehouse University, Boston University and his doctorate from Florida International University.

The two new presidents were stepping into a situation that was, financially at least, probably more stable than that of any community college in the state, if not the nation. Property values had rebounded from the Great Recession, meaning TCC could count on millions more in ad valorem tax revenue. The state was healthier, too, and the College’s yearly appropriations for both Fiscal Years 2016 and 2017 would see almost $2 million increases as a result.

The signature financial feel-good moment, however, came on February 15, 2015, when the final payment – $98 – was made on TCC’s last outstanding general obligation bond. The College was thus tax-free for the first time since the first bonds were sold in 1966 to build the South and Northeast campuses. As was done with those original bonds, the last bonds went up in smoke – literally – as they were ceremonially burned by former Chancellors Joe Rushing, C.A. Roberson and Leonardo de la Garza on August 1 at the College’s 50th Anniversary Celebration on the banks of the Trinity River just north of the Trinity River Campus.

That celebration took place on a hot, cloudless day, but there were some virtual clouds on TCC’s horizon that were hard to ignore. First was the fissure on the Board of Trustees. For the board president to be elected by a single vote is never a good sign, but it was hard to tell how deep the difficulties lay. Most board meeting votes continued to be unanimous, but Carter’s fiscal conservatism led to increasingly frequent votes against his colleagues, in which Heede sometimes joined him.

It was far from the public, bare-knuckle wrangles that had become routine at some local school boards and city councils, but it was unusual and unsettling to veteran employees. Of course, those employees might have been well served to remember that healthy, civil disagreement within a governing board is not necessarily a bad thing, especially in view of the charges of complacency leveled in the media during the downtown campus controversy.

Much more concerning to the campus communities, which had little or no direct interaction with or knowledge of board members, was the widening gulf between faculty and administration. “In any case where there is a labor-management dichotomy, people are going to bellyache,” said David Clinkscale, who retired at the end of 2014-15 as one of TCC’s most revered and respected teachers. “But it [faculty morale] is as low as I’ve seen it now in 37 years. The sense of frustration is palpable.”

The faculty’s discontent was directed mostly not at the campus leadership but at the central office administrators. “Pretty much, I think, if you ask a person working on the campus, they love it,” South’s Kristina Miranda said. “They love the people they work with. They love the people across the hall. They even, most of the time, love their campus president. But once you step outside that, that’s the part they really don’t like.”

Northeast’s Gary Smith, also a 2015 retiree, has seen, for years, “a movement toward more and more control from the District level. ... The major change I’ve seen in the bureaucracy has been that the faculty feel – and I think it’s true in many instances – that they have less and less control over their own destiny, and they’re being told how and what to do more so than in history.

“Now, the people who do that [controlling] can deny that, and how do you respond? Perception is reality, and that’s what the faculty perceive.”

Clinkscale said that for most of his career, there was a sense among faculty that they and the administration were generally moving in the same direction and that central administrators sought, valued and took into account faculty opinion. Now, he said, “there’s a widely held belief that collegial governance at TCC is a myth, that governance is basically top-down. Decisions are made, and then the faculty are asked to come along with those decisions. But the ideas of the faculty generally do not get a hearing until after decisions are made.”

“That’s the piece that worries me the most,” said former Trinity River President Tahita Fulkerson, “that they [the faculty] don’t feel they have a voice in the world they live in.”

Not only did many faculty think governance was increasingly top-down but also that the top was getting pretty heavy. The numbers seemed to reinforce that perception. The number of job titles in the two salary classifications immediately below the Cabinet/CELT doubled from 23 to 46 between 2004-05 and 2014-15. In 2004-05, the College had no associate vice chancellors. Ten years later, there were nine.

“That does not go down well,” Miranda said, “and it’s being looked at ... well, having more wardens, I guess, if you’re a prisoner. You just have more people watching over you and who are going to give you more things to do.”

The common textbook initiative and TCC Connect’s structure seemed to draw the most faculty ire. Not only were they not consulted about changes that directly affected how and where they taught, but they did not have a clear picture of why the changes were being made. Robin Birt, who left the classroom to become director of student learning readiness, said that when she was a member of the faculty Joint Consultation Committee during the implementation of Achieving the Dream, “a lot of what happened [faculty disquiet] was because an explanation of ‘why’ never came about. ... The JCC would ask, and a lot of times it was ‘because I said so.’”

Hadley readily conceded that decisions could have been better communicated but insisted that the proper role for faculty input is into how something is going to work, not if it’s going to be done. Of TCC Connect, she said, “I’m building a campus just like we built Trinity River. We didn’t ask the faculty, ‘Tell us what you think.’ Have we ever done that in building a new campus? ... Now, that’s a point where we have a huge divide. I don’t think the faculty is designed to run the College.”

As to governance being top-down, Hadley didn’t disagree. “Because I’ve consistently asked the faculty, every time I’ve ever talked with the faculty, ‘Give me your ideas. Tell me what you think. Tell me what you’d like to do.’ I haven’t gotten anything.”

A common faculty complaint was that Hadley had moved too far, too fast on too many fronts – TCC Connect coming in on top of the textbook project on top of Achieving the Dream giving the faculty what Northwest’s Joe Rode called “initiative fatigue.”

Hadley again didn’t disagree. “The fact that I want everything done yesterday perhaps is intimidating to some people,” she said, “but at the same time I think we must have a sense of urgency. If we are truly going to be a 21st century college and be able to deal with the students and all of the things they present to us ... we have no options except to move.

“So, when I look at it, I’m in a Catch-22 position. I either lead with boldness, doing the things I think need to be done for students, or I wait for everybody else to say, ‘Let’s do this.’”

Board disagreements and faculty angst, however, were far from the most pressing uncertainty as Tarrant County College headed into its second half-century. Underlying and potentially affecting every aspect of the College was concern over the chancellor’s health.

Immediately after the October 2014 board meeting, Hadley met privately with CELT members and with members of the JCC, telling each group that, because of health problems, she would need to take days off from time to time. The next day, an email to all College employees relayed this information and asked that everyone respect her privacy.

Naturally, speculation as to the nature of the illness began immediately, but it would be Hadley herself who partially ended the conjecture at the November board meeting, talking freely about visits to the famed M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston. She gave additional information in December as – weak and needing assistance to walk down a Trinity River Campus hall lined with applauding faculty and staff – she attended the annual Chancellor’s Holiday Luncheon. There, she revealed she was suffering from pancreatic cancer.

She continued her usual active role running the College, although sometimes from home via a telephone hookup, and appeared to be getting stronger with each passing month. She resided with élan at the August 1 “birthday party” by the Trinity River, even getting in a little line dancing.

She presided at the August 3 board meeting and again at the meeting of August 11, but these were to be her last public appearances. Later that month she was unable to attend, on consecutive days, the annual luncheon for new faculty, the August 24 board meeting at which the annual budget was passed and – most alarming to everyone – the annual Chancellor’s Employee Appreciation Breakfast, an event in which she had always taken enormous pride.

Faculty and staff began asking the inevitable question – to themselves and openly with others. If, for whatever reason, Hadley could not continue as chancellor, who would take her place? If so, what would happen to the initiatives she had worked so hard – and endured so much criticism over – to get on track?

It was a fair question. Hadley had a vision of what Tarrant County College should be, and in her six years as chancellor had led – some would say dragged – TCC well along the path to that vision, largely through strength of will. Would another person – any other person – have the ability to stay the course?

The questions became more than academic when, on the morning of Thursday, October 1, Erma Johnson Hadley died peacefully. The board, at an emergency meeting the next day, named Angela Robinson acting chancellor.

At Hadley’s funeral service a few days later, President Michael Sorrell of Paul Quinn College, on whose board Hadley served, said, “How do you say goodbye to an icon?” [230] For the Board of Trustees, the question was one of how they were to replace an icon. Should they want to continue Hadley’s course, they might look within the College, but only one CELT member, Elva LeBlanc, had more than five years at TCC. They might choose to go outside the present staff, but a newcomer – or one from within, for that matter – might wish to put his or her stamp on things and put their own initiatives on the front burner instead of trying to be Erma 2.0.

Whatever the trustee’s decision, it would determine what the college would become over its next half-century.

Chapter 23: Looking Ahead

Yes, what would TCC become, not just in the short term but in the half-century to come? The question of what Tarrant County College, founded in 1965, would look like at its Centennial in 2065 was posed to a representative group of trustees, administrators and faculty. Their responses follow:

Erma Johnson Hadley, Former Chancellor

The College will always be here, but it will look extremely different from the way it looks today. You’ll see a lot of seamlessness among learners from elementary, middle, high school, community college, university, graduate school. You’ll see a lot of melding.       We’ll get to a point where students are able to design their own learning needs and be able to get them taken care of at whatever level they need. TCC will fall within that. And you can see signs of that today. One of the things on my list is competency-based learning, which is not probably going to be something the faculty is going to be in love with. But when you look at the number of people out there who need a credential and won’t come to us otherwise, it should not be a threat to anybody.

We’ll move toward faculty being managers of learning – not so much the sage on the stage. Much of our learning will be online. Just look today at where we are with Google – anybody can be so much more intelligent just like that with a smartphone. We learn significantly more at the point of need than just going into the classroom learning it just for the sake of learning it. If you need to know it, you know it.

So, for the 100th anniversary, I think the citizens of Tarrant County will still need Tarrant County College. What we look like in our 100th year of service to the community will be so different that none of us can imagine it -- just like 50 years ago, the founders of Tarrant County College would have never envisioned what we are today – never!

Elva LeBlanc, President, Northwest Campus

I believe that TCCD will continue demonstrating vision, implementing ideas that advance the community and being an important part of the economic engine of Tarrant County. The jobs may change over time, but we will still need a workforce that is innovative, capable of critical thinking and able to build relationships across nations and people of different backgrounds. The College will continue setting high expectations and providing high support for students and college personnel.

David Clinkscale, Retired Faculty Member

and Member of First Student Body

My heartfelt hope is that, in 50 years, Tarrant County College will still be an institution where people from all over the North Texas region can come and be confident that they will have opportunities to enrich their lives.

I hope in 50 years that TCC will still be a place where, as it is now and as it has been for its entire existence, lives can be changed profoundly.

Most of all, I hope that the TCC faculty 50 years from now will still harbor the passionate commitment to teaching and learning that has been the hallmark of this institution since its inception, and that by doing so, they will carry forward the tradition of excellence envisioned by those who founded this great institution a half-century ago.

Jeffrey Miranda, Former President, Northwest Campus Faculty Association

I'm no futurist. I'm guessing that what’s expected of me is a prediction of what we’ll be doing then and how we’ll be doing it, but, honestly, I haven't a clue. People tend to imagine major changes (like the flying car dreams of the ’50s) when most change is rather more incremental.

If, indeed, the changes are dramatic and involve flying cars, then, then, oddly enough, I'm not all that hopeful. The pessimistic side of me says that in 50 years, the college won't be a brick-and-mortar operation any longer, except for a central administration building that will house administrators that will decide curriculum and purchase it for online delivery (perhaps using a system of osmosis). Students will register from home, receive their education from some form of packaging, and will have contact from success coaches.

TCC will continue being one of the largest colleges in Texas, as it is now, but will do it largely through TCC Connect. It won't be particularly personal, but Austin will love it, as will the actuaries at the Teachers Retirement and Employees Retirement Systems.

But perhaps it won't be this way at all. It seems to me that it is just as likely that changes will be more incremental. The optimistic side of me indeed hopes for a rather more incremental change to the system of education that is TCC's legacy to this point, because while TCC has been innovative, and dramatically so over the last 50 years, systems tend to slow down and consolidate what they do best.

In such a case, the optimistic side of me says that we'll be a larger institution, certainly more mature in that the county will have stopped growing and so, too, will the College. It will continue to be relevant not only to Tarrant County, but also a welcomed partner of the community. It will certainly have more campuses but probably not more than Dallas County today.

I certainly hope for continued personal relationships between students and instructors built less on the demands of constant assessment and more on the intrinsic value of learning for the sake of creating opportunities. In short, hopefully the next 50 years will look much like the last 50 years, a solid record of being an important part of the community through student involvement and innovation.

But again, I'm no futurist, and really, I haven't a clue.

Tim Marshall, Vice Chancellor for Institutional Intelligence and Technology

TCC will evolve into the primary education provider for the area, with early college elementary and early college middle schools in place in addition to the early college high schools in place, feeding into the multiple workforce, associate and bachelor’s degree programs offered at the seven physical campuses and the world-renowned virtual campus. The conversion of the old TXU power plant into the centerpiece structure of the district, including educational spaces, residences and a thriving business incubator, will have vaulted the institution into its current stature.

Louise Appleman, President, Board of Trustees

My crystal ball is MIA. However, based on the first 50 years and the outstanding professional educational leadership and the community support that Tarrant County College has attracted and appreciated, I expect that the future of TCC will be as productive and beneficial to its stakeholders as in the past.

Therefore, I predict continued standing as the “community’s college,” offering tens of thousands of Tarrant County citizens opportunities for enlightenment, self-improvement and education (cradle to grave); a continued presence in and impact on workforce/economic development; and a resource for new and innovative ideas.

The College will continue to offer multiple centers of excellence in areas of technology, health care, the arts, public safety, aeronautics and all that is “new” in the future. I also trust that the continuum of high school-to-university education will include TCC.

Our founders would be proud, to be sure, of what has been accomplished in our first 50 years. There is every reason to believe that the second half-century will be another one of accomplishment and celebration.

Larry Darlage, Retired President, Northeast Campus

(Written as a 2065 student)

TCC is celebrating its Centennial Anniversary this year, and I have been asked to write a historical paper focusing especially on the past 50 years, 2015-2065. I have decided to divide this document into several major topics, as so many things have changed since the Golden Anniversary Celebration in 2015.

Campuses: TCC had only six campuses in 2015. It now has nine with the addition of the Southwest Campus in Benbrook in 2025, the Alliance Campus in 2046 and the most recent one in West Fort Worth that was completed in 2060. The West Fort Worth Campus is an education center offering bachelor’s degrees in a partnership with Angelo State and Tarleton State. It is patterned after the highly successful partnership of the Alliance Campus with the University of Texas in Arlington and Texas Christian University. Most of the buildings on the two oldest campuses, South and Northeast, have been replaced with state-of-the-art, technology-smart facilities.

Transportation: In a partnership with surrounding counties, Tarrant County now has a wonderful mass transit system called the MRT (Metroplex Rapid Transportation) that crisscrosses much of North Texas. High-speed rail lines also provide quick access to Austin, Houston and San Antonio. All campuses are connected to each other and downtown Fort Worth with trains that run on a highly efficient schedule so students can access any campus in less than 30 minutes.

Enrollments: As one of the fastest-growing counties in the U.S. for many years, Tarrant County has provided an abundance of students for TCC. Another important factor in boosting enrollments on every campus is legislation passed in 2034 to extend tuition-free education to community colleges. This is largely due to the explosive growth of early college high schools. Thus, the face-to-face and blended enrollments have grown to more than 160,000 students in the fall of 2065, and TCC Connect, outpacing this growth rate significantly, claims almost 100,000 enrollments.

New Programs: The use of fossil fuels in vehicles declined sharply in the 2040s as petroleum supplies diminished and fuel cells and batteries became more economical. This triggered the need for fuel cell and battery manufacturing technicians and greatly changed the automotive program. The shift in computer system processors from silicon-based chips to bio-molecular processors in the late 2050s created a demand for bio-information technologists. In the health-care industry, nanotechnology programs were added as nano-robots are now used to eliminate cancer cells in the human body. In 2060, physicians began implanting biological submicrocomputers into human fetuses so that people could eventually keep track of their health status with their iPhone 56 devices, somewhat reminiscent of the onboard computers in automobiles more than 50 years ago. This has created monumental changes in the Health Information Technology Program. Finally, several international exchange programs were implemented with Spain, Germany, Australia and China. All the TCC students completing an Associate of Arts degree are required to spend at least one semester abroad in total immersion programs.

That concludes my quick look back at TCC for the past 50 years. I expect to be able to write a sequel to this article in 2115, as I will be a mere 70 years old and working on my 15th career at that time. It is amazing what great strides have been made in the medical sciences with life expectancies approaching the century mark now!

David Ximenez, Associate Vice Chancellor for Enrollment Services

The world population will have grown; the U.S. population is estimated to be half a billion. Automation and technology will have increased, and the advent of artificial intelligence (AI) could be a reality.

I believe technology will transform the current model of education. I think education will occur in a virtual environment with full-immersion virtual reality. Face-to-face learning will incorporate holographic interfaces. Paper and print will not exist.

I think the emergence of AI will lead to virtual teachers that will make the historical classroom model obsolete. Virtual teachers will make it possible for a person’s education to be tailored exactly to their own learning abilities and interests. This will mean exceptional students won’t be held back and struggling students won’t be left behind.

Advising will be predominately, if not entirely, done online, mostly through apps like today’s Skype or FaceTime. I see a phone app like Siri that registers students just by them speaking their desired course schedule and that is smart enough to have already calculated financial aid, degree requirements and payment options.

The reduction in in-person instruction and services will result in sharp decreases in staffing for institutions like TCC, which will also likely reduce their property holdings. Many employees will not report to a District-owned workplace, and those who do will log only a few weekly hours at a designated workplace.

Gary Smith, Retired VP for Academic Affairs, Northeast Campus,

and Member of Original 1967 Faculty

The College will have sold off most of their campuses with only small satellites remaining. The staff will consist primarily of District administrators who will oversee mostly adjunct faculty, student success personnel and operations personnel such as registrars. All functions will be administered and standardized at the District level.

The reason for these changes will be technology. The vast majority of the classes will be taught online with limited or no face-to-face courses. This will allow the College to dispense with facilities and full-time faculty, which will greatly reduce expenditures. The college will look more like the University of Phoenix than the present TCCD.

The curriculum will be greatly changed. General education courses will be a thing of the past. The college will operate more as a trade school, rather than a well-rounded educational institution. Courses will be restructured so that they will be task-oriented rather than general principles-oriented. The courses also will be modularized so that students will not take entire courses but specific modules that prepare them for specific tasks in the workplace. The curriculum will be dictated by business/industry rather than by the educational institutions and organizations.

Gladys Emerson, VP for Community and Industrial Education, South Campus

By 2065, distance education at TCC will have outpaced face-to-face instruction for degree and certificate programs, even in the career and technical education (CTE) areas.

With fewer students actually traveling to campus, many faculty and staff will telecommute. Technology will continue to advance so rapidly that TCC will align more closely with key industries, and student learning activities conducted on site in various industries will be commonplace.

As we progress into the 21st century, degree plans will be more flexible, with stronger consideration for non-credit education. TCC will be more attuned to learners at any stage through multiple learning platforms to ensure expeditious responses to students’ needs. Easy access to data through Institutional Intelligence and Research (IIR) will position TCC to be more proactive than reactive to change and curtail speculative decision-making at all levels.

TCC will be as focused on health and wellness among its employees as quality teaching and learning for its students. Open-office concepts will be universal to foster employee relationships and develop teams to improve workflow and minimize stress. Everyone will engage in physical activity during the workday — some at their workstation.

The College will continue to grow with the population explosion of Tarrant County. However, the leadership will see the benefit of co-location of services in the community and leveraging resources that will not require investing in bricks and mortar as much as building solid partnerships with those that add additional dimensions to student success. Those partners will likely be both local and global.

* * *

Historians are supposed to be recorders of events, not predictors. But the author, in view of 34 years as a Tarrant County College administrator and faculty member, will take license to peer into the future at the TCC of 2065.

Bricks-and-mortar campuses will still be with us. While e-learning will mushroom, it will never totally replace face-to-face instruction. First, there are thousands of students, particularly those first-generation students in their initial college experience, who are unsuited for online courses by virtue of their lack of academic preparation and maturity.

Second, there will still be courses and segments of courses that do not lend themselves to a virtual environment. Students in the Heating, Air Conditioning and Refrigeration program shouldn’t be fooling around in their garage with industrial strength electrical current. There should be no chance of microbiology students storing a potentially virulent bacteria culture in the fridge next to yesterday’s meatloaf.

There will be one more comprehensive campus, very likely in the Benbrook area. The Board of Trustees has already been eyeing property in that sector of the county. The current physical campuses will lose enrollment and by 2065 will have fewer buildings and less real estate.

Workforce programs, those offered in the technical areas, will increase in scope, but delivery will no longer be through the semester-length credit hour model. Rather, instruction will be on a clock-hour basis whereby students spend only enough time to acquire the competencies required. Training in basic electricity, therefore, might take three months or six months depending on the students.

TCC Connect, already the largest campus in terms of enrollment in 2015, will have a national online presence. The College’s out-of-state tuition, even though one of the highest in Texas, will be far less than that charged by for-profit online colleges. The growth of in-state online students might be curbed, however, if the Legislature ever decides to reimburse colleges at a lower rate for online than for face-to-face instruction.

There will still be a cadre of full-time faculty members, but close to 80 percent of class sections will be taught by adjunct faculty and by full-time faculty teaching overloads –  sections in excess of their full credit hour load – at an adjunct rate. One of the College’s greatest challenges will be to maintain quality instruction within the faculty, many of whom may never set foot on a campus or even in the state.

TCC’s present and future trustees and administration will need to remain ever mindful of the need for quality in all programs and in all modes of delivery. They must not, in the rosy glow of big enrollment numbers and hefty bottom lines, lose sight of the College’s mission to students and community. For it is in that mission that the future of the College lies as was so eloquently stated by Board of Trustees President Jenkins Garrett at the first formal Commencement in 1969:

“This college must be measured not in brick and mortar, but rather by the hopes and the dreams and plans and imagination and daring and faith and courage and foresight of this entire community, the students ... the staff, as well as the trustees. It is the aggregate of these things of the spirit swelling in those who participate in its creation and development that makes an institution great and meaningful to those it serves. I am convinced this institution possesses those spiritual strengths.” [231]

Chapter Notes

Chapter 1: Groundwork

1. Howard Erdman and William R. Ogden, “Reconsidering William Rainey Harper as Father of the Junior College,” College Student Journal, September, 2000, http://www.freepatentsonline.com/article/College-Student-Journal/66760565.html. [back]

2. Henry Cisneros, “Community Colleges and Urban Development.” HUD User, U.S. Department of Housing and Urban Development's Office of Policy Development and Research, 1996. [back]

3. Clifford G. Erickson, “Multi-Campus Operation in the Big City.” The Junior College Journal, October 1964, pp. 16-17. [back]

4. Harley Pershing, “Junior College Needed Here.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 9, 1963. [back]

5. “Board chairman proudest of grads.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, October 1982.[back]

6. Quentin Joseph Bogart, A Multi-Campus Junior College Case Study: A Search for Guidelines. Doctoral dissertation published by The University of Texas at Austin, August 1968. [back]

7. William W. Lace, “Early Leadership Laid Foundation for Future Success.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, Summer 2005.[back]

8. Bogart, p. 24. [back]

9. “Mayor Barr Has Been Leader in Movement.” Progress, Fort Worth: Downtown Fort Worth Association, 1965, p. 16. [back]

10. Lace, “Early Leadership Laid Foundation for Future Success. [back]

11. Bogart, p. 32-33. [back]

12. Bogart, p. 34.[back]

Chapter 2: The Race Toward August

13. “How it Was.” [back]

14. Bogart, p. 40. [back]

15. C.C. Colvert, A Report on the Need for a Public Junior College in Tarrant County, Texas. Austin: The University of Texas, 1965, pp. 26-27. [back]

16. “Advantages of a Community College to Business and Industry in Tarrant County.” Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce Special Sub-Committee on Technical-Vocational Needs, Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce, 1965, pp. 5-6. [back]

17. Bogart, p. 51. [back]

18. Bogart, p. 53. [back]

19. “State Board OKs Junior College Here.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 6, 1965. [back]

20. “How It Was.” [back]

21. “How It Was.” [back]

22. News. News release of the Fort Worth Chamber of Commerce, December 18, 1964. [back]

23. “Recommended Organization for Junior College Campaign.” Undated memo from Jim Vachule contained in History of the Tarrant County Junior College Campaign compiled by Don Kennard, Tarrant County College Archives, Northeast Campus. [back]

24. “New trustee an old friend of the College.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, February 1987. [back]

25. “Boy Scouts to Rally for Junior College.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 13, 1965.[back]

26. The statement from Moudy and those below from Sone, and Woolf are contained in History of the Tarrant County Junior College Campaign compiled by Don Kennard, Tarrant County College Archives, Northeast Campus. [back]

27. “Junior College Backer Wants 2-Year Limit.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram. History of the Tarrant County Junior College Campaign. [back]

28. “A Permanent Junior College.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, undated clipping contained in History of the Tarrant County Junior College Campaign.[back]

29. Bogart, p. 78-79. [back]

30. Bogart, p. 78-80. [back]

31. Bogart, p. 82. [back]

32. “How It Was.” [back]

33. “Dr. May’s seen all the milestones.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, April 1983.[back]

34. Bogart, pp. 82-83.[back]

35. Bogart, p. 62.[back]

36. “College Ballot in July, Judge Opines.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 23, 1965. [back]

37. “How It Was.”[back]

38. “College Victory Elates Backers.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, August 1, 1965.[back]

Chapter 3: Starting from Scratch

39. “Building College To Be Job for All.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Fort Worth, Texas, August 2, 1965.[back]

40. “College Location Important.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, Fort Worth, Texas, August 8, 1965.[back]

41. “Early Leadership Laid Foundation for Future Success.”[back]

42. “Early Leadership Laid Foundation for Future Success.”[back]

43. Minutes. Tarrant County Junior College District Board of Trustees, August 29, 1965.[back]

44. Bogart, p. 94.[back]

45. “Foreword,” Overview and Guidelines. Tarrant County College District, p. ii, found in History of the Tarrant County Junior College Campaign.[back]

46. Overview and Guidelines, p. 19.[back]

47. “How it Was.”[back]

48. Minutes. Tarrant County Junior College District Board of Trustees, November 17, 1965.[back]

Chapter 4: Another Race Against Time

49. “3 Junior College Sites Acquired.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, December 8, 1965.[back]

50. Bogart, p. 130.[back]

51. Bogart, p. 133.[back]

52. Bogart, p. 138.[back]

53. “Bond Sale.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, July 1966.[back]

54. Bogart, p. 143.[back]

55. Bogart, p. 145.[back]

56. Bogart, p. 145.[back]

Chapter 5: The Parallel Race Against Time

57. Lace, “Early Leadership Led to Future Success.”[back]

58. “McKinney Lured West.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, April 1989.[back]

59. Bogart, p. 117.[back]

60. Bogart, p. 105.[back]

61. Minutes. Tarrant County Junior College District Board of Trustees, March 3, 1966.[back]

62. “No. 1 alumnus remembers start.” Tarrant County Junior College, Momentum, January 1985.[back]

63. Guidelines, p. 37.[back]

64. Guidelines, p. 37.[back]

65. “Applications Over 1,000.” Tarrant County Junior College, Momentum, May 1967.[back]

Chapter 6: Curtain Up!

66. “Happy Birthday, TCJC.” Momentum, Tarrant County College, July 1985.[back]

67. “First enrollee looks back.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, November 1984.[back]

68. “The Home Towner.” Fort Worth Press, September 18, 1967.[back]

69. Guy Draughon, “TCJC No Place for Hippie Folk.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, September 19, 1967.[back]

70. “Governor Speaks at College Dedication.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, December 7, 1967.[back]

71. Bogart, p. 205.[back]

Chapter 7: Encore!

72. “President’s Corner.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, May 26, 1969.[back]

73. “Strike Settlement Stirs Optimism for N.E. Opening.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, May 1968.[back]

Chapter 8: Northwest Makes Three

74. “Dr. Michael Saenz Selected As Northwest President.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, March 1975.[back]

75. “Saenz of the Times.” The Circuit Rider, Tarrant County Junior College Northwest Campus, September 15, 1975.[back]

76. “Saenz of the Times.” The Circuit Rider, Tarrant County Junior College Northwest Campus, November 17, 1975.[back]

77. “Saenz of the Times.” The Circuit Rider, Tarrant County Junior College Northwest Campus,” January 17, 1977.[back]

78. “Virginia Chancellor Dana Hamel Dedicates $12 Million TCJC Northwest Campus.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, June 1976.[back]

79. “TCJC honors Mr. and Mrs. F. Howard Walsh.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, March 1979.[back]

Chapter 9: Meanwhile, the ‘70s

80. “Rev. Haynes Leaves Board.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, March 1975.[back]

81. “Berry finds sailing smooth on TCJC board or on land.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, July 1983.[back]

82. “Berry finds sailing smooth on TCJC board or on land.”[back]

83. “Lamond cares – and shows it.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, January 1983.[back]

84. “C.A. Roberson’s Title Changed To Executive Vice Chancellor.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, July 1974.[back]

85. “The personal touch.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, August 1989.[back]

86. “19,103 in Fall Registration.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, November 1976.[back]

87. “Northwest Campus’ Gary Smith Cited as Minnie Piper Professor for 1977.” Momentum, Tarrant County College, June 1977.[back]

Chapter 10: Growth and Change

88. “TCJC to have downtown home.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, October 1981.[back]

89. “District Center named after founding trustee.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, October 1982.[back]

90. “New trustee an old friend of College.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, February 1987.[back]

91. Minutes. Tarrant County Junior College District Board of Trustees, April 21, 1988.[back]

92. Personal recollection of the author.[back]

93. “New trustee active in city.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, June 1988.[back]

94. “Reality for professor is Piper Award.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, June 1984.[back]

95. “Piper Professorship finally bestowed on Duane Gage.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, May 1985.[back]

96. “3 receive first teaching awards.” Momentum, Tarrant County Junior College, July 1986.[back]

97. “20th Commencement to be last for Chancellor.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, June 1988.[back]

98. “Friends remember years with Chancellor.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, December 1988.[back]

99. “Board names College’s second Chancellor.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, October 1988.[back]

100. “C.A. Roberson shares thoughts on past, future of TCJC.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, October 1988.[back]

101. “McKinney lured West.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, April 1989.[back]

102. “The personal touch.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, August 1969.[back]

Chapter 11: Arlington at Last

103. “Trustees approve Arlington property.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, August 1987.[back]

104. “Voters to decide TCJC’s direction August 14.” Projection, July 1993.[back]

105. “Voters to decide TCJC’s direction August 14.”[back]

106. “Board approves mall concept for Southeast Campus.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, March 1994.[back]

107. Minutes. Tarrant County Junior College District Board of Trustees, February 13, 1996.[back]

108. “‘Whatever it takes’ is motto of new Southeast Campus president.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, January 1996.[back]

109. Minutes. Meeting Tarrant County Junior College District Board of Trustees, June 3, 1996.[back]

110. Minutes. Tarrant County Junior College District Board of Trustees, October 23, 1997.[back]

111. Minutes. Tarrant County College District Board of Trustees, April 6, 1999.[back]

112. “Southeast Campus, C.A. Roberson Theatre are dedicated.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, January 1997.[back]

113. “Southeast Campus, C.A. Roberson Theatre are dedicated.”[back]

Chapter 12: Toward a New Century

114. “McClaskey watching ... for now.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, June 1992.[back]

115. “A new face on TCJC’s Board.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, September 1996.[back]

116. “We and Bobby McGee....” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, January 1998.[back]

117. “Ending Just the Beginning.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, May 1993.[back]

118. “Ending Just the Beginning.”[back]

119. “Ending Just the Beginning.”[back]

120. “Collegian ‘best,’ but getting better.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, February 1993.[back]

121. “Going out with STYLE(S).” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, September 1993.[back]

122. “South Campus gets the Person-al touch.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, January 1994.[back]

123. Minutes. Tarrant County Junior College District Board of Trustees, September 19, 1996.[back]

124. “Black staff members at TCJC back Johnson for chancellor.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, December 17, 1996.[back]

125. “Seasoned community college veteran to take the College’s reins.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, March 1997.[back]

126. “Seasoned community college veteran to take the College’s reins.”[back]

127. “Thomas prepares to assume presidency.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, March 1998.[back]

128. Personal recollection of the author.[back]

Chapter 13: Toil and Trouble

129. “TCC colleague and friend retires after 32 years.” Projection, Tarrant County College, Summer/Fall 2000.[back]

130. Personal recollection of the author.[back]

131. Personal recollection of the author.[back]

132. “TCC Board Conducts Self-Appraisal.” Projection, Tarrant County College, Fall 2003.[back]

133. “Fill in the blanks.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, August 27, 2002.[back]

134. “There’s no way to say no to this tax increase.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, August 25, 2002.[back]

135. Mitchell Schnurman, “TCC downtown campus in works,” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, February 13, 2004.[back]

136. Mitchell Schnurman, “TCC’s grand plan teems with promise.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, May 21, 2004.[back]

137. Mitchell Schnurman, “Fort Worth: the Vancouver of the South?” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 20, 2004.[back]

138. Mitchell Schnurman, “Vision, cooperation key to TCC’s grand campus plan.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, October 31, 2004.[back]

139. “Definitely not asleep.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, October 30, 2004.[back]

Chapter 14: Storm Warnings

140. Scott Streater, “Breaking News.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 11, 2006.[back]

141. Mitchell Schnurman, “Bridging the gap.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, November 15, 2006.[back]

142. Sandra Baker, “Start date for campus delayed.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, March 8, 2007.[back]

143. Minutes. Tarrant County College District Board of Trustees, May 16, 2007.[back]

144. Sandra Baker, “TCC OKs big boost in budget of project.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, May 17, 2007.[back]

145. Mitchell Schnurman, “Campus is still worth the price.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, May 23, 2007.[back]

146. Sandra Baker, “TCC listens to critics.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 11, 2007.[back]

147. Mitchell Schnurman, “It’s pretty late to be changing TCC design.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 14, 2007.[back]

148. Schnurman, “It’s pretty late to be changing TCC design.”[back]

149. Sandra Baker, “Panel: Construct TCC plaza at street level.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 17, 2007.[back]

150. Baker, “Panel: Construct TCC plaza at street level.”[back]

151. “What should Tarrant County College do?” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 5, 2007.[back]

152. Board of Trustees Meeting, July 10, 2007. video disc, Tarrant County College Public Relations and Marketing Department.[back]

153. Board of Trustees Meeting, July 10, 2007.[back]

154. Michael B. Wilkins, “Tarrant County College plans under scrutiny.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 20, 2007.[back]

155. Mitchell Schnurman, “It’s an idea that deserves our support.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 15, 2007.[back]

156. “Moving on.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 22, 2007.[back]

157. Rich Connor, “When there’s a controversy in Cowtown, blame it on the river.” Fort Worth Business Press, July 30, 2007.[back]

158. Sandra Baker, “TCC board sticks with plaza plan.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 25, 2007.[back]

159. Sandra Baker, “TCC board sticks with plaza plan.”[back]

160. “With RadioShack deal, TCC eyes downtown classes in 2009.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 27, 2008.[back]

161. Minutes. Tarrant County College District Board of Trustees, September 16, 2004.[back]

Chapter 15: Change of Plans

162. Betty Brink, “Master’s degree of a mess.” Fort Worth Weekly, January 30-February 5, 2008.[back]

163. John Austin, “Critic of downtown campus wins seat of retiring trustee.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, May 11, 2008.[back]

164. Max Baker, “TCC move pleases Uptown backers.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 26, 2008.[back]

165. Max Baker, “TCC move pleases Uptown backers.”[back]

166. Richard Connor, “Vain search for meaning in a shrine to tax-dollar waste.” Fort Worth Business Press, July 30, 2008.[back]

167. Betty Brink, “It’s Not Nice to Fool the Taxpayers.” Fort Worth Weekly, June 25, 2008.[back]

168. Leonardo de la Garza, “From the desk of the chancellor.” Projection, Tarrant County College, Winter 2008.[back]

169. Betty Brink, “Shell Game.” Fort Worth Weekly, July 9, 2008.[back]

170. Brink, “Shell Game.”[back]

171. Traci Shurley, “Chancellor vote displeases trustee.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, July 2, 2008.[back]

172. Shurley, “Chancellor vote displeases trustee.”[back]

173. Brink, “Shell Game.”[back]

174. Shurley, “Chancellor vote displeases trustee.”[back]

Chapter 16: Fallout

175. Sandra Baker, “TCC might keep downtown buildings.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, October 30, 2008.[back]

176. Minutes. Tarrant County College District Board of Trustees, May 12, 2009.[back]

177. Mitchell Schnurman, “TCC trustees need to salvage what they can from a bad situation.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, September 20, 2008.[back]

178. Bill Hanna, “TCC parts ways with chancellor after 12 years.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 24, 2009.[back]

179. Bob Ray Sanders, “Determination steered his accomplishments.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 28, 2009.[back]

180. Personal recollection of the author.[back]

Chapter 17: Full Speed Ahead

181. “Erma Johnson Hadley Named TCC Chancellor.” Projection, Tarrant County College District, Summer 2010.[back]

182. Minutes. Tarrant County College District Board of Trustees, August 20, 2009.[back]

183. Quoted on Cross Group website, http://www.crossgroupinc.com/clients/.[back]

184. “First Things First: Student Learning and Success.” Projection, Tarrant County College, Summer 2010.[back]

Chapter 18: Looking Out, Looking In

185. Betty Brink and Jeff Prince, “Rebels in the Palace.” Fort Worth Weekly, July 7, 2010.[back]

Chapter 19: Goodbyes and Hellos

186. Diane Smith, “TCC’s Joe Hudson starts a new chapter.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, September 9, 2011.[back]

187. Diane Smith, “Texas Comptroller Combs tours TCC nursing facility.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, September 17, 2011.[back]

188. Diane Smith, “TCJC campus in downtown Fort Worth almost ready amid praise and criticism.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, August 7, 2011.[back]

189. Sandra Baker, “New TCC campus wins Downtown Fort Worth Trailblazer award.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, September 17, 2011.[back]

190. W&M Environmental Group, “Tarrant County College Trinity River East Campus named one of Texas’ Top 13 Buildings to See in 2013!” http://www.wh-m.com/news/bennett-benner-pettit-announces-tarrant-county-college-trinity-river-east-campus-named-one-of-texas-top-13-buildings-to-see-in-2013, June 24, 2013.[back]

191. Bob Ray Sanders, “Architecture of Tarrant County’s new maximum security jail masks function.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, September 14, 2011.[back]

192. Smith, “TCJC campus in downtown Fort Worth almost ready amid praise and criticism.”[back]

193. Betty Brink, “A Pretty Penny.” Fort Worth Weekly, November 9, 2011.[back]

194. Diane Smith, “Classes begin at Tarrant County College Trinity River East Campus.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, August 30, 2011.[back]

195. Smith, “TCJC campus in downtown Fort Worth almost ready amid praise and criticism.”[back]

Chapter 20: Upsetting the Applecart

196. Minutes. Tarrant County College District Board of Trustees, August 12, 2012.[back]

197. Jeff Prince, “Unrest in Academe.” Fort Worth Weekly, July 16, 2014.[back]

Chapter 21: The Wraparound

198. “Belmont College Receives Grant to Educate Baby Boomers.” Belmont College Website, May 23, 2013, http://www.belmontcollege.edu/news-2013/belmont-college-receives-grant-to-educate-baby-boomers.[back]

199. Draft press release, Office of Community and Industrial Education, TCC Northeast Campus, July 2014.[back]

200. Kendra Prince, “Creating a Culture that CAREs.” Reach, Tarrant County College, Winter 2014.[back]

201. Prince, “Creating a Culture that CAREs.”[back]

202. “New Program Urges Students to become ‘Stars of Tomorrow.’” Projection, Tarrant County College District, Fall 2008.[back]

203. “New Program Urges Students to become ‘Stars of Tomorrow.’”[back]

204. Chancellor’s Emerging Leaders brochure, Tarrant County College, 2015.[back]

205. Katie Hudson-Martinez, “WINR – Celebrating 30 years: Founder lifts veil from life to create program.” The Collegian, Tarrant County College, February 27, 2008.[back]

206. Heather Horton, “WINR organizer leaves lasting legacy.” The Collegian, Tarrant County College, November 13, 2013.[back]

207. Horton, “WINR organizer leaves lasting legacy.”[back]

208. Hudson-Martinez, “WINR – Celebrating 30 years: Founder lifts veil from life to create program.”[back]

209. Digital file, Tarrant County College District Board of Trustees meeting, April 13, 2015, http://tccd.granicus.com/MediaPlayer.php?view_id=4&clip_id=191.[back]

210. Digital File, TCC Board of Trustees meeting, April 13, 2015.[back]

211. Digital File, TCC Board of Trustees meeting, April 13, 2015.[back]

212. First Choice online brochure, Tarrant County College, https://www.tccd.edu/documents/CIE/skill-building/FirstChoiceBrochure.pdf.[back]

213. “What Now? – Lifelong Learning Skills Program may provide answers.” Projection, Tarrant County Junior College, July 1998.[back]

214. Alliance edition, Fort Worth Star-Telegram, May 7, 2000.[back]

215. “Lessons of life found in each day of play.” The Collegian, Tarrant County College, March 3, 1993.[back]

216. “All work and some play.” Projection, Tarrant County College, May 1994.[back]

217. Diane Smith, “TCC’s Visions Unlimited lets homeless people get higher education.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, May 12, 2010.[back]

218. Smith, “TCC’s Visions Unlimited lets homeless people get higher education.”[back]

219. James Russell, “TCC graduate shares life challenges with WINR group.” The Collegian, Tarrant County College, September 22, 2010.[back]

220. Smith, “TCC’s Visions Unlimited lets homeless people get higher education.”[back]

221. Smith, “TCC’s Visions Unlimited lets homeless people get higher education.”[back]

222. From an e-mail to the author, September 22, 2015.[back]

Chapter 22: Fifty Years and Counting

223. Minutes. Tarrant County College District Board of Trustees, September 22, 2012.[back]

224. Rita L.B. Parson, “Forum to Promote Innovation.” News release from TCC Public Relations and Marketing Office, October 10, 2012, http://sites.tccd.edu/tccbuzz/2012/10/10/forum-to-promote-innovation.[back]

225. Sandra Baker, “TCC officially opens new Aviation Center at Alliance Airport.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, September 17, 2014.[back]

226. Audrey Werth, “South shows off its technology.” The Collegian, Tarrant County College, August 31, 2015.[back]

227. Jennifer Sicking, “Ayala’s Election to TCC Board Brings Her Back to Her Roots.” Reach Magazine, Tarrant County College, Summer 2015.[back]

228. Monica S. Nagy, “Longtime Tarrant County College president retires; national search underway.” Fort Worth Star-Telegram, June 29, 2014.[back]

229. Audrey Werth, “TR Campus’ founding president retires,” The Collegian, Tarrant County College, September 2, 2015.[back]

230. Personal recollection of the author.[back]

Chapter 23: Looking Ahead

231. Bogart, pp. 216-217.[back]

Appendix: TCC Facts and Figures

Enrollment

Fall Semester Credit Classes

(Official state report figure; includes all terms, including second eight-week courses and May “minimester” courses. These numbers differ from the 12th class day figures announced each September.)

1967      4,221

1970      10,652

1975      19,496

1980      20,798

1985      23,783

1990      27,999

1995      25,850

2000      26,836

2005      35,163

2010      49,108

2015      51,705

Academic Year Credit/Non-Credit Classes,

September 1 through August 31

Non-duplicated enrollment determined by Colleague ID numbers

2000-01      74,889

2001-02              78,152

2002-03           83,448

2003-04           78,911

2004-05           81,777

2005-06           82,838

2006-07           82,612

2007-08           89,992

2008-09           96,467

2009-10           96,189

2010-11           100,727

2011-12           100,098

2012-13           101,682

2013-14           101,332

TCC Then and Now

(Figures as reported by Office of Research and Institutional Intelligence)

1967-68      2014-15

Fall enrollment*            4,272            50,628

Men      62.8%            41.8%

Women      37.2%            58.2%

White      90.71%            41.8%

American/Alaskan Native      .02%            0.5%

Asian      .05%            5.8%

African-American      9.22%            18.6%

**Hispanic                  28.9%

**Hawaiian/Pacific Islander                  0.2%

**International                  0.8%

**Multiethnic                  2.1%

**Unreported                  1.2%

Annual Budget      $4.7 million      $406.1 million

Full-Time Employees      175            2,313

*  12th class day figure

** Not a category in 1967

Tarrant County College District Trustees/Administrators

Trustees

Place/District 1

Delbert Adams            1965-1972

Loyd Cox                  1972-1982

J. Pete Zepeda                  1983-1996

Robyn Medina Winnett       1996-2015

Teresa Ayala                  2015-

Place/District 2

J. Ardis Bell                  1965-2008

Joe Hudson                  2008-2011

Conrad C. Heede            2011-

Place/District 3

Jenkins Garrett            1965-1972

Edward Sampson            1972-1978

John Lamond                  1978-1987

Dixon Holman            1987-1989

Tom Demarest            1989-2002

Kristin Vandergriff            2002-

Place/District 4

L.L. Haynes                  1965-1975

Harold Odom                  1975-1977

Clay Berry Jr.                  1978-1997

Bobby McGee             1998-2010

William Greenhill            2010-

Place/District 5

Ed Hudson                  1965-1972

Bill McKay                  1973-1986

Tom Schieffer                  1986-1992

Gary McClaskey            1992-2003

Randall Canedy            2003-2010

O.K. Carter                  2010-

Place/District 6

John Finn                  1965-1976

Audrey Trammel            1976

Gwendolyn Morrison      1976-

Place/District 7

May Owen                  1965-1988

Louise Appleman            1988-

Chancellors

Joe B. Rushing                  1965-1988

C.A. Roberson                  1988-1996

Jim Worden (interim)                  1996

Larry Darlage (interim)            1996-1997

Leonardo de la Garza                  1997-2009

Erma C. Johnson Hadley (interim)      2009-2019

Erma C. Johnson Hadley            2009-2015

Angela Robinson (interim)            2015-

Campus Presidents

South Campus

Charles “Chuck” McKinney            1966-1989

Jim Worden                        1989-1993

Oswell Person                        1994-1997

Tom Stover (interim)                  1997-1998

Ernest Thomas                  1998-2011

Joy Gates Black (interim)            2011

Peter Jordan                        2012-

Northeast Campus

R. Jan LeCroy                        1966-1969

Don Anthony                        1969-1975

Herman Crow                        1975-1995

Tom Stover (interim)                  1995

Larry Darlage                        1995-2014

Allen Goben                        2014-

Northwest Campus

Michael Saenz                  1975-2006

Elva Concha LeBlanc                  2006-

Southeast Campus

Judith J. Carrier                  1995-2011

William Coppola                  2012-

Trinity River Campus

Tahita M. Fulkerson                  2008-2015

S. Sean Madison                  2015

TCC Connect

Carlos Morales                  2013-

Cabinet/CELT Members

(Includes all vice chancellors, Community Campus provosts and directors in some areas. Individual titles are not listed since many people had title changes and some occupied more than one Cabinet/CELT position. Campus presidents are listed separately.)

Jimmie C. Styles

C.A. Roberson

Don Newbury

Clarence G. (Sam) Krhovjak

William W. Lace

Erma Johnson Hadley

Joe Ed Spencer

David Wells

Elva Concha LeBlanc

Roy Belew

Maria Shelton

Rudy Gonzales

Tahita Fulkerson

Lily Tercero

Nina Petty

Mark McClendon

Reginald Gates

Timothy Marshall

Joy Gates Black

Angela Robinson

TCC Historical Timeline

1965

July 31            Tarrant County voters approve establishment of Tarrant County Junior College District, authorize issuance of bonds, elect seven members to Board of Trustees (Jenkins Garrett, Delbert Adams, J. Ardis Bell, John Finn, May Owen, L.L. Haynes, Edward Hudson Sr.)

August 10      First board meeting: Jenkins Garrett elected chairman; John Finn, vice chairman; May Owen, secretary.

August 29      Dr. Joe B. Rushing of Broward County (Fla.) Junior College interviewed by board, which votes to appoint him president on September 2 at annual salary of $25,000.

October      Office space rented in First National Bank Building (753 sq.ft. at $22.50 per month); Jimmie C. Styles hired as assistant to president effective January 1, 1966.

November 11       Tom Law (Law, Snakard and Gambill) appointed legal counsel for College; Weaver and Tidwell chosen as accounting firm.

November 24       Architects Morris Parker and Associates and Albert Komatsu and Associates named for South, Northeast, respectively; plans for first campus are for 2,500 full-time students with expansion for enrollment oto4,000.

December 1      Styles authorized to complete application to obtain surplus land from federal government as site for South Campus; board agrees on Northeast Campus site at $2,500 per acre; gift of land for future Northwest Campus from Mr. and Mrs. F. Howard Walsh approved.

December 6       Locations of first two campuses announced at news conference;  College receives gift of land on Marine Creek Lake from F. Howard Walsh family designated for third campus.

1966

March      C.A. Roberson, business manager at Odessa College, named as director of finance; to begin duties May 1.

April      Dr. Charles McKinney named executive dean of South Campus.

June 2      Board changes Styles, Roberson titles to vice president.

July 14      R. Jan LeCroy named assistant to president, will start September 1 to assist in planning of Northeast Campus, first budget ($1.875 million) adopted; total tax rate is 27 cents per $100 valuation.

August 5      Tuition of $5 per credit hour for in-District students established; would be lowered in 1971 to $4 when authorized by state. Office space on 14th floor of Fort Worth National Bank authorized.

August 19      South Campus construction contract ($8.6 million) awarded to McCann Construction; target completion date is August 19, 1967.

December      Application for admission as students begins.

1967

May 5      Haynes, Hudson re-elected to board.

April 6      South, Northeast Campuses officially named.

June 20      McCann Construction bid ($6.12 million) for Northeast accepted.

July 17      LeCroy named executive dean of Northeast.

September 18      South registers 4,272 students.  AAJC says it’s “probably” a national record. Official enrollment eventually 4,217.

September 28      Student elections choose Reflector as newspaper name, Carillon for yearbook, blue/gold as colors, Chargers as nickname.

December 6      Texas Governor John Connally speaks at South Campus dedication.

December 9      Black-tie dinner precedes 1967 first drama production, The Caucasian Chalk Circle.

1968

May 15      McCann Construction reports that, because of labor strike, most Northeast buildings will be 45 days late in opening.

August      Charles Williams and Albert McCord graduate. They finished during summer school and had transferred credits from other colleges.

September 20      Rushing announced that Northeast Campus day classes will meet on South Campus.

December 4      TCJC accorded candidacy status by SACS.

1969

February      Northeast students choose NorthEast Weekly Student as newspaper name, Ship’s Log for yearbook, Vikings for mascot, red white blue for colors.

August      Rushing given new title of chancellor; Styles, Roberson vice chancellors; executive deans become presidents. Don Anthony replaces LeCroy as president of Northeast.

October 16      Board adopts tenure policy for faculty.

December      TCC gets full SACS accreditation.

1970

September      Fine Arts Center on Northeast opens; enrollment goes over 10,000 to 10,915.

September 28      Dedication of Northeast Campus; Commissioner of Higher Education Bevington Reed main speaker; Col. and Mrs. John Glenn special guests.

October 6      Fire does heavy damage to Northeast Student Center; $100,000 transferred from reserve to cover damage not picked up by insurance.

1971

September 21      $21 million bond election for construction of Northwest Campus, expansion at other two campuses passes, 7,492 to 5,273.

December 16      Geren Architectural awarded contract for design of Northwest.    Jenkins Garrett reads letter of resignation from board to become UT System regent; Ed Sampson appointed to replace Garrett.

1972

April 1      Bell, Sampson re-elected to board; also elected is Loyd Cox, replacing Delbert Adams.

November 11      Ed Hudson dies.

1973

January      Bill McKay appointed to replace Hudson.

March 5      SACS team visits

April 26      Plans for Northwest Campus approved.

1974

January      Construction starts on Northwest Campus; opening scheduled for fall 1975.

February 14      Ground broken for Northwest by Rushing and Bell with mule-drawn plow.  General contractor is Gilmore and Walker with bid of $6.9 million.

February 21      TCJC’s first Affirmative Action plan written by Erma Johnson Hadley adopted. C.A. Roberson’s title change to executive vice chancellor.

September      Enrollment passes 15,000 (15,557).

December      TCJC reaccredited for 10 years by SACS.

December 9      Michael Saenz named Northwest Campus president.

1975

January      Spring enrollment at 15,883; Northwest construction said to be at halfway point.

January 1      L.L. Haynes resigns from board; Harold A. Odom appointed in his place.

February      Erma Johnson Hadley promoted to personnel director.

May 27      Don Anthony announces resignation as Northeast president; Herman Crow named in July to succeed him

June 19      Labor strike at Northwest site goes into seventh week.

September      Enrollment exceeds 20,000 for first time (20,551); Northwest Campus opens with classes in Meacham Field facility, Boswell High School, Castleberry High School, Monnig Oaks Shopping Center.

November 20      John Finn resigns from board for health reasons; Bell elected president in January.

1976

January 22      Audrey Trammel appointed to Finn’s place on board.

February 19      Board told Northwest construction completed.

April 9      Dedication of Northwest Campus; campus officially receives designation as nation’s only Bicentennial Campus.

April 24      Gwen Morrison defeats Trammel in runoff election, 3517 to 3,336.

1977

May      Northwest’s Gary Smith named TCJC’s first Minnie Stevens Piper Professor; future Piper winners would be David Clinkscale (1984), Duane Gage (1985), Laura M. Wood (1999), Eduardo Aguilar (2004), David (2007) and Elise (2010) Price.

August 11      Clarence G (Sam) Krhovjak introduced as provost of Community Campus, TCJC’s non-credit operation.

November 29      Trustee Harold Odom dies; Clay Berry appointed to Odom’s spot on December 20.

1978

April 1      John Lamond elected to replace Sampson.

September      Northeast becomes largest campus, overtaking South.

November      Northwest library named for Walsh family.

1979

September 20      Jordana Lowe honored as College’s 250,000th student.

1980

September      With 22,026 students, TCJC becomes largest college or university in Tarrant County.

1981

January      Director of Communications Don Newbury named president of Western Texas College; Bill Lace replaces him as director of College Relations in April.

February 19      Board agrees to join new Tarrant Appraisal District.

April      Chancellor Rushing elected chair of American Association of Community and Junior College Board of Directors.

April 30      Erma Johnson Hadley named vice chancellor for human resources.

June      College for Kids begins on South Campus with 84 students.

Aug.-Sept.      Board votes to buy property fronting Lancaster Avenue to build District administration facility.

September 17      Board told College now has 1,124 full-time employees.

October 27      Geren and Associates named architect for new District offices.

1982

March 18      Rose Construction wins District office contract, $2.199 million.

May 19      Loyd Cox resigns from board.

September 16      Board votes to name District office building after Dr. May Owen.

September      Credit enrollment goes over 25,000 (25,740).

1983

February 17      Pete Zepeda appointed to board.

March 6      District offices move to May Owen Center, which is formally dedicated on April 19.

August 16      Budget exceeds $50 million for first time ($5.87 million).

1984

April 7      Ardis Bell, John Lamond win re-election.

April 28      Pete Zepeda defeats Jo Ann Reyes in runoff election.

October 18      Board discusses need for new campus.

1985

April      Board hears proposal for $47.25 bond election.

May      First tuition increase in college history – $4 to $5/credit hour.

June 20      Board approves plans for televised instruction.

July 31      TCC celebrates 20th anniversary.

September 28      $50 million bond package approved, 3,736-1,424.

1986

May      Mike Cinatl (Northwest), Gary Smith (Northeast), Jim Nichols (South) win first Chancellor’s Awards for Exemplary Teaching.

May 21      Board approves plans for Criminal Justice Training Center on Northwest; $1.8 million contract awarded in July.

June      Last of original bonds burned. Final payment was $98.15.

December 18      Bill McKay resigns from board; Tom Schieffer appointed to replace him.

1987

August      Board authorizes purchase of Southeast Campus site in Arlington; 123 acres, $3,087,500.

September 17      Dixon Holman appointed to replace John Lamond, who resigned from board in August.; enrollment for fall is at 25,137.

November      Separate campus student newspapers combined to form The Collegian.

1988

April 12      Death of Dr. May Owen.

May 7      Louise Appleman defeats Gary Weller in runoff to win Dr. Owen’s place on board.

May 15      Board accepts Rushing’s resignation effective February 1, votes to appoint C.A. Roberson as College’s second chancellor.

October 20      Board adopts Articles of Incorporation and Bylaws for “Friends of TCJC” foundation; Dixon Holman submits resignation from board effective October 31.

1989

January      Joe Ed Spencer becomes vice chancellor for business affairs; Roy Belew appointed director of management information systems (CIO).

January 19      Tom Demarest appointed to replace Holman.

February 16      Board names South Campus performing arts center for Joe B. Rushing.

May      Charles McKinney retires as South president; Jim Worden named in August to replace him.

1990

January      Friends of TCJC board named.

September 20      Board votes to name South Campus Library for Jenkins Garrett; dedication ceremony conducted on November 20.

November 16      Gala dinner at Worthington Hotel celebrates TCJC’s Silver Anniversary.

1991

April 23      Board told of legislation to bring all higher education employees into Employees Retirement System of Texas.

July 18      Board approves resolution establishing single-member trustee districts and appointing advisory committee; plan for districts adopted on October 10.

1992

May 2      Gary McClaskey elected to replace Tom Schieffer, who did not live in new district.

1993

January      Spring enrollment record is record 26,503.

May 25      Elva LeBlanc reports to board on SACS visit; 25 recommendations, 17 suggestions; four commendations; Elva LeBlanc announced as Director of Institutional Effectiveness.

August 14      $70 million bond issue passes 10,112 to 4,391; primary purpose is construction of Southeast Campus.

August 31      Jimmie Styles retires.

1994

January       Oswell Person appointed president of South Campus replacing Jim Worden, who had been named vice chancellor for academic affairs.

December 8      Ground broken for Southeast Campus.

1995

February 28       Herman Crow retires as president of Northeast Campus.

December 1      Judith Carrier, Larry Darlage named presidents of Southeast and Northeast, respectively.

1996

May 7      Robyn Medina Winnett elected to board over Pete Zepeda.

May 16      Board accepts C.A. Roberson’s retirement effective August 31.

August       Southeast Campus opens with enrollment of 3,993.

September 1      Jim Worden becomes interim chancellor.

November      C.A. Roberson Theater dedicated on Southeast.

December 7      Jim Worden dies unexpectedly; Darlage named interim chancellor on December 13.

1997

January 4,5      Board interviews six semifinalists for chancellor position.

January 16      Board narrows candidates to three finalists – Jan Kehoe, Leonardo de la Garza, Gwendolyn Stephenson.

January 25      De la Garza named third chancellor of TCJC.

July      Oswell Person resigns as South Campus president; Tom Stover named interim president.

August 21      Clay Berry announces retirement from board; Bobby McGee named his replacement.

1998

January      Ernest Thomas named South Campus president; telephone registration begins.

August 27      Board adopts pay-as-you-go method of financing major capital projects; total tax rate raised from 5.769 cents/$100 valuation to 10.641 cents.

1999

January 21      Name change first explored in board meeting.

February 18      Board votes to change name to Tarrant County College District.

August 2      New star logo approved by board.

August 19      Faculty summer pay changed by board to adjunct rate; all full time faculty to receive 15 percent increase in base contract.

2000

February 1      Maria Shelton starts as vice chancellor for info systems and technology.

May 17      Bookstore contract awarded to Wallace’s Bookstores Inc.

June 29      Chancellor de la Garza announces intention to charge in-district tuition to undocumented resident who meet residency requirements and not report these hours for state funding.

2001

January      Friends of TCJC name changed to TCC Foundation

March 16      Datatel selected as administrative software provider.

2002

January      Tom Demarest announces he will not seek re-election; Kristin Vandergriff elected to his seat in May.

October 29      Fire Service Training Center dedicated on Northwest.

2003

January 22      Gary McClaskey resigns from board due to moving from district; Randall Canedy appointed.

April 1      Board goes through first self-appraisal process.

June      TCC ceases mass mailing of schedules.

October 16      Chancellor de la Garza’s contract extended for three years at annual compensation of $270,000.

December 6      TCC reaccredited by SACS.

2004

February 19      Board votes to freeze property taxes for citizens 65 and older.

March 18      Board accepts a settlement from Wallace’s, which had gone bankrupt.

May 26      Freese and Nichols selected to do Facilities Master Plan.

August 26      3D-I, Projects Group selected for project management services; board empowers chancellor, board president to finalize purchase of undisclosed property for downtown campus.

September 16      Bing Thom of Vancouver, Gideon-Toal of Fort Worth selected architects for downtown campus.

November 4      Randy Gideon tells board site has been acquired for new campus; projected completion date is fall 2008.

November 18      Facilities Master Plan adopted; Vice Chancellor for Operations and Planning David Wells says plan will depend on development of Academic Master Plan.

2005

February 24      Associate of Arts in Teaching degree approved; board authorizes issuance of RFP for leasing of mineral rights; chancellor authorized to negotiate terms for assumption of ownership of FW Opportunity Center.

June 15      Architectural master plan for downtown campus presented to board; design concept follows in August.

October 15      Austin Commercial named construction manager at-risk for downtown campus.

December 4      Chancellor de la Garza’s contract extended until August 2008.

2006

March 23      Chancellor authorized to negotiate, finalize agreements for natural gas drilling on campuses.

August      Elva LeBlanc rejoins TCC as president of Northwest; Robert Aguero, Tahita Fulkerson named vice chancellor for teaching and learning services and president-elect of downtown campus, respectively.

August 16      Alra Reeves of Projects Group reports on sharp rises in construction cost; interim guaranteed maximum price for (GMP) now $179.7 as opposed to $170 million; Follett chosen as bookstore vendor.

November 15      Board approves resolution acknowledging Texas Higher Education Coordinating Board Star Award for Southeast’s Sure Start program.

2007

May 16      De la Garza reports additional downtown construction costs of $38.2 million; proposed GMP now $197.2 million; proposed total project cost of $297.5 million, increase of $63.5 million; proposed solution includes unused funds from previous projects and delay of new district offices.

June 14      After objections to aspects of downtown campus design, three outside consultants recommend change to design of gateway plaza.

July 10      Public meeting on campus design conducted at Northwest Campus.

July 24      Board votes to reject consultants’ report, stick with original design.

September 19      David Wells tells board construction permit submittal to Army Corps of Engineers did not take place as hoped in July; target date now December 15;  Trustee Bobby McGee says there should be a point at which TCC should take stock of project and cost and see if alternatives exist.

2008

January 23      Board approves three change orders increasing downtown campus construction cost to $208.17 million.

May 10      Joe Hudson elected to board as Ardis Bell chooses not to run for re-election.

June 18      With de la Garza’s contract about to expire, board offers one-year contract with compensation of $325,000.

June 22      Naming of Northeast Library for Dr. Bell announced at reception on campus.

June 25      At morning meeting, board votes to purchase Radio Shack complex for $238 million as site for new campus, second closed meeting held, after which action of June 18 amended to make chancellor’s contract three years.

August 5      Board adopts Trinity River Campus name for downtown campus; announces that that all mineral resource income will go into scholarship fund.

August 27      Cost of “mothballing” construction on bluff south of Trinity River estimated at minimum of $17.8 million.

September 24      Board votes to “shell” bluff construction and study options; Beck Group selected project manager for renovation of Radio Shack complex.

2009

February 19       Consultant Bob Kembel offers three scenarios to board for bluff construction; board approves, 4 to 3, option requiring additional $103,836, bringing total project to $203,028.

May 12      Board votes 4-3 to build out bluff site for use by TCC for health professions programs.

June 22      Board reaches agreement to amend de la Garza’s contract so as to terminate it on July 29 at cost of $700,000.

June 30      Erma Hadley named interim chancellor.

August 20      Gideon Toal awarded contract for de-scoping bluff project and adding design elements; policies changed authorizing placing of minutes on website, streaming video of board meetings.

2010

January 21      Board agrees to lump sum contract with Austin/Con Real for $129 million for completion of Trinity River East; consultant Jim Cross introduces strategic plan timetable.

February 18      Board told planning underway for early college high school on Northwest Campus; Hadley named as sole finalist for position of chancellor.

March 11      Board names Hadley third chancellor.

April 15      Vision 2015 Strategic Plan approved by board; early college high school agreement with Lake Worth ISD approved; Bill Lace appointed to Hadley’s former position of vice chancellor for administration.

May      Trustees McGee, Canedy elect not to run for re-election; William Greenhill elected to McGee’s seat, O.K. Carter to Canedy’s.

June 23      Joe Hudson elected board president; Vandergriff, vice president.

July      TCC becomes member of Achieving the Dream initiative.

2011

January 19      Bill Coppola and Peter Jordan introduced as presidents of Southeast and South Campuses, respectively.

February 16      Tim Marshall introduced as CIO.

March 10      Board approves voluntary separation plan; 126 employees will retire August 31 under the plan, including Presidents Carrier and Thomas, vice chancellors Shelton and Lace.

April      Joy Gates Black appointed vice chancellor for student success.

April 23      Joe Hudson announces he will step down effective with June meeting as board president as a compromise to changing policy to provide for annual officer elections.

June 18      Kristin Vandergriff, Greenhill say they will both run for presidency of board; Greenhill elected on August 8 by 4-3 vote.

September 1      Angela Robinson appointed vice chancellor for administration and general counsel.

October 20      Board interviews Dennis Slechta and Conrad Heede as candidates for District 2, replacing Hudson; Heede selected; board moves elections to odd-numbered years.

October 21      “A Little River Music” staged at Trinity River East Campus; $133,000 raised for scholarships.

2012

February 24      Board approves Achieving the Dream intervention strategies and timeline.

June 21      Board approves Student Success Plan.

August 16      Board approves $351 million budget including $2/credit hour tuition increase to $55 to fund “sticky spaces.”

September 22      Presentation by consultant BOKA Powell predicts unduplicated head count of 115,549 by 2020; 14 recommendations would cost of $375 million.

September 22      Idea of charter school at South Campus presented to board.

October 18      Radio Shack lease amended to expire April 30, 2018.

2013

January 17       Innovation Forum, DREAM score concepts described to board.

March 7      New TCCD seal approved.

June 20      Louise Appleman defeats William Greenhill for presidency on 4-2 vote with Conrad Heede absent. Carlos Morales introduced as TCC Connect president.  Building at 2301 Horizon Drive at Alliance Airport purchased from Bell Helicopter Textron for $16 million.

August 19      Board approves Institutional Plan; architect selected for SE early college high school; budget of $361,826,126 approved.

October 10      Board told Foundation event with Bill Cosby raised $212,000 for student scholarships.

November      Visit by SACS/COC committee results in four recommendations.

November 21      “Success Within Reach” marketing plan outlined.

2014

January 16      Chancellor announces David Wells’ retirement at end of March; positions of vice chancellor for academic affairs and vice chancellor for student success combined and will be filled by Joy Gates Black.

August 18      Board approves budget of $406 million; part of income from tuition increase to fund Supplemental Instruction.

September 1      Allen Goben starts as president of Northeast Campus replacing retired President Larry Darlage.

September 29      Northwest Campus Center of Excellence for Aviation, Transportation and Logistics opens.

October 15      Hadley tells board, JCC of illness, later revealed to be pancreatic cancer.

2015

March 23      Former Israeli President Shimon Peres speaker at TCC Foundation luncheon.

May 9      Teresa Ayala elected to board, replacing Robyn Winnett, who did not run for reelection.

August 1      Sean Marshall becomes president of Trinity River Campus, replacing Fulkerson.

August 1      Tarrant County College celebrates 50th anniversary with community celebration on banks of Trinity.

September 16      Census date enrollment of 51,705 sets record.

September      SACS acknowledges TCC Connect as College’s sixth campus; Center of Excellence for Energy Technology opens on South Campus.

October 1      Chancellor Erma Hadley dies; Angela Robinson named acting chancellor on October 2.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments

Contents

Chapter 1: Groundwork

Chapter 2: The Race Toward August

Chapter 3: Starting from Scratch

Chapter 4: Another Race Against Time

Chapter 5: The Parallel Race Against Time

Chapter 6: Curtain Up!

Chapter 7: Encore!

Chapter 8: Northwest Makes Three

Chapter 9: Meanwhile, the ‘70s

Chapter 10: Growth and Change

Chapter 11: Arlington at Last

Chapter 12: Toward a New Century

Chapter 13: Toil and Trouble

Chapter 14: Storm Warnings

Chapter 15: Change of Plans

Chapter 16: Fallout

Chapter 17: Full Speed Ahead

Chapter 18: Looking Out, Looking In

Chapter 19: Goodbyes and Hellos

Chapter 20: Upsetting the Applecart

Chapter 21: The Wraparound

Chapter 22: Fifty Years and Counting

Chapter 23: Looking Ahead

Chapter Notes

Appendix: TCC Facts and Figures

TCC Historical Timeline