WARP Business Meeting
Sunday, October 28,2001
PNAIRP/Victoria Conference Center
11:30 to 1:00

Meeting Notes

  1. Welcome and Introductions. Meeting called to order by President Judi Knutzen (CBC). Attendees introduced themselves briefly (see attached participant list.)
  2. Spring Conference 2002 Update. The spring meeting will be held at Renton Technical College on April 4 & 5. Carol Kallfelz (Renton) is the local contact. A teleconference is planned in the next few months to plan the agenda for the conference. Let members of the executive committee know if you have ideas for topics.
  3. Minutes from April 2001 meetings. Geneva Blake (Bellingham) , secretary, distributed minutes from the Thursday evening and Friday morning meetings, at which the bylaws were accepted and executive officers were elected. The minutes of this meeting were sent to the WARP list serv in May. Moved and seconded to accept the minutes as written.
  4. Treasurer's report. Treasurer Mary Ann Medlin (Centralia) reported that there is a zero balance in the treasury, due to the fact that WARP does not charge a membership fee at present. A preliminary discussion of having dues was opened; this was the first opportunity to bring the issue before the group. Should WARP charge membership dues? If so how much? $20-25? Historically, the cost of the spring meeting has been covered by SBCTC. Doug Whittaker (SBCTC liaison) reported that now that we are an organization, Jan Yoshiwara, Director, Educational Services Division at SBCTC, thinks WARP should be self-supporting, including costs of materials, facilities and mailings for the spring conference. The cost is in the range of $100s not $1000s. The SBCTC will not charge for Jackie Eppler-Clark's (SBCTC administrative assistant) time spent on coordinating and organizing the spring meeting. WACRAO and other groups are already charging annual fees. It was noted that WARP members have been paying for materials out of pocket.

    A recommendation was made for the Exec board to put together an annual budget, to provide a rationale for determining what the annual fee should be. Sixty to seventy people usually attend the spring meeting. People could pay the cost of attending the spring meeting and an additional an annual institutional fee. If we had reserves, we could think of (1) developing resources that would make our jobs easier, e.g., crosswalks between SMS and Data Warehouse; and (2) having outside speakers at meetings. It was noted that any decision made by the group regarding the charging of dues or fees would not be binding for 30 days, during which time members would have an opportunity to comment.
  5. Web page. Doug Whittaker, SBCTC liaison, provided a progress report on the WARP web page, which is hosted by SBCTC (address: http://www.sbctc.edu/warp). Judy Morehead (Yakima Valley) is working on the design and layout and coordination with Sandy Main at the SBCTC. The PNAIRP website includes a description of WARP written by Judi K, and will also include the link to the WARP web page in the near future.

    Doug indicated that additional ideas for content are always welcome. The WARP membership list is currently being updated; it will also be posted on the website.
  6. WARP Handbook. Ideas for the handbook were solicited over the WSDATAG list serv this summer and fall. The ideas that were submitted were organized into topic areas and distributed at the meeting. Doug suggested assigning topic areas to people. The list of ideas, and names of people who volunteered to work on topics areas, is attached. More volunteers to work on topics or individual items are needed, and suggestions for additional topics to include are welcome.

    The handbook will be posted on the website. Geneva will coordinate changes, updates and additions to the handbook with Judy Morehead. The goal is to have a draft of the handbook ready by the spring 2002 meeting at Renton Technical College.
  7. Coding Committee Report. . Colleen Straight (Spokane District), committee chair, reported on the committee's activities during summer 2001. The current focus is the STU-PURP-ATTEND data element. The wording has undergone change over time, some of it inadvertent. The committee held a two-hour phone conference in August to discuss the wording of the item and response choices for this data element. A modified version of the item was drafted. The committee did not discuss what happens next. Questions posed to WARP: Would this group endorse the proposed changes? If so, should the new wording be pilot tested, and if so, when and where? Loretta Seppanen (SBCTC), who was involved in the development of the original item, reported that it was tested in a wide range of classroom settings, and talked through with students. Arriving at the final version was an iterative process.

    The current coding committee also includes Ellen Hoffman (Spokane), Donna Finnegan (Clark), Linda Woiwood (Skagit), Pat Campbell (Columbia Basin), and Denise Anderson (Yakima Valley).
  8. Assessment Instruments committee report. . Maureen Pettitt (Skagit), committee chair distributed the committee's purpose statement and work plan for 2001-02. During the year the committee will: (1)solicit locally developed survey instruments from WARP members. These will be organized into categories and posted on the WARP web site. The collection of instruments developed and used at the state level (e.g., WTB, LAAP) was also recommended. (2)identify web sites for national surveys, such as the NCRP survey bank, the CIESS educational outcomes site, the University of Maryland at College Park list of campus climate instruments. Links to these web sites will be included on the WARP web site. Other members of the committee include Tina Leimer (Seattle Central), Judi Knutzen, Carol Kallfelz, Mary Ann Medlin, Marsha Brown (South Seattle), and Candy Bennett (Clark).
  9. WACRAO liaison report. Candy Bennett reported for Donna Finnegan (Clark). Donna is the WARP liaison to WACRAO. Agenda items of particular interest to WARP members were: (1) CIS update a. SID/SSN modification project (see item 10 below) b. Application rehosting project c. Data warehouse project (2) SBCTC update a. Definition of 10th day count b. ABE upper level fees structure c. Report from Loretta Seppanen
  10. SID/SSN modification project. Kelly Smith (CIS) summarized the history and current status of the project. The SSN cannot be required and can no longer be used as a student identifier, but colleges need it for Financial Aid. The PPMS system is excluded from the restrictions, but may also adopt an employee id number for some processes. The following issues were discussed: (1) Universal vs college?defined ID. There would be an ID repository for universal ID. (2) After cross over, you will see the new ID. An extra step would be needed to link to SSN. (3) The initial conversion of the existing SID's will occur in April 2002. Colleges will continue to see the current SID for about three weeks, but will be able to query new datasets containing the new SID/USID. After three weeks, the new SID/USID will appear in the application screens. It is anticipated that look?up screens (to crosswalk to the SSN) will be available in all applications. (4) Problem areas: a. Incorrectly entered SSNs of current students b. Students who currently have college assigned IDs in lieu of SSNs

    The Monday meeting will focus on the changes that will be needed at the colleges, e.g., library cards, various forms, ID cards, SRN, and data express procedures where it is necessary to extract SSN. The format of new ID will also be discussed. The modification plan will formalized by December 2001.

    Kelly requested input from WARP for the CIS meeting on Monday 10/29. Involvement of K-12 and 4-year colleges in the overall discussion was strongly encouraged. Kelly noted that because of the time constraints, it was not likely that a statewide usid would be adopted.

    Kelly will send out a list of names of people on the project committee. Updates will be sent to the Dbreport listserv.
  11. Other. Paul Stern (SESRC/SBCTC) reported that he will continue to oversee the Job Training Results project through this year, after which it will be taken over by the Workforce Training board.

    Carol Kallfelz shared her plans to submit a proposal to the National Science Foundation. The project would implement WorkKeys-a vocational skills assessment tool-at Renton and other interested technical and community colleges. Please contact Carol (ckallfelz@rtc.ctc.edu) if your college has an interest in collaborating on this project. The full proposal is due by November 20.