APTOS — The Cabrillo College community on Wednesday heard from four candidates hoping to fill the seat when President Laurel Jones retires at the end of the year.
The community forum nearly packed the Samper Recital Hall at the college’s Aptos campus with students, staff and community members. Each candidate spent 45 minutes answering questions from the moderator and from audience members.
College officials on Thursday were scheduled to conduct final interviews. A final decision is expected soon.
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Kimberlee Messina
Kimberlee Messina is currently Interim Vice Chancellor of Educational Services and Planning at San Mateo Community College District.
Before that, she served as the Vice President of Instruction and Institutional Research and Interim President at Foothill College.
Messina has worked for California Community Colleges for more than 26 years. She is a two-term academic senate president, and was an instructional dean of STEM at Santa Rosa Junior College.
Messina taught Spanish full-time for 10 years in Santa Rosa, which she said is an agricultural community that gives her an understanding of the Watsonville area.
Messina holds a bachelor’s degree in sociology, a master’s degree in Spanish from California State University, Sacramento and a doctorate in educational leadership from University of California, Davis.
To better serve the population of undocumented students, she said she focused on high school recruitment and informational sessions in high schools, and on increasing the numbers of ESL classes.
“It’s a lifelong commitment that I have had,” she said.
Planning a budget, she said, requires following a process that starts with getting all “stakeholders” together and taking a close look at every level of the college.
Messina said she has been involved with bond measures that often help fund projects at community colleges.
The college’s last attempt to garner support for a bond measure failed, Messina said, because the community didn’t understand it, or the needs of the college.
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Matthew Wetstein
Matthew Wetstein is Assistant Superintendent/Vice President of Instruction and Planning at San Joaquin Delta College in Stockton.
Before that, he served as Interim Dean of the San Joaquin Delta College Agriculture, Science and Math Division. He was also Dean of Planning, Research and Institutional Effectiveness for five years.
Wetstein has served as the President of the Research and Planning Group of the California Community Colleges since 2016.
Wetstein began his academic career as a political science instructor.
He received a Ph.D. in political science and an M.A. in political science from Northern Illinois University, and he holds a B.A. in political science from the University of St. Francis, in Joliet, Ill.
“I’ve served in a leadership capacity throughout my entire time in community colleges,” he said.
Wetstein said that the declining enrollment at Cabrillo is similar to those faced by many community colleges in California.
Fixing the enrollment problems would also include leveraging technology and social media in the college’s marketing efforts, Wetstein said.
He also said the college should expand its dual enrollment program, which allows high school students to take classes at Cabrillo.
If hired, Wetstein said he would make student interaction a centerpiece of his presidency.
“I think it’s critical for a president to be interacting on an almost daily basis with the students,” he said.
In addition, Wetstein said he values child care programs that allow parents to take classes.
“That will not fall down on my watch,” he said.
Wetstein said he would serve the college’s Latino community by promoting instruction relevant to those students, and hiring Latino faculty members that understand their culture.
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Georgia Lorenz
Georgia Lorenz currently serves as Vice President of Academic Affairs at Santa Monica College.
Before she took on that role, Lorenz was the Dean of Instructional Services. Earlier, she served as Associate Dean of Instructional Services and as Director of Instructional Services.
Lorenz also worked as Associate Director of the University of Southern California Center for Urban Education. Before that, she worked in student affairs at USC and California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo.
Lorenz earned a Ph.D. in educational policy, planning and administration at USC. She holds a Master of Science in education and social policy from Northwestern University, and a Bachelor of Arts in English from Stanford University.
Lorenz said she previously worked on two successful bond campaigns that benefitted community colleges.
She said that the college should address its enrollment issues on several levels.
“We need to be innovative and creative when meeting those enrollment challenges,” she said.
Lorenz acknowledged that community colleges have a hard time attracting instructors, and said she would look to college graduate programs to recruit.
“We need to sell what Cabrillo has to offer,” she said.
She said she would focus on integrating into the community, and on working with every sector of the college.
“I believe very strongly in participatory governance,” she said. “I have the expectation that faculty and staff will participate in the governance of the college.”
In promoting Cabrillo, Lorenz said she would stress the college’s positive economic impact on the community.
She said she would work to ensure long-term financial health and help the college weather possible economic storms.
“This is a college and a community that I want to be a part of for many years to come,” Lorenz said.
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Melinda Nish
Melinda Nish is Executive Advisor to the President/Acting Vice President of Academic and Student Affairs at the College of the Marshall Islands.
From 2011 through 2016, Nish was Superintendent and President of Southwestern Community College in Chula Vista.
Before that, Nish was Vice President of Instruction at Orange Coast College in Costa Mesa, where she also served as Dean of the Business and Computing Division.
Nish has been a professor and instructor at two universities in Switzerland and one in Salt Lake City, Utah.
She also was an Associate Professor at Salt Lake Community College.
Nish received her Ed.D. in educational leadership and change from Fielding Graduate University in Santa Barbara, her Master of Arts in economics from the University of Utah in Salt Lake City, and a Bachelor of Arts degree in political science from the University of Utah.
“It’s a joy to come to work when you work at a community college,” she said.
Nish said she has learned about bonds and fundraising, and that she has ideas about how the college can pass an upcoming bond measure that would fund infrastructure repairs.
That starts with reaching out to the community in an effort to make the bond language accessible and understandable, Nish said.
“You’re asking them to give you money, and they have to feel really good about doing that,” she said.
Nish said she would address the declining enrollment among community colleges by working to build the existing programs.
The numbers of high school graduates that would feed the college is not increasing, according to Nish.
“We need to look at not only ways to get more students, but to help the students reach their goals,” she said.
Nish said she would also look to the Watsonville population by reaching out to the community there.
“We really need to understand what skills they need and how to deliver them,” she said.
