Hespe looks back on first year at BCC

When David Hespe took the reins of Burlington County College in September, his predecessor had just departed after 25 years. The newcomer expected a challenging year of transition.

What he did not expect was Hurricane Sandy, the storm that walloped New Jersey in October and forced the campus to become one of two authorized shelters in the county.

"We were more than happy to help out," Hespe said last week in a wide-ranging interview looking back on his first year, "but it was a tough two weeks."

On the up side, he said, it was "a great opportunity to start working at a really intimate level with a lot of folks here, and [I] saw how professional and talented they are."

Hespe, 52, is a former New Jersey commissioner of education and a lawyer who has served multiple roles in state government and K-12 as well as higher education.

Through those experiences he has learned to see challenges as opportunities for growth. After Sandy, for example, his conversations with students convinced him that social media would need to play a larger role on campus because e-mail is not fast enough. The school now uses its Twitter profile and Facebook page to push out information and answer questions directly.

Another challenge he faced in his first year was the state's January announcement that a total of $1.3 billion in grants would be made available for "shovel-ready" construction and infrastructure projects at New Jersey colleges and universities.

"Within just a few weeks we had to turn around grant applications," and that was "phenomenally difficult" for "a college like Burlington," Hespe said in a conference room at the school's Mount Laurel campus. "We don't have a standing infrastructure that we can call on, like Rutgers or Rowan or Stockton or any of those."

One of the funding sources, the Technology Infrastructure Fund, required institutions to provide matching funds equal to the amount of the grant.

"Within just a few weeks we had to find those matching funds. The county was tremendous. The county said, 'We'll give you $500,000 toward those matching funds.' We needed them to not only say it, but to have a meeting and a formal resolution," Hespe said.

BCC is set to receive $4,573,881 under the announced list of grant awards. Its projects include upgrading it IT network and computer labs, and renovating a center for science and technology on the Pemberton campus.

Burlington received one of the smallest total awards, in part because Hespe did not want to bite off more than the college could chew by starting new construction projects.

"I think the future of higher education is not focused on buildings. The future of higher education is going to be focused on technology," he said.

Hespe, who plans to spend at least a decade at BCC before retiring, said encouraging K-12 educational reform is one of his primary concerns because students who enter BCC often need developmental courses, frustrating them and hurting graduation rates.

Hespe began tackling that challenge in his first year, implementing an administrative reorganization that creates a Division of Student Success for students who need tutoring, counseling, academic advice, or other services.

And a new First Year Initiative, beginning this fall, will include courses to help students develop math and reading skills, study habits, and will include free tutoring as well as resumé writing and career workshops.

Throw in the increased demand for adult and continuing education, Hespe said, and the student body will look very different when he retires than when he began.

"We're going to be pivoting more toward adult learners. That's where the future of community colleges for the next 10 to 15 years is going to be: Those adult learners who never got a degree, want to change careers or need . . . retraining in a current job for a managerial position," Hespe said.

"They're looking for blended learning. Some of it can occur online, some . . . can occur on weekends in nontraditional settings, all of which you don't need new classroom buildings to support," Hespe said. "Can we serve that expectation of adult learners for an environment that allows them to work and . . . spend time with their families? That's all about technology, and that's what I want to position this college for."

Educated at Rutgers University, where he earned his bachelor's and law degrees, Hespe has served as first assistant attorney general for New Jersey, as well as stints specializing in education and higher education for Gov. Christie Whitman, the Office of Legislative Services, and the state Assembly's committee on education and higher education.

He was on the faculty of Rowan University's educational leadership department for eight years, five of them as chair, and worked in K-12 education in administrative roles in the Willingboro School District.

Colleagues at other county colleges say that background was good preparation.

"It definitely will help the whole community college sector to have someone with the kinds of experiences he's had . . . working closely with K-12 on curriculum development and curriculum reform," Camden County College president Raymond Yannuzzi said. "He knows community colleges, he knows K through 12, he knows Trenton. . . . He's helped us a lot already with understanding how things work and what to expect."

Yannuzzi, who has known Hespe for several years and now sees him on a regular basis, said community colleges have different challenges compared with other schools because they serve not only students on campus but larger communities. His advice for Hespe is to remain flexible because the demands on community colleges are constantly changing.

"You always want to apply everything you've learned to get something done," said Hespe. "That's what this job is for me: It's a new challenge [and] folds nicely into everything else I've done in K-12 and higher education."