Portland Community College | Portland, Oregon

May Board Report Reflect Bond Program Progress

Photos and story by Gina Whitehill-Baziuk

Bond Program Update:

Our Transportation Demand Management (TDM) survey was sent out via email in April to all students, staff, and faculty. The survey was open for about two and half weeks and almost 5,000 responses were received. The input from the survey will be one of several avenues of gathering information to move the college forward in TDM and lower the number of single occupancy vehicles driving to the various campuses.

Planning is moving ahead for the Rock Creek and Sylvania Voice over IP (VoIP) deployment.  We met with the A&E teams, TSS and FMS to walk-through the campuses and identify the needs of each telecom room.  We are evaluating and waiting on A&E proposals to upgrade the telecom room infrastructure which includes category 6 cable upgrades, a number of telecom room build-outs, and mechanical and electrical work.   Telecom room upgrades will start at Sylvania in the near future so that the VoIP rollout can occur during the summer.  The Rock Creek VoIP rollout will happen in the fall.

The ID cards and Access Control committee is continues to work on proposal for an incremental upgrade to the current systems.

The draft results for the multi-disciplinary survey have been distributed to the campuses and cabinet for review and questions. A few items were identified as needing further information in a one-time focus group format. This will occur in May and include one for students, which will cover classrooms, classroom technologies, and informal gathering spaces. The other focus group will be with faculty to discuss classrooms, classroom technologies, and workspace environments.

Multiple areas of the college, under the guidance of the PCC Library Director, have been learning about a new student centered “learning commons” model, which includes integration of the library, computer resource center, and tutoring. About 50 people from across the district spent an afternoon learning about this new model and what it means and how it supports the needs of our students. At the beginning of May about 50 staff comprised of people from all four campuses and four students took a tour at Pierce College. Pierce has done a major renovation of their library and is moving towards a more integrated library for students, which just opened for service this year. This allowed PCC the opportunity to see and talk with staff at the Pierce.

Campus Updates:

Newberg:

The building shell construction is ongoing.  The structural steel and  SIPS (Super insulated panels) installation is complete.  Skylights and roof drains have been installed.  Exterior brick is being installed at the north and east sides of the building.  Interior metal wall framing is underway and will continue through April and May. The south parking lot is ready to receive pavement but is pending proper weather conditions and Werth Blvd is continuing to be prepared for asphalt. Project is currently scheduled to complete Summer 2011.

TSS and Bond representatives went to Newberg to discuss classroom layouts and screen orientation.  Internet service provisioning and telecom room equipment is being procured for Newberg.  We are set to meet in early May to identify computers needs.  Planning for an electronic public display of Newberg’s Path to NetZero features is underway.

Rock Creek:

Four work groups continued to discuss plans for Rock Creek Bond planning work.

The Learning Spaces group has met to fine tune potential program elements going into the new addition to Building 7.  The group was introduced to furniture concepts and how furniture can impact learning. This group will help facilitate the discussions around the Learning Commons, as well as a new improved concept for the Teacher Learning Center, furniture and technology discussions for the new classrooms.

The West Zone group reviewed the scope of work for the farm renovations, storm water improvements including the relocation of the remodeling yard for BCT due to the placement of the exit road to 185th. Currently there is more scope than budget, so the group is working on prioritizing the work to fit the budget.  The road and the storm water work will be done during the summer of 2012 in order to allow time to plan and get approval of the storm water master plan as required by Clean Water Services.

The Building 2/CTE group continued to refine the scope of work for Building 2.  Next steps will include investigating infrastructure requirements for the building prior to proceeding with construction.  The group is looking for “low hanging fruit” projects that could be done in preparation to the remodel work for the summer of 2012.

A small work group from the the Bond Internal Steering Committee (BISC) reviewed the budget and locations of proposed programs for the Bond Program and made a recommendation to proceed with the work on Building 7 with the goal of completing the budget and program reconciliation by December 2011.  There was a lively discussion by most of the BISC members to ensure we are proceeding in alignment with our guiding principles, staying within the spirit of Version 1.6 and continuing the Rock Creek engagement process.  At the conclusion, the BISC recommended that Opsis Architecture proceed with schematic design for the addition to Building 7.  Proceeding now will keep the project on schedule for a construction start for the summer of 2012.

Southeast Campus:

The main focus is completing the documentation on the conditional use master plan application that will be submitted to the City of Portland. Before we can do any work on the campus the City has to approve our conditional use application, which takes between four and six months. The application will be submitted in May.

Campus discussions have centered on aligning the needs and wants with the budget. As is typical during this type of process the wants are generally more than what the budget will allow. Options are being taken to the campus advisory group in May to give input and recommendations on path forward with campus design.

Cascade Campus:

The Bond Team conducted a series of open houses in April to get input from community members and the campus regarding campus development. The 3-d campus model was moved between a local coffee shop, the public library, a near-by church, the Public Safety Education Building, and the quad.  Passers-by were encouraged to place the model pieces for the new buildings in preferred locations.  A number of new campus development options were created through this effort.

More than a dozen design options were forwarded to the neighborhood-based Bond Advisory Committee and campus-based Strategic Work Group to evaluate based on a set of guiding principles.  Pros and cons were identified which will be used to help narrow the options.  This effort will continue through May and June when three or four campus design options will move forward to costing in the summer.

Sylvania Campus:

The design team has concluded its first round of meetings with the building groups, TSS and FMS for the SS, ST and AM buildings to develop building framework plans.  Those plans and narratives have been issued to HSW for pricing and schedule.  The ground floor of the SS building has been selected to be in construction this summer.  GBD is finalizing the design and issuing to the city for permit at the end of May.  Work is scheduled to begin in June and finish before Fall term this year.

The HT and CT committees are currently meeting to develop similar framework plans.  The CC building is pending finalization of the CRC (Computer Resources Center) and SSC (Student Success Center) potential move into the Library as the first “learning commons” model for the college. There are on-going discussions at the campus as this work unfolds into a new example for student learning.

A Sylvania Site Committee has also been meeting.  There are several site improvement projects being discussed.  These projects include the completion of G Street and storm water modifications to the existing parking lot areas.  HSW is currently pricing these projects and developing schedules for PCC review.

We are continuing E6 projects.  Projects currently underway include the installation of paddle fans in the HT gymnasium and filter/rack changes to the air handling units at several of the buildings.  The next E6 project scheduled to begin later this month is the modification of the HHW (heating hot water) loop which will make the current system more efficient and reduce energy costs to the college.