This content was published: August 30, 2016. Phone numbers, email addresses, and other information may have changed.
PCC advances key personnel this summer
Photos and story by Kate Chester
Three leaders at Portland Community College have been selected or promoted to high-level positions due to their expertise, experience and significant contributions to the institution. Each serves in a college-wide capacity on behalf of all four of the college’s campuses and its eight centers and service areas. Their promotions are effective immediately.
Kristin Benson
Benson has been chosen as PCC’s registrar and manager of student records after a competitive national search. In this role, she oversees all aspects of the Student Records Office including transfer credit, degree/certificate awarding, commencement, academic record appeals, grade changes, maintenance of students’ academic history, configuration of registration and student records controls, records requests/subpoenas, and compliance with the federal Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. With a staff of 12, the Student Records Office serves all of PCC’s student body – approximately 85,000 full-time and part-time students.
Benson joined the college in 2011 as its records and enrollment services coordinator and steadily worked her way up to the interim registrar role in June 2014. Prior to PCC, she was the associate registrar at Marylhurst University from 2009 to 2011, and before that she worked in a variety of leadership student affairs and registrar roles at Clackamas Community College and The Art Institute of Portland.
Benson currently serves on several statewide committees related to student affairs and is the immediate past-president of the Oregon Association of Collegiate Registrars and Admissions Officers. At PCC, she is part of the college’s fraud prevention taskforce and information security advisory council. In 2015, Benson completed a year-long leadership academy with PCC, and earlier this year she was honored with an award from the college’s Office of Equity and Inclusion for her efforts to organize and lead equity and inclusion change at PCC.
Benson earned her bachelor’s degree in Environmental Studies from New College of Florida and her master’s degree in Educational Policy, Foundations and Administrative Studies from Portland State University.
Derrick Foxworth
Foxworth has been tapped as the college’s director of public safety, replacing Ken Goodwin who retired in June.
As director of Public Safety, Foxworth is responsible for organizing and directing the operations of the 45-person department that provides effective and efficient public safety services for all of the college’s campuses and center locations. He oversees departmental policy development, training, investigations and personnel. He serves as incident commander for situations related to investigations, college closures and police-medical response to college campuses. Additionally, he and the department provide college emergency preparedness training and exercises to staff, faculty and students throughout the school year.
In terms of community outreach, Foxworth serves as co-chair for PCC’s Cascade Campus Albina Killingsworth Safe Neighborhood Commission along with Karin Edwards, PCC’s Cascade Campus president. The AKSNC is a collaborative partnership with members of the criminal justice system, PCC, local neighborhood association, businesses and others to address livability issues and the Cascade Campus educational environment. The group was recognized in 2012 with a Community Policing Award from the City of Portland for its successful initiatives.
Foxworth is one of original members of the Multnomah County Threat Assessment Team, modeled after the Salem-Keizer School District and charged with helping to assess behaviors of concern and developing safety plans to mitigate threat. Partnership with this group has assisted PCC in leveraging outside resources to make the college’s campuses safer.
Foxworth joined the college in 2009 as its public safety lieutenant. Prior to coming to PCC, he worked with the Portland Police Bureau for 25 years in a variety of capacities including as its chief of police for three years.
He is a graduate of the University of Portland, where he earned a Bachelor of Science in Business Marketing/Management, and holds several certificates related to safety standards, threat assessment and security training, as well as professional membership in a variety of law enforcement associations.
Briar Schoon
After a comprehensive national search, Schoon has been selected as PCC’s sustainability manager.
Schoon has served as the college’s interim sustainability manager since April 2014. For the past two years she has led a variety of initiatives to advance the college’s operational and educational programming in alignment with PCC’s strategic plan to “achieve sustainable excellence in all operations,” as well as its adherence to the American College and University Presidents Climate Commitment – now know as Second Nature’s Carbon Commitment – a network of higher education leaders committed to building a sustainable global future.
Under Schoon’s leadership PCC has garnered a number of sustainability accolades and honors, including national recognition for efforts to calculate the environmental impacts of services and products it buys annually as a means to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions. This work was responsible for PCC being chosen as the only community college in the nation to sit on the Founders’ Circle of the Sustainable Purchasing Leadership Council. The college’s sustainability program also was honored by APPA: Leadership in Education Facilities with the 2016 International Sustainability Award.
In her permanent role, Schoon will continue to facilitate the district-wide Sustainability Leadership Council meetings and work closely with such college departments as Facilities Management Services and Auxiliary Services, to implement and promote initiatives like solid waste reduction, sustainable purchasing and alternative transportation. She will continue collaboration with students and faculty to promote sustainability education and community outreach to encourage long-term behavioral change. This is in alignment with the college’s Climate Action Plan, which Schoon has been instrumental in helping to update and integrate into college practice since late 2013.
Schoon joined the college in January 2013 as its sustainability analyst. In this role she was responsible for completing the college’s greenhouse gas inventories and sustainability reports, as well as launching PCC’s Green Office program which included a certification model, outreach materials and a website. Since March 2014 she also has been an adjunct instructor at PCC, teaching sustainability courses in the Environmental Studies program.
Briar holds three degrees from Arizona State University: a master’s degree in Sustainability, a Bachelor of Arts in Sustainability, and a Bachelor of Science in Justice Studies. She is a LEED Green Associate and Master Gardener volunteer, has presented at national conferences on behalf of PCC, and participates in such regional and local initiatives as the Greater Portland Sustainability Education Network as a board member.