Big Bend Community College turns 50 years old
You don’t reach 50 years without building a rich heritage of tradition and excellence of which we can be very proud. The Big Bend Community College 50th anniversary provides a wonderful opportunity to celebrate those traditions as well as to recognize shared accomplishments of the last 50 years in working together to ensure excellence in education and life-changing discoveries for our community families and our generations to come.
Yet even as BBCC takes the opportunity to honor the past, we as a community cannot help wonder what BBCC will look like when the next milestone of 100 years is reached? While we undoubtedly can expect much to change over the next fifty years, we know the commitment to excellence in education will remain constant at Big Bend Community College. We as a community can expect nothing less.
Talking With Big Bend Community College
President William C. Bonaudi, Ed.D.
VM: We would like to know what exactly is the role of a college president?
Bonaudi: I’m usually trying to balance my off campus responsibilities against those involved in the academic year operations on campus. It doesn’t seem to matter whether you’re talking about a university or a community college president, both of us find that revenue stability and growth occupies most of our time. Externally at Big Bend my emphasis is with the activities of the BBCC Foundation, raising funds for scholarships, staff development, equipment, capital improvement, etc. These funds have always been important assistance for our students, but during our nation’s financial turmoil it’s absolutely critical support. There is no local tax support for training needed to help the parents of our K-12 students to secure employment or advance on the job.
Our biennial legislature meets yearly, an interesting concept! I’ve been traveling to Olympia each year since I arrived in 1995, to help secure support for our growing student population. The past four years, I’ve been in Olympia, trying to minimize the size of the budget cuts we’ve been experiencing rather than seeking new funding. This political effort extends to visits to Washington, D.C., seeking congressional assistance.
We have a saying at Big Bend, “Good things happen when we go off campus!” Our trustees have directed me since my arrival, to serve all students in our college district, all 4600 sq. miles of it. Primarily we overlap three legislative districts, the 9th, the 12th, and the 13th. We keep these nine legislators informed of our triumphs and our challenges. Between my own visits and those of several staff, we try to visit regularly with residents and employers in our 15 primary communities.
VM: How has it changed over the 50 years of BBCC?
Bonaudi: The president’s job at Big Bend, over the past 50 years has always had the internal and external demands noted above. I think the major change is the growth in the use of technology to provide instruction, counseling and advising services, and management of an annual institutional budget of more than $20 million, with 150 employees.
It’s remarkable that our relatively small college has had such visionary leaders, beginning with interested folks from Moses Lake and the surrounding communities who saw a need and spent 10 years advocating for a “junior college.” Dr. Phillips saw the potential in the closing of Larson Air Force Base, resulting in our current campus. Dr. Wallenstien saw the potential of contracting with the US Army to provide basic skills and high school diplomas for our soldiers stationed in Europe. Dr. DeVries recognized the need to convert an air force base into a college and gave our campus a core physical plant structure that is architecturally pleasing and functional for educational activities.
VM: What do you like best about your position?
Bonaudi: A fundamental responsibility of my job is to set a vision for the college based on the mission as outlined by our trustees.
What we have today is evidence of a vision, and the critical aspect of the process of establishing a vision is to anticipate the future needs of our students and the tools our faculty and staff will need to help them achieve their goals.
My vision for Big Bend is to develop our resources, skills, and services, so that a growing audience views us as a visible, excellent resource for higher education. We want residents to see us as a first choice, a second chance, and a resource for life-long learning. If necessary, our future students will be able to use all of our resources from a distance. Our employers will join us with new partnerships so we can help to keep their workforce updated with skill improvement and new technologies, and help to attract new employees and employers to the region. Our students will seamlessly transfer to a growing number of locally available baccalaureate and graduate programs.
The campus will continue to develop as a community-gathering place, serving as the natural choice for meetings and community events, so that with each visit to the campus our visitors become more closely acquainted with the resource that Big Bend Community College represents to the central Columbia Basin. Attendance and participation in our annual commencement ceremonies is the most visible way we report the success of our students and receive recognition from our communities for the excellent job our faculty and staff do.
