Mayland community hears from top three contenders
Mayland Community College staffers and others recently gathered to hear pitches from the three top candidates to replace President John Boyd.
Boyd plans to retire, and the Mayland Community College Board of Trustees organized three separate public forums to allow the community to hear from the three finalist under consideration to replace him.
Kenon Briggs, a search consultant with the Association of Community College Trustees, acted as emcee for the forums. Job candidates Aron Gabriel, Jeremy R. Gibbs and Robin Ross each came to speak to the community on a different day.
“The Board of Trustees created this opportunity to engage,” Briggs said. “The board’s intent is to give you a voice.”
Robin Ross
Ross, currently the vice president of K64 and talent development at Catawba Community College, spoke first. She opened her remarks by talking about how she had become involved in the community college system by “accident.”
“I had a four-year degree as a recreational therapist, and I worked in the hospital with stroke and head injury patients,” Ross said.
Ross decided she needed a career change when she got divorced and found that her salary no longer accommodated her needs as a single parent. Respiratory therapists at the hospital where she worked encouraged her to consider studying their field at the local community college in order to make ends meet.
“So I went back to school as a single mom with two kids, and was working full-time as well,” she said. “I actually made more money with my two-year degree than I did with my four-year degree. And that’s powerful.”
Ross found that she enjoyed supervising students when they came to the hospital where she worked, so she applied for a teaching job and began working her way up through the community college system.
Ross spoke about her work as a teacher, a dean, and in workforce development, among other topics.
Aron Gabriel
The second forum was devoted to hearing from Gabriel, currently the superintendent of Newton-Conover City Schools.
Gabriel spoke about a variety of topics. In response to a question from an audience member about legitimate uses of artificial intelligence versus the threat of students cheating with artificial intelligence, he spoke of the importance of training staff on both the threats and value associated with new technology.
“As a K-12 system, we have invested a lot of our training time … to the use of artificial intelligence as a tool,” he said. “So, the way I look at it, the way to keep AI from overtaking … is try to create assessments that do not utilize AI. And it takes more time — sometimes that’s pen and paper. Sometimes that’s presentation.”
Gabriel also spoke about economic development, approaches to leadership, and many other topics.
Jeremy Gibbs
Jeremy Gibbs, a consultant who previously served as the deputy state superintendent of Public Instruction for the North Carolina Department of Public Instruction, spoke at the final event.
In his opening remarks, Gibbs spoke about having been raised in Western North Carolina in a small community. In response to a question from Briggs, he spoke about his interest in community college education and Mayland specifically.
“Community colleges are true anchor institutions,” Gibbs said. “If we didn’t have this, we’d fall apart. They keep us going.”
Gibbs said that having been a community college trustee, he has been thinking about getting more involved in the community college system for years, and that he is interested in Mayland specifically because of his connection with rural communities.
“I think there is something very important about identity and cultural values,” he said. “It’s in my DNA — I can’t outline it.”