New vice president of student success marks the start of a new chapter

Involvement helps inform local and state politics

By Valerie Velikaya

After three decades of the student suc­cess and engagement being led by Dennis Day, the college will experience a transi­tion with a new leader.

Randy Weber will oversee the counsel­ing department as he utilizes his previous experiences of attending and working at community colleges.

Weber, 37, attended a small rural high school in Kansas before transitioning to a community college. After completing his time there, Weber went to KU before working for various community colleges, including Pikes Peak Community Col­lege in Colorado Springs, Co., where he served as the vice president for enroll­ment services.

His experiences of working in a com­munity college environment has spanned over a decade, intertwining with his shared vision of progressing the commu­nity.

A few reasons that intrigued Weber to work at the college included its emphasis on leadership, educational excellence and innovation.

Alicia Bredehoeft, faculty chair for the counseling center, said her first percep­tion of Weber was his awareness of com­munity college issues.

During his interview, “He didn’t an­swer the question on a surface level. He gave really good content to the under­standing of the needs of community col­lege students,” said Bredehoeft. “I think he has high level of energy. He’s very committed to this position at this insti­tution and that’s very refreshing when somebody wants the job and wants to be here.”

Weber has established several objec­tives, which include maintaining a strong model of student success. Weber will be­gin his career at the college on Monday, Feb. 16.

“The college has already identified some key initiatives and strategies that they want to work on and the current strategic plans. I definitely want to work with the individuals in place on those ini­tiatives to make sure that we can deliver on what we’ve promised,” said Weber. “I would say, overall, it’s just to build a stu­dent success model that the college and the community can be proud of.”

Bredehoeft sees a new face at the col­lege as a welcome change.

“I think the historical piece is we have a lot of longevity at the institution,” said Bredehoeft. “I think that’s probably one of the things that drew people to Dr. Weber is that he is coming in without any history or baggage … it’s a blank canvas, really.”