MISSION: Northland Pioneer College provides educational excellence that is affordable and accessible for the enrichment of communities across northeastern Arizona.

2018 - 2020 Strategic Plan

Strategic Priorities (1) Preparing for the Higher Learning Commission (HLC) Accreditation review and site visit; (2) Improve the NPC student experience.

College Mission: Northland Pioneer College provides, supports and promotes lifelong learning.

Strategic Priority I


Prepare for NPC's 2019 Higher Learning Commission (HLC) accreditation review and site visit.

What shaped this strategic priority:

  • NPC is scheduled for an HLC Accreditation visit on November 18-19, 2019.
  • The purpose of the site visit is to allow HLC peer reviewers to evaluate if NPC is continuing to meet HLC’s Criteria for Accreditation, pursuing institutional improvement and complying with certain requirements set by the U.S. Department of Education.
  • This review leads to an action by the HLC regarding the reaffirmation of the institution’s accreditation and if additional monitoring is required.

What the college will do to prepare for the accreditation review:

Action Steps:
  1. Complete NPC’s Assurance Argument and Evidence Files.
  2. Implement a college-wide HLC awareness and preparation communication plan to prepare NPC faculty, staff and board members for the November 2019 HLC visit.
Targeted Outcomes:

Prepare for the 2019 HLC Accreditation visit  | Operations Plan

Strategic Priority II

To improve NPC's student experience, the college will implement eight strategic initiatives.

What we heard that shaped this strategic priority:

  • Open rates for student email are very low. The 2017 Student Marketing Survey showed that most students have mobile phones and approve of receiving text messages from the college. Texting has a much higher response rate than email.
  • The TALON project has resulted in very high student course pass/completion rates for high school students. This positive outcome has encouraged the college to explore expanding the distance learning technology used by the TALON project to more areas of the college and include more external partnerships.
  • All of Arizona's community colleges are implementing a guided pathways model to help improve student outcomes.
  • NPC's financial aid processing system is outdated and students complain it takes too long to receive their funding. This results in students being dropped from classes and loss of student registrations.
  • NPC's registration and payment process is not completely available online which causes extra work for both students and staff and slows down the process.
  • In several surveys, NPC employees ranked the following items as high priorities for improvement by the college:
    • Internal communication
    • Community awareness about the college
    • Work process knowledge and technical training

What we will do to improve the NPC student experience:

Action Steps:
  1. Implement a college-wide, nonemergency, student texting system that allows multiple NPC student service offices to text students while avoiding message duplication (not used for instructional communication).
  2. Pursue consortium agreements with local school districts, and other potential partners, to optimize utilizing newly-adopted classroom technology.
  3. Implement support service and instructional design elements of the American Association of Community Colleges guided pathways model that fits the college mission and improves NPC student success.

  4. Improve NPC's financial aid processing system and realign the disbursement schedule to assure students receive their awards in time to be fully prepared for each semester.
  5. Fully implement a web-based registration, payment, and support service delivery system to allow for expansion into online, hybrid, and telepresence course delivery.
  6. Improve internal employee communication by addressing frequent communication challenges.
  7. Improve external communication by hiring a part-time Social Media Specialist to take charge of NPC’s social media sites, post consistently on NPC outlets and produce short videos and stories about students, programs, faculty and events.
  8. Improve knowledge and skill level of all college employees on internal processes and technology, leading to a greater measure of self-sufficiency, and reducing Information Services (IS) training workload in the long term. Accomplish this by hiring a part-time Human Resource Training Coordinator who will create customized training modules for college employees.
Targeted Outcomes:
  1. Nonemergency Student Texting System – Operations Plan | Current Status
  2. Expand Consortium Agreements utilizing new classroom technology – Operations Plan
  3. Implement Guided Pathways Model – Operations Plan
  4. Improve Financial Aid Processing System – Operations Plan | Current Status
  5. Implement web-based registration and payment system – Operations Plan
  6. Improve internal employee communication – Operations Plan
  7. Improve external communication utilizing social media – Operations Plan | Current Status
    a. Improve external communication through college signage – Operations Plan
  8. Hire Human Resources Training Coordinator to improve employee training – Operations Plan