Over the past two years, Joseph Collins has been enveloped in the reformation period of the College of DuPage after former COD President Robert Breuder’s departure. As interim president, he did everything he could to keep the college afloat internally while working towards mending many issues the college faced with the time frame he was given. His time as a vice president showed his commitment to the student body through working with universities to meet the needs of our student body by developing more streamlined transfer agreements.

His experience in higher education administration, as well as his over 30 years of experience in community colleges, carried him through the ranks at COD from starting as an associate vice president all the way up to interim president of the college. He should be remembered as a man who did everything he could to serve the students of District 502.

After Breuder was put on administrative leave during the spring semester by the Board of Trustees, Collins was appointed with the task of taking on the responsibilities of the college president on top of his executive vice presidential duties. Over his 14-month tenure as interim president, Collins had a hand in guiding the college through tumultuous political turmoil and dealing with our school’s accreditation probation.

When Collins first assumed office, the Board of Trustees was led by Kathy Hamilton, and controlled by her and the Clean Slate; Deanne Mazzochi, Frank Napolitano and Charles Bernstein. These four individuals led the charge to fire Breuder and ran head first into attempting to fix the problems left behind by the former administration. Seven months after Hamilton was appointed chairwoman, she stepped down due to “personal reasons” as stated in her resignation letter.

The newly split board could not work together on most, if any, issues at the meetings due to both lack of attendance by veteran members Joseph Wozniak, Dianne McGuire and Erin Birt, and their apprehension to work with Interim Chairwoman Mazzochi. On top of this dysfunction, the Higher Learning Commission (HLC), the college’s accreditation firm, placed COD under probation due to “concerns related to operating with integrity and governance of the College.”

Through this chaos, Collins served on the HLC Institutional Actions Council, which approves accreditation activities for its members, for COD. He worked with faculty union representatives to help smooth out the internal tension between the college’s administration and faculty. He told the Courier in a previous interview, reflecting on when he was interim president, that his greatest accomplishment was “focusing on doing what we can institutionally to get this sanction removed.”

After the political chaos died down with David Olsen’s inauguration to the board, the school went back to business as usual, and trustees were able to go through an agenda without questioning if they will have enough votes to even call a meeting. Collins was there with the board, assisting in matters of his expertise, whether it was internal operations or giving input to public concerns, all while the tension within the board was burning hot. He was a neutral and steadying force which served to benefit the community and board members alike.

After Ann Rondeau took the presidency on July 1, Collins moved back to his executive vice president position to only be shifted back to his 2011 position as vice president of academic affairs. The change occurred due to Rondeau eliminating the executive vice president position within her first month of office.

During his time as vice president of academic affairs, Collins had a hand in building new transfer agreements with schools like University of Illinois at Chicago and Northern Illinois University. In conjunction with this, he worked to curb academic dishonesty within COD classroom’s by building a committee to review the college’s policy towards cheating.

The committee, headed by Associate Vice President of Academic Affairs Emmanuel Awuah, has begun an internal investigation and analysis of student plagiarism due to a recent study showing 14 percent of students attending COD in the 2016 spring semester were caught cheating by 389 responding faculty members. This is something we at the Courier are going to be looking into going forward.

Due to Collin’s constant commitment to the students, faculty and the college itself, we at the Courier would like to thank him for his service and time at COD. His resolve during tumultuous times, on top of his constant standard of excellence for the college, is what led him to climb the administrative ranks over the past 11 years as well allowed him to shine as a caring and charismatic figure.