EMCC survey seeks ideas to mold future

BANGOR – Eastern Maine Community College wants help shaping its future.

About 100 area businesspeople and community leaders who have a relationship with the college are being asked to fill out an online survey and provide direction on what EMCC should look like in five to eight years, President Joyce Hedlund said Friday.

The college is seeking guidance on how it can be responsive to the needs of the community and how it should go about educating and training students so they can best meet the needs of local employers.

The idea is to determine “what are we doing right and what do we need to improve,” Hedlund said. “It’s making sure we are setting the right curriculum and overall direction for the college.”

The other community colleges also are sending out surveys, she said.

Hedlund said that as part of EMCC’s strategic planning initiative, similar questions already have been asked during face-to-face interviews of businesspeople in East Millinocket, Dover-Foxcroft and Ellsworth, “the primary areas we draw from.”

A consultant will take the results of the interviews and the community survey, “pull all the information together” and report back to a team on campus involved with planning, she said.

People said in interviews that the college needs to “continue to make the public aware of who we are and what we do,” she said.

Interviewees also urged the college not to lose its technical education focus, and they voiced concerns that there may not be enough workers to fill their needs down the road.

Programs identified as being “very important for us to focus on” include welding, automotive technician and health care, Hedlund said.

The survey can be found at www.emcc.edu.