Marcus Kolb is assistant vice president for assessment and academic policy at Ivy Tech Community College where he collaborates with faculty and staff to improve student learning.Samuel Cargile is vice president and senior advisor to the CEO at Lumina Foundation, where he served as one of the architects of the initiative Achieving the Dream: Community Colleges Count and led its transition to an independent nonprofit organization.Lynn Priddy serves as provost and chief academic officer of National American University following 14 years of service with the Higher Learning Commission.Nassim Ebrahimi is the director for Learning Outcomes Assessment at Anne Arundel Community College, including launching several campus-wide innovations in teaching and assessment.Jason Wood is president of Southwest Wisconsin Technical College. Prior, he served as executive vice-president for student and academic services at Central Wyoming College, including oversight of daily operations and development of new programs and services.Laurie Dodge is vice chancellor of institutional assessment and planning and vice provost at Brandman University. Dr. Dodge is a national leader in competency-based education and is serving as chair of the Competency-Based Education Network (C-BEN)

The Urgency of Now: Equity and Excellence is an outstanding read that is recommended for anyone concerned with the plight of higher education. This book presents reasoned arguments which support the goal of reforming community colleges chiefly as a matter of sound public policy and implicitly to further the Judeo-Christian imperative which calls for social justice.

• ForewordAcknowledgmentsIntroduction: The Urgency of Now: Equity and Excellence – Samuel CargileChapter 1: Making the Case – Jason WoodChapter 2: The Accountable Institution from Compliance to Learning – Lynn PriddyChapter 3: Competency-Based Education – Laurie DodgeChapter 4: Integrated Outcomes Assessment – Nassim EbrahimiChapter 5: Engaging Faculty – Marcus KolbEpilogue – Marcus Kolb and Samuel CargileIndexAbout the Authors