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January 27, 2016
Vol. 3, Issue 3
Board of Trustees

Chairman of the Board
Anna U. Bustamante
District 3

Vice Chair
Dr. Yvonne Katz
District 7

Secretary
Joe Alderete, Jr.
District 1

Asst. Secretary
Clint Kingsbery
District 8

Denver McClendon
District 2

Marcelo S. Casillas
District 4

Roberto Zarate
District 5

Dr. Gene Sprague
District 6

James Rindfuss
District 9

Sami C. Adames
Student Trustee

Chancellor

Dr. Bruce Leslie
Alamo Colleges
Alamo Colleges' I-BEST Program Wins National Bellwether Award  
The Alamo Colleges has won the prestigious national
Bellwether Award for the third time in five year.


For the third time in five years, the Alamo Colleges has been chosen by the Community College Futures Assembly (CCFA)
to receive the national Bellwether Award, which recognizes outstanding and innovative programs in community college education. This year, the Alamo Colleges' Integrated Basic Education and Skills Training (I-BEST) program won in the Workforce Development category. The Alamo Colleges is one of only two community colleges to win the award three times and the only winner to have won the award two years in a row. The Alamo Colleges received the 2012 Bellwether Award in the Planning,  Governance and Finance category, was a finalist in the Workforce Development category in 2013 and 2015, and won in 2015 in the Workforce Development category for the Alamo Academies.

This recognition places the Alamo Colleges in a select group of leading community colleges. In almost two decades, there have been thousands of applicants, but only 53 winners honored with the Bellwether Award. The I-BEST program was one of only 10 finalists selected from the hundreds of applications received for this year's award.

The I-BEST program is a unique initiative that provides students with the basic skills (reading, writing, math and/or English) needed for college success, along with technical training that prepares them for a good-paying job in a high-demand career field. Find out more at alamo.edu/ibest. 

"In more than 1,200 national community colleges, the Bellwether Award is one of the highest honors an institution can receive. The awards are similar to being selected by your peers for the Oscar® or Emmy® awards," said Dale F. Campbell, professor and director of the Community College Futures Assembly and Institute of Higher Education. "Leaders of past winning programs have obtained 'free agency' status through the demonstrated results their programs have made. Leaders from the winning institution are often recruited by other colleges to replicate the award-winning program. They also receive hundreds of phone calls and visits by other colleges wanting to replicate the success of their program."


U.S. Assistant Secretary of Commerce Williams Tours Central Texas Technology Center
(l to r) CTTC Director Chester Jenke; Stephanie Ferguson,
CTTC advisory board chair; U.S. Assistant Secretary of Commerce
for Economic Development Jay Williams; Janice Roth, CTTC staff;
Jorge Ayala, regional director, U.S. Department of Economic Development; and Reverend Michael D. Franklin, pastor, Christ Ministries International Church tour the CTTC expansion


U.S. Assistant Secretary of Commerce for Economic Development Jay Williams recently toured the Alamo Colleges Central Texas Technology Center (CTTC) in New Braunfels. Williams is the administrator of the Economic Development Administration, which has provided grant funding to the CTTC for the initial building of the school, as well as the phase two expansion now underway.

Williams' also addressed community leaders and members of the New Braunfels Manufacturers Assocation and participated in the city's first Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day march. 

Williams is the former mayor of Youngstown, Ohio, as well as a member of the Federal Reserve Bank of Cleveland. 



Troy Touchette, SAC professor and chair of the Computer Information Systems department, was named Tech Educator
of the Year by the San Antonio Business Journal.

Alamo Colleges - San Antonio College Chair Named Tech Educator of the Year

Alamo Colleges - San Antonio College (SAC) professor and chair of the Computer Information Systems (CIS) department, Troy Touchette, was recently named Tech Educator of the Year for 2015 as part of the S an Antonio Business Journal's (SABJ) second annual Tech Flash Titans Awards.

The Tech Flash Titans Awards recognize outstanding people, businesses and organizations in various sectors of San Antonio's growing technology industry. Touchette was honored for his work in shaping the curriculum to help students make a more seamless transition through each level of the educational pipeline and ultimately to employment in technology.

A SAC faculty member since 1999, Touchette was named chair of the CIS department in 2012. He also serves as a professor of programming and security courses.

Touchette studied electrical engineering at McNeese State University in Louisiana. Before joining SAC, he served as a lecturer and adjunct faculty member at the University of Texas San Antonio (UTSA) and Texas A&M University - San Antonio. 



The Alamo Colleges mission is: empowering our diverse communities for success. Our vision is: the Alamo Colleges will be the best in the nation in student success and performance excellence. The Alamo Colleges is one district with five community colleges serving more than 90,000 students annually from Bexar County and seven other counties in our service area. We provide an affordable, quality college education that leads to associate degrees, certificates and transfers to four-year universities. Hundreds of thousands of Bexar County residents who have come through the Alamo Colleges education programs are major contributors to the economy and culture of Sa n Antonio.