OCC appoints new president
Michael Miller
Bob Dees, who has served as Orange Coast College’s vice president of
instruction for the last seven years, has been appointed as the
college’s new president.
The Coast Community College District Board of Trustees selected
Dees over three other candidates after interviews on March 30 and
announced their choice on Monday. At the board’s meeting this
Wednesday, Dees will be sworn in to replace the college’s eighth
president, Gene Farrell, who retired at the end of March.
“I’m very excited about it, and I look forward to working more
closely with the chancellor and the board and to do what I can to
help the college move ahead,” Dees said. “I’m just delighted to have
the position and am looking forward to being president here.”
Board member Jerry Patterson said it was Dees’ history at Orange
Coast College, more than anything, that put him past the other three
candidates.
“I think any of them would have been a good choice,” Patterson
said. “I think what gave Bob Dees the inside track was being in the
position of an OCC administrator for a number of years. He’s a known
quantity, and that can work both ways. Sometimes it works against
them, sometimes for them, and in his case it worked for him.”
Dees, 60, first came to Orange Coast College as an English
instructor in 1978. From 1981 to 1984, he chaired the campus English
department and later spent 14 years as dean of the school’s
literature and languages division. In the mid-1990s, Dees also served
on the statewide English Council of California Two-Year Colleges,
acting as its president for one year.
During his time as vice president of instruction, he has
co-authored the college’s accreditation and midterm reports and
helped to develop the campus’s new master plans following the passage
of ballot Measure C in 2002. Under the measure, Orange Coast College
will add more than $250 million in new facilities and also renovate
its academic programs. Over the last year, Dees helped to develop the
college’s new Learning Campus Program, a faculty-based system
designed to enhance student learning.
“I think he’s a great choice mainly because he’s been there 27
years,” said Jim Carnett, director of community relations for Orange
Coast College. “He’s been a faculty member, an administrator, a dean,
a vice president; he’s come all the way up the ladder.
“He is so familiar with this place that there really won’t be a
transition. He’s going to hit the ground running. When he officially
starts Thursday in that position, he’ll be at a full sprint.”
A Monrovia native and Laguna Niguel resident, Dees earned his
bachelor’s and master’s degrees in English from San Jose State
University and also pursued doctoral work at UCLA. Before joining
Orange Coast College’s faculty, he taught English at UCLA, Cal State
Northridge, Los Angeles City College and Los Angeles Trade Technical
College.
* MICHAEL MILLER covers education and may be reached at (714)
966-4617 or by e-mail at michael.miller@latimes.com.
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