PRESIDENT OF DELGADO COMMUNITY COLLEGE IN NEW ORLEANS TO GIVE COMMENCEMENT ADDRESS AT COMMUNITY COLLEGE OF PHILADELPHIA

PHILADELPHIA, PA, May 2, 2006- Belted by Hurricane Katrina, which leveled New Orleans killing hundreds of people and wreaking millions of dollars in damage, it is a wonder Delgado Community College in New Orleans survived.

But through the skilled leadership of Dr. Alex Johnson, Delagdo's chancellor, the school is slowly returning to the vibrant campus that long has had the distinction of being the state of Louisiana's oldest community college.

Johnson will be the keynote speaker at Community College of Philadelphia's 40th Commencement at 2 p.m., Sunday, May 7 at Temple University's Liacouras Center, 1776 Broad Street in Philadelphia. Like many of the students at Community College of Philadelphia, Dr. Johnson knows what it is like to battle against the odds and succeed.

Hurricane Katrina devastated Delgado's campus inflicting damage on 70 percent of the buildings on the school's main campus and causing an estimated $60 million to $75 million in damage throughout the entire campus. "But we were blessed in that we will be able to occupy five or six of our 25 buildings this spring, and those include our larger classroom buildings," Johnson told Community College Week in an interview earlier this year.

Most of Delgado's students, faculty and staff were displaced to areas throughout the country. Some of the students came to Community College of Philadelphia, which waived their tuition.

It is Johnson's optimistic attitude that has guided Delgado through one of the most turbulent times since the school was founded in 1921. It has not been easy.

Reeling from the after-effects of Katrina, the state of Louisiana was forced to tighten its fiscal belt late last year. As a result, it cut funding to the college by nearly $6 million, forcing the college to cut its 400-member staff almost in half, mostly by furloughs.

Delgado was not alone. The state cut a total of $17.3 million from the entire Louisiana Community and Technical College System, of which Delgado is a part. As a result, 615 of the system's 5,000 employees were furloughed or laid off, according to Walter Bumphus, president of the Louisiana Community and Technical College System.

Since that time, Delgado has received federal funding and private donations, but it is still working to regain its footing. For example, before Katrina hit on Aug. 29, Delgado had close to 17,500 students. This spring about 15,000 students are in attendance, according to Delgado officials.

After the hurricane, Johnson wasted no time in working to return the college to normalcy. By September 5, he secured and relocated the college's top administrative functions to temporary headquarters at the Baton Rouge Community College Conference Center. He also set about getting the college to locate and reassemble its faculty and staff who were scattered around the country.

With assistance from the Louisiana Community and Technical College System office in Baton Rouge, a call center was established that enabled Delgado employees to communicate with the college. Baton Rouge Community College also provided Delgado with server space for a temporary college Web site.

Under Johnson's leadership, Delgado also embarked on a huge initiative to transfer as many courses to online instruction as possible, enabling the college to hold a virtual fall semester for more than 2,500 students. Faculty and staff had just a few weeks to implement the special online fall semester, which provided 5,281 course offerings, according to the college's website.

The college also established two funds, the Katrina Victims Student Relief Fund and the Delgado Recovery Fund, to accept donations for Katrina Relief assistance.

Johnson has contributed his expertise to the citywide hurricane recovery effort as a member of Mayor C. Ray Nagin's "Bringing Back New Orleans Commission," where he serves as chair of the workforce subcommittee and as a member of the education, strategic healthcare issues, and economic development steering committees.

Prior to being named chancellor of Delgado in December 2003, Johnson was president of the 8,000-student Cuyahoga Community College Metropolitan Campus for a decade.

He is widely published with articles on administration and curriculum and a variety of book reviews and reports covering education and community college issues. He is the recipient of several honors and awards including the Frank G. Jackson, Mayor of Cleveland, Ohio Visionary Award in 2003, the Innovator of the Year Award from the League for Innovation in the Community College, and the Phi Theta Kappa national honor society's President of the Year Award, 1999-2000.

Johnson holds a doctorate in curriculum and instruction from Penn State University; a Master's degree in early childhood education from Lehman College in the Bronx, N.Y.; and a Bachelor's degree in intermediate education from Winston-Salem State University in North Carolina. He will be presented with an Honorary Doctorate of Humane Letters at Community College of Philadelphia's commencement.