Two men — Aaron Klein and John Vodonick — are running to represent Trustee Area 7 on the Sierra College board of trustees.

Klein, a resident of Colfax who runs his own business in Auburn, has served one term on what is formally called the Sierra Joint Community College District board.

Challenger Vodonick is a lawyer who lives in Nevada City.

The Union posed four questions to the candidates, and here are their answers:

What qualifies you to serve on the board of trustees?

Klein:

I've only been a trustee for the last four years, but we've accomplished a great deal in that time. When I was elected, the college had just suffered through three straight years of deficits totaling $850,000. I led the drive for passing four balanced budgets in a row, with surpluses of more than $2 million since.

We've steadily increased access to college: More students than ever are being prepared to thrive in any four year university or get a high-paying job. Just last month, Sierra College became one of only colleges in the state to achieve "fiscal independence" — a recognition of our fiscal stability and prudent reserves.

We need to finish the job we started four years ago when we started developing our strategic plan, tying our priorities to our budgeting and improving student learning outcomes.

Vodonick:

I have over a dozen years of classroom experience in post secondary education as a student and have enjoyed teaching at Sierra College.

My first degree was earned at Fullerton Community College. I transferred to CSU Fullerton, where I graduated with a BA in business administration. I graduated cum laude and second in my class from Pepperdine University School of Law. I’ve recently returned to the classroom, completing coursework for a master of arts degree and working toward my Ph.D.

I also have extensive experience in business; administering sizable budgets, long-term goal setting, strategic planning and implementation. I work well with others to reach consensus and have developed team building skills that would be an asset to the current Sierra College board of trustees.

What are the three most important goals you would want to accomplish?

Klein:

We need to invest more in online education. Expand student services to make college more convenient for working people. And schedule college classes in vacant high school classrooms in the afternoons, so we can give every high school student the chance to take their first steps into college before they graduate from high school.

Vodonick:

1) For the first time in history Sierra College is on the Academic Accreditation Warning List. I would bring the focus back to the mission of the institution, which is to provide quality education. This includes providing vision and leadership to draft and adopt a strategic plan.

2) This semester, Sierra College turned away thousands of nursing and science students. It has the lowest ratio of full-time faculty members in the California College system. I would throw open education to all of those in the district who desire to further their education and would work to provide the necessary faculty.

3) Sierra College is ranked 70th out of 72 districts in investment per student. No comprehensive renovations have occurred on the Rocklin campus. I will put education first and remove politics from the equation so we can again become a respected educational institution.

How do you propose to make Sierra College an asset to our local economy?

Klein:

Our goal is to allow Nevada County kids to grow up here, get a great education and get a great job without leaving the hometown they love.

We do that by increasing the academic quality and excellence of our job training programs so that we are delivering the skills to our graduates to start new businesses, create new jobs, and fill those jobs with a qualified workforce.

Vodonick:

The presence of Sierra College and the 20,000 students attending brings an estimated billion and half dollars to our local economy. How we keep Sierra College, now that it is on the academic accreditation warning list for the first time in history?

The trustees must provide the leadership, find the fortitude and display the courage to say no to politics and say yes to protecting the process of education for all individuals seeking to enrich their lives.

What will you do to bring more advanced classes to the Grass Valley campus in the areas of nursing, high technology, Web technology, solar technology and other fields important to the economy in Nevada County?

Klein:

We definitely want to expand the college's excellent firefighter training, nursing, mechatronics, technology and solar and clean energy job training programs as quickly as we can.

To press forward, we expanded our leadership team at NCC by having our dean of business and technology, Stephanie Guevara, spend a great deal of time integrating with Nevada County business leaders, because we need their help to align our job training programs with their specific workforce needs.

With the Measure G expansion projects coming toward completion, we will have the facilities available to expand advanced classes at the Nevada County Campus, so our job will shift to growing the demand in the areas where there are jobs available, and managing the growth of our courses to meet that demand.

Our strategic plan has been instrumental in putting resources and focus behind this effort.

Vodonick:

The reason thousands of students wishing to enroll in science and nursing classes have been turned away this semester appears to stem from the fact that Sierra College has one of the smallest ratios of full time to part time faculty in the California College system.

There isn’t the full time faculty available. I would advocate for improving the part time to full time faculty ratio.

I would look into leveraging our use of technology to increase access to individualized distance learning. I would explore the co-location of facilities with other educational, health and research facilities to increase the capability of our local campus to expand nursing and technical training facilities.

I would work to establish the facilities to train those in our district in emerging technologies, with the goal of providing a workforce here which will attract those new business opportunities we require to grow our local economy.

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