Modesto JC president, hired last year, already is on the hunt for another job

Here we go again.

In May 2021, when Modesto Junior College was in between presidents, this Modesto Bee Editorial Board pondered MJC’s misfortune at having the worst record for retaining executives among California’s 115 community colleges. The president chosen just after that editorial now seeks another job, 19 months later.

If MJC President Santanu Bandyopadhyay is hired in coming weeks by the three-campus San Mateo County Community College District, where he is a finalist for the chancellor’s job, MJC’s unfortunate record will continue, and our community once again will wonder where we’re going wrong.

Maybe it’s time to take a closer look at the culture cultivated by Yosemite Community College District Chancellor Henry Yong, who oversees Bandyopadhyay, and at the elected board Yong reports to, the YCCD Board of Trustees. They administer MJC and Columbia College near Jamestown.

It’s not easy to give a comprehensive report card on Bandyopadhyay’s performance, because his time here has been so far (characteristically) short. No doubt he has made friends and accomplished some things at a time when all institutions of higher learning are struggling to rebuild enrollment after large swaths of students during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Modesto Junior College President Santanu Bandyopadhyay addresses the audience during the Centennial Founders’ Day Celebration in the East Campus Quad on Sunday afternoon, Sept. 19, 2021.

In a recent public interview with the San Mateo district, Bandyopadhyay said MJC managed to improve enrollment this fall 30% over the previous year, when the pandemic raged. That’s encouraging.

It’s hard, however, to conclude that Bandyopadhyay is committed to Modesto when at least some evidence suggests otherwise.

Last year, two days after accepting the MJC president job — and a $240,548 starting salary — he interviewed for the same position at another community college in Southern California, and he was a finalist at yet another college at the same time. He told a Bee reporter that the YCCD’s less-than-reassuring 4-2 vote to hire him had kept him looking for greener pastures, which makes some sense.

A month later, in June 2021, YCCD trustees unanimously voted to offer Bandyopadhyay a two-year contract extension, through June 2024, and gave him a $5,000 bonus, which he said he would donate to the MJC Foundation.

But a year and half later — much sooner than June 2024, obviously — he’s resumed his job search.

Why retention matters

In Bandyopadhyay’s recent San Mateo interview, he said he would try to strengthen campuses there by improving dual enrollment, where high school students obtain college credits by also taking courses at a junior college. It’s a head-scratcher that he would go there, when MJC’s dual enrollment with Stanislaus County high schools is the worst in the Central Valley and among the worst in California, The Bee’s Adam Echelman reported earlier this month.

Bandyopadhyay also told San Mateo viewers he would like stronger relationships with industry there — another curious statement, given MJC’s weakness in providing students with the type of job training desperately sought by some or our large employers.

Modesto Junior College President Santanu Bandyopadhyay

For the record, a news report in that area indicates that San Mateo’s current chancellor intends to retire in June 2023. If Bandyopadhyay is hired there, he presumably would stay at MJC until then, fulfilling his promise to Yong last year to stay here two years .

But MJC would keep its disappointing place at the rock bottom of California’s executive-retention list.

Why is it so important that college executives stick around?

In 1995, alarmed at presidents and chancellors coming and going with increasing frequency, the Community College League of California — an association providing professional development for such leaders, plus elected trustees — commissioned an every-other-year survey concluding that more should stay put.

The longer a college president remains in the job, the better chance she or he has at improving campus culture, said the survey and subsequent studies. Long-tenured presidents are better equipped to handle prickly problems and to make tough decisions, the commission says.

Those managing to keep a president 13 years, for example, inspire innovation on a much higher level than those which struggle to retain leaders. Longer-tenured presidents cultivate relationships with other community institutions and are better able to respond to local workforce needs.

Worst among 115 JCs

The American flag blows in the wind on a warm summer evening on Modesto Junior College’s picturesque west campus on Sunday, July 26, 2020.

Since 2000, MJC has had 14 presidents or interim presidents. The statewide average is four.

The average presidential tenure in that same time frame for MJC is 17 months. The statewide average is 72 months.

This discouraging turnover doesn’t just affect MJC but the entire community.

MJC, which celebrated its centennial last year, by virtue of its job-training mission will play a pivotal role in Stanislaus 2030, a broad-based effort to jump-start our economy. The promising effort needs a strong, healthy, committed MJC to fulfill its mission of bringing 40,000 well-paying jobs, defined as making $29 an hour.

Finding a community college president who is more committed to Modesto than to climbing her or his own personal professional ladder must become Job 1 for Yong and for YCCD trustees.