Sue Grolnic, of Newburyport, Northern Essex Community College’s Dean of Experiential Learning in Academic Affairs and former Dean of Arts, Business, Communication & Technology was honored recently at the Chair Academy International Leadership Conference with a 2012 Idahlynn Karre International Exemplary Leadership Award for her work with Early College programs at NECC.

The Chair Academy, an organization dedicated to advancing academic and administrative leadership training worldwide, recognizes leaders, or teams of leaders, in post-secondary institutions worldwide who have modeled best practices to advance academic and administrative leadership development. Each leader was nominated by someone within their college.

Dr. Grolnic was honored for her role in launching the Amesbury High School Early College Program in 2008. For the last three years she has provided hands-on leadership of this critical college initiative. The program is an outstanding model of collaboration in the name of improved college preparedness—one that the college is now expanding to other schools in northeast Massachusetts and southern New Hampshire—and that other colleges and school districts are using to shape their own partnerships.

“When we started the program in the fall of 2009, we were looking for students in the middle-of-the-pack academically: those who had the aptitude to succeed but hadn’t yet proven themselves academically. We wanted to raise the bar, helping them to realize that college was in their future,” according to Grolnic.
It worked. Recently 20 Amesbury High School seniors were recognized for participating in the program and earning an impressive number of both high school and college credits.

Grolnic remains committed to the program despite her new role.

Her new title and position in Academic Affairs is a direct result of NECC’s new Academic Master Plan (AMP). The second priority under the “Broader Student Experience” part of the plan is to “Increase Experiential Learning Opportunities.”