“At the height of the pandemic, about 60-70 percent of the classes were remote in one way or another,” Daniels said. “And I say that because you have to understand that you can talk about being totally remote, which means that there is no in-person component of the course. And then there is the hybrid format, which is a combination of in-person and remote. When you put both of those together, we were probably running at the height of the pandemic about 85-90 percent. For 10 percent of our classes, we had to do in-person because of the necessity of some of the disciplines like nursing and EMT. You had to do those in-person. You can’t do them outside of that, especially when you are talking about clinicals.”

As people sheltered-in-place during the pandemic, not everyone successfully transitioned to remote education and so overall attendance dipped. But for Daniels and Madison College, they didn’t want to wait for students to come back. They wanted to proactively go out into the community and engage underrepresented communities to ensure that they were once more fully represented in the Madison College learning community.

“The Office of Community Engagement was born in July 1, 2021,” Daniels said. “We are out in the community trying to engage our students, especially with those communities that have disengaged or we have been disengaged to them, marginalized communities, those communities where our engagement as not been at the level that I would expect it to be. And so we have a strong group of five people who are focusing in on those communities of color, especially African Americans, Latinx, Hmong and the Ho-Chunk community. We have focused right there on those communities. Most recently, Dr. Ernise Williams who was formerly the dean of the School of Nursing is now the manager of the Community Engagement folks. She took that role over in mid-February.”

As a part of Community Engagement’s initiatives, it has been offering programming designed to bring people back into Madison College’s buildings, to get that in-person feel again. They celebrated the Hmong New Year, hosted a Black Women’s Art exhibit in honor of late Madison College staffer Dzigbodi Akyea and will revitalize its annual pow wow later this month. It’s all about equity and inclusion.

“That’s a huge focus for us,” Daniels said. “We’re doing it in every avenue and every corner of the college trying to focus in on that. We’re in the midst of a hiring process for a new person who will be the VP of Equity & Inclusion. We will conclude those interviews tomorrow and hope to make a decision in the next 10-14 days. But that’s continuing. We’re part of Achieving the Dream, which is a national network of basically peer institutions. They are looking at how do you move forward for student success using the equity lens. So we are continuing to do that.”

One of the biggest barriers for people returning to work and to school is the lack of affordable childcare. It’s an issue that holds back the entire community.

“We are really focusing on good deal on that whole childcare, child development industry,” Daniels said. “The dollars that we got from the Workforce Investment Grant focus in on that. We are using that money in a couple of ways. One is the fact that there is only one childcare center in Madison College, in Truax. We are now looking at putting a childcare center at each of our regional campuses. And we have to come to some conclusion of what we are going to do in South. We’re trying to work through that in several different positions. That’s a huge issue. It’s an economic development issue. It’s a community development issue. It’s a social action issue. It’s an educational issue. And we will put a lot of effort in addressing the childcare/child development needs of our community.”

Madison College has set up a structure of support and connection to help it and its students weather any crisis. And Daniels is committed to maintaining that fabric for success.

“We are here for the community,” Daniels said. “We are here for folks who are looking for post-secondary education and training. We are actively partnering with many of our community-based organizations so that we can engage ourselves around specific issues and concerns that are based in the community. I feel very good about those collaborations and those partnerships. And we will continue to expand upon those. Madison College is going to entering into the next turn, if you will. We are as fully prepared as we possibly can to meet the needs of our students and our community.”

And that makes for a brighter future for Dane County and beyond, pandemic or no pandemic.