In response to concerns brought forward by faculty and staff during the fall 2021 term, Salt Lake Community College’s Board of Trustees commissioned an internal audit, the results of which showed issues with complaint reporting and employee websites.
Employees reported technical obstacles when attempting to file complaints of issues in the workplace or requesting information from higher ups. Employee websites, the internal audit team at the college found, are often outdated, unmonitored and contain inaccurate information.
Alisa Garcia, an internal auditor for the college, said administration is working to fix those issues. One potential solution put forth by the audit team is to design user-friendly graphics that more clearly layout the process for filing complaints or getting answers to questions.
“The purpose for [the graphics] is to make it simplified … to just see instead of combing through a lot of text or reading policy line by line,” Garcia said.
Some of the discrepancies on the employee websites – such as incomplete or inaccurate information – was due to a lack of upkeep, according to the audit team.
“We found that there wasn’t a designated webmaster to make sure the [sites are] being updated on a regular basis,” Garcia said.
While this particular audit only focused on employee concerns, student concerns are handled similarly. When a student reports an issue to the college, such as a Title IX complaint regarding sexual harassment or misconduct, the college will also often perform an internal audit.
“Students who are filing a complaint would fall into the same processes in many cases,” said Travis Lansing, director of the internal audit.
Chris Martin, vice president of Finance and Administration, said he and other colleagues in administration are grateful the internal issues and web reporting faults were brought to their attention.
“I am very appreciative of the board for bringing this forward and … for the recommendations they’ve made,” Martin said, “and I am hopeful that we will get better because of this audit.”
Martin is hopeful that insight from the audit’s results will allow SLCC to improve their workflow not only for faculty and staff complaints, but also for students going forward. He went on to say the audit team is optimistic about the coming Staff Association audit forums next week, in which employees can give additional feedback.
“I hope there’s positive feedback on the progress that we’re making,” Martin said, “I think we’ll get that feedback – the good, bad and constructive feedback at these small forums in November.”
The dates, times and locations of the upcoming Staff Association employee concern audit forums are as follows:
- Taylorsville Redwood Campus (AAB-135): Monday, Nov. 21 from 9-10 a.m.
- South City Campus (SCM 2-188): Tuesday, Nov. 22 from 1-2 p.m.
- Jordan Campus (HTC-105): Tuesday, Nov. 22 from 3-4 p.m.
- Online/Westpointe Center (WWTC 215/217): Wednesday, Nov. 23 from 9-10 a.m.
