Career Service Post - Maricopa Community Colleges' Creative Pathways

Every semester the Maricopa Community Colleges District Office hosts an employee orientation to educate the incoming employees on the culture of Maricopa.  Although I have worked for Maricopa before, I was prompted to attend because I am new to South Mountain Community College.  At first I went kicking and screaming, because I figured it would be another four hours of the history, goals, culture, etc, etc, of Maricopa.  Although I did relearn all this information, I was happy I attended because I learned of the Maricopa Community Colleges' Creative Pathways.  Which up to this point I had not learned much about it, below is a synopsis from their website:

Creative Pathways offers eligible MCCCD employees a variety of opportunities to work toward their professional and personal goals, while at the same time, advancing the educational objectives of the Maricopa Community Colleges. These opportunities have been designed to provide employees with real-world learning experiences for the purpose of acquiring new knowledge, skills and abilities and to help employees consider career options and identify important career development activities.

I found this interesting because I was able to speak to several members that have participated in this program.  What I learned that the program gives us the employees the ability learn new skills across departments.  Essentially in professional development, the skills you learn from other departments help you strengthen your own in your department as well as gives the participants a better understanding of how other departments work.  Many times we work in silo's, meaning Financial aid only works on financial aid issues, and Admissions and Records (A & R) only work with A & R issues.  Learning both would give anyone an advantage, not only in how the process of something is suppose to get accomplished, but also in the rationale, guidelines, and communication between departments.  As an institution we begin to illuminate barriers that affect students as well by increasing effectiveness and efficiency across departments.  As an individuals we learn other ways of operating, developing processes, and create relationships across departments in the hopes that if one day there is a position available at a department I've trained for, I can be seen as a candidate for that position.

With an institution as large as Maricopa Community Colleges, one can get lost in the shuffle, this is a great way to stand apart, learn new skills, and train for future positions of greater responsibilities if need be.