Changes to community college funding in Mississippi may be inevitable, but Copiah-Lincoln Community College President Ronnie Nettles believes the school he leads should be ready to weather the transition.

     “I’m not afraid of it,” Nettles said last week of proposals to link community college funding to the performance of those schools.

     During a Thursday afternoon board meeting with Co-Lin’s trustees, he discussed the issue after distributing a performance profile of the school.

     “This is all the beginning of a shift from enrollment- to outcomes-based budgeting,” Nettles said of the profile, further indicating such a shift should begin over the next few years.

     Right now, community colleges receive funding based on total enrollment numbers rather than performance data.

     Such data could include how many students actually graduate.

     Individualized profiles of state community colleges have been compiled by the Education Achievement Council.

     This council was created by the Mississippi legislature in 2010 and tasked with setting certain performance goals and tracking progress.

     The standards in the profiles were created by administrators of Mississippi’s 15 community colleges.

     The profiles track such items as student “success” (measured by graduation and transfer data), school retention and graduation rates, and workforce development activities.

     The report Nettles presented to trustees Thursday was based on information from 2010, but Nettles said the reports for 2011 and 2012 will be forthcoming.

     There shouldn’t be any surprises in those reports, however, said the president, because the school already has access to the data from those years.

     “I think it will be a positive trend,” he said of the upcoming reports.

     However, he feels prepared for other possibilities.

     “Should they (performance statistics) trend downward, that’s when you step in and do something different,” he said.

     Of the profile data he had last week, Nettles was upbeat.

     “Mostly some good information, but a few area we can improve on,” he said.

     In areas of strength, Nettles pointed out that Co-Lin’s graduation percentages are stronger than the statewide community college percentage.

     Areas in need of improvement include retention rates.

     “That’s an area in our planning we want to focus on,” Nettles said.

     The Education Achievement Council has been working with Co-Lin for over a year to produce the report Nettles handed out Thursday, he said.

     In other business Thursday afternoon, the board of trustees also approved several changes to the structure of membership plans to the college’s golf course.

     Under the new plan, discounted plans available to those living more than 30 miles away from the school will be eliminated as they expire.

     Certain free play options will also be eliminated.

     Nettles had previously appointed a committee of board members to study fee and membership structures at the golf course.

     Those members presented their recommendations last week after visiting other colleges and universities throughout the state that operate golf courses for students and members of the public.