Greetings friends and colleagues of CVHEC,

We are so delighted to welcome you to the 2026-27 academic year, and hope our member college and university campuses are off to a great fall semester.

We also are excited to announce plans to observe next year the 25th anniversary of the Central Valley Higher Education Consortium beginning with our 2027 CVHEC Summit.

We have set the dates for April 22 and 23 when we invite you to join us in celebrating the great impact this organization has made on higher education in the region since its incorporation in 2002. We are particularly pleased to note that the consortium, with two and a half decades of impactful work by its member institutions, has been recognized nationally and at the state level.  

Also, in this issue, I have been presented with an opportunity to observe my own 10th anniversary as executive director of this remarkable organization by presenting in our monthly “What the CV-HEC is Happening” Blog my personal perspective about the origins, history and spirit of the consortium and the privilege I have enjoyed of serving in this position. 

I actually share the 25th anniversary with CVHEC as I was a founding board member in 2002 as president of Merced College, serving on the board until my retirement in 2015. The following year, I was recruited to ignore the joys of retirement and resume a life of advocating for students seeking higher education and a productive career and life as the consortium executive director. 

That move has truly been one of the highlights of my personal and professional career as it presented me the privilege to collaborate not only with the leaders of the valley’s colleges but to help assemble the CVHEC core team of professionals I have been fortunate to work with for the past 10 years. And we all know that, really, these movers and shakers — many themselves former CVHEC board members — do all the  heavy lifting. 

Keep an eye out in our coming newsletter issues for more about our 25th anniversary, and if you haven’t already, check out the CVHEC Story video we released in May.

Please enjoy our September newsletter as we look ahead to planning a grand observance of our great 25-year run.