DSPS. SEA. EOC. SSS. EOPS.
And my personal favorite: ECDBC (try saying it quickly ten times).*
Every profession has its own jargon that includes a slew of acronyms. West and the District are no different. Now, we've added two more to the lexicon of "alphabet-speak," but they've quickly taken on significant importance: EOC and ICC.
These two entities emerged as a result of the District's response to the coronavirus epidemic. I realized, however, that we've talked about them during the virtual town halls, but their purpose and function may not be clear. So here's a quick tour of EOCs, ICCs...and EOPs.
EOC stands for Emergency Operations Center. An EOC is established in response to a significant crisis or emergency: in this case, the coronavirus. The LACCD model is similar to that initiated by the CDC (sorry...Centers for Disease Control and Prevention). According to the LACCD Pandemic Plan (February 27, 2020), the EOC is charged with "provision of overall direction of the response activities of all departments; strategic long-term planning for prolonged campus closures; and development of timely, consistent and accurate information to the college’s or the District’s community regarding impacts of the pandemic on college or District operations, closures and eventual recovery." The EOC Director is Dr. Melinda Nish, Interim Deputy Chancellor; members include representatives from all nine campuses, governance and bargaining entities, and the District.
At the local level, the ICC--Incident Command Center--is responsible for monitoring campus activities, reporting suspected cases to the EOC, and implementing the directives and safety advisories of the Chancellor as recommended to him by the EOC. At West, the ICC coordinator is Silvia Barajas, Vice President for Administrative Services. West's ICC includes representation from all three divisions of the College (Academic Affairs, Student Services, Administrative Services) and our bargaining units.
The EOCs and ICCs will be in operation until such time that the Chancellor decides that resumption of services dictate that an emergency operations process is no longer needed.
An EOP, by the way, is an Emergency Operations Plan. And the HTH in the title: texting shorthand for "hope this helps."
* ECDBC stands for Executive Committee of District Budget Committee