Education
BY CASSANDRA JENKINS
Mario Castillo appointed Lone Star College System’s fifth chancellor Mario Castillo was appointed the fifth chan- cellor of the Lone Star College System in August. Castillo follows former Chancellor Stephen Head, who retired this year. Castillo has served LSCS since 2015 as vice chancellor, general counsel and chief operat- ing officer. He is also the first Hispanic LSCS chancellor. What are your thoughts on House Bill 8’s changes to the way community colleges are funded? I’m a much bigger fan of outcome-based funding. That means we’re not going to be an enrollment-focused institution anymore. We are going to be a retention-focused institution, which means that what I’m more interested in
is keeping the students that we have rather than recruiting more. What industries do you expect will have the most significant workforce needs over the next 10 years? Information technology; computers, national security, information technology and computer chips. A lot of our computer chips come from overseas, and so we are vulnerable to countries that are not entirely friendly to the United States. What are some short- and long-term goals you have for the LSCS? I’m a big proponent of one LSC, so for the next 10 months, my goal is to get all 7,000 of our employees doing the same thing and working collaboratively toward the same goal.
This interview has been edited for length, style and clarity. For a longer version, visit communityimpact.com .
COURTESY LONE STAR COLLEGE SYSTEM
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