DANVILLE — Adding new class-scheduling software at Danville Area Community College will allow employees to better manage the school’s continuing growth spike, said President Alice Jacobs on Friday.

“We need to have a much more efficient way to schedule than we’re currently doing it,” said Jacobs, adding school officials expect another jump in enrollment when classes start for the fall semester Aug. 23.

“We need to take advantage of technology where we can.”

Jacobs will ask DACC trustees Tuesday to OK purchasing $52,000 in software and support from a Denver company as the board convenes at 7p.m. for its July meeting.

Installation will allow college staff, which Jacobs said has been reduced by 20 heads even as student numbers have risen, to more efficiently manage campus classroom space — which includes community use as well.

“Right now it’s more of a manual process,” she said.

And an ever-growing one.

The college saw respective 21 and 32 percent increases in spring and fall semester enrollment in the 2009-10 year, compared to the year prior.

“This summer (2010) increased over last summer 30 percent and last summer was a 30 percent jump (from the summer prior to that),” she said. “We expect fall enrollment to be strong. Typically, that’s a predictor.”

The agreement with Dean Evans and Associates, which bested two other bidders for the scheduling software, comes with on-site training visits and an annual maintenance fee of $7,000. The choice is the result of a nine-person DACC “task force” charged with researching the college’s management information systems overhaul.

“It will be several months in terms of implementation,” Jacobs said. “There’s a great deal of manual input that we’ll have to do.”

Childcare rate hike considered

In other business, trustees will be asked to approve rate increases for child-care services at the Child Development Center.

The following changes are being sought:

• Increase of $10 in the student and community rate for 2- to 3-year-old care, bringing the weekly rate to $115 and $130 respectively.
• Increase of $5 for 3- to 5-year-old care, increasing the student weekly rate to $105 and the community rate to $120.
• Increase in school-age care by $10 to $105 for students, but leaving the community rate the same at $100.
  
  

  Jacobs said operational increases led to the rate-structure request.
  
  “It’s been two years since we had an increase,” she said, adding the new rates would take affect by September, with board approval Tuesday.
  
  The CDC was recently chosen to serve as a demonstration classroom by the U.S. Department of Education’s American Institutes of Research following above-average student improvement scores.
  
  It serves as a laboratory for several college classes and is also utilized by students for its services. More than half of 63 students surveyed in April were children of DACC students and nearly 60 percent qualify for subsidies, including special rates and meals.
  
  Nearly 14 percent of children at the center are those of DACC staff members, with the remaining 31 percent from the community.