By QUINTON SMITH/YachatsNews
Marshall Roache has been a college wrestler and coach, retail store manager, police officer and community college administrator.
Now he’s becoming a community college president.
Roache, 49, was named the fifth president in the 37-year history of Oregon Coast Community College during a special board meeting Monday night. He will start work at the college Nov. 12 and take over Jan. 1 from Birgitte Ryslinge, 66, who is retiring Dec. 31 after 10 years as president.
The college’s seven-member board voted unanimously to hire Roache after a six-month search that had three finalists and brought two of them to campus for interviews in August. The board approved a three-year contract for its new president that carries a $170,000 yearly salary that increases to $180,000 with completion of his doctoral degree from the University of Southern Mississippi.
“I’m honored and delighted to join this extraordinary college and community,” Roache said in a prepared statement after the board meeting. “OCCC provides transformative opportunities for Lincoln County and I can’t wait to be a part of something so important and impactful.”
Roache was a wrestler at the University of Oregon, managed his family’s grocery and shoe store in Cannon Beach for nine years, worked for six years as a police officer and detective in Hillsboro and McMinnville, and began his college teaching career in 2011 as a part-time criminal justice instructor at Salem’s Chemeketa Community College. He has been the executive dean of career and technical education and public safety at Chemeketa since 2020, was dean of Chemeketa’s training center in Brooks from 2015-20 and was program chair and a full-time criminal justice faculty member at the Brooks facility from 2012-15.
At Chemeketa, Roache oversaw areas including Health Sciences programming, including nursing and dental assisting, as well as applied technologies, apprenticeship programs, and the college’s Brooks Regional Training Center.
He has a master’s degree in organizational leadership from Fort Hays State University and a bachelor’s in English from the University of Oregon. He expects to complete his doctorate in education at the University of Southern Mississippi in December. In addition to a wide variety of professional groups, he is a member of the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities and this year was awarded an education leadership award from USM.
“OCCC is a remarkable college in a remarkable community,” said Ryslinge in a news release from the college. “Each leader brings something different. I’m delighted with the board’s choice of Marshall as their next president, I’m confident he is the right leader for the challenges and opportunities ahead.”
Board chair Rich Emery thanked board members for their work as well as the college’s outgoing president. “I’m going to miss you, Birgitte,” he said. “There’s no question about it.”
“We are very pleased, Marshall, that you have applied and have accepted our offer,” Emery said. “Welcome – we are looking forward to working with you …”
Bond approved, contracts settled
Oregon Coast Community College was founded in 1987 but it didn’t have a campus until 2004 when voters passed a $23.5 million bond to establish a main campus in the South Beach area of Newport and satellite buildings in Lincoln City and Waldport. Those facilities were finished in 2009.
In May, voters approved by a wide margin a $33.6 million bond to build a technical and trades education center on the college’s Newport campus and make other improvements to facilities. That bond replaces the 2004 bond.
Oregon Coast Community College is the smallest of Oregon’s 17 community colleges. It has a yearly operating budget of $20 million, 900 full- and part-time students, 105 employees and recently finished negotiating new, five-year contracts with faculty and staff unions.
There were seven initial applicants for the Oregon Coast job, two withdrew and five went through a screening process involving 90-minute interviews and competency assessments with six administrators. Roache and college administrators from Sacramento and Iowa had the highest scores on those assessments, which were drawn from the American Association of Community Colleges and dealt with budgeting, accreditation, facilities, and curriculum.
Roache and Brian Kelly, president of Clinton (Iowa) Community College, came to Newport for interviews in late August. The board met in executive session in September to authorize Emery and board member Chris Chandler to negotiate a contract with Roache – and voted 6-0 approved that contract Monday night. Board member Bud Shoemake was absent but sent a message that he was enthusiastic about hiring Roache.
“Life changing”
In an interview with YachatsNews on Tuesday, Roache said he fell in love with community college work in 2011 when he was asked by Chemeketa to help develop police training tools for its public safety programs for its Brooks campus.
“It’s been life changing. I switched careers because of it,” he said. “Community colleges just don’t change individuals but generations of lives.”
Roache said he has some understanding of OCCC’s programs because of relationships between the two schools. But he intends to spend the first few months on campus “listening to faculty, staff, students and the community.”
“What are the opportunities and the challenges?” he said.
Roache said he and his family are excited to return to the coast. His wife, Leslie, worked in Silverton schools and now manages grants at Chemeketa. He has a son attending Oregon State University and a daughter at the University of Oregon.
“I am humbled at this opportunity,” Roache told the OCCC board Monday night. “I can’t wait to get there, roll up my sleeves and get to work.”
- Quinton Smith is the editor of YachatsNews.com and can be reached at YachatsNews@gmail.com