JOHNSTOWN — Fulton-Montgomery Community College got a visit from the Department of Homeland Security recently, according to college president Dustin Swanger.
During Thursday’s Board of Trustees meeting, Swanger said a couple weeks ago, the college was visit by officers from the department for a check of the college.
He said they were doing an ‘audit’ of the see “See Something, Say Something” policy. See Something, Say Something asks that people report suspicious activity to local law enforcement.
Swanger said over three days, officers visited the campus. The first two days they went unnoticed as they moved about campus taking photos. But on the third day the officers were acting a little “off” and asking questions that raised concerns.
Admissions staff called for campus security, who responded to the scene.
“They were pleased with our response. That was reaffirming,” Swanger said.
Swanger said he never met the officers while they were there. He said he is not certain if the college will get a report from Homeland Security.
Also during the meeting, Swanger announced that the college recently made changes to its website following a call from the Department of Education about the site being out of compliance for people with disabilities.
“That sounds awful, but I will tell you that this went across the entire country. There was a company, I believe that filed against many colleges across the country that their websites were out of compliance. And this company had software that would fix that,” Swanger said.
Swanger said FMCC did not use the company that allegedly filed the complaint, but instead went with Shannon Rose Design who has done work for the college before, including creating a new front page for the college.
“They weren’t major. There were some program things we needed to do,” Swanger said.
Swanger said he got a letter from the Department of Education on Thursday confirming the college is in compliance with these changes.
“They were minor issues, and we have addressed them,” Swanger said.
Swanger said items that colleges needed to have for being in compliance included: alternative ways to navigate if someone can’t use a mouse, they can navigate with a keyboard; having a search field state it is a search field; and including the ability for software to help those with limited or no vision via voice prompts.
“We were missing some of those things that we added them,” Swanger said.
Kerry Minor can be reached at [email protected]
