The Guardsman The Truth Shall Make You Free
Vol. 1 8 0, I ssue 3 | S ep te m b e r 2 5 – O c to b er 8 , 2025 | City Colleg e of San Fran c is co | S in ce 1935 | F R EE | www.th e gua rdsma n .co m
Transit Pass for City College?
Balboa Reservoir Project
Women's Volleyball
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Fresh Leadership, Fresh Vision: City College's New Chancellor Steps In By Tabari Morris tmorri47@mail.ccsf.edu
C
ity College has welcomed its 13th chancellor in just 11 years, as Chancellor Kimberlee Messina takes the helm, promising to unify a campus troubled by leadership turnover and to advance new plans for equity and stability. Messina expressed her vision for the college's future in a comprehensive interview in which relationship building, data-informed student success, and transparent leadership were highlighted amid overcoming budgetary and structural challenges.
Vision and Leadership Messina, a veteran of California community colleges who most recently served as president of Spokane Falls Community College in Washington, described City College as a “core part of this community” with “90 years of being committed to social justice, equity, diversity and inclusion.” However, Messina acknowledged that “a lot of turnover, a lot of internal stress, as well as some external stresses” have weakened institutional cohesion. Messina pointed to having navigated an institution through the COVID-19 pandemic as a defining experience, and one for which she credited the emergency with pushing deeper equity work and organizational alignment. At Spokane Falls, the number of first-year students completing college-level math in their first semester doubled, and the institution moved from last to first in Washington state. “When we finally were sort of out of the pandemic, we had made so many different changes to our organizational structure that it was much more integrated and much more student-centered,” she said.
Student Success and Equity
Dr. Kimberlee S. Messina, chancellor of City College. Sept. 9, 2025. (Isaac Ortiz Dominguez/The Guardsman)
Java on Ocean. Sept. 16, 2025 (Cain Gibson/The Guardsman)
Tired of nodding off in the library or duking it out for a power outlet? Look no further! Our illustrious Culture editor turned this town upside down to rank all the best study spots near City College's Ocean Campus in Ingleside. We ranked local watering holes on sprawl-factor, lock-in potential and more! For the full Guardsman Guide to study spots, turn to page 4.
Messina said she aims to get “Guided Pathways,” a national reform movement for community colleges to offer clear academic and support services so students are on course. “It's not an initiative,” she said. “It's literally like, okay, do students have the advice and support they need from the very beginning? Do they have the ongoing check-ins to ensure that they're staying on their path?” she explained. City College began implementing Guided Pathways previously, but the effort “has sort of been kind of paused a bit,” according to Messina, who intends to accelerate it by engaging faculty, staff, and students. “It was designed for a whole different population … community college was like, let's allow everyone in, which is wonderful, but we didn't go beyond that for a long time. So everyone came in, but then we didn't change our processes, our language, our systems, to be relevant to a diverse population.” Messina also called for the updating of City College's technology in seeking to enhance student engagement and retention. “Some of the strategies … we can, and we will be able to leverage AI and other systems to … have an actual dialogue with them,” she said. A newly revamped “Student Equity Plan,” set to go before the board in October, seeks specifically to prioritize those student populations with the widest achievement gaps, specifically Black and African American students. She committed to “look into” recent reports of program eliminations for initiatives like Rising Scholars to help ensure such students continue to receive robust support.
Financial Stability and Transparency
The adopted City College budget, approved in June, is “very, very solid,” says Messina, who complimented
the finance staff for wiping out inherited code errors and generating one-time revenues. More instructional sections and student services are budgeted in place, while high reserves are on hand. But Messina warns against a projected structural deficit — when an organization spends more than it earns year after year — within two years unless further steps are taken. “The challenge for us this year and next year is to look at our overall organization and prepare for a leaner future in some ways. There's no intention of looking at any layoffs ... What we're looking at is, as we encounter vacancies, is the position used, or should it be placed elsewhere? So, looking at ways to put our resources where they can do the most for our students.” Messina cited a need to continue the precedent of budgetary transparency. Students, faculty, classified staff and administrators are represented in government, and San Francisco and Sacramento policymakers are being kept up to date on the college's transition back to financial well-being.
“My first goal is to really embed myself in this college community, get to know people, develop relationships, and start to reignite … the sort of collaboration that exists here and not have it be so siloed,” Messina said. Support and Community Engagement Messina praised City College's “very large and diverse set of support mechanisms for students,” but acknowledged that these resources are often “funded in different silos” that can confuse students. Guided Pathways, she said, will help coordinate these services. She highlighted Family U, a program supporting parenting students, as an example of responsive, student-centered innovation. In her first six months, Messina sees her primary objective as “being out and about, and engaged in all of our centers and our departments to make sure that I have a pulse on what everyone is experiencing, feeling and needing.” She described her leadership style as “open” and “transparent.”
“You have a question. Ask me. Come see me. I might not give an answer that you like, but I will always give the truth. Happy to share why,” Messina said. Message to City College Messina's closing message to students and employees reflects both optimism and urgency. “I'm just thrilled to be here to work with everyone. I think that we have an opportunity to continue to build on our legacy of social justice,” she said. “It's important, now more than ever, to ensure that not only are we open and that we're accessible, but that students who want to graduate or transfer, that we're making sure that they're able to do that in a timely fashion so that they can economically benefit.”