Policies

About HCC Board Policy Manual

The HCC Board Policy Manual* serves to articulate the foundation for the College’s activities and is structured to provide the legal requirements and local board mandates where they exist for each of the major areas of HCC operations. The policy manual is unique to the College, based on the legally-referenced material (“LEGAL” policy), but reflecting the board’s decisions on key policy issues (“LOCAL” policy).

As a condition of employment, HCC employees must comply with the standards contained in these policies and all other applicable College District procedures and regulations, as well as laws that impose duties, requirements, or standards upon HCC employees.

The HCC Board Policy manual is divided into sections corresponding to these major areas of operations:

Within each section, the manual is further divided into individual policy codes which serve to outline the manual for each topic. The HCC Board Policy Manual contains up to four kinds of documents for any given code. The absence of any one of the above documents does not make the policy code unenforceable:

About the Policies

Legal Policies

(LEGAL) policies— which contain legally cited provisions compiled by TASB Legal Services and housed in the policy manual for convenience. These are not adopted by the Board. (LEGAL) policies should be read alongside corresponding (LOCAL) policies, though not every code includes both a (LEGAL) and a (LOCAL) policy. (LEGAL) policies cite applicable federal and state law, Texas Attorney General opinions, and court decisions, providing the statutory context in which all other policies and documents should be read.

 

Local Policies

(LOCAL) policies—which are Board-adopted local mandates housed in the policy manual. (LOCAL) policies should be read alongside corresponding (LEGAL) policies, though not every code includes both a (LEGAL) and a (LOCAL) policy.

 

Regulation

(REGULATION)— is a written administrative document, such as a procedure, guideline or handbook, meant to implement the requirements of law and local board policy.

 

Exhibit

(EXHIBIT)— are forms, charts, or other policy-related information presented in a graphic format. An (EXHIBIT) is a local administrative document, such as an agreement or permission form.

 

Policies and Procedures

Note about Policies

*The HCC Board Policy Manual contains copyrighted material from the Texas Association of School Board’s (TASB) Community College Policy Reference Manual and the TASB Policy Service, which serves as the basis for the localized policy manual contained herein. HCC contracted directly with TASB to develop and maintain the policy manual. All legal and local policies contained in this manual are pending authorization and approval from TASB to duplicate and distribute and use with permission.