ALSO IN THIS ISSUE
Ceramics
From manufacturing to medicine to the mundane, ceramics are all around us

Turning Back the Clock
Jeffrey Wheat helps his older adult students stay young and limber

Plane Speaking
Aviation maintenance instructors build their own planes

Verbal Volleys
Larry Weiss coaches Mesa College debate team to lob the winning argument

Left Brain, Right Brain
Herald Kane is equally adept at analytical and creative pursuits

To Protect and To Serve
Police officer Diana Medero enthusiastically serves her college community

Online Biology
Cooking up experiments at home

Taking to the Streets
Faculty, staff and students march to protest governor's budget cuts to colleges

Chancellor’s Page
Chancellor and trustees wage battle for fair funding

Development News
Concerts fund music scholarships; Miramar College Foundation forms subcommittees

Factoids
Miscellaneous tidbits of information

NewsMakers
Faculty and staff accomplishments

Factoids

Miscellaneous tidbits of information

SOUP’S ON. San Diego is home to the nation’s only accredited chef’s training offered in a homeless shelter. The Centers for Education and Technology (CET) have teamed up with St. Vincent de Paul Village to offer the 600-hour culinary program, followed by 200 hours of paid internship in local restaurant and hotel kitchens. The students are drawn primarily from residents of the village. They get practice slicing and dicing when they sometimes help prepare the 1,200 meals served daily at the shelter. November saw the first class of 16 graduate and move on to above entry-level culinary jobs.

Felix Aquino, president of CET, Marc Cuellar, dean at Centre City and Cesar Chavez centers, and Donna Namdar, instructional leader for family and consumer sciences, showcased this culinary program during their presentation to the League for Innovation in the Community College about collaborations with St. Vincent de Paul. For more information, contact Donna Namdar at 619-388-4949 or e-mail dnamdar@sdccd.edu.

WHY DOES THE STUDENT CROSS THE STREET? City College’s business communications professor Leroy Brady and Sandra Linn, who teaches the same topic across the street at Centre City Center, have teamed up, giving their students exposure to instructional content from both sides of Park Boulevard. Brady, whose class meets on Fridays, gives his students extra credit for every one of Linn’s Monday-through-Thursday classes they attend. In addition, Brady will teach at Centre City this summer.

3RD ANNUAL CAREER EXPO. Miramar College students and the general public were joined by more than 250 area high school students during an event filled 3rd Annual Diamond Days Career Expo which included a campus-wide open house, job fair and student festival. Visitors explored career training programs offered by the college, including transportation technologies (aviation, diesel and automotive), biotechnology and public safety. Guests were able to explore campus facilities, including the college’s three-pool aquatic center, state-of-the-art Mac graphics arts and digital music lab, award-winning child development center and Independent Learning Center computer lab. Comprehensive displays by transportation industry partners Toyota and Chrysler, and diesel partner Hawthorne Machinery drew large crowds.

More than 30 employers, recruiting for current and future job openings, participated in the Job Fair portion of the event.

The student festival, “Flower Fest,” was sponsored by the Miramar College Associated Students, and added bands, a DJ, food and craft vendor booths to the event. Planners of the annual event include Julianna Rodriguez, Mary Benard, Greg Newhouse, Joe Hankinson, Ray Quon, Tim Riley and Sandi Trevisan of Miramar College. Denise Whisenhunt, dean of high school outreach, addressed high school students at “welcome” orientations to kick off their visit.

TOYOTA SUMMER SCHOOL. Toyota of El Cajon is hosting automotive instructor and department chair Ray Quon’s T-TEN (Toyota-Technical Education Network) program summer class, using dealership equipment and work areas at its new Santee Automotive Store. Quon’s program is slated to move from old quarters at Mira Mesa High School, but the new facilities on the college campus are not ready for occupancy. Dale Snow, service director at Toyota of El Cajon heard about this problem and offered his facilities free of charge for the summer air conditioning class. Quon credits strong industry partnerships and respect for Miramar’s quality training for this generosity.

PATRIOT BASKETS. This spring staff and students at West City Center conducted a donation drive to fill “patriot baskets” for the families of their students who had a servicemember deployed or soon to be deployed in the Iraq war. The drive culminated in a special event on April 30, complete with music and refreshments where 25 military-dependent children, ages 10 months to 14 years, received their gift baskets. The baskets held age appropriate toys for the kids plus food coupons and other items for the family from area businesses including McDonalds, Chuck E. Cheese, Big Lots, Krispy Kreme, Target, Mervyn’s, WalMart, the San Diego Padres and many others.

West City staff came up with this project to show their appreciation for the sacrifices service personnel and their families are making during the Iraq conflict. Spearheading the homefront drive were counselor Lola Gaona, clerical assistant Esther Anthony-Thomas, and senior office manager Charlene Shurtleff. The Associated Students organization pitched in to survey the students to identify military families.

Lynne Mayfield and Holly Leahy helped with planning and creating the posters. Deans Bill Grimes and Sy Lyon were on hand to express gratitude to and show support for our military families, and to help distribute the baskets.

ONLINE ORIENTATION. Bob Garber, Miramar College vice president for student services, and counselors Rick Cassar and Kirk Webley have created an innovative computer-based orientation program for students to use along with their online placement tests. At the end of the orientation, there is a brief student questionnaire that is sent back to counseling to verify completion of the orientation. The Miramar College online student orientation is a district first. Check it out at www.sdmiramar.edu/depts/orientation.

MOVE OVER, MIA HAMM. One Saturday in February 400 girls from the elementary and middle schools around City College converged on the campus for the 13th Annual National Girls and Women in Sports Day. They participated in nine different sports clinics during the day-long event that supports gender equity in school athletics.

“Many of the girls who have attended this event have gone on to pursue athletics in high school and college,” said event coordinator Kathy McGinnis, health and exercise professor at the college. “This day empowers these girls to believe in their abilities and to explore sports that they would otherwise not have access to,” she said.

Cash and in-kind donations to support the event came from People’sFirst.com, S&S Sports, Domino’s Pizza in North Park, and Deb Canning, district gardener/groundskeeper.

Campus volunteers who helped with the project include Dede Bodnar, Ellen Turkel, Paul Greer, Mary Bongard, Simone Vasquez, Cheryl Campbell, Nick Skvarna, Lori Ray and Cassie Macias.