The Chancellor's Opening Session

—Some quick notes on today’s “Chancellor’s Opening Session” at Irvine Valley College.

Chancellor Mathur gave an overlong and passionless address about the usual things. He said that the state is increasingly concerned about the high cost of textbooks (a thousand bucks a semester for some students, said Raghu). He encouraged faculty to publish their own texts, making them available to students for free.

Blah, blah, blah, he said. I’ve got most of it committed to digital videotape, but I feel no impulse to review that. Nope.

He made no mention of the ongoing crisis and fiasco that he created by allowing the district to drift far out of compliance with the 50% Law. He’s obviously a very honest and decent man to be so direct with us about the real problems that we face.

Dr. Wallace Walrod (VP of Research and Communications, OC Business Council) once again informed us about the county and its financial health and future. Traffic and the high cost of housing are the big issues, everybody says. But the OC economy is strong compared to others. Plus there’ve been some real improvements in K-12 student performance among Latinos, and that’s great, he said.

Walrod seems very knowledgeable. Plus he knows how to keep things brief. I like ‘im.

It turns out that Lance Izumi (VP, Board of Governors, Cal Community Colleges, etc.)—you know, the former Meese speechwriter—is a good, if unspectacular speaker with useful info and interesting things to say. He discussed the problem of student unpreparedness for college work, etc. He really wasn’t bad and I told ‘im so.


As predicted, the entertainment turned out to be Elvis—or, to be more accurate, Scott Robertson, the “OC Elvis,” who seems to be the OC Neil Diamond, too.

Robertson provided essentially the same show as last year, and, again, it was good, for what it was, although I do think he was less “inspired” by the audience this time around. I couldn’t see the audience, cuz I was way in front.

—Which reminds me: he gyrated a lot, which does absolutely nothing for me, but waddoo I know. He went out into the audience, too, said some funny things, like when he did one of those Elvis “splits” and sang that he hoped his pants wouldn’t tear. I had the same hope.

And, of course, Raghu preceded the King with his odd “kinglet” performance, revealed in an earlier post. The less said about that the better.


Raghu "honored" a couple of people with big plaques. Among them: Saddleback's Rich McCullough. The way Raghu went on about Rich and his "high standards," you just know that he gave Rich a really great evaluation. Yep.

I talked to some people here and there after the session, and it sounds like things are going better with ATEP than I expected. It seems the trustees are still on board and the City of Tustin is coming around. Last semester, ATEP had 400 students; this semester, it already has 500 plus.

Went to the Faculty Association Luncheon, and that was good, I guess, if you don't mind chicken grease. (Liked the salad dressing, though.) I’ve got most of that on tape, too, but I’m only showing that stuff if somebody asks. Otherwise, forgetaboutit.