The SOUTH ORANGE COUNTY COMMUNITY COLLEGE DISTRICT —
"[The] blog he developed was something that made the district better." - Tim Jemal, SOCCCD BoT President, 7/24/23
☻ I took this one from near Modjeska grade—very near DISSENT the COMMUNE. We're looking at Santiago and Modjeska peaks (i.e., "Saddleback"—elevation, 5687 feet).
Looking west, toward Fashion Island (Newport Beach) and even Catalina Island.
Looking south, over near my place.
IRVINE VALLEY COLLEGE'S "PERFORMING ARTS CENTER":
Earlier today, I walked over to the new Performing Arts Center, still under construction. It's gonna be impressive, I think. Hear that IRVINE?
Took a few pics:
Have a nice weekend!
P.S: this is what the Performing Arts Center is supposed to look like when it is finished (some time in the fall):
☺ ▼ ASTOUNDING. Among the innovations brought to IVC a couple of weeks ago for the "Astounding Inventions" kiddie event were some extreme modifications of the plumbing in at least two buildings. Those scamps!
Gosh, that reminds me of my youth, when one of my 8th grade colleagues attempted to clear the pipes of a toilet at Cerro Villa Junior High by flushing a lit cherry bomb. "Boom," it said.
As I recall, the colleague was the rat bastard son of a high-profile Villa Park doctor, namely, Dr. R, the official medical advisor of the California Angels (we were terribly impressed), and, according to rumor, Dr. R showed up with a wad of green to make the whole thing go away, and it did.
My school days were filled with such glamour. The principal of the junior high was one C.B. Courson. Years earlier, he was the principle of Villa Park Elementary, where I spent my first two or three years of school (c. 1961-2). I recall he had occasion to drive me home once when I missed the bus. (He seemed nice enough.) When the new elementary school was built (Serrano), I was among its students, and C.B. Courson became its principal! And—get this!—when I went from Serrano to Cerro Villa (7th grade), so did CB! It was an amazing coincidence. Naturally, it had no meaning whatsoever.
As it turns out, CB Courson was the father of Jim Morrison's girlfriend. (I think she was played by Meg Ryan in the movie.) I don't know the details, but I do know that, by about 1970, Courson went Hollywood bigtime. I recall his mod suits and hair and gold chains. Wadda asshole.
Years later, when I checked out a copy of that posthumous album of Morrison's poetry, I was amazed to discover that the name of the producer on the album's cover was none other than--C.B. Courson, Mr. hair and suit--Mr. Executor of dead daughter's estate. Wadda creep.
Anyway, my sources tell me that the restrooms still haven't been fixed. In the meantime, the Amazing Wayne has been scarce of late and he seems to too preoccupied to make life hell for his employees as per usual. Or so I'm told.
What does it all mean? Dunno.
▼ BOARD MEETING MONDAY. Don't forget: meeting of the SOCCCD Board of Trustees, Monday! For the agenda, go to AGENDA.
▼ "IT'S HIP!": BROUGHT TO YOU BY STUDENTS--AND THE DEPARTMENT OF WOMEN STUDIES! Sheesh, check out this wacky story (see Inside Higher Ed) about, um, the "deconstruction" of our "assumptions" about "sex workers" (it's all very academic, you understand) at the venerable College of William & Mary: Show draws crowd:
...Sparkling nipple adornments, feather boas, bare bottoms, erotic dances, striptease music and sex toys entertained a crowd of more than 400 who were packed into the auditorium of the University Center. Another 300 were turned away. The show attempted to empower the actors by portraying the realities of their careers.
…"It's just so out there and expressive," said Josh Campbell, a member of Lamba Alliance, one of six student groups to sponsor the event. "It's hip, it's in your face, and it's exciting."
In addition to curiosity, the show also aroused some opposition.
Ken Petzinger, a physics professor, was outraged to learn that the college had permitted such an event. He found out about it last Friday, too late to stop it.
"I think it's a totally inappropriate use of student funds," Petzinger said. "It's in conflict with other values the college has."
President Gene Nichol issued a statement Tuesday afternoon, perhaps hoping to preempt inevitable criticism tied to the Wren cross.
"I don't like this kind of show and I don't like having it here," he said. "But it's not the practice and province of universities to censor or cancel performances because they are controversial."
Most of the money for the event, which cost about $1,800, comes out of student fees. The Office of Student Activities helps disperse the money for all kinds of campus-wide events. The Department of Women Studies donated $200 to help pay for the show.
…Senior Sean Barker, a black studies major, … felt it important to bring back such a unique perspective to college students…Barker felt the provocative performances and crass anecdotes don't encourage promiscuity or promote sexual activity.
"It serves to deconstruct some of the assumptions we may have about sex workers," he said. "It's just exposure to a different world."
The event is part of a month-long national tour, which included a stop at Virginia Commonwealth University on Sunday. It serves to give sex workers an opportunity to explain how they view their own work. They don't sugarcoat the details.
…A 75-year-old man, who wouldn't give his name, was in attendance with a group of people accompanied by a faculty member. He was bothered by what he saw.
"It's shocking they had this type of event for impressionable young people," the man said.
▼
▼ NEVER MIND ALL THAT. Here's something good. I remember this recording (with Lester on piano, unlike in this live performance, evidently) from my childhood. Just love it.
(No doubt Principal Courson and I listened to it in his little sports car.)
~ WHO KNEW that IVC had its own unofficial softball team? Apparently some of you did but you weren’t telling. It took Rebel Girl stumbling across two of the players exchanging bon mots about last week’s game and showing off their injuries (ouch!) in the A-200 hallway to discover the existence of the – get ready – IVC TASERS! [Update: we stand corrected. Evidently, they're called the "PHASERS." You know. Star Trek.]
Dominated by self-described “shy tech guys” who declined to go on the record for this report and at least one sporty Bio type, the team has suffered a string of weekend defeats at nearby Harvard Park but their spirits remain undaunted.
Sources say that the next game is scheduled for this Saturday.
❦ I FIRST RAN AWAY when I was — oh, I must have been about ten or eleven. It was after my first younger sister was born but before my second one was. The sister was finally sleeping through the night but my mother and her new husband were not — instead they were having what the novels I would later love characterize as "rows." I left the apartment and spent the night across the street in the 24-hour laundromat. The dryers rumbled. The lights were bright and no one bothered me as I tucked myself away in a linty corner. It was my protest against poor parenting and drunken all-night brawls. My mother did not notice. I returned at dawn, before the baby woke up, made breakfast, and got myself off to school.
Five years later, I ran away again, this time to a runaway shelter, which fed me and made sure I got to school and to the local police department, where the officers duly took photos of my bruises and took down my sad story. My mother showed up for counseling sessions at the shelter and even I was impressed by her. I went back home, leaving behind a plaid flannel shirt for a girl who needed it more than I did.
Two months later, I left again, never to go back, pedaling away one night on my lime green ten-speed bicycle. No one came looking.
Since then I have tried to not run, epecially since I come from a family of runners. I recognize irresponsibility, recklessness, the selfishness — and worry I have it too. My father ran away as did my mother and my sisters, though my siblings were mostly taken by young husbands or the state.
Then, last week, I ran away, although, since I had my sweetheart and son in tow, I don't know if it really qualifies. There was something solitary in the other escapes. This one was different. For example, from the outset, returning was a given. But then again, there was the irresponsibility too — the recklessness, selfishness. I left behind things undone, ill friends, ailing family, dishes in the sink, laundry piled in baskets and a broken computer that seemed to underline the general brokenness of everything else, or so it seemed at the time. Broken hearts, bodies, world, the sad anniversaries of loss.
Where I went, too, was broken, albeit beautiful. ("Albeit" — another word from those novels!) It helped to understand that again.
So I am back. My computer is still broken. I'm using someone else's. It works; mine doesn't. That's okay. It has to be.
I will work harder to do what I should with what I have.
The wee birdies sing and the wild flowers spring And the sunshine and waters are sleeping The broken heart it kens, no second spring again And the world does not know how we're greeting!
☻ REMEMBER Adam Probolsky? He was at Tom Fuentes’ side during the days, back in the summer of 2000, when Fuentes was selected by our very Republican Board to replace trustee Steve Frogue. Frogue, a Holocaust denier and conspiracy-theory fan, had resigned just four or five months prior to election.
That was mighty convenient for everybody. Fuentes, then the controversial head of the OC GOP with a closet full of skeletons (and maybe a few live ones), was suddenly an incumbent. In a world of idiot voters, the F Man coasted to victory. I mean, he was the incumbent, wasn't he? Well, there you are!
Another close Fuentes ally was Michael Schroeder, the current kingpin/kingmaker of Orange County Republican politics. You know: he’s the one they call the “most powerful man in Orange County.” Probolsky, a well-known Republican consultant, is a member of Schroeder’s nasty little crew, aka the Republican mafia. I guess he's what you call a "lieutenant."
Martin Wisckol, some time partier at Reb’s place, has this to report in this morning’s THE BUZZ. (File it under "typical Schroeder-Fuentes Republican Party intrigue"):
The venerable Lincoln Club apparently had its own money used against it to defeat the club's candidate, Carlos Bustamante, in this month's special election for county supervisor.
The OC club is made up of Republican business people that participates in campaigns on many different levels. For instance, last year it was a primary financer of a political action committee – "Irvine City, School and Neighborhood Leaders Committee" – created to help John Duong's ultimately unsuccessful bid for Irvine mayor.
The PAC, which was coordinated in part by GOP consultant Adam Probolsky, ended that election with about $2,700 left. The account was collecting dust when somebody decided to rename it, raise more money and use it for attacks on Lincoln Club-endorsee Bustamante.
"It just gets weirder and weirder," said Matt [“Jubal”] Cunningham, the Red County/OC Blog editor trying to unravel the intra-party cloak-and-dagger affair.
The new treasurer of the committee, now called the Orange County Healthcare, Education & Neighborhood Leaders PAC, hasn't returned Cunningham's calls. But Cunningham tracked down some of the PAC's latest contributors as also being Janet Nguyen supporters. [Nguyen very nearly tied another Nguyen for the 1st district OC Supervisor race that Bustamante lost. She’s been spouting off about “fraud.”]
Probolsky, it so happens, has done some work for Nguyen, and that has lead to speculation that he had a hand in transforming the PAC.
"There is no advantage for me to get involved in that discussion," Probolsky told the Buzz when asked if he would deny the speculation.
In other words, “nope.”
Now wait a minute. Probolsky's pal Mike Schroeder is Janet Nguyen opponent Trung Nguyen's attorney. Right? (See Claiming voter fraud.)
This don't add up. Well, whatever.
One more factoid: Adam Probolsky is on the Board of Governors of the Irvine Valley College Foundation. (IVC is in Fuentes' SOCCCD.) Jeez, how do you suppose he ended up there?
The Director of the Foundation (admittedly, a nice guy) is a close friend of Fuentes (do you suppose that Fuentes had something to do with his landing that job? --Nah). Fuentes, as you know, just happened to be a paid consultant of last year's infamous congressional candidate Tan Nguyen--yes, yet another Nguyen. You'll recall that Tan got into hot water by sending rather questionable mail to Spanish-speaking folks. That tactic seemed to come straight out of Mr. Fuentes' bag o' dirty tricks. Remember those poll guards?
Well, Tan's treasurer (who resigned amid the letter scandal) just happened to be--you guessed it--the Foundation Director's wife.
✴ AS YOU KNOW, Saddleback College got spanked during its last go-round with the Accreds. Like Irvine Valley, Saddleback must now produce a “Focused midterm report [FMR] on issues of Commission special concern.”
Unlike Irvine, however, Saddleback College will be subjected to yet another team visit!
Ouch!
According to the Accred commission’s January 31 Action Letter, the FMR should especially emphasize Recommendations 2 (start planning!), 4 (dump unprofessional hiring procedures for execs!), 5 (cease board micromanagement!), and 6 (overcome hostility and despair!).
Recently, a colleague suggested that I read through that document carefully. I recommend that you do the same.
I am particularly struck by the section of the document concerning Recommendation 6: to overcome the plague of “hostility, cynicism, despair, and fear.” It is literally the end of the document.
Here, in its entirety, is the “conclusion” of that section. (I have added the section headings.)
Conclusion:
[DIFFERENT SIDES:]
It is difficult for the team, as outsiders, to fully assess the cause of the climate issues in the district. These issues are of long duration and have produced many scars that run deep. On the one hand, the faculty and classified leadership present a picture that depicts them as being downtrodden and overworked. The board and the administration tell another story. There are probably any number of individual variations and takes on these themes that fall in between these two poles. So where is the cause of this problem?
[THE COLLEGES VS. THE DISTRICT:]
By their own admission, a primary source of the hostile climate that has plagued this district and its two colleges is the chronically strained relations between the colleges and the district. It is not unusual in a multi-college district to have tension between the desire for autonomy at the colleges and the need for accountability or oversight by the district.
[THE GROUNDLESS CHARGE OF PARSIMONY:]
There is a perception by faculty, staff, and administrators at Saddleback College that the district is sitting on a pile of money and doesn’t share it sufficiently with the college. The team did not find evidence for that assertion. The district has funded numerous construction and modernization projects at both colleges. The district has negotiated generous contracts with the bargaining units such that they are among the best paid in the state. The list of positive district actions could go on. The point is that the district has shared resources with the college and is supporting the college in an appropriate manner.
[THE CULTURE OF CONFLICT, INCLUDING FACULTY:]
The chancellor, to a certain extent, appears to be a lightning rod for much of the blame for strained relations. However, after seeing firsthand and hearing anecdotal evidence about the actions of constituent leadership, especially the faculty leadership, the constituent groups must own up to their part in causing and sustaining a negative environment. It is almost as if there is a culture of conflict that is relished by some parties in the district, not for any great principle, but for the sport and enjoyment of conflict itself. This culture of conflict is fueled by a power struggle between the various groups. There are many secondary problems generated by this type of culture. One is that it is unproductive and wastes valuable time that could be spent on more important issues. Another is that the power that is being contested is illusory in that in this day and age there are myriad limitations on the power of any group, including the board. The worst problem is that such conflicts take the focus from students and they cause people to look out for their own interests rather than the interest of students.
[“WHEN THE BOARD BEHAVES BADLY”:]
It is apparent that the SOCCCD Board and the chancellor would like more credit for the positive actions that they have taken on behalf of the colleges. Unfortunately, when there are still examples of micromanaging or examples of board members disrespecting individual managers (or others, including one another) in open session meetings before the public, it has the opposite effect. When the board behaves badly, it sets a negative tone and message throughout the district. It tends to undo whatever good has been done as they are not given equal weight in most people’s minds. While there is sufficient blame to go around to all parties for contributing to the climate described in this recommendation, it remains the board to show the way in moving the district and the colleges to a better place.
✴ OK, NOW BEAR WITH ME HERE. This morning’s LA Times has a story about Tustin Unified School District. According to the story, the ACLU has charged that “Too few Latino and African American students are enrolled in gifted programs” at the TUSD. They’re threatening a lawsuit:
"The district is not doing enough to identify talented students from different racial and ethnic groups and different income levels," said Hector Villagra, director of the American Civil Liberties Union's Orange County office. "We've looked at other districts in Orange County, and a number of them are also doing a poor job, but Tustin is really off the charts." (ACLU targets Tustin Unified's gifted program)
It seems to me that Villagra's point concerns the "mission" of a public school district. What are we to make of a district that emphasizes assisting the especially prepared while neglecting the especially unprepared or disadvantaged? And is TUSD doing that?
MEANWHILE...
Back in January, the OC Register got excited about IVC’s expanded partnership with Tustin Unified, as we then reported ("Offhand" question). According to the Reg,
Tustin high school students will be able to graduate with a high school diploma and a college associate's degree at the same time after the district and Irvine Valley College agreed Monday on a program that will start in the fall.
The program will put college professors in high school classrooms to teach college courses, giving students a chance to earn college credit throughout high school without paying college tuition.
…The early college program will launch in the fall at Beckman High School, and will be brought to Tustin High and Foothill High schools soon after. (See.)
The Reg goes on to explain that “The district is targeting students in high school honors and college preparation courses.”
Uh-oh. There's that pattern again.
FACULTY OUT OF THE LOOP
I week or so earlier, during an IVC Academic Senate (faculty) meeting, senators expressed surprise and consternation when they learned about the Tustin/IVC program. Few were aware of it, and yet, evidently, it was already a “done deal.” Senators generally felt that they’d not been kept in the loop. (They often feel that way, these days. Consider how ATEP has developed--until now without significant faculty input, despite the faculty's authority over program & curriculum development, etc.)
But other issues arose during that meeting. I recall senators expressing reservations about participating in a program that singles out the “best and the brightest” among students. Targeting those students isn’t the community college system’s mission, they said. (For a statement of the California community college system's mission, see Mission.)
Since then, administrators have been making the rounds explaining and defending the program to faculty. In the course of that effort, faculty learned that early college programs are increasingly popular. It appears that we’re faced with another one of those “this may suck, but it’s inevitable, and so we’d better get on board” situations.
On the other hand, the Tustin/IVC program is unusual. For one thing, its courses will be held at the High Schools, not at the college.
Well, that’s no biggie, I suppose.
But then there’s this: early college programs typically target "underrepresented" students. That makes them especially attractive. (It also makes them eligible for huge chunks of "Bill & Melinda" cash.)
But, as I say, the Tustin/IVC program is not that kind. It's special. It focuses on "honors" and "college prep" students--students who are already assisted by the school district in other ways.
(Note: by law, all CA community college courses are essentially open to all. This means that non-TUSD students--e.g., my Aunt Fanny--can enroll in the Tustin/IVC courses. In reality, however, most students will be from the High School.)
I took this one from near Modjeska grade—very near DISSENT the COMMUNE. We're looking at Santiago and Modjeska peaks (i.e., "Saddleback"—elevation, 5687 feet).
Looking west, toward Fashion Island (Newport Beach) and even Catalina Island.
Looking south, over near my place.
Earlier today, I walked over to the new Performing Arts Center, still under construction. It's gonna be impressive, I think. Hear that IRVINE? 
Have a nice weekend!
