More CYA down at the County?

Drakodaidis Placed on Admin Leave (Voice of OC)

     Alisa Drakodaidis, the Orange County deputy CEO who in July sent a politically explosive letter that alleged corruption among county supervisors, has been placed on administrative leave....

No more Butt Library

     On Monday, the SOCCCD board of trustees will hold its September meeting.
     It appears that, on that night, Chancellor Gary Poertner intends to quietly bring about the close of the "James B. Utt" era and to launch the "Boring And Inoffensive Names" (BAIN) era via the following consent calendar item:

ITEM: 5.5
RE: Saddleback College: Naming the Library and Learning Resource Center
. . .
STATUS
The Saddleback library building is undergoing an extensive renovation that includes a state-of-the-art learning resource center on the second floor. In keeping with the new design and its multi-purpose functionality, it is recommended that the building be named the Library and Learning Resource Center.

RECOMMENDATION
The Chancellor recommends that the Board of Trustees approve the naming the of the Saddleback College library building to be named the Library and Learning Resource Center.

     Not that I'm complaining.
     Well, I do have one complaint. Contrary to the agenda, they're not "Naming the [']Library and Learning Resource Center[']," cuz it doesn't yet have that name. They're either naming the as-yet-unnamed center—or they're renaming the "James B. Utt Library" (aka "Butt Library").
     I'm trained in philosophy, OK?
     Now if only Saddleback College would replace its "Frito Bandito" mascot!

     Another interesting item:

     That's cool.

James B. Utt Library: built as a fortress against students; hence no windows

City College of San Francisco's accreditation crisis

UPDATE: On the 19th, State Senator Leland Yee rebutted Shireman's commentary: Faculty voice key to CCSF's future

Who's in Control? (Inside Higher Ed)

     Robert Shireman has long criticized colleges and lawmakers for not doing enough to protect lower-income students. But now that he's back in California, after a stint battling for-profit colleges for the U.S. Department of Education, Shireman has found a new opponent: faculty leaders at the state's community colleges and an approach to shared governance he says created the mess at City College of San Francisco.
. . .
     The problem, he said, is a “labyrinthine” approach to shared governance by California’s community colleges that is perhaps unique in American higher education.
     The state Legislature in 1988 updated a law calling for community colleges and their districts to “ensure faculty, staff and students the right to participate effectively in district and college governance, and the opportunity to express their opinions at the campus level and to ensure that these opinions are given every reasonable consideration.”
     The language in the bill (AB 1725) is fine, according to Shireman. But he said the supporting regulations drafted later by the Board of Governors of the California Community Colleges give Academic Senates too much clout. Local governing boards have the choice of reaching “mutual agreement” with the faculty groups or essentially deferring to them on decision-making about a broad array of issues, extending well beyond curriculums and academics….

Family of 6 in 570 square foot studio apartment?

KPCC reports that Democratic challenger Steve Young is suing to have Republican State Senator Mimi Walters removed from the ballot.

Walters is up for re-election in the 37th district which includes Irvine.  The district, like many others, was recently redrawn.

excerpt:

....To run in the district, Walters reportedly moved from her home in Laguna Niguel to a residence in Irvine. 

The biography on Walters' State Senate website says “she and her husband, David, live in the City of Irvine with their four children.”

But the lawsuit claims Walters' move is only on paper, pointing to the size of her Irvine rental as proof: it's a 570- square-foot studio apartment.

That would be a big step down, according to the lawsuit, which claims Walters and her family still live in a 14,000-square-foot home in Laguna Niguel where they've resided for more than a decade.

To read the rest, click here.

from the Los Angeles Times:  State Sen. Mimi Walters challenged by opponent over her residency

excerpt: 

"Brad Chase, a spokesman for Young, said the campaign sent flowers to the Irvine apartment and they sat uncollected on the doorstep for a week. "

Stay tuned.

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District lets coach go, disciplines two in kickback scheme (OC Reg)

Tuition increase? Again?

     A Saddleback Valley walk-on football coach has been let go and two other high school coaches have been formally reprimanded after being accused of receiving thousands of dollars in gifts and checks via an elaborate kickback scheme involving an athletic supply company.
. . .
     Last year, Mission Viejo's Saddleback College disciplined one athletic department employee in the Lapes Athletic matter, while Irvine Unified completed an investigation but determined no wrongdoing on the part of its employees.

CSU trustees confirm plan: Voters to decide on 5% tuition increase (OC Reg)

     California State University trustees ratified Wednesday a proposal to leave a tuition increase in the hands of voters….

"As with any class, sometimes nothing works."

     Rebel Girl arrived home yesterday to find this week's Nation waiting in her mailbox. In it it, she found a kindred spirit, a community college composition teacher.  Just what she needed.  In his essay, "I Hear America Singing, Wick Sloane writes about his Writing 1 class at Bunker Hill Community College in Boston and shares some of his students's work.

excerpt:

     Bunker Hill Community College in Boston, where I teach College Writing I, has more than 13,000 students, including almost 500 veterans. The average student age is 27. More than half are women, and 77 percent are people of color. Forty-four percent receive Pell Grants. 

     Many are immigrants, from more than ninety-five countries. The languages spoken in the class that wrote these poems include Creole, Spanish, Portuguese (one via Brazil, one via Angola), French and Swahili. The site of Bunker Hill CC, where Charlestown prison once stood, has good progressive credentials. This is where Sacco and Vanzetti were jailed and executed. The prison library was where Malcolm X went to read. The film Good Will Hunting was set here.

     This summer I was tracking down a student whose family has been lost in the civil war in Mali. After I wrote a column about hunger on college campuses, Bunker Hill hosted its fourth food bank in three months, an eighteen-wheeler filled by the Greater Boston Food Bank. The food was gone in ninety minutes. Amid all this, two students from here will study at MIT this fall.

     As these poems show, Bunker Hill students have plenty of intellect. The best are as bright as any I have encountered in my platinum-spoon life. What’s missing for the students here is seat time to master intellectual and academic skills. They have not read the Western canon by the time they are 18. They have not already written half a dozen research papers in MLA style when they arrive in my class. But they are able to understand the books and write such papers when shown the way.

     As with any class, sometimes nothing works. I pulled out Walt Whitman’s “I Hear America Singing” as a last resort one day and asked the students to write their own versions, saying only that they may choose a verb other than “singing.” The results the first time astonished me. They still do. My hope is that we can encourage teachers everywhere to steal this assignment and flood the US Capitol with the results. Our hope for America is that whatever crimes we may commit, voices like these will keep bubbling up and send the country soaring.

I Hear America Crying   by Chantal Midgette

I hear America crying; the varied sounds I hear;
The young teenager ends her dreams because a newborn child interferes
The widow, mother of four who lost her husband in a war
The woman being abused at home, praying to live life no more
The bullied child at school who is in pain
The Afghan family hoping they’ll be accepted again
The black man on death row for killing his own kind
Too late to turn back time, a brown leather cowl will make him blind
The white man judged as a racist for protecting himself from a black gunman
Sad to see that people doesn’t care that he’s a veteran
Crying, with tears, falling down to their ears, the sounds I hear

     To read more  poems by Wick Sloane's Writing 1 class which appear in the September 24, 2012 issue of The Nation, click here.

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Big names set for Big Orange Book Festival (OC Register)

     The Big Orange Book Festival debuts at Chapman University on Friday and Saturday with appearances by a few dozen writers including well-known novelists such as Alice Sebold, author of the novel "The Lovely Bones" and the memoir "Lucky," and Sapphire, whose novel "Push" was adapted into the Oscar-winning movie "Precious."
     The festival, which takes place at various locations on the Chapman campus, also includes an appearance by Mary Badham, the actress who played Scout in "To Kill A Mockingbird," talking about the transformation of Harper Lee's novel into a much-loved film, and Lizz Winstead, co-creator and former head writer of "The Daily Show" on Comedy Central….

Professors and the Students Who Grade Them (New York Times)