The College Fall Winter 2021 Issue (English Version)

fall/winter 2021 CALIFORNIA LUTHERAN UNIVERSITY’S PUBLICATION FOR THE COLLEGE OF ARTS & SCIENCES

GRANT PROGRAMS POSITIVELY IMPACT FIRSTGENERATION STUDENTS

GRANT PROGRAMS POSITIVELY IMPACT THE FIRST-GENERATION STUDENT EXPERIENCE Since 2017, more than 125 Cal Lutheran students have benefitted from three grant programs directed at first-generation college students who are historically marginalized and underrepresented.

AMERICORPS FELLOWS PROGRAM Cal Lutheran is one of three private universities partnering with the state of California in an inaugural, first-in-the-nation program that pairs students with local public service projects. Twenty AmeriCorps Fellows spend 20 hours per week working with local nonprofits to help close the achievement gap for low-income and immigrant communities in Ventura County. They also receive a $7,900 stipend to help cover tuition and living expenses and up to 3 units of course credit.

Launched in 2020, it wasn’t clear how the new program would go given that Fellows would have to engage in an entirely online format due to the pandemic, according to Cynthia Duarte, PhD (left), director of the Sarah W. Heath Center for Equality and Justice, which houses the AmeriCorps program. “But the

02 ENGAGEMENT. EXPLORATION. INNOVATION. RELEVANCE.

students have brought so much energy, hard work and innovation to their placements,” she said. “Many of them are very comfortable in the world of social media and understand what students want from a virtual program. Their ideas have been very successful.”

AmeriCorps Fellow and junior biology major Miguel Angel Gomez signed up with Safe Passage Foundation, which works with at-risk youth, helping build a stronger connection between the community and the police force. “Animosity between the people and the police is something I encountered in my own life,” he said, “so I felt I could support the work of Safe Passage. If I could help deter a youth from joining a gang, I wanted to be part of it. To tutor and mentor students is meaningful to me, as is implementing student projects using my STEM background. I loved doing my part to make sure the youth have a place where their problems are being listened to and their needs are being met.”

success,” she said. “They believed in me when I didn’t. First-generation college students have difficulty navigating academia and knowing how to ask for help.

The McNair program made me believe in myself. After graduation, I’ll attend the University of Rochester Medical Center PREP program where I’ll gain benchwork experience to become a competitive doctoral program applicant.”

NONPROFITS PARTNERING WITH AMERICORPS FELLOWS PROGRAM ixteco/Indigena Community M Organizing Project Safe Passage Foundation xnard Male Educational Goal O Achievement Initiative Rising Scholars Academy

PROJECT CHESS*

MCNAIR SCHOLARS PROGRAM Fifty-five scholars have participated in this two-year program. Its mission is to help prepare students, particularly first-generation students who have financial need or are from traditionally underrepresented groups, for PhD programs. How? By expanding their college experience to include scholarly research, funding and one-on-one faculty guidance.

In addition to working with a faculty mentor, these student scholars enroll in the McNair Seminar, where they learn research skills and begin defining and planning their project. A Summer Research Fellowship allows them to participate in a five-week residential program focused on research production. During their senior year, scholars take a capstone seminar in which they participate in conference presentations and work with mentors to publish their research.

“We’re a young program but are already counting successes,” said Program Director Francisco Fuentes, PhD (left). “Ten students are currently working on their Master’s degree, and another four are in doctoral programs.” In fact, one in three alumni are currently in a graduate program, and 57 percent of all McNair Scholar graduates have gone on to graduate school.

As two-thirds of scholars are first-generation and have significant financial need, the program has been essential to the success of many, such as Bianca Flores (pictured above), a senior chemistry major. “I want to emphasize how important my mentors and professors were to my undergraduate

RIO Pre-University Programs T at Cal Lutheran and Oxnard College

CHESS is a collaborative partnership between Cal Lutheran and Moorpark College, and one of its initiatives includes peer mentoring for historically marginalized male students. Junior and senior male

xnard College’s Center, O Basic Needs Initiative and Associated Student Government

SUPPORT EMPOWER NEXT GEN SCHOLARS Boost the success of first-generation college students by contributing to summer student research programs.

Contact: Maria Paredes mariaparedes@CalLutheran.edu

students at Cal Lutheran mentor secondyear male students from Moorpark. More than 50 Project CHESS students have benefited from a three-day leadership retreat and monthly meetings, which promote academic and personal success.

Mentees like Kelvin Hau Canche (pictured above), a senior business administration major, become mentors. “Project CHESS changed my life,” he said. “Joining CHESS at Moorpark College removed my doubts about not succeeding in school and helped me finish strong. At Cal Lutheran, we focused on building social capital to see men of color succeed academically. Nothing compares to finding identity and receiving invaluable advice to pass on to others.”

Another initiative of Project CHESS is a professional development program in culturally responsive teaching strategies to increase retention and graduation rates.

As of June 2021, 60 faculty members from both institutions had been trained. Many more faculty members will be trained over

the next two years of the Title V Hispanicserving Institution grant. Faculty have shown a high interest in updating their courses with principles and practices that promote diversity, equity and inclusion.

Philosophy assistant professor Lacey J. Davidson, PhD is one faculty member who embraced the program.

“Philosophy is often taught in a lecture style with long and hard-to-read classic and primary texts,” she said. “This way of teaching doesn’t reflect culturally responsive practices. CHESS gave me the confidence to embrace my passion for socially engaged philosophy and explore new assignments.

For my ‘Problems in Philosophy’ immigration module, students wrote sample letters to elected officials, applying arguments discussed in class to real-world cases and developing skills in engaged citizenship.” * Collaborative for Hispanics in Higher Education and Student Success, funded by the Federal Dept. of Education.

THE COLLEGE FALL/WINTER 2021 03

CAL LUTHERAN STREAMLINES THE PATH TO TRAINING HISPANIC TEACHERS FOR TODAY’S K-12 CLASSROOMS Cal Lutheran, a Hispanic-Serving Institution, is addressing the Latino student-teacher discrepancy by creating innovative programs to identify, support and train Latino students interested in teaching. Cal Lutheran has also streamlined its credential path in order to get new qualified K-12 teachers into public schools as fast as possible.

THE EDU|CAL PROJECT: IDENTIFYING AND SUPPORTING STUDENTS INTERESTED IN TEACHING

TRAINING ELEMENTARY SCHOOL TEACHERS: FAST-TRACK TO K-5 CLASSROOMS

In 2018, the university was awarded a Title V grant by the U.S. Department of Education to support academic and community engagement activities to boost the graduation rate of Latino students from Cal Lutheran’s K-12 Preliminary Teacher Credential program. The university initiated the Edu|Cal project to diversify the teacher pipeline so that students see themselves represented in their classrooms.

Majoring in the Interdisciplinary Educational Studies (IES) teacher prep program at Cal Lutheran connects undergraduates interested in elementary school teaching with credentialing pathways. Students may, for example choose to pursue a Bachelor of Arts degree and a California multi-subject teaching credential in four years instead of a traditional four-year IES B.A. program plus two semesters of graduate study.

EDU|CAL has been engaging in community outreach with Latinx high school, community college and undergraduate students to introduce them to single-subject (for middle/high school) and multi-subject (for elementary) preliminary teaching credential programs. It has presented student panels, Q & A sessions and other outreach events for Ventura County students and parents at local public schools.

TRAINING MIDDLE AND HIGH SCHOOL TEACHERS: FAST PASS TO THE SINGLE-SUBJECT TEACHING CREDENTIAL

To improve student outcomes in math and writing, a full-time math specialist and bilingual writing specialist have been hired. They work with math and English faculty to redesign courses to be more culturally responsive to the learning styles of underrepresented students. The math tutoring area has been upgraded to a new math center located in Pearson Library.

Math and English courses for transfer students are being redesigned so that underresourced students can complete them as no-cost summer courses, facilitating access and promoting inclusion.

Student tutors for math and writing are available to all students, including those enrolled in these summer courses. Together, these new initiatives are proving successful in increasing retention and completion rates.

4 percent of K-12 students attending California 5 public schools are Hispanic/Latino.1 1 in 5 California teachers are Latino.2

1. kidsdata.org, 2020 2. edsource.org, 2019

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Students interested in teaching middle school or high school must earn the single-subject teaching credential, in addition to their single-subject majors (e.g. English, math, biology, history). To help more of these students into the teaching pipeline in a timely — yet prepared — way, Cal Lutheran has been developing a proposal for single-subject proficiency in science and art for state approval.

Teaching candidates in these majors would not be required to pass the California Subject Examinations for Teachers (CSET) exam, which is used to verify a prospective K-12 teacher’s mastery of essential subject matter and content. Cal Lutheran has already been successful in getting the single-subject math major, history major and exercise science major state-approved, so graduates in those disciplines are exempt from having to pass the CSET. Meanwhile, pending state legislation could change the requirements for prospective applicants to middle and high school teacher education programs. If the legislation is approved, candidates who have a degree in a single-subject area will be able to have their previous coursework evaluated for equivalency and, consequently, not be required to pass the CSET exam.

Removing this hurdle will expedite the journey of newly minted Cal Lutheran teachers into classrooms, where they will reflect and inspire the student population.

SUPPORT

CAL LUTHERAN PROGRAM ONE OF FIRST IN THE STATE TO EXPEDITE WAY TO BILINGUAL TEACHING This spring, a new Cal Lutheran program was approved by the California Commission on Teacher Credentialing allowing undergraduate students to begin earning their bilingual teaching authorization by taking graduate-level classes. This gives them a head start once they enter a teaching credential program, as they won’t need to pass the CSET language exam in Spanish. Bilingual teachers, who meet the needs of English learners in all instructional settings, are critically needed in California, which has the highest percentage of public school English-language learners in the U.S.

INVEST IN THE FUTURE OF EDUCATION Planned giving can enhance programs for students earning a teaching credential while completing their major.

Contact: Maria Paredes mariaparedes@CalLutheran.edu

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CAL LUTHERAN PROFESSORS RE-INVENT RESEARCH & TEACHING Once again, necessity is the mother of invention. Over the course of the 2020-21 academic year, with its profound pandemic limitations, the faculty has taken a creative approach to teaching and research. Science faculty, operating without access to labs, were particularly challenged. Yet, this resulted in some student and personal breakthroughs. A biology professor studying Legionnaire’s Disease and the COVID-19 virus “flipped her lab’s approach to scientific discovery.” A chemistry professor working on creating a new class of antibiotics upended lab teaching by starting at the end with computer-based structure solutions. A physics professor guided his students to new heights in graduate-school level research.

Paloma Vargas, PhD Assistant Professor of Biology

Sebastian Carron Montero, PhD Assistant Professor of Physics

Katherine Hoffmann, PhD Associate Professor and Chair, Chemistry Department

SUPPORT DISCOVER A PROMISING SCIENTIST Donate to scholarships benefiting student scientists and be part of their exploratory journey.

Contact: Maria Paredes

06 ENGAGEMENT. EXPLORATION. INNOVATION. RELEVANCE.

mariaparedes@CalLutheran.edu

BIOLOGY

CHEMISTRY

PALOMA VARGAS, PhD

KATHERINE HOFFMANN, PhD

Lab focus: My students and I study infectious diseases and the ways they interact with their various environments. One project focuses on identifying the functions of novel proteins used by the bacteria that cause Legionnaire’s Disease. The second examines the potential for mutation of the S1 and S2 proteins of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.

Lab focus: Our long-term goal is to create a new class of antibiotics targeting bacterial iron acquisition. We’re trying to get a very clear idea of how our target system works — the shape, speed and changes it undergoes.

Method: We’ve used bioinformatics in the past to complement projects but never as the major method of data collection and analysis, which we plan to complement with traditional biochemistry and molecular biology techniques. We have quite literally flipped this lab’s approach to scientific discovery.

Results: A protein we’ve considered novel may actually have some function, but we had to really look at the DNA and protein sequences very closely. It’s tedious work but slowly results are emerging, and I think they may have a real implication on Legionella work. We’ve also found that SARS-CoV-2 has been mutating at a decent rate in humans, even in areas of the genome that are usually kept intact.

What you’ve learned that you’ll carry forward: I expanded my research activities beyond the wet lab and connected with students differently. I learned software I never thought of using and developed new projects for my courses and research lab. Virtual instruction forced me to determine the “must need” content in a course, and I learned new methods of facilitating discussion. These changes added context to the course, introduced lower stakes activities that are conducive to learning, allowed students to develop a growth mindset and helped them become more successful.

Method: This year we couldn’t do lab experiments in person, so we began at the end with computer-based structure solutions rather than preparing crystals first. The students instantly had results and a really positive first impression of their skills as scientists. It made it much easier to stay motivated through all the other protocols to prepare for that payoff.

Results: What surprised me most was how much work we got done. I crowd-sourced hypotheses, and they each piped up to say “my literature says this” or “the structure I solved does this.”

There were instant comparisons, and we were able to build analyses fast. They acted less like students and more like scientific colleagues.

What you’ve learned that you’ll carry forward: The virtual classroom revealed that the way my students spend their time in lab was not aligned with our learning goals and priorities.

I needed to let go of the idea that they have to perform every step every time from the beginning. The students who don’t do sample preparation well, for instance, might never get to see whether they shine somewhere else. I’ll still have students performing every step of their own experiments but with less time in sample prep and more time running instruments and analyzing results.

PHYSICS SEBASTIAN CARRON MONTERO, PhD Lab focus: My students and I work on cutting-edge particle physics data analysis techniques, as well as participate in the development of new technologies for elementary particle detection. A major focus is our study of the properties of a recently detected particle (the Higgs boson), responsible for the physical mass of other known fundamental particles.

We’re searching for decay processes that have been predicted but are yet to be observed.

Our research is conducted using the Compact Muon Solenoid (CMS) multilayer detector at the Large Hadron Collider in CERN*. We maximize our chances of detecting these fundamental particle processes through collaborating with other institutions to design an improvement for the CMS detector component responsible for measuring the energies of decay particles and identifying decay particle types.**

Method: With very limited access to labs at collaborating institutions, as well as travel to CERN being interrupted by the pandemic, our group has been mostly concentrating on the analysis of already collected experimental data, as well as working on instrumentation design. We’ve been trying to improve our searches by applying ever more sophisticated data-sorting algorithms.

Results: I’ve been impressed with the students’ ability to apply very sophisticated machine-learning methods for data analysis. They are very effectively involved in graduate school-level research and are actively collaborating with researchers at some of the best national and international particle physics research institutions.

* European Organization for Nuclear Research ** This detector project – the High Granularity Calorimeter — represents the largest particle detector U.S.-based effort.

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MEET DR. LORENA MUÑOZ ducation E Proud first-generation college student and community college graduate PhD in Geography, University of Southern California revious appointment P Mills College ethnic studies department esearch R Two interdisciplinary, collaborative, comparative projects across the globe 1. A study of informal access to food, labor and health in urban populations of migrant and immigrant laborers in the Global South: Colombia, Mexico and the U.S. 2. A comparative study of family separation experiences and affects among Latinx domestic workers from Baja, California working in Southern California, and Zimbabwean immigrant domestic workers living in Johannesburg, South Africa.

08 ENGAGEMENT. EXPLORATION. INNOVATION. RELEVANCE.

A CONVERSATION WITH NEW ETHNIC AND RACE STUDIES PROGRAM DIRECTOR Lorena Muñoz, PhD, joined the Cal Lutheran community as director of the ethnic and race studies (E&RS) program and the College’s associate dean for equity, inclusion and engagement on July 1, 2021. In the cross-disciplinary ethnic and race studies (E&RS) major, introduced in fall 2020, students explore how race and ethnicity have been defined, constructed and applied in different places and times.

What is the relevance of the Ethnic and Race Studies major at Cal Lutheran?

ABOUT THE ETHNIC & RACE STUDIES MAJOR Cal Lutheran added an ethnic and race studies major in the fall of 2020 to help students gain a deeper understanding of communities of color in the United States and build cultural competence in working with diverse groups. In this cross-disciplinary major, students explore questions such as: How have race and ethnicity been defined, constructed and applied in different places and times?

Students can easily add ethnic and race studies as a double major with English, history, political science, sociology and more.

A Sample of Cross-disciplinary E&RS Classes nglish E Studies in African-American Literature

By engaging with class material through a social justice lens, E&RS classes enrich the educational experience of students. Double-majoring with E&RS prepares students for the realities of the current complex socio-political events that make visible the nation’s and the world’s deep structural inequalities, ultimately affecting all industries and practices. I want the program to be a home for BIPOC* students and allies, who feel invested in the direction and future of the program.

panish S Contemporary Chicano Literature istory H Civil War: Slavery to Civil Rights olitical Science P Music and the Civil Rights Movement

How has your research influenced your teaching — and how does it impact the E&RS major?

eligion R Asian Religions in the United States

My experiences abroad influence my teaching. It’s important to see ourselves as citizens of the world, and that only together will we be able to bring solutions to global issues. I strive to expose students to knowledge at the margins, particularly from BIPOC authors, which is important for enriching how all students critically engage and navigate their social worlds.

ociology S Immigration in the Global Age

What class are you excited to teach and why?

Introduction to Ethnic and Race Studies. We’re living in a moment of tremendous violence, as well as activism that demands change. Both Black Lives Matter and white supremacist groups use the same tools for visibility. This class is designed for students to engage and further develop critical tools for making sense of the world they live in, in particular as it relates to race and racialization processes in the U.S. By engaging with material they never encountered in high school or even college history classes, they’re able to understand their own experiences through a different lens.

How is Cal Lutheran’s E&RS program a good fit for you — and you for it?

As a Hispanic-Serving Institution, Cal Lutheran is a place I know I can use my 15+ years of teaching, research and service experiences to grow the E&RS program while making it my intellectual home. Also, my research on informal economies is centered in SoCal, where I grew up between San Diego and Ensenada, Baja California, Mexico. The foundational ethnographic research I conducted was with street vendors in Los Angeles.

SUPPORT EXPAND THE HORIZON Your gift to support hiring of professors with diverse backgrounds helps to broaden students’ perspectives and appreciation of different cultures and points of view.

Contact: Maria Parades mariaparedes@CalLutheran.edu

*Black, Indigenous and people of color

THE COLLEGE FALL/WINTER 2021 09

FROM THE COLLEGE OF ARTS & SCIENCES PROFESSORS LISA DAHILL, PhD, Religion Awarded a $40,000 grant from the Louisville Institute to work on her book project, “Rewilding Life Together: Bonhoeffer, Spirituality, and Interspecies Community” during her sabbatical year in the academic year 2021-2022.

RAINER DIRIWÄCHTER, PhD, Psychology His article titled “Remembering Wilhelm Wundt and the Second Leipzig School of Psychology” received peer review and was published in the journal Human Arenas.

GREGORY FREELAND, PhD, Political Science Awarded the endowed Uyeno-Tseng Professor of International Studies position and was interviewed for The Atlantic about his family history in South Carolina and VOICE magazine for “Preserving Santa Barbara’s Black History.”

MOLLY GEORGE, PhD, Criminology and Criminal Justice Awarded a grant along with Jamshid Damooei, PhD, (School of Management) and Leslie Abell PhD, California State University, Channel Islands from the Ventura Council of Governments to support an evaluation study titled, “When Home is Not a Safe Haven: Acute Needs Assessment of the Ventura County Family Justice Center in the time of COVID-19.”

ANDREA HUVARD, PhD, Biology Secured a grant of $4,000 from the PADI Foundation to study the accumulation of microfibers in sediment and filter feeders.

JOSE MARICHAL, PhD, Political Science Published an essay in the journal Tech Policy Press titled “Twitter Finally Suspended Trump’s Account, but Did They Do It for the Right Reasons?”

MAHMOUD SALIMI, MFA, Film and Television Won a Gold Award from the Spotlight Short Film Awards for his film Not Me. The film was also selected and presented at the 74th edition of the Salerno International Film Festival along with several film festivals worldwide.

ADITI SENGUPTA, PhD, Biology Published an article in the journal Soil Biology and Biochemistry, “Antecedent conditions determine the biogeochemical response of coastal soils to seawater exposure” and presented it at the American Geophysical Union 2020 fall meeting.

JENNIFER VANDERPOOL, PhD, Visual Arts Received 2020-2021 Fulbright Artist Award from the US-UK Fulbright Commission for exploring post prosperity communities in Northern England and furthering her ongoing exhibitions that investigate the human cost of deindustrialization.

SHERIDAN WIGGINTON, PhD, Spanish Received a grant from the Gannett Foundation in the amount of $10,000, which will fund the College’s Spanish media minor. The new program will provide additional academic content, attract more Latinx students to journalism, increase the cultural competency of all College journalism students, and incorporate experiential learning through work on El Eco student newspaper insert and local internships.

ALUMNI AMY JOHANSSON ’11, MS ’13, PsyD ’19 Accepted assistant professor position in the Alliant International University PsyD Clinical Psychology program in Fresno, California.

JASMINE RUYS, EdD ’99 Named Vice President of Student Services at College of the Canyons in Santa Clarita, California, where she has worked in various positions, including Director of Admissions and Records and Dean of Enrollment Services, since 2001.

10 ENGAGEMENT. EXPLORATION. INNOVATION. RELEVANCE.

LUIS PEREZ ’20 Computer Science, McNair Scholar and Student Athlete Published an article in the Rose-Hulman Undergraduate Mathematics Journal with his findings based on his five-week summer research in the McNair Scholars Program under the mentorship of John Villalpando, PhD, Mathematics. Perez is currently a graduate student at San Francisco State University.

STUDENTS

FROM THE

HERO AWARD RECIPIENTS This year, the College launched its inaugural Student Hero Award, which recognizes remarkable students who demonstrated considerable strength and steadfastness in serving the community as essential workers throughout the COVID-19 pandemic. This year’s award recipients are Lauren Bacchus, Whitney Beck, Krista Chang, Indianna Cooper-Murray, Angelo DeVito, and Hannah Nandor. Their courage, tenacity and resilience inspire the College, its faculty and staff and we laud them for their dedicated service.

NEWS 2021 CAL LUTHERAN CARES DAY BENEFACTORS The College of Arts and Sciences exceeded its goal for 2021, bringing in more than $176,000 from the Cal Lutheran community!

Some standout contributors include: hilanthropist and perennial Cal Lutheran supporter Sue P Swenson, who made a $75,000 challenge gift following 100 donations to the College. r. Jim and Mrs. Kim Overton generously supported Cares Day M with a $32,000 gift to the College Music Strings Major Scholarship. lumna Laureen L. (Spinas ‘83) Hill, MD and her husband A Micarl Hill provided a $25,000 challenge gift after the College received 130 donations. he Bachofer Family, in honor of Cynthia, Sylvia, Ernie T and Ruth Bachofer, gave a $20,000 challenge gift following 30 donations.

J ump-started by a $2,500 generous contribution from Mary Ellen Cosenza, Ph.D., the Dean’s Advisory Council members rallied and contributed nearly $7,300 to the College. al Lutheran alumni and long-time supporters Kirsten and C Karsten Lundring donated $1,000.

We thank these individuals for their generosity and remain grateful for each donation and the encouragement we received from our students, faculty, alumni, staff and others who gave to the College this year to support our students and programs.

DR. JESSICA L. LAVARIEGA MONFORTI The term ‘educate’ comes from the Latin phrase ‘educere,’ meaning ‘to draw out.’ As a Lutheran institution of higher learning, we affirm all students possess meaningful, and often untapped, talents, and it is our responsibility to elicit these gifts and help them develop skills through critical thinking, experiential learning and career-related opportunities. What can we, as educators, draw out of our students’ indigenous knowledge and experiences?

This brings a richness to our academic conversations because our students, faculty and staff hail from diverse backgrounds, and bring cultural wealth and lived experiences to Cal Lutheran.

For students to succeed in academia and beyond, faculty must use culturally relevant and responsive strategies to engage students to build a lifelong community of learning and service so they feel confident and competent in sharing their talents with the greater world. I call this ‘Por Vida’ meaning ‘for life’ in Spanish.

Our foundational commitment to students as whole persons yields immeasurable gains for the greater society as evinced by two graduates from the class of 2021. Christopher Clark was briefly homeless and lived in the foster care system for 10 years, and he earned his political science degree at Cal Lutheran.

He wants to continue his studies and work with children in foster care. At six months old, Karyme Lara Chagoya arrived in the U.S. from Mexico with her parents, who hoped to give their only child a better future. Devastating circumstances caused Karyme to move in with an aunt as a teenager. Her aunt instilled in her the value of education, prompting Karyme to attend Cal Lutheran and work with other undocumented students and volunteer with a social justice organization. Post-college, she intends to work with disadvantaged communities.

These students’ dedication to serving others through their abilities and personal stories highlights the transformational impact of adopting a more culturally responsive mode of teaching ...and learning. This allows us to set the course for students to discover their own potential, empower others and exemplify the meaning of ‘Por Vida.’

Photo by Inga Parke, published with permission from The Echo.

CONTACT INFORMATION

2021 CARES DAY BY THE NUMBERS

142

UNIQUE DONORS CONTRIBUTED

28*

FACULTY DONATED

48

ALUMNI MADE CONTRIBUTIONS

College of Arts & Sciences 805.493.3015 TheCollege@CalLutheran.edu Soiland Humanities Building

*Equating to approximately 25% of professors.

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NON PROFIT ORG. U.S. POSTAGE PAID THOUSAND OAKS, CALIFORNIA PERMIT NO. 68

Soiland Humanities Building 60 West Olsen Road Thousand Oaks, CA 91360 CalLutheran.edu/college-arts-science

2021 GRADUATES REFLECT ON THEIR CAL LUTHERAN EXPERIENCE SUVEE RANASINGHE

COLIN VIRGINES

Major: Exercise Science Cal Lutheran involvements: Peer Advisor, Presidential Host, ASCLUG Senator Currently: Physical Therapy Aide

Majors: English and Environmental Science Cal Lutheran involvement: Presented paper “Storytelling for Environmental Justice: Voices of the Simi Hills” at the Association for Environmental Studies and Sciences Low-Carbon Conference (with Dr. Bryan Rasmussen) Currently: Student (Fall 2021 Cal Lutheran graduate)

Cal Lutheran equipped me socially and intellectually…The education I’ve received was easy to transfer to my daily patient work. My involvements within Student Life invigorated my communication skills, making it easy to direct patients through their treatment. The connections I’ve built, tangible skills I’ve gained and person I’ve grown to become are aspects of my time at Cal Lutheran that are irreplaceable.

Thanks to the many faculty and staff who helped push me towards success and encouraged me to achieve things that seemed far beyond my reach, I find myself hopeful for the future of my professional life. Because of them, I feel as if it is my duty to extend that care and passion to other people and to our environment.

GARRETT JAMES WYATT

ABIGAIL ESPINOZA

Major: English | Minor: Theatre Arts Cal Lutheran involvements: First Year Peer Advisor, Presidential Host, English Department Assistant, ASCLUG Senator and Senate Director and director of the TAD production of The Women of Lockerbie.

Currently: Assistant in Film & TV Development

Majors: Interdisciplinary Educational Studies (IES) and Spanish Cal Lutheran involvements: Peer Advisor, Presidential Host, Her Campus, Latin American Student Association, Club Teach Currently: Applying for the Cal Lutheran Spanish single subject teaching credential and masters program to become a high school teacher

Cal Lutheran instilled in me a passion for assuring that people see themselves represented, both in media and leadership positions.

So, as I pursue a career in entertainment, I hope to take on leadership roles to create a hub of art and entertainment where members of our global society see themselves fully and truthfully represented in media.

My Cal Lutheran experience has made me a well-rounded individual and allowed me to grow as a future teacher. In IES I learned about lesson planning, classroom management and active learning.

Through my Spanish classes I learned about Latin America, literature, linguistics — all of which I will teach my students.