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The Student Voice of California State University, Fullerton
Volume 113 Issue 02
Vietnamese community celebrates Lunar New Year
Editor
ALEXCIA NEGRETE Deputy Editor
Cal State Fullerton President Framroze Virjee announced last Monday his plan to retire effective July 31 in a school-wide email welcoming students back to campus. Virjee, who is 62 years old, said in his statement that his plans to retire sprung from the need to spend time with his loved ones. “This was an incredibly hard decision – I love CSUF and the Titan Family deeply, and as president over the past five years, I have dedicated my entire being to this great institution and the students, faculty, staff, and community we serve,” Virjee said. CSU Interim Chancellor Jolene Koester said in a public statement released after Virjee’s announcement that an interim president will be appointed to lead CSUF and a nationwide search will be conducted to find a successor. Koester and Andrew Jones, the general counsel of CSU, did not provide any additional comment on Virjee’s retirement announcement other than the public statement. Virjee was appointed as CSUF president in December 2017. Prior to Virjee’s appointment, he served as executive vice chancellor and general counsel for CSU from 2014 to 2018. He has also served as secretary and chief legal officer to the CSU board of trustees. Before that, he was a partner for almost three decades at O’Melveny & Myers, a law firm in Los Angeles that specializes in labor and employment law and frequently represented educational institutions.
The Vietnamese community celebrated Tet Festival at the Orange County Fairand Event Center over the weekend by recreating a traditional villages and landmarks. (Huy Nguyen / Daily Titan)
MELANIE NGUYEN Asst. Editor
HUY NGUYEN Staff Writer
The Union of Vietnamese Student Associations participated in the 41st annual Vietnamese New Year celebration in Costa Mesa from Friday to Sunday last week.
The Tet Festival, held at the Orange County Fair and Event Center, is the largest student-run Vietnamese New Year celebration in the nation. This is the 10th year that the event was hosted at the fairgrounds. The Union of Vietnamese Student Associations is a non-profit organization that connects Vietnamese American students to advocate for social justice and build unity.
This year, the Cal State Fullerton chapter of the Vietnamese Student Association attended the festival. Vanessa Vuong, the Vietnamese culture night coordinator at CSUF Vietnamese Student Association, said Tet is a time to wish others wealth, luck and prosperity in the new year. “We have a very large Vietnamese community here and it really
brings people together and get to know different cultures, different perspectives and how we identify as a community,” Vuong said. With the theme “Road to Our Homeland,” Chau Thuy, a calligrapher who writes people’s names or SEE TET 2
University sets deadlines for posting syllabi SINCLAIR ANDRUSKA Editor
The Academic Senate voted to amend Cal State Fullerton’s syllabi policy to improve students' access to accurate course information. The amendment, which passed on Jan. 26, includes syllabus deadlines for instructors and updated disability access requirements. Course syllabi must be accessible for students with disabilities, according to the amendment. The revised policy will now require instructors to post their syllabi to the university’s online learning management system
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Canvas, which features an accessibility tool to help instructors ensure their syllabi and other course content is available to all students. “If it’s accessible for people with disabilities, it’s also more accessible for everyone else as well,” said Paul Miller, the director of Disability Student Services. The revised policy will require instructors to have a syllabus available to students by the end of the first full week of classes for spring and fall semesters. In winter and summer semesters, instructors will still be required to have a syllabus ready by the first day of classes. A previous version of the course
policy stated that course syllabi shall be provided to students within the first full week of classes. With the added revisions, it will now state that in the fall and spring it is preferred that syllabi are available by the first day of classes, but it is not required. The amendment calling for a firstday syllabi requirement for winter and summer classes was proposed by multiple senate members, including Robert R. Robinson, professor of political science, who said shorter semesters would require the syllabi be available sooner. “If you’re teaching a summer or winter course that’s five weeks,” Robinson said. “One week is 20% of the
class, that would not be acceptable.” Isabella Galvan, the Board of Directors chair for Associated Students, said she would prefer to have a syllabus by the first day of classes with general information even if it means needing to adjust the details of the syllabus later on in the semester. “As long as we have a skeleton based with the basic information, and if it’s with a few adjustments, as long as we have something to guide us the first day, then that’s more than enough,” Galvan said. Kevin Silvestre, a second-year international business major student, felt that it would not make sense to have syllabi after class has started
and should be ready prior to the first day of classes so students can prepare for the cost of class materials and know what items they will need ahead of time. “It’s kinda like a contract, and it tells you what to expect with the course, you know, if we need anything to buy because every student has different financial wishes, so sometimes they’re worrying about the materials,” Silvestre said. The amendment to the university policy will go into effect following a signature from President Framroze Virjee. The Academic Senate will hold their next meeting in Pollak Library on Thursday.
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