President's Blog

Photo Credit: Tim Meyer

Professional Photography student, Courtney Miller’s image entitled, “Purple Butterfly” won the grand prize in the Professional Photographers of California (PPC) ProPhoto West Magazine’s First Annual College Cover Challenge Print Competition on February 19, 2009. In addition to appearing on ProPhoto West Magazine’s cover for July 2009, her winning image was on display at the 56th Annual Western States Conference – ProPhotoExpo and Tradeshow in Pasadena.

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Brooks Institute has always been committed to serving the greater Ventura and Santa Barbara communities. In fact, we actually encourage employees to actively engage in their local communities through paid time off to work with area non-profit organizations that provide a charitable or philanthropic service. We also invite entire departments or offices to serve together for a day for team-building and camaraderie.

Due to the significant increase in the number of residents of Ventura County in need of food, the executive Leadership Team chose FOOD Share Inc. in Oxnard, California, to work together on Friday, March 27. During our day together, we prepared boxes for shipping food items to distribution points located throughout Ventura County, cleaned food donation barrels, sorted donated food, and worked the conveyor belt to prepare food distribution boxes.

From left to right: Denese Phillips, Liz Harris, Jamie Platt, Richard Guest - our Food Share Coordinator (in background) and Roger Andersen. Photo Credit: David Litschel

From left to right: Jamie Platt, Liz Harris, Denese Phillips, Tim Halsey, Richard Guest (our FOOD Share coordinator), Roger Andersen, and David Litschel. Photo Credit: David Litschel

FOOD Share Volunteer Coordinator Meg Horton states, “Dr. Andersen, you and your team are so gracious, generous, and may I say, hardworking people. FOOD Share thoroughly enjoyed having you and your team here last Friday…Community support on every level is what enables the food bank to go forward with its mission, and you and your team are an excellent example of such support.”

Brooks Institute has also decided to play a major role in the National Letter Carriers Food Drive on Saturday, May 9. We have committed to FOOD Share to have 20 volunteers work that afternoon to unload donated food items collected from letter carriers throughout the Ventura County region. If you want to join us to support this great cause, please contact Brooks Institute Director of Human Resources Jamie Platt at jamie.platt@brooks.edu.

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Dr. Roger Andersen, Congresswoman Lois Capps, Jacob Foko

Congresswoman Lois Capps (representing residents in Santa Barbara and Ventura, CA) congratulates Visual Journalism graduate Jacob Foko on receiving the prestigious GREAT Award from the Career College Association on Wednesday, March 11 on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C.

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Joyce Tenneson signed books and chatted with reception attendees

Students and community members lined up for their chance to get a book autographed by Joyce Tenneson

Joyce Tenneson spoke to a Brooks Institute audience and signed books and prints at an artist reception for the Santa Barbara community on Friday, March 13th at Brooks Institute’s Gallery 27.

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A student shows off the sign at The Focal Point.

Faculty, staff and students showed up to celebrate the grand opening of, “The Focal Point.” This space will be used to provide students with tutoring services and workshops. Students can also use The Focal Point to hold their own group meetings. Professional Photography student, Michael Randles won the naming contest and Professional Photography student, Sarah Sinclair designed the logo and signage. The Focal Point is open from 10a.m. – 5p.m. Monday through Friday and by appointment.

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Richard Carlson had a best-seller with Don’t Sweat the Small Stuff…And It’s All Small Stuff.

As we all know, it is the small stuff – the little things – that often sets the tone of our days or turns an experience into a positive or negative one.

Some small stuff to recognize:

The staff of our Cota and Mason Street campuses recently cleaned all the student chairs with a steamcleaner and scrub brush. (They even picked off hardened gum!) We know that students appreciate a desk, chair, meeting table or learning environment that is clean and attractive. To our fantastic Cota and Mason people: thank you!

Faculty and staff at the Ventura campus recently spent part of a Friday roaming the campus picking up disgarded cigarette butts. Even though we have special cigarette disposal units located throughout the campus, many people simply chose to toss and smash on our sidewalks and lawn areas. To the “butt picker-uppers” at Ventura: thank you!

Brooks Institute allows all of its full-time employees to use up to eight hours of paid time each year to volunteer for a local, non-profit organization. Although Brooks already has a high level of community involvement and civic engagement, we wanted to increase our commitment – especially in these difficult economic times. (The entire 7-member Brooks Institute Leadership Team will be working an entire day for FoodShare of Ventura County in late March as our collective commitment to this fantastic program.) For all faculty and staff who have served in 2008 and already in 2009: thank you!

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