PCC Courier, October 17, 2002

A Look Inside the TV Studio see page 5 ‘Bowling for Columbine’ Movie Review see page 6 Lancers Keep Winning see page 10 p A S A D E N A C l ;.;1 С О • - ' A ■> ■ E G : E COURIER Since 1915 VOL. 88 NO. 8 www.pcc-courieronline.com OCTOBER 17, 2002 On Campus UCLA Ain't Got Nothin' On Us By Kevin Awakuni Associate Editor A common misperception" among students is that four-year universities have more to offer and are more prestigious than their local commu¬ nity colleges. This is not necessarily true. Schools like PCC offer the same quality of education, and some class¬ es are even superior. While freshman English and math courses taught at four-year schools have class sizes in the hundreds and are usually instructed by teaching assistants, those same classes at PCC are small¬ er and taught by professors. Furthermore the professors at PCC all have identical credentials to their counterparts at four-year schools. Almost all of them have at minimum, a master’s degree in their respective field and many have even earned their doctorates. At least 104 of the 373 full-time teachers that work at PCC have a PhD. Comparatively, Citrus College only employs 22 professors with doctorates, while Glendale Community College only has 46 out of its staff of 235 full-time faculty members. Teachers come from university programs as diverse and prestigious as Harvard, MIT, Caltech and the U.S. Naval Academy. Teachers cited several different reasons for applying for teaching positions at PCC, but the most prevalent seems to be their love of teaching. While USC can boast of a higher number of professors with doctor¬ ates, (58.6 percent of the full-time instructors at USC have their doctor¬ ates), teachers who have worked there said the emphasis was not bn teaching. v СТА Protests Trashed Fliers Leslie Rodriguez /Courier Staff Copali Copili members portray an Aztec story through the dance of the fire serpent. Fire, drums and symbolic costumes helped tell about the fifth re-creation of the world. The fierce warriors above are Martin Teliez (standing) and Dante Gamboa. See story on page 4 By Luis Romero Staff Writer Students may need to take their own roll call and mark their teachers absent if negotiations with the district don’t improve. A survey conducted by the Pasadena Chapter of the California Teachers Association indicates that a majority of СТА mem¬ bers voted for a walkout ranging from an hour and a half to a full day. In addition, 55 faculty members voted to strike. “I was quite surprised by the level of support among faculty for a strike. It was much more than I had anticipated,” said Thomas Berg, vice president of the СТА Pasadena chapter. James Kossler, president of PCC, questioned the numbers represented in the survey. First, only СТА members were given the survey, which is a small por¬ tion of the entire PCC faculty. Second, more than one vote was allowed on each survey, he said. “I don’t know what the numbers represent because it’s not independently verified,” Kossler said. “That survey and that website serves their purpose.” The survey is the result of a two-year contract dis¬ pute between the district and the СТА over salary increases for full-time and part-time faculty. СТА distributed the survey to its members asking what actions teachers would be willing to be involved in. The list included:, participating in a partial day walkout, in an hour and a half walkout, a full day walkout or a strike. It asked faculty to help organize e-mail/phone campaigns, distribute material, partici¬ pate in activism during accreditation week. Members were also asked to organize faculty, staff and students to elect a new board of trustees. They could even indi¬ cate they were not willing to participate at this time. A full day walkout had the most votes at 60, fol¬ lowed by 56 votes for a partial day walkout. A strike ranked third. Both sides are in agreement about trying to avoid a situation that would disrupt education. “I would hope that we don’t get to that,” Kossler said. “1 don’t think they will as a body because they’re too dedicat¬ ed to teaching students.” John Jacobs, president of the Pasadena chapter of the СТА, thinks other¬ wise. “There are a lot of different job actions we can take that won’t adversely affect students. That’s our main goal.” Rio Hondo had Pasadena Unified teachers march their picket lines while the teachers stayed in class and taught, he said Still, the pro- CTA’s John Jacobs # see СТА, page 4 AS Bungles Town H all Fliers, Funds that he had some kind of hook-up or connection,” said Keenan Gosset, vice president of campus activities. “I was confident Linus would get the job done.” Unfortunately, Shen-tu would not deliver. your Associated students are By Andrew Campa EdiTor-in-Chief What was to be a simple proj¬ ect turned ugly last week as the Associated Students board approved promotional fliers passed out over the last three weeks adver¬ tising today’s town hall meeting. The fliers, which were originally sup¬ posed to cost $500 for 10,000 copies, snow¬ balled into $1125 for 20,000 copies after a slew of errors were discovered on the first batch. Linus shen-tu, vice The first batch of fliers contained president for cultural typos and a former AS member. diversity, originally are YOU a student at у art!: x«»r - prciftlent яапгу Torres - -jororoai affairs е:я»:о wong - ос.чЛьиЧ affairs arthur thoy •• business affairs keenar. goswu - activities six-n-tu - Co Kura! affairs; Catherine К • student services gabrtei gey tort - external affairs liiinvii -minir mtil if ffirti itinr cc? because we had an agreement,” Johnson said. “When a budget is settled upon, I expect [the AS] to stick to it, no exceptions.” Johnson’s refusal to sign the bill led Shen-tu to table the mat¬ ter to last week’s AS meeting, where funding was approved. However, the S250 increase was not the only oversight for Shcn-tu. While there was plenty of time to check the fliers after they were delivered from the print shop, many AS members immedi- “It’s a little disappointing,” Wong said. “We have put so much effort into making the town hall meeting successful. It would be unfair to place the blame on one individual, however this is something that should have been тшчмиидщ цвиипл <1111 garth wjf • pres-titer-T i ; лзег.у rorres - Internal affairs : eJ*<r.« «лед - zcM otoc affairs: artlsur <r»oy • tosiftess affairs koeaan gosset *• csieous activtrKs К ruts stoo-tu ~ cultural Affoics : Latoya ^turyo • public rolaticrs : are YOU a student at pcc Zeuschner Lindoerfer* # see Ph.D page 4 accepted the responsibility for producing the pocket-size pam¬ phlets. At an AS board meeting last month Shen-tu was allocated funds totaling $500 for the print¬ ing of 10,000 copies. “I was under the impression Within a week of agreeing to the expenditures, Shen-tu returned to the board with a bill of $750. His inability to stick to the budget did not please AS adviser Stephen Johnson. “I did not sign off on the bill ately began to distrib¬ ute the promos to stu-The second set included the entire dents and faculty. AS board minus the previous errors. One of those mem- caught.” The errors on the town hall fliers were more than a few typos. First, two AS officers were omitted from the staff list on the back cover. Those members were bers, Elaine Wong, vice president for academic affairs, was dis¬ pleased that advertisements were riddled with errors. She was also dismayed that AS officers deliv¬ ered hundreds of promos before realizing the mistake. Gabriel Gayhart, vice president of external affairs and Catherine Li, vice president of student serv¬ ices. What might have been a worse mistake was the careless inclu¬ sion of a member no longer on the board. Lenhi Teng, former AS chief justice had submitted her resigna¬ tion to the board weeks before the fliers were sent to the printshop, yet her name and position were included on the staff list. The position is currently vacant. “It’s an unfortunate error,” Shen-tu said. “It’s a little embarrassing to include someone who is no longer part of the AS, while not naming two active members.” Also embarrassing was the spelling of student trustee with three “e’s,” on the back cover and the inclusion of town hall dates # see AS ERROR page 4 Some Teachers Skip Out On Office Hours By Chaim Dauermann Staff Writer Office Hours Laurence Carrido, 20, is a full-time student at PCC, and for him, teacher office hours are a valuable resource. It is useful if I am absent or if I need further information about a certain subject or assignment, said Carrido. However, he has not always had help readily available at the teacher offices when he needs it. Even dur¬ ing posted office hours, his teachers have been absent on a few occa¬ sions. “It is kind of irresponsible to say you are going to be there and you are not.” Instructors are required to keep specific conference hours so that students can see them in their offices if they need to talk to them. This could be to clarify some¬ thing misunderstood in the class¬ room, to get some help on a project, or just to talk. Whatever the reason, teachers are supposed to be there for the stu¬ dents. Not only does this make sense, but it is also a contractual obligation for full-time teachers. Yet, not all PCC teachers habitu¬ ally keep their office hours, and this has become a frustration for many students. So, the Courier decided to look a little more deeply into the issue. Over the course of two weeks, the Courier made 61 visits to 49 dif¬ ferent professors to check and see if they were in their offices when they said they would be. Sixteen instructors accounted for 20 absences. Nearly all of the visits were divided among the R, C and U buildings. The visited teachers offices in the C building had the best record, with only four absences out of 25 visits. However, in- the U Building, there were eight absences out of 10. The offices visited in the U building belonged to teachers in the health sciences department. Although their absences from their office during their hours sug¬ gest negligence, Kathleen Winston, interim dean of the division, sees it differently. In addition to time in the class¬ room, students in the health sci¬ ences department spend time with teachers in hands-on environments, such as a hospital. “Sometimes we will have oppor¬ tunities for students,” said Winston. “Sometimes they fall during office hours. We need that flexibility in order to give students the best pos¬ sible clinical experience.” “There is a lot of individual time that is given to our students,” she added. “Health Sciences is a really good example of a strong working relationship between teachers and students.” Because of this, Winston believes it reduces the students’ need for office hour contact. However, on the official list of faculty conference hours, there are specific hours listed when the teach¬ ers are supposed to be in their offices, and not in the hospital or any other clinical setting. The Courier paid visits during the hours designated specifically for the office. Winston is confident that when health sciences I instructors are absent from their offices, it is for a good reason. The division’s administrative staff knows where each teacher is at all times. ® see HOURS page 5 lriguez A frustrated student pays a visit to an empty office dur¬ ing posted conference hours. t