It’s not unusual to see Sethuraman smiling while teaching, sitting in on a meeting or simply walking around the campus of Cal State San Marcos.

But forgive the biological sciences professor if his smile has been extra wide these days.

Earlier this month, Sethuraman was granted early tenure and promotion to the rank of associate professor starting with the upcoming fall semester.

That announcement came on the heels of his National Science Foundation (NSF) CAREER Award being recommended for funding. It’s a prestigious award that puts Sethuraman in rare company as he’s believed to be one of just two CSUSM professors to ever win it. The other was biology professor George Vourlitis in 2002.

Sethuraman’s grant will cover a period of five years and is worth a total of $608,360.

“It's a career-building opportunity,” Sethuraman said. “It’s set up to both engage our student population in science and to make sure that we communicate it. We want to be able to communicate our science to the general public with all sorts of engagement activities and programs.”

The NSF CAREER Award is for early career researchers. The award aims to provide financial support and assistance to those who have just started out on their careers and are trying to establish a program for themselves. Only assistant professors and tenure-track assistant professors can apply for it. The award needs a scientific or public community engagement component for it to work.

That won’t be a problem for Sethuraman, who with an NSF grant earlier in his career as a postdoc student at Temple University established a summer workshop program for high school teachers in the Philadelphia area.

That program trained teachers basic programming skills to take to their high school biology or chemistry classroom after a week of learning different types of exercises.

As soon as next summer, Sethuraman plans on implementing a similar program for San Diego County high school teachers, one in which potentially 25-30 lesson plans can be given to each teacher.

“That’s one part of (the grant),” said Sethuraman, who earned his bachelor’s in computer science from the Birla Institute of Technology and Science in Pilani, India, and his Ph.D. from Iowa State. “The other part is, I write for a popular science blog called ‘The Molecular Ecologist,’ and my goal as part of this career was to incorporate my own graduate students and teach them how to do science communication to the general public. They will work on tutorials and articles, which we’ll then publish as part of the science blog accessible to the general public. So there's a number of other sort of synergistic outreach and community engagement activities that are also part of the brand.”

Sethuraman isn’t waiting until next summer to make his latest impact.

The second annual Research Experience for Undergraduates (REU) program that he and biology professor Betsy Read co-run began on campus last week and runs for 10 weeks.

There were more than 250 applicants from all over the country for this year’s program. Ten students will do research projects in different labs and receive training in genomics and bioinformatics. The program will end with a poster presentation on Aug. 13.

Whether it’s earning tenure, receiving a prestigious award or being the driving force for an important summer program, Sethuraman has big goals for his career beyond just the classroom and lab.

“I've already started to think about sabbatical years and things that I want to do in those years,” he said. “My immediate goal would be to teach a lot of genetics classes here. I've noticed over the years that genetics textbooks and resources are not very inclusive, and actually that's also written into my NSF CAREER grant.”

Last spring, Sethuraman co-taught a one-unit seminar course with kinesiology professor Richard Armenta that is open to the entire campus called the genetics of minorities. In that course, he discussed the genetic basis behind ethnic and racial minorities, sexual orientation, weight and people with pre-existing conditions, and how there are different types of minorities and disabilities that are also affected by sociological perspectives.

“It’s also actually written into my CAREER proposal that the goal is to offer that class as a three-unit course on campus to explore the sorts of things that are not in the textbooks and not talked about or not studied enough just by virtue of the fact there's no resources in parts of the world that are highly underrepresented or for sections of the society that are highly underrepresented,” Sethuraman said. “So my goal, whenever I'm eligible for sabbatical, would be to eventually write about genetics of minorities in a much more inclusive genetics book.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

The grant of $1.9 million covers five years and was awarded to a group of researchers headed by Dr. Wesley Schultz, a psychology professor and the Dean of the Office of Graduate Studies and Research at CSUSM. Schultz will lead the project alongside Dr. Anna Woodcock, research faculty in the CSUSM psychology department, and Dr. Paul Hernandez, a professor at Texas A&M University and a CSUSM alumnus. 

Schultz and his team will aim to answer the question of how the development of an identity as a scientist affects a student’s persistence and success within a STEM discipline, and how that identity aligns with the student’s other identities.  

“Say you’re a Hispanic student at Cal State San Marcos and you’re interested in engineering,” Schultz said. “But there’s a stereotype that says engineers are white. How does the student reconcile that? Is it even important that they reconcile it? We don’t know. I suspect it’s critically important to see that the groups you’re a member of and the activities you’re engaging in are aligned with each other. Those are the things that we’re measuring.” 

The project will enroll 1,400 junior engineering and biological science majors – 50% underrepresented minority and 50% majority students – from 10 campuses in the California State University system: CSUSM, Cal Poly Pomona, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo, Cal State Fullerton, Cal State Long Beach, Cal State Los Angeles, Cal State Northridge, Sacramento State, San Diego State and San Jose State. Students will be recruited into the My College Pathways project, a new five-year longitudinal panel. Biannual surveys and computerized test scores will allow the research team to compare the development and stability of STEM identity and identity balance across a critical juncture where many STEM majors leave their path toward a STEM career. 

The project, which starts Sept. 1, will be supported by the NSF’s Education and Human Resources Core Research program, which emphasizes fundamental STEM education research that generates foundational knowledge in the field. And it will build on two years of background work, funded by the NSF’s EAGER (Early-concept Grants for Exploratory Research) program, in which Schultz’s team collected data from about 300 students on three CSU campuses: CSUSM, Long Beach and Northridge.  

The grant is the continuation of research that Schultz has been conducting with Woodcock and Hernandez for more than a decade. 

“This research should have a profound impact on understanding how Hispanic STEM students balance their emerging identities as scientists or engineers with their ethnic identity, and what academic experiences can help foster identity balance,” Woodcock said. 

About California State University San Marcos

Building on an innovative 29-year history, California State University San Marcos is a forward-focused institution, dedicated to preparing future leaders, building great communities and solving critical issues. Located on a 304-acre hillside overlooking the City of San Marcos, it is the only public four-year comprehensive university serving North San Diego, Southwest Riverside and South Orange counties.

The University enrolls more than 16,000 students. With approximately 2,000 employees, the institution is a Great College to Work For® (The Chronicle of Higher Education). As a recipient of the annual HEED Award since 2014 — a national honor recognizing U.S. colleges and universities that demonstrate an outstanding commitment to diversity and inclusion — CSUSM is committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment.

Though Silvia is grateful for a strong support system of friends in North County, it’s still challenging being a single mom attending school full time, working multiple jobs and caring for a son with spastic quadriplegia, a severe form of cerebral palsy.

But Silvia never thinks about moving back to Colombia.

“I made a life here, and I feel like I can be successful with what I'm doing here,” Silvia said. “Here, there's so many opportunities for research and you can do world-class things, revolutionize, if you will. In the U.S., the opportunities are endless.”

For Silvia, one of those opportunities included a prestigious workshop at Princeton University in July. Silvia and fellow CSUSM physics student Mireya Juarez were among 20 students from throughout the country selected to participate in the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory (PPPL) Undergraduate Workshop in Plasma Physics. The four-day workshop provided students an overview of plasma physics, fusion and the research done at PPPL, which is a collaborative national center for fusion energy research that is managed by Princeton.

Silvia and Mireya joined other participants in attending lectures and conducting experiments. The program is designed to encourage women and people from underrepresented backgrounds to consider a career in physics. It was particularly inspiring for Silvia that the program was led by a fellow Colombian, Arturo Dominguez, who is a science education senior program leader at the PPPL.

“It was cool to see somebody and to meet somebody that is also Colombian that succeeded and is at Princeton,” she said. “I thought, ‘If he did it, then I can probably do it, too.’ ”

The road to becoming a scientist has been an unexpected journey for Silvia, who earned a degree while studying physiotherapy at Universidad del Rosario in her native Colombia more than a decade ago. She worked as a physical therapist in Colombia before moving to the United States in 2009 with her now ex-husband, a Marine who was stationed at the U.S. Embassy in Bogotá.

The extensive process to practice physical therapy in the U.S., coupled with Silvia’s waning interest in the field, led her to consider returning to school. She always had a passion for science and was intrigued by a career in engineering.

But it wasn’t an easy decision. She would essentially be starting from scratch after years of experience in the health-care field. There were her son’s health challenges to consider. And starting over in her 30s seemed daunting.

It was a conversation with her mom that helped convince Silvia to make the change.

“She said, ‘What makes you happy? Because that’s what it’s about. Life is about being happy,’ ” Silvia said. “I said, ‘I want to be a scientist. I want to work in engineering.’ And she said, ‘Go for it.’

“My family was really supportive, and that made it easier.”

Silvia earned her associate degree at MiraCosta College and transferred to CSUSM for fall 2018. Now 37, Silvia has embraced the age gap between her and most of her classmates. Many have a difficult time believing that she’s nearly two decades older than them. One classmate even requested to see her ID because they didn’t believe she was that much older. And she said her maternal instincts often kick in when it comes to her classmates, just as it did at the PPPL workshop.

“It was a lot of 19-, 20-year-olds, so I felt like I was responsible for the entire group somehow,” she said. “Everyone was like, ‘You’re not the mom.’ And I’m like, ‘But I feel like I am a little bit.’

“I am very protective of the younger crowd and I’ve always tried to be a mentor. If I know something that they don’t know or if they’re looking for guidance, I’m really happy to help because I didn’t really have that when I was in school back in Colombia.”

Silvia makes time for her classmates despite her myriad commitments. In addition to her full-times studies, she is part of CSUSM’s Summer Scholars program working in the lab of physics professor Stephen Tsui, a math facilitator for the university’s Readiness and Success program and a math tutor at MiraCosta College.

Tsui first learned of Silvia through fellow physics professor Chuck De Leone, who thought she would be a good fit for Tsui’s lab. Then Tsui saw her work firsthand last spring when she took his advanced lab course.

“She was very focused in the lab course,” Tsui said. “They work in groups, and there were times when she was the one in her group helping to keep people on task because her grade was important to her.”

Silvia’s success in the class helped her get selected to work under Tsui during Summer Scholars, a 10-week program that pairs a student with a faculty mentor to gain hands-on research experience. Silvia is spending 20 hours a week in the lab this summer examining the heat capacity properties of the mineral magnetite and will present her work during the Summer Scholars Poster Showcase on Aug. 8.

But her top priority is Matthew, her 7-year-old son who has been at Rady Children’s Hospital’s rehabilitation wing since 2015.

Silvia commutes multiple times each week from her Vista home to Rady in San Diego to be with Matthew, and she spends many late nights there studying while he sleeps.

“She’s very driven,” Tsui said. “It’s not just for her. What she’s doing is for her and her son. Her dream one day is to be in mechanical engineering. After she’s done here, I think she’ll be able to go on to whatever she wants to do, and she’ll be great at it.”

Silvia will graduate in May and plans to pursue a master’s in mechanical engineering at UC San Diego. Leaving San Diego County for her master’s isn’t an option because she wants to ensure that Matthew continues receiving the care he needs at Rady.

“It’s been a journey,” Silvia said. “I’m proud of what I have done thus far. With all the effort that I have put in my academics and in life so far, I’m starting to see that it’s finally paying off. It’s a good feeling.

“The university is so supportive of students like me. The faculty members of the physics department, my peers, everybody is just amazing. This is an amazing university. I’m proud to be here.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

“Hydroseeding does not appear to be doing what we were hoping it to be doing, at least so far,” said Dr. Arun Sethuraman, a computational biologist and an assistant professor in the Department of Biological Sciences. “Instead, it appears to be impeding the recovery of microbial diversity.”

What’s more, some of the microbial samples could not be categorized even after sequencing their DNA.

“There are some species we just can’t classify,” said Dr. George Vourlitis, who heads the CSUSM Terrestrial Ecosystems Research Lab and who partners with Sethuraman in teaching the course Research Methods in Molecular Evolution and Ecology. “What is pretty clear is there is a different bacterial community in the hydroseeded area.”

Eleven students were enrolled in the course taught for the first time this spring. The class is unique in that it is entirely research-based. It is funded through a four-year, $278,679 grant from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture at the U.S. Department of Agriculture.

“This was entirely a student-led project,” Vourlitis said.

The project focused on the ecological impacts on a hillside charred by a 2,000-acre brush fire at the edge of CSUSM. An earlier, 2016 student-led study found that hydroseeding was inhibiting the recovery of native woody shrubs after almost two years of post-fire recovery.

The just-concluded study went further, digging deeper into the impacts on soil microbial abundance and diversity in the burn area. Students employed next-generation DNA sequencing to measure 24 soil samples from a burn area that was hydroseeded, 24 samples from a burn area that recovered on its own, and 24 samples from an unburned area.

Microbial diversity is critical in soil health and quality, and bacteria is a primary regulator of decomposition and carbon storage.

“It’s important to understand how fire and post-fire management affects carbon and nutrient cycling,” Vourlitis said.

In applying for the grant from the National Institute of Food and Agriculture, Vourlitis and Sethuraman highlighted the importance of boosting the number of students conducting research and being trained in agricultural sciences, increasing student confidence in their ability to conduct agricultural research, and increasing the number of students seeking graduate degrees or careers in agricultural sciences. Agriculture is a growing industry in San Diego County and had an economic impact of nearly $1.8 billion in 2017, according to the San Diego County Department of Agriculture Weights and Measures.

Next year’s research will focus on the diversity of different hop strains used by the local craft brewing industry and how well they grow in different soil types.

“It is important to train the next generation of agriculturalists, not just in field work, but in the lab and in working with data,” Sethuraman said. “We want our students to tackle local environmental and agricultural problems and show they can address these challenges when they join the local workforce.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

The challenge was this: Come to our laboratory over the summer and try to devise a solution to a problem related to the topic of transactive energy. Ochoa was a physics student who loves to try to decipher complex puzzles, so this invitation was like a siren song to him.  

As he embarked on a project that might end up changing his life, he had just one question: What exactly is transactive energy? 

It wouldn’t be the first time that Ochoa and the other students essentially were thrown in at the deep end and asked to swim. In the course of the unpaid internship, they were exposed to other relatively foreign concepts like microgrids, blockchains and internet of things.  

By the end of the summer, most of the students returned to school, satisfied that they had expanded their knowledge base. But for Ochoa and three others who came to be friends and partners, the experience was merely a jumping-off point.  

Almost a year later, Ochoa is the CEO of a startup company called simpl (in the style of modern tech firms, the “S” is lower case and the “E” is omitted intentionally) that builds off work done during the transactive energy project. The 2018 CSUSM graduate founded the business with fellow alumni Dragan Lukic (computer science, 2019) and Daniel Sanchez (physics, 2019) as well as Palomar College product Nate Wise, who will begin studying engineering at UCLA this fall.  

“We knew nothing about the topic beforehand,” Ochoa said. “But in eight months, we were able to accumulate a vast amount of knowledge and put something together.” 

Transactive energy represents a new approach to dealing with the reality of the old and outdated energy grid in the United States, and the additional strain put on it by the increasing popularity of renewable energy sources like solar and wind power. It’s based on the idea of microgrid technology, which involves breaking up the existing grid that spans large regions into smaller chunks that can be powered by renewables. 

“What transactive energy is and what our project focused on is, instead of power being generated miles and miles away and then being transported over these large grid systems, how can we get a system powered by renewable energy – in our case, it was solar – integrated with the grid to be functionable with pre-existing technology and infrastructure?” Wise said. 

The quartet of students first experimented with a hardware solution. At Open Source Maker Labs, the Vista makerspace that offered the U.S. Navy-sponsored project, they built and tested a small microgrid using solar panels and batteries.  

At the time, they were still just a group of enthusiastic engineers-in-training who were having fun putting their brains together to solve a problem. It was Dan Hendricks, a former Navy captain who established OSML in 2014, who urged the four non-business students to strongly consider forming a business. 

“What triggered me to make the suggestion was not just the technology they were working on, but seeing how they worked together,” Hendricks said. “They didn’t know each other before but very quickly formed a cohesive and focused team. That’s a key ingredient for a startup, so that’s what prompted me to say, ‘Hey, have you ever thought about going into business?’ ”

They hadn’t. But as they began to mull over how they might monetize their initial work, they quickly realized that the cost to produce thousand-dollar microgrids in mass quantities would be prohibitive.

Several iterations of a possible company later, they came up with an idea that they believe lives up to its name. Simpl is a software platform – a website and a mobile app – that facilitates a connection between your thermostat and the droves of solar energy firms that may want you as a customer. The target audience is residential clients and small to medium businesses.

“Your thermostat is the highest energy-consuming thing in most homes,” Ochoa said. “What we show you is how much it costs to be comfortable, how much it costs to be at a given temperature. Then, taking that information, we show you your utility bill and how much that’s costing you, and then we show you, with the current cost of renewables, how much that would cost you and here’s the breakdown.

“Right now, it takes a bunch of work to get that information. You have to do months of research, you have to get quote after quote. With simpl, it’s, ‘Here’s your utility bill, here’s the return on investment you could be making,’ and then we pair you with the right company that can address that need.”

Ochoa said he and his partners researched the market and found potential competitors – from solar companies to smart home companies to utilities themselves – that were addressing some of the needs that simpl aims to fulfill, but none that was tackling the issue as a whole. Because the platform has such low overhead, the foursome are funding the venture on their own so far.

They plan to initiate a three-week pilot program of about 30 users on July 13, followed by an alpha program featuring more than 100. If everything progresses smoothly, the business could be launched formally by the end of the year.

Asked what has surprised him most about the process, Lukic said: “That we made it this far. When we first discussed starting this company, I never imagined that we would be so close to doing a pilot program to actually get our product going.”

It seemed fitting that the simpl team was speaking during San Diego Startup Week, May 28 to June 3, and from the OSML offices at the heart of the Highway 78 corridor. OSML is part of Innovate 78, a collaboration of the five cities along the freeway – Carlsbad, Escondido, Oceanside, San Marcos and Vista – to boost economic prosperity in the region.

A few businesses have germinated from OSML already. Team simpl hopes that they are next.

“With so many technological challenges that we’re all facing, how can we get the workforce to accelerate in their learning beyond traditional methods?” Hendricks said. “The current method is you have to stay in school four years before you can be productive. Our hypothesis is, ‘No, people are capable of learning a lot faster than we give them credit for.’ I think these guys proved that in spades.”

Media Contact

Brian Hiro, Communications Specialist

bhiro@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7306

But when Oberem steps down as CSUSM’s provost at the end of June, it will mark the end of a 6½-year tenure, more than double the California State University average of three years for the position.

“Dr. Oberem has been an exceptional leader and advocate for Academic Affairs,” said President Karen Haynes, who also will be retiring at the end of June. “I appreciate his thoughtfulness in consideration of university challenges and opportunities, his creation of a strong Academic Affairs leadership team and his seniority and credibility among the CSU provosts.”

A native of South Africa, Oberem arrived at CSUSM in 1996 as the university’s first physics hire. CSUSM didn’t have a physics department at the time – and Oberem was told there wouldn’t be one – so it was suggested that he become faculty in either chemistry or computer science while he taught physics courses. Instead, he convinced his dean to allow him to be an independent unit, providing the opportunity to manage his own budget while he set up the new physics labs.

Before his first semester on campus ended, Oberem wrote to the dean laying out exactly why the university needed a physics department. Most university physics departments at the time focused on preparing students for graduate school, but Oberem advocated for an applied physics program.

“Part of the reason I came here was because of the students we serve,” Oberem said. “I believed strongly that if we had a degree that emphasized applied physics, these students would be highly marketable in the regional job market with a bachelor’s degree. That really did prove to be true, even from the outset.”

The physics program celebrated its 10^th anniversary in 2017, and the department was recognized earlier this year by the American Physical Society for being ranked sixth in the nation based on the number of undergraduate physics degrees awarded to underrepresented minorities.

Oberem’s career took an unexpected turn in 2006 when he agreed to serve a four-year term as an associate dean for the erstwhile College of Arts and Sciences. The split of the colleges was announced at the end of his term, and then-Provost Emily Cutrer asked if he would stay on two more years and move to the new College of Science and Mathematics.

Near the end of the year, Cutrer announced that she was hiring an associate vice president for planning and academic resources, the position now known as vice provost. Intrigued by the job description, Oberem applied and, following a national search, was appointed to the position on May 1, 2012.

By the end of the year, Cutrer had left for a presidential opening in Texas. Haynes asked Oberem to serve as the interim provost while a national search was conducted for a permanent replacement. For the second time in less than a year, Oberem was an applicant in a national search and, for the second time, he got the job.

As Oberem’s time as an administrator nears its end, he is looking forward to spending more time with his family and pursuing his other interests – he is an accomplished musician and enjoys photography. He also is considering participating in the Faculty Early Retirement Program, which allows eligible tenured faculty to continue teaching part-time.

Oberem is grateful for more than two decades at CSUSM. Founding the physics department was just one of many notable achievements. As provost, he led the creation of the Office of Undergraduate Studies and he was also part of the effort to launch the university’s engineering program. But more than anything, he will miss the people.

“The people here are incredible,” he said. “What’s unique about this campus is the level of collaboration and genuine caring for one another. That’s one of the reasons that I came here.

“It’s just been really amazing.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

"We’ve conquered those brick walls of long nights studying for finals. We’ve conquered those brick walls of our Senior Experience projects. We’ve conquered all those brick walls together, and today we have shown how badly we wanted to get here," said Jeff Mata, the student speaker for the College of Business Administration's ceremony on Sunday morning. "We made it, we made it. Tap two of your neighbors and tell them that we made it."

College of Humanities, Arts, Behavioral and Social Sciences

Friday, May 17 - 9 a.m. Ceremony Photos and Live Stream Replay
Friday, May 17 - 2:30 p.m. Ceremony Photos and Live Stream Replay

College of Education, Health and Human Services

Saturday, May 18 - 9 a.m. Ceremony Photos and Live Stream Replay
Saturday, May 18 - 2 p.m. Ceremony Photos and Live Stream Replay

College of Business Administration

Sunday, May 19 - 9 a.m. Ceremony Photos and Live Stream Replay

College of Science and Mathematics

Sunday, May 19 - 2 p.m. Ceremony Photos and Live Stream Replay

Clark-Ibáñez was a coach for the program designed to introduce e-learning to faculty members. Ouyang, eager to try something new, was the only science professor in a cohort filled with colleagues from the sociology department. 

Despite their vastly different academic fields – Ouyang in computer science, Clark-Ibáñez in sociology – the two hit it off immediately. It was the start of a close friendship, and a wonderful professional partnership that stands to benefit CSUSM students for years to come. 

In 2017, Ouyang and Clark-Ibáñez teamed up to secure a five-year, $1 million grant from the National Science Foundation to fund scholarships, workshops, mentors and networking opportunities for computer science majors from low-income families. 

Now, with that program thriving, the two professors are back for more, this time targeting computer science students as they first enter the university.  

Ouyang and Clark-Ibáñez were the faculty behind a proposal that resulted in CSUSM last month being named one of only six project teams in the state to receive full funding in the first set of awards from the California Education Learning Lab, a new program that seeks to close equity and achievement gaps in STEM and other disciplines.  

CSUSM was selected to receive a Learning Lab award of more than $1 million over three years. Ouyang and Clark-Ibáñez submitted the proposal along with Nery Chapetón-Lamas, a computer science professor from MiraCosta College, and the team was one of just six in California granted a full award out of 42 turned in across the state. 

“To me, this grant means opportunity for my students,” said Ouyang, chair of the computer science and information systems department. “That’s what drives a lot of my proposals.” 

One of Ouyang’s grants, nicknamed “CodeQueens,” focuses on helping high school girls learn more about STEM career paths. Another, the 2017 one procured with Clark-Ibáñez, is dubbed “Fab Fridays” and involves upper-class computer science students being mentored by industry partners and working on real-world projects at an on-campus makerspace.  

The most recent grant will service a different population – of the age between prospective CSUSM students and the upper classes – but with a similar hands-on approach. Assisted by Clark-Ibáñez, Ouyang will overhaul the university’s two introductory computer science classes (CS 111 and CS 211) to make them more student-driven and less lecture-based – with the objective of keeping students from giving up on the subject before they ever have a chance to get hooked. Because CSUSM and MiraCosta are minority-serving institutions, they also include elements to the pedagogy and content that are culturally relevant. 

In writing the proposal, Ouyang compared a typical computer science lesson plan at the high school level with that of an introductory college course. She found the difference to be stark. The former was exciting and engaging, the latter dry and off-putting. 

“As a non-computer science person, I could understand the high school problem. I could understand the bigger picture of what it was trying to get at,” said Clark-Ibáñez, chair of the sociology department. “The college version of what she pulled out to do a side-by-side comparison was so involved with solving proofs and the critical thinking went away. It was just computation. 

“Youwen will be working to transform these intro classes that can really turn off students. They told us they were so excited to be in the major and then they get to their first class and they’re like, ‘Oh God, this is so horrible.’ ” 

Ouyang said she hasn’t taught a course for a few years, but she plans to return to the classroom this fall after having redesigned CS 111 during a faculty in residence program at Google headquarters in June. She will come back to teaching with a different perspective born of her experience with Fab Fridays and other projects. 

“When I was in the classroom, my students were pretty quiet and I didn’t see much wrong with it,” Ouyang said. “I was thinking the teacher’s role is to explain things to students. Now I’m seeing things very differently.” 

The CSUSM professors plan to incorporate the Open Learning Initiative offered by Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, a collection of evidence-based tools and approaches to learning that are proven to boost student success, and enable instructors to be more effective. While Ouyang teaches the course, Clark-Ibáñez will utilize her expertise in sociology to ensure that the material and the research accounts for the racial, cultural and gender diversity of CSUSM’s students.  

“It’s going to be a very innovative approach,” Clark-Ibáñez said. “The goal is to have students coming in to be hooked right away, to feel like they are honored as a whole person.” 

Media Contact

Brian Hiro, Communications Specialist

bhiro@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7306

She thinks it was three months. Her middle sister, Madina, estimates that it was closer to two. Whether it was two or three, one thing is certain – for a 9-year-old looking after a 6-year-old and a 3-year-old, it felt like an eternity.

Malika and her sisters got through those months on their own. They got through nearly two years in an orphanage. And they got through a seemingly interminable adoption process to create a new family with a loving couple from Fallbrook.

“We were meant to be,” Malika said.

Graduation day is a time of celebration and joy, but it will also be a bittersweet occasion for Malika. Crossing the commencement stage at Cal State San Marcos in May ends a six-year journey to earn her bachelor’s in biochemistry. It also means an end to driving from her parents’ Fallbrook home to campus each day with sisters Madina and Zarina, who also attend CSUSM. There will be no more daily lunches together on campus or study sessions in Kellogg Library, which they affectionately call their second home.

“We’ll have to start doing things on our own,” said Madina, also a biochemistry major who will graduate in 2021. “It’s going to be different.”

Malika won’t be going far as she enters the working world with an eye toward beginning nursing school in 2020. But considering where they’ve been, it will be, as Madina notes, different.

The road to the orphanage

Malika and her sisters grew up in Priozersk, a small city of less than 14,000 people known for a military base that is used by Russia for testing anti-ballistic and anti-aircraft defense systems.

The girls’ birth father, who was in his 60s, died of unknown causes, and their birth mother’s abuse of drugs and alcohol increased after his death. Their birth mother was prone to disappearing for days at a time before finally resurfacing to bring the girls more food. Then the temporary disappearances became permanent. The girls had no idea where their birth mother went. Malika stopped attending school so she could care for Madina and Zarina.

The girls managed to get food from a local market that allowed customers to purchase on credit, but the store owner soon had to cut them off because nobody was paying the bill. Malika was forced to beg for food.

“It was humiliating because we would ask people we knew,” she said.

A neighbor took the girls in after they had already been living on their own for months, but it didn’t last long. The strain of trying to care for three young girls in addition to her own children and grandchildren was too much to bear, and the neighbor called the police after two months. Malika and her sisters were placed in a temporary group home of about 80 children before being transported to a large orphanage in Karaganda, about 300 miles north of Priozersk.

While Malika and her sisters were fortunate to be placed in the same orphanage – some siblings were split up – they rarely saw each other. The more than 400 children in the orphanage were divided into age groups. Though Madina and Zarina started off in the same group, Madina soon aged into the next group. If they were lucky, the girls might see each other in the cafeteria. More commonly, they had to wait until a big celebration like Christmas or a summer activity.

“The hardest part was not knowing what was happening with my sisters,” Malika said. “If one kid was in trouble, everyone in the age group was in trouble and got punished. Knowing that happened in my age group, I couldn’t imagine what was going on with my sisters.”

While Malika and her sisters were becoming accustomed to life in the orphanage, some 7,000 miles away in Fallbrook, Peter and Sylvia Berens had been discussing adoption.

‘Love at first sight’

Peter and Sylvia’s first attempt at adoption was stymied by a paperwork mix-up, and they never even met the children whom the adoption group had targeted. The mistake helped Peter and Sylvia move to the top of the list the following year. They received a stack of photos of children waiting to be adopted. Peter didn’t even make it through half of the photos.

“When I saw the picture, I knew,” he said.

It was a photo of Malika, Madina and Zarina.

“We didn’t plan for three kids,” Sylvia said. “But we saw them and – something in their eyes, their sparkle – we knew they were going to be our kids.”

As part of the adoption program, the girls flew to the U.S. for a six-week trial period. The girls didn’t speak any English, and Peter and Sylvia spoke no Russian.

Despite the language barrier – “It was a lot of hand signals back and forth,” Peter said – they instantly connected.

“When people say love at first sight,” Malika said, “that’s how it was with our parents. We knew we were going to be together.”

But it was an arduous process. If everything went according to plan, Peter and Sylvia knew it would be nearly a year before they would get to bring the girls to the U.S. permanently. Six weeks together made it even more excruciating to see the girls board a plane to return to the orphanage in Kazakhstan.

Malika made one request of Peter and Sylvia before departing for Kazakhstan: She asked if they would visit the orphanage at Christmas. Peter and Sylvia couldn’t make any promises, but that December, as kids in the orphanage were preparing for the holiday, Malika noticed a buzz of excitement. Children were running to the windows and Malika could hear them saying, “The Americans are here.” She went to the window to see what the commotion was about.

It was Peter and Sylvia.

“I got really emotional,” Malika said. “That made it more real because I knew they wanted us and they loved us.”

Peter and Sylvia made two more trips to Kazakhstan – once for a bonding period with the girls and a final visit to bring their daughters home. The girls officially became U.S. citizens on May 5, 2005, at the moment their plane landed on U.S. soil.

A second chance

There were still adjustments and challenges. On their first night as an official family, Zarina woke up at 2 a.m. screaming yabloka, yabloka, yabloka while running wildly around the kitchen. Peter and Sylvia had no idea what she was saying nor the severity of the problem. They called one of their employees, a native of Uzbekistan who spoke Russian. Peter apologized for waking him and explained the situation. The employee asked what Zarina was saying.

“Yabloka,” Peter said.

“She wants an apple,” he replied.

The girls’ English steadily improved, and they thrived at St. Joseph Academy in San Marcos. The only thing they enjoyed more than school was frequent trips abroad with their parents.

“I think that’s how our love of education started,” Zarina said. “On every trip, our parents would make sure we went to a museum and learned something. Then we’d go back to class and could say, ‘Oh, I saw that.’ We could make a connection.”

When it came time to choose a college, CSUSM was an easy choice. Though Peter and Sylvia each earned a doctorate in physical chemistry from UC San Diego – and Sylvia also completed her undergraduate work there – they encouraged their daughters to attend CSUSM, where they thought a smaller-college experience would be beneficial.

It was a prescient decision. Malika and Madina credit chemistry professor Jackie Trischman for providing critical mentorship throughout their time at CSUSM.

Laurie Schmelzer, the director of student services for the College of Science and Mathematics, also proved instrumental in Malika’s success at CSUSM, virtually from day one. Malika met Schmelzer through her freshman GEL Chemistry & Biochemistry Learning Community course, and Schmelzer helped Malika develop the confidence to take on leadership roles in events like Super STEM Saturday.

“She was so shy but always had questions about what needed to be done before the next class, who she should talk to about advising,” Schmelzer said. “It was obvious that she was going to make the most of her college experience, and she jumped right in.

“She has been an amazing mentor to her two sisters, and that compassion carries over into every aspect of her life. I’m going to greatly miss her visits to my office and spending time with her at outreach events, but I can’t wait to see what she does next.”

Malika is hoping to work as a certified nursing assistant before starting preparations for nursing school. She hopes to enroll in CSUSM’s Accelerated Bachelor of Science in Nursing program in spring 2020.

Malika learned about compassion and caring at a young age, and it remains at the forefront of everything she does.

“I believe that God has a plan for everyone,” Malika said. “It might not be the plan we are envisioning, but we should always be grateful for what we have because we never know when it’s going to be taken from us. God has been a huge part of my life. I feel like being adopted was part of his plan.

“My parents have provided us with unconditional love and support. They’ve been there through the hard times. It sounds clichéd, but they’re my heroes. They’ve given me a second chance in life, one I’ll never take for granted.”

Today, Ashley and Marissa work as mentors to high school students participating in the program, but it wasn’t long ago that both were CodeQueens participants themselves.

“It’s really exciting because most of the girls haven’t been exposed to computers or computer science early,” said Ashley, a second-year computer science student at CSUSM. “It’s a new thing for them, and they might not have been exposed to the field otherwise.”

“CodeQueens has a great impact, the greatest one being exposure to the field,” added Marissa, a first-year software engineering student.

Ashley and Marissa will both be at nearby Mission Hills High School on Saturday for the CodeQueens Showcase, an annual event where participants share the online games they created during the semester. The assignment for this semester’s showcase was to create a game to combat distracted driving.

Eight North County high schools are participating in the showcase from 9 a.m.-1 p.m. in the Mission Hills library. The event is free and open to the public, and prizes will be awarded to participants.

Ashley and Marissa each developed their interest in computer science and software engineering through their time as high school participants in the CodeQueens Club.

While many participants know little about the topic when they join, Ashley wanted to get involved while she was a student at Mission Hills because she had an interest and knew it was something she wanted to pursue in college.

However, she knows that is the exception.

“I think the main reason that girls aren’t going into the field is a lack of exposure to computers,” Ashley said.

Neither computer science nor software engineering were on Marissa’s radar until she joined CodeQueens, and she credits her high school teacher, her CSUSM CodeQueens mentor and CSUSM professor Dr. Youwen Ouyang for providing inspiration to pursue it in college.

Ashley and Marissa are part of a group of student mentors from CSUSM who lead weekly club meetings at North County high schools and teach participants the fundamentals of computer programming while engaging them in activities that build their self-efficacy and identity as programmers and problem-solvers. Ashley spent the semester working with students at Mission Hills and Escondido High while Marissa worked with students at San Marcos High.

“It’s a fun after-school activity,” Marissa said. “And then some of them say, ‘I found out I like computer science and I’m really interested in pursuing it after high school.’ ”

The CodeQueens Club grew out of a National Science Foundation-funded project to help diversify the North County tech workforce. It is a collaboration among CSUSM’s Ouyang (Computer Science Department), Dr. Moses Ochanji (Department of Education) and Dr. Anna Woodcock (Psychology Department).

This is the final year of the three-year grant, which is titled “Inspiring Commitment for STEM Career Paths through Extended Women’s Hackathons.” But Ouyang said they anticipate receiving a one-year extension from NSF and are looking for ways to partner with local organizations to extend the program beyond the NSF funding.

“I’m always amazed by the support from the community,” Ouyang said. “We couldn’t do the showcase without the support of the professionals who come out to help.”

Ouyang has lined up more than a dozen professionals to help at Saturday’s event, including multiple members of CSUSM’s Instructional and Information Technology Services team.

The program has been a tremendous success, not only introducing girls to coding and computer science, but also helping them make connections at CSUSM and continuing efforts to build a more diverse computer science workforce for North County.

“Even the girls who aren’t necessarily looking to get into computer science, even if they’ve decided to pursue something else, it’s a really good experience for them to work in a team and learn to cooperate with other people,” Ashley said. “It’s not about learning all the specific details of computer science, it’s about being able to work together.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Honorees were nominated by faculty or staff and endorsed by their college’s dean. Here is a closer look at each award recipient:

Conner Whitten, B.A., Psychology

President’s Outstanding Graduate

Dean’s Award, College of Humanities, Arts, Behavioral and Social Sciences

Conner is a first-generation college student and American Indian whose academic interest lies within the field of neuroscience. In his time at CSUSM, he has held the role of research assistant four times, and he’s currently conducting an independent research study on the role of neuropeptides on the performance of maternal behavior in mice.

Two of Conner’s research projects – the Pill Take Back Program on opioid abuse and Ready Set Go! on fetal alcohol spectrum disorders – directly affected the American Indian community. He already has been accepted into the Ph.D. program for experimental psychology at the University of Tennessee.

Read more about Conner here.

Alisha Blush, B.S., Accounting

Dean’s Award, College of Business Administration

Alisha transferred from MiraCosta and Palomar colleges after a successful 17-year career in management and after overcoming some challenging life experiences, including two bouts with thyroid cancer.

She not only excels academically, but she also motivates other students to achieve their academic potential. She was appointed by faculty to roles as head tutor of the accounting lab, supplemental instructor for Introduction to Managerial Accounting and teaching assistant for the junior-level cost accounting class. She also is external vice president of the Accounting Society.

Alisha has been accepted to the Master of Professional Accountancy program at UC Irvine and plans to pursue a doctorate.

Diana Lopez, B.A., Human Development

Dean’s Award, College of Education, Health and Human Services

A first-generation college student struggling with her cultural identity, Diana was embarrassed to speak Spanish in front of her friends until her second year at CSUSM. Helped by the university’s and the department’s celebration of diversity, she built her fluency in English and demonstrated a drive and sense of leadership.

Last year, she served as the president of the student-led Human Development Club, and she has volunteered many hours to local community organizations helping culturally diverse youth and their parents, all while working to put herself through college.

Diana plans to continue her education and is applying to master’s programs in social work.

Jesus Perez, B.S. Physics,

Dean’s Award, College of Science and Mathematics

Though he has not yet received his bachelor’s degree, Jesus is already an accomplished physicist. He has been accepted into UCLA’s doctoral physics program and was awarded the Eugene V. Cota-Robles Fellowship, which will provide him with a graduate stipend of $100,000 over four years.

Jesus’ undergraduate research began in 2016 with a semester-long internship at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory, and he since has proven to be an outstanding member of the CSUSM physics research lab. And his involvement in the university chapter of the Society of Physics Students has led to increasing roles of leadership and service to the community.

Read more about Jesus here and here.

Carolyn Matthews, M.S., Biological Sciences

Dean’s Award, Graduate Studies

After Carolyn earned a bachelor’s in biological sciences, she promised herself that one day she would return to school for her graduate degree. She worked as a teacher and then a clinical lab scientist for many years, starting a family and supporting her husband while he served in the U.S. Navy. This spring, she will finally achieve the goal she made for herself.

Carolyn is currently working on a research project studying the roles played by the immune system in the skin during wound repair. Her findings are being compiled and written into a manuscript that will be submitted this summer, with Carolyn as the first author.

In pursuing her master’s degree, she has played the role of mentor for many young scientists, including training seven undergraduate students. She now plans to pursue her dream of obtaining a research position in biotechnology while continuing to teach at the community college level.

Alexa Diaz, B.A., Human Development and Spanish

Dean of Students Outstanding Leadership Award

Alexa is an outstanding scholar whose true passion is helping others. During her first year, she was initiated into the Alpha Lambda Delta honor society, and later elected president of the CSUSM chapter.

During her second year, she joined the Tukwut Leadership Circle, the campus’ leadership certificate program, and her service has been recognized by UNESCO for the last three years. Last year, she because the lead for the TLC Peer Leadership Team; in total, she has served over 3,000 hours in support of TLC students.

Alexa also has begun to explore the world of teaching at the college level. After receiving training covering student development theory and research on first-year student college success, First-Year Programs hired her as an instructional student assistant to serve as a GEL 101 peer educator.

Media Contact

Brian Hiro, Communications Specialist

bhiro@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7306

On that fateful day, his lifelong friend Alex Lazo committed suicide. Lunneberg’s personal and academic life as a student at Cal State San Marcos took an understandable dark turn.

But with the help of counseling and a strong support system of friends and family, he regained his composure, recording a GPA a full point higher in fall 2017 as compared to the previous spring.

Kyle will graduate this month with a bachelor’s in biological sciences and go straight to a prestigious graduate school program.

“His death has changed many of my perspectives,” Lunneberg said. “Mostly personal, but it framed the importance of community support, teamwork and kindness in my career. It was difficult relearning how to focus after losing Alex, but happiness is a choice and can be achieved by anyone who seeks it out.”

Lunneberg came to CSUSM as a computer science major, but something serendipitous occurred in his first semester. His GEL 101 professor introduced him to the topic of ecology and the importance of understanding the role of all organisms in our environment.

For an outdoor enthusiast who has camped his entire life, it was an easy decision to switch to biology with a concentration in ecology in that first semester and never look back.

“CSUSM gave me a chance other universities didn’t,” Lunneberg said. “I never felt motivated or challenged in middle and high school, and it showed in my academics. CSUSM’s focus on accepting local students gave me a second chance and has made a huge difference.”

Lunneberg was recently nominated for the Outstanding Graduate award for the College of Science and Mathematics by Environmental Studies faculty member Christina Simokat. As a student in her Introduction to Environmental Studies course as a freshman, he impressed her with his attention to detail and strong communication and writing skills.

“His individual work is of the highest quality, showing an ability to master complex concepts and apply them to real-life situations,” said Simokat, who added Lunneberg was her top-ranked student in that course. “In groups, Kyle is a natural facilitator, taking responsibility for organizational tasks and helping other group members to express themselves clearly. I always find Kyle pleasant, professional and positive with a helpful attitude toward his peers.”

While many college students wait until their senior year to gain valuable work experience, Lunneberg got involved with local ecological organizations early. He interned at Springs River Ecological Sciences LLC and worked as a parks/trails aide for the city of Carlsbad. He has also been working at Agua Hedionda Lagoon Foundation in Carlsbad for the past three years.

At AHLF, he heads the scientific monitoring committee, which works with industry leaders for enhanced monitoring of the lagoon.

“Kyle is a true ‘MacGyver’ of all things, and our community nature center would be of lesser value without his many talents,” said AHLF CEO Lisa Rodman, a CSUSM alumna. “I have no doubt of his bright future and successes in any field he chooses to pursue. He is an outstanding human as well. You can always count on Kyle to do the right thing, even when no one is looking. He inspires me daily.”

Lunneberg will continue his academic career as a student in a joint doctoral program in ecology hosted by San Diego State and UC Davis. He will study under Dr. Walter Oechel, who is the co-director of the Center for Climate and Sustainability Studies and the director of the Global Change Research Group at SDSU.

“I am grateful to have my next adventure planned and very excited to participate in a lab at the forefront of climate change,” Lunneberg said. “It’s a foundational goal of mine to leave this world better than when I started, and this is a major step toward that.”

Following his educational path, Lunneberg would like to eventually consult large-scale mitigation projects. Wherever his professional career takes him, he possesses a singular focus of making the planet better for future generations.

“Environmental issues are one of the most looming problems for our generation, and there are many different facets to address,” Lunneberg said. “The problem we face has accumulated over generations. We need to focus on multiple social, political and scientific dilemmas to properly deal with environmental issues.

“It’ll take a village; not just the politician, the activist or the scientist. That’s what I feel is most important for our generation to agree on.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Indeed, Rosa, one of nearly 3,800 Cal State San Marcos students graduating in May, has made the most of every opportunity that has come her way – from services provided by the nonprofit Girls Inc. in high school and the MARC U*STAR program at CSUSM to the laboratory research afforded by her professors.

This fall she will make the most of another opportunity: a University of Michigan doctoral program in biochemistry.

Rosa credits CSUSM with providing the guidance to realize her goals.

“I love Cal State San Marcos so much,” Rosa said. “I got so much one-one mentoring and I was able to have the opportunities I had because of the professors here. I can’t imagine having gone anywhere else for my undergraduate work.”

The daughter of Mexican immigrants of modest means who didn’t speak English at home, Rosa faced more than her share of challenges navigating the educational system in her early years.

“I think my parents would have been happy for me just to graduate high school,” she said.

Rosa’s path changed when she discovered Girls Inc. during her senior year at San Pasqual High School in Escondido. The San Diego nonprofit’s mission is to empower girls and young women from 8 to 18 and help themsee college as attainable and a career in science, technology, engineering and mathematics also well within their reach. Girls Inc. provided Rosa with a college-readiness program, which guided Rosa in applying to CSUSM, filing forms for financial aid and taking the necessary standardized tests.

“Before that happened, I knew I was going to go to college, but I didn’t know what I was going to do or what I wanted to do,” she said. “I was at one of their events and heard from a speaker who said you have to find a career in doing something you enjoy. So I thought about it, and I remembered when I was younger how excited I was about biology when I learned about stuff like photosynthesis and how I was also interested in chemistry. So I decided I would pursue biochemistry without really knowing what it was.”

It didn’t take long to learn. Rosa became a biochemistry star at CSUSM – literally – through the MARC U*STAR program, an acronym for Maximizing Access to Research Careers – Undergraduate Student Training Research. The program, funded by the National Institute of General Medical Services, is aimed at preparing undergraduate minority students majoring in the sciences to enter and succeed in doctoral studies. Only five new scholars are admitted in the honors research program annually. Students spend up to 15 hours each week during the academic year learning in a research laboratory and 40 hours per week or more in the summer. Students also take part in weekly seminars and workshops, participate in a summer research program outside of the region, and attend scientific meetings to present their findings.

Rosa’s research interests are focused on protein dynamics, including protein misfolding that can lead to diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. She has left an impression with all she comes in contact.

“She really represents the best of what Cal State San Marcos achieves, and achieves regularly, with our students,” said chemistry professor Kambiz Hamadani, who recruited Rosa to work in his research lab. “She didn’t speak great English in her household until she was a little older and she didn’t have a lot of the advantages a lot of other people have, but she is extremely bright, extremely motivated, and she is willing to engage with others to learn. And she makes it seem so simple.”

Indeed, Rosa pretty much takes everything in stride.

“You could pretty much do whatever you want in life as long as you’re willing to put in the work,” she said.

Rosa’s initial research experience was in the laboratory of her organic chemistry professor, Jackie Trischman, with a focus on discovering novel compounds with antibacterial properties against Mycobacterium marinum, the closest genetic relative to Mycobacterium tuberculosis – the causes of tuberculosis. Rosa had found her calling.

“I am extremely grateful to Dr. Trischman for inspiring me to pursue a Ph.D. in research,” she said.

Rosa will have three years of research experience when she begins her doctoral program, including a 10-week summer research program at Yale University last year, before she arrives at the University of Michigan.

“I’m really excited for her future,” Hamadani said. “I can’t wait to see what she’s going to do, and I’m really proud to have been a part of it.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

UPD raised more than $4,000 in its first Tip-A-Cop event at Urge Gastropub and, despite being one of the smallest police agencies in the county, finished second in donations for the annual Law Enforcement Torch Run.

The Torch Run began in 1981 in Kansas and has grown to include more than 125 runs, raising more than $500 million for the Special Olympics.

Stowell honored by alma mater

Laurie Stowell, a professor in the School of Education, was recently honored by Ohio State’s College of Education and Human Ecology with a career achievement award, given annually to OSU alumni who have proven records of career accomplishments and have made outstanding contributions to their professions. Stowell received her master’s and doctorate from OSU.

Stowell also heads the San Marcos Writing Project, which aims to boost the skills of K-12 writing teachers through professional development workshops, seminars and other resources.

Physics receives national recognition

CSUSM was recently ranked sixth in the nation by the American Physical Society for awarding the highest number of undergraduate physics degrees to underrepresented minorities.

The APS, which works to advance the knowledge of physics, analyzed all U.S. higher education institutions that grant physics degrees, ranking them by number of degrees granted.

Chancellor awards two grants to CSUSM

The university has been awarded two grants from the CSU Chancellor’s office – a faculty research grant and a community garden grant. The funding will be used to expand the Sustainable Food Project, a living lab started in 2012 by Greig Guthey, program coordinator for the environmental studies program, and to supply fresh produce for the Cougar Pantry.

FDM to receive Effective and Innovative Practices Award

Facilities Development and Management has been selected to receive APPA’s Effective and Innovative Practices Award. FDM will be honored at the APPA 2019 Annual Conference and Exhibition in Denver in July.

APPA “promotes leadership in educational facilities for professionals seeking to build their careers, transform their institutions, and elevate the value and recognition of facilities in education.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

An unusually rainy winter and spring season has led to the local phenomenon that has resulted in nearly every hillside being painted with swaths of vibrant and delicate wildflowers. A special combination of environmental conditions coincided to produce this year’s mass showing.

“It’s not just the amount of rain, but how even and spaced out we received it,” said George Vourlitis, a biology professor and ecology researcher at Cal State San Marcos. “The last super bloom produced many seeds that form a seed bank that produces small blooms during the dry years and can produce a super bloom when the climatological conditions are right.”

This year, conditions were right. The colorful hills of California poppies could be seen from space, and droves of families and Instagram influencers alike have flocked to the desert and to local hot spots like Lake Elsinore to see and photograph the flowers.

Vourlitis is most excited by the impact that an event like the super bloom has on his students. He sees it as an opportunity to take what they’re learning in the classroom and what they’re seeing on social media and tie it into something familiar to them.

“Most people look around and say, ‘Geez, you know, the hillsides are just dead shrubs and weeds and it’s not very pretty,' " he said. “But it’s an extremely diverse environment, and the super bloom keys people into that.”

Media Contact

Andrew Reed, Digital Communications Specialist
areed@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7315

Apolinar’s co-written research paper, “Catalytic, Enantioselective α-Alkylation of Azlactones with Non-Conjugated Alkenes via Directed Nucleopalladation,” resulted from his work in the Engle Lab in summer 2018 at Scripps Research through its Summer Undergraduate Research Fellows (SURF) initiative. The paper details a process utilizing palladium and chiral phosphoric acids to manipulate a simple compound into something far more complex in just one step. The discovery could potentially lead to creating new pharmaceuticals.

Angewandte Chemie is a peer-reviewed journal of the German Chemical Society, and it has been published under different names since the late 19^th century. Catalytic, Enantioselective α-Alkylation of Azlactones with Non-Conjugated Alkenes via Directed Nucleopalladation appeared in the journal’s February 2019 international edition.

“This is one of the higher-echelon peer-reviewed journals for organic chemistry published today,” said CSUSM chemistry professor Robert Iafe. “Even for a graduate student, this would be an amazing feat. Only the most highly driven undergraduate could accomplish something like this.”

Apolinar said the experience has been beyond inspirational.

“I never would have imagined that I could ever have had a research paper published in a journal such as this,” Apolinar said. “It’s amazing to realize that I have contributed to the chemistry literature. It’s something that can never be taken away, and it motivates me to want to publish more original work that can lead to other discoveries.”

He should have plenty of opportunity. Graduating summa cum laude this spring with a degree in biochemistry, Apolinar, 21, already has been accepted to several doctoral programs. At the moment, he is deciding between Scripps Research, the California Institute of Technology and the University of Michigan-Ann Arbor. His ultimate goal is to become a process chemist in the pharmaceutical industry breaking new ground on developing life-saving drugs.

But first, Apolinar will spend 10 weeks this summer interning with Janssen Research & Development’s Discovery Process Chemistry Group in La Jolla.

Apolinar has been building a legacy at CSUSM since he arrived after graduating from San Marcos High School. He was selected as a California State University Program for Education and Research in Biotechnology (CSUPERB) Presidents’ Commission Scholar in 2017, an effort aimed at increasing the number of undergraduate students who can access a full-time research experience, and it supports up to 11 CSU undergraduates each summer. He worked as an undergraduate research assistant in Iafe’s laboratory his junior year. He is a STEM Peer Educator at the CSUSM STEM Student Success Center. And he was chosen to take part in the first cohort of the TRIO McNair Scholar program, which is dedicated to boosting the number of low-income and first-generation college students who earn graduate degrees.

He will be presenting research he has been conducting in Iafe's lab at the American Chemical Society’s 257th Spring National Meeting & Exposition from March 31 through April 4 in Orlando.

When he’s not in school or engaging in research, Apolinar spends much of his time as a volunteer operating the Pier Giorgio Food Pantry at St. Mark’s Roman Catholic Church in San Marcos.

“One of the really inspiring things about Omar is despite his accomplishments, he remains a very humble person,” Iafe said.

Apolinar said he has been drawn to the sciences since he was a child. Determined at one time to work in medicine, his goals began changing during his sophomore year in high school.

“I was taking a general chemistry class and we had a substitute come in for our regular teacher, who went out on maternity leave,” Apolinar said. “He decided one day he was going to teach organic chemistry, and I was captivated by it. I was captivated by the complexity of the molecules and how it all seemed like a puzzle but was really art. I decided then that this was something I was going to pursue.”

He made up his mind after taking Iafe's organic chemistry class.

“It completely changed my career path,” Apolinar said. “Everything from high school made sense; organic chemistry truly is art.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

As part of that vow, Nadia attended meetings for the Office for Training, Research and Education in the Sciences (OTRES), which helps students’ career development in biomedical sciences and related disciplines.

Juniors and seniors at the OTRES meetings were encouraged to seek work in a campus laboratory. Nadia was just a freshman at the time, but figured she might as well give it a shot, too. She had no idea how unique it was for a first-year undergraduate to seek a lab position.

“I was just jumping into any opportunity I could find,” Nadia said.

It didn’t take her long to secure a position in the lab of biology professor Julie Jameson.

“She immediately impressed me with her ambition,” Jameson said. “I took a risk on this young, aspiring scientist, and it was one of the best decisions I have made.

“Nadia is a bright, ambitious young woman who has a wonderful knack for science and will go on to do great things in her future career.”

Nadia will be the first in her family to earn a degree when she graduates in May with a bachelor’s in biotechnology. While her family is eager to celebrate the accomplishment, Nadia simply sees it as another step on her path to earning a Ph.D. and pursuing a career in cancer immunotherapy.

As a teenager growing up in San Francisco, Nadia knew she wanted to pursue a science education. But she had no idea where to start. A high school chemistry teacher encouraged her to research biotechnology programs, which is how she discovered CSUSM.

While a 500-mile in-state move might not seem like a big deal, it proved challenging for someone from a tight-knit family with limited financial means. Nadia still remembers her first trip to San Marcos and seeing the intersection at Twin Oaks Valley Road and Barham Drive for the first time.

“San Francisco is a city where everything’s cramped, so when I saw the block on Barham, I had never seen an intersection so wide,” she said.

Despite the challenges of being away from home, Nadia wasted little time taking full advantage of the opportunities at CSUSM.

She joined the Louis Stokes Alliance for Minority Participation Program, which works to increase the number of students from underrepresented groups graduating from a STEM discipline. She is also part of the first cohort of TRIO McNair Scholars Program, which assists students with research opportunities and dedicated mentoring, with a goal of helping them succeed in graduate school.

In Jameson’s lab, one of Nadia’s early projects was determining whether T cell populations that have become reduced in the intestinal epithelium – the tissue that lines internal surfaces – of obese and diabetic mice can be restored with diet-induced weight loss. Nadia was accepted into CSUSM’s Summer Scholars Program and spent the summer working on the project. At the end of the program, she presented her work on campus and at multiple conferences, including the annual meeting of the CSU Program for Education and Research in Biotechnology, or CSUPERB.

“These experiences have strengthened Nadia’s ability to communicate within the field,” Jameson said. “During these presentations, fellow scientists are often surprised to find that Nadia is an undergraduate and not a graduate student.”

Nadia will continue her education in the fall when she begins a doctoral program. She is leaning toward attending UC Merced, about a two-hour drive from her family. While her goal is to work on cancer immunotherapies, she also wants to help students with backgrounds similar to her own pursue a STEM education. She is already a role model for her younger brother and sister, and she hopes to serve a similar role for others.

“For my Ph.D., I want to have an undergrad, someone that I can mentor because that’s how I got where I am now, and I want to give other students opportunities to conduct undergraduate research,” she said. “And when I work in industry, I want to make a program especially for high school students because that’s where I really started to see what I wanted to do in college. I want to make a program that helps college students and high school students figure out if STEM is right for them.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Fan is a driving force in developing curriculum for a program that currently has enrolled more than 40 students – with an additional 50 students set to enroll in fall of 2019. He has actively participated in a workshop series titled Empowering Engineers for Success where a team of faculty and mentors meet with students regularly to teach them to learn how to learn. He’s spearheading a software engineering club on campus. He has his sights set on starting a local Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) student branch, in which students can be exposed to cutting-edge technologies and professional networking opportunities.

“Our goal is to build a strong software engineering program in which our graduates will be well recognized by industry and academia,” Fan said.

CSUSM launched its engineering program thanks to a $6 million, Hispanic Serving Institutions STEM grant from the U.S. Department of Education, a $1.5 million donation from Carlsbad-based communications company Viasat and its employees, and a $100,000 gift from San Marcos-based Hunter Industries.

Fan is one of the program’s two founding faculty members, the other being Dr. Yongjie Zheng, and the program has been drawing growing interest from students at other universities and area community colleges. Its first graduates will earn their diplomas in the spring of 2021, at which time CSUSM will seek accreditation from the Accreditation Board for Engineering and Technology (ABET).

“It is very important to have our engineering programs ABET accredited, software engineering first, followed by electrical engineering,” Fan said. “It can not only help us to hold our education standards high, it will also help our students to establish their eligibility for many federal student loans, grants and/or scholarships.”

Born and raised in Nanyang, China, Fan earned his bachelor’s degree in computer science at Zhengzhou University when personal computers were coming of age. Apple shipped its first handheld computer, the Newton. Intel’s Pentium microprocessor hit the marketplace. But at Zhengzhou, resources were rather limited; the university had only a few computers – almost all of them IBMs – and student access was rationed.

That didn’t thwart Fan.

“I love this discipline,” he said. “It encourages you to think about issues such as computability, scalability, and reusability. It’s simply fascinating.”

His fascination led him to earn a master’s degree in computer science in 1996 and a doctorate in software engineering three years later. With research interests that include employing artificial intelligence to build cognitively-inspired software, he has worked on several projects involving the Army Research Laboratory in developing advanced decision-making systems and has published numerous papers in prestigious journals and conferences. He played key roles in developing teamwork-ready agent architectures, such as CAST, R-CAST and SMMall, and he has served on the editorial board of the Journal of Applied Intelligence, as an associate editor for Intelligent Information Management, and on the technical program committee for many international conferences.

Fan says this is an exciting time for the software engineering industry.

“With the advances of cloud computing and the breakthroughs of artificial intelligence, the demand for high-quality software is ubiquitous and the demand for software engineers can never be overestimated,” he said.

At Pennsylvania State University, Fan helped launch an online software engineering bachelor’s degree and was the lead faculty in the program. Courses he’s teaching at CSUSM include software engineering principles, software architectures and capstone project designs.

“I came here because I wanted to challenge myself in creating something monumental that will have a significant impact in our region and on our industry,” Fan said.

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Sixteen students from sixth through eighth grades line up outside a classroom door 15 minutes before the lesson is to begin at the middle school in Escondido. The regular school day is over, so they don’t have to be here. They want to be here. 

They want to see, and learn from, Emmanuel. 

Soon, Emmanuel Morales, a senior chemistry major at Cal State San Marcos, arrives along with a fellow STEM ambassador from the university’s Center for Research and Engagement in STEM Education (CRESE). Wearing a white CSUSM T-shirt with the words “Learn STEM Lead STEM,” he starts unpacking his supplies and informing the students about that week’s assignment: They will create a robotic arm out of ordinary household supplies like cardboard, plastic straws, popsicle sticks and string.  

“This is a semi-difficult project,” Emmanuel tells the middle-schoolers. “The idea is to simulate the function of tendons in the hand and wrist.” 

As he circulates around the room over the next hour, helping groups of two and three with their construction at separate tables, it’s clear that Emmanuel has earned the students’ respect with his soft-spoken, patient demeanor. 

“The kids are very attached to him,” said Sophia Gonzalez, an English teacher at Del Dios who supervises the weekly STEM sessions. “He doesn’t say a whole lot, but he’s very open with them and doesn’t really dictate; he just offers his expertise or alternate solutions. Today, they were all looking forward to him. They enjoy coming here, and I think it’s because of how he interacts with them.” 

Emmanuel is in his third year as a STEM ambassador, one of the senior members of a group of about 20 CSUSM undergraduate science students who fan out weekly to 12 middle schools across the San Marcos, Escondido and Vista school districts. They do their work through a program called Mobile Making – funded by a five-year grant from the National Science Foundation, as well as a donation from Carlsbad-based Nordson – the purpose of which is to bring design-based, STEM-related activities to underprivileged schools that wouldn’t otherwise have exposure to such disciplines. 

Twice a week, Emmanuel stops by the CRESE center in the QUAD building – it’s nicknamed the STEMbassy – to load up on the materials that he’ll need for that day’s project. Besides the robotic arm, among the activities that STEM ambassadors (who also attend Saturday training sessions once every few weeks) assist students with are building basic robots with toothbrushes and cell-phone motors, creating solar-powered vehicles from recycled materials, and powering motors and buzzers with conductive Play-Doh. 

It’s all part of a nationwide trend toward the lost art of making things. Makerspaces are popping up in schools around the country – CSUSM is considering installing one – and Mobile Making is just a way to take the same concept on the road. 

“Making in general is a big movement right now,” said April Nelson, the program director for CRESE. “The mobile part is unique to us. We are definitely one of the schools leading the charge on this, and we’d like to be more of an example.” 

The Emmanuel of the age of the students he’s mentoring now would scarcely recognize the Emmanuel of today. Back then, not only was he not doing STEM activities at school, but he didn’t even know what STEM was.

He was raised in a part of Vista where, he says, “not many people think about college. Most people just want to get a job and start making money.”

Emmanuel was one of those people. He lacked confidence in his intelligence and academic potential. He switched from Rancho Buena Vista to Vista High after his sophomore year, and didn’t have many friends at the new school. And on the home front, his dad temporarily moved out of the house during his high school years, leaving him without a father figure during that crucial, angst-ridden stage of development.

That was when the man Emmanuel still refers to simply as Mr. Robinson entered the picture. Mark Robinson is a Vista High science teacher who’s in his 25th and final year at the school – he plans to retire this spring to focus on his prosperous side venture of winemaking.

Emmanuel took Robinson’s chemistry class as a junior, and something immediately clicked. He discovered that, unlike with other subjects, chemistry came easily to him. More importantly, he found in Robinson an adult figure who believed in him, who thought he was smart, who thought he was special.

“He was a very big influence for me,” Emmanuel said. “He always told me, ‘You’re a fantastic student to have around here, you’re picking up this chemistry very quickly.’ It felt good hearing that from him.”

Robinson, like Emmanuel a first-generation college student whose father wasn’t present in his life, saw in Emmanuel a kindred spirit. They frequently would sit and talk after class and after school about topics far beyond just chemistry.

“He was an incredibly fascinating human being,” Robinson said. “He was serious about the subject matters, but he was way more interesting after class. He had so many ideas, a gazillion little hypotheses in his head. We would talk about anything and everything – philosophical things, science things, earth things, botany, ethnobotany, you name it. If you ask me to pick a word to describe him, it would be curious. He has a curious mind. He’s blessed.”

Emmanuel liked Robinson so much that he proceeded to take his anatomy class as a senior. He went from getting Bs and Cs in most classes to taking AP courses. At Robinson’s urging, he began thinking about college for the first time.

“When I graduated, he told me he was very proud of me,” Emmanuel said. “He would jokingly say, ‘If I could adopt you, I would.’ ”

After he arrived at CSUSM, Emmanuel started looking for opportunities to teach, to take Robinson’s influential tutelage and pay it forward. When he learned about the STEM ambassador program, he knew he had found the perfect avenue.

“The best part is seeing the students’ smiles and knowing that I taught them something,” Emmanuel said, “that they’ll go home and think about trying to be a STEM student.”

Emmanuel used to aspire to be a high school science teacher like Robinson, but Robinson himself convinced him to aim higher. Emmanuel now says he wants to get a job at a company like Viasat or Genentech and try to earn a master’s degree while working.

Asked if he thinks of himself as a Mr. Robinson for the middle-schoolers, Emmanuel smiles.

“That’s something I can take pride in,” he said. “He was very highly looked upon at our school, and I want to be looked at that way as well. The students look up to me; my coworkers look up to me.

“It’s great to think that all this happened because he told me I should continue going to school and get an education.”

Here’s to you, Mr. Robinson.

Lauren had only recently started taking physics courses and was touring some of the labs when her professor, Stephen Tsui, had to step away. He told Lauren to look around while he attended to another matter. Lauren knocked on the first door she saw, which happened to be Dominguez’s lab. She poked her head in and asked what he did.

Dominguez’s research interests include astrophysics, also one of Lauren’s passions, so he invited her in and provided an impromptu overview of his work.

“I was so happy,” Lauren said. “I asked him if I could start working in his lab. I was probably only a month into my first physics class.”

Dominguez recommended that she come back after completing more of the physics basics. She kept his contact information and returned after completing her second physics course.

Lauren’s persistence paid off. She not only earned a place working in Dominguez’s lab, but had the opportunity to present her research earlier this month in Seattle at the American Astronomical Society’s annual meeting.

“Lauren joined the lab in late spring of 2018 and as a junior has already had an impact on the work we do,” Dominguez said. “She is developing protocols for experiments aimed at understanding the behavior of water in astrophysical environments. This is important work, and she is doing what a first-year graduate student at an R1 institution would be doing.

“It’s a pleasure to work with her, and I’m lucky to have her as part of my research group here at CSUSM.”

It’s a far different path than the one Lauren planned when she enrolled at CSUSM.

Lauren wanted to study something she considered practical, so she chose accounting, the same major her mother pursued. But from the moment she started taking accounting classes, she realized it was a poor fit. She began reading some of the philosophy books that her mother had at home and became interested in philosophical theories about the universe. It wasn’t long before she changed her major to applied physics.

Lauren completed Physics 201 in the months following her initial meeting with Dominguez and returned to his lab after taking Physics 202. Dominguez suggested that she attend his weekly student lab meetings and read up on topics such as geochemistry, isotopes and vacuum systems.

“It was a little intimidating at first,” she said. “Everyone in the lab tries to be really supportive, but they also have a lot of work to do. I just had the mindset of ‘I can do it. I can figure it out.’ ”

When students used unfamiliar terms during the meetings, Lauren would write them down and look them up later. Her efforts led to her being selected for the College of Science and Mathematics’ Summer Scholars Program, a 10-week program in which students work closely with a faculty mentor to gain hands-on experience. In Lauren’s case, that meant an opportunity to further her research in Dominguez’s lab. When the Summer Scholars Program ended, Dominguez offered Lauren a paid position in the lab, which she happily accepted.

Last fall, Dominguez suggested that they present their research at the 233^rd meeting of the American Astronomical Society. Lauren jumped at the opportunity. She was one of just a handful of undergraduate students in attendance.

“Everyone was really inclusive,” said Lauren, who will graduate in May 2020 and plans to pursue her Ph.D. in physics. “It was a really supportive environment. Being able to represent Cal State San Marcos at the conference gave me a lot of collaboration opportunities.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Every Wednesday, for about five months starting last January, Jeffrey Foertsch would arise at 4 a.m. and take a bus from his Oceanside condominium to the nearest Sprinter station, where he would then catch a train to Cal State San Marcos. He would attend a couple of classes toward his major in computer science and information systems. 

Then, around lunch time, his day would really begin. 

Foertsch would leave campus and walk over to Discovery Lake, the starting point of a long, steep climb up to Double Peak. That might be enough of a workout for most people. But Foertsch would hike on and around the ridgeline trails for the rest of the afternoon and into the evening, covering at least 16 miles and as many as 26. 

“I was always by myself, wireless headphones in, just trucking,” said Foertsch, who tended to listen to podcasts or electronic music. “That was prime hiking for me. I went through a couple good pairs of shoes in that period.” 

Foertsch knew about hard workouts from his days in the Marines, but there was a method to this particular madness. Around this time last year, he signed up for the Trailblaze Challenge, a one-day, 28-mile hike through the Big Bear Lake portion of the Pacific Crest Trail to raise money for the San Diego chapter of the Make-A-Wish Foundation. 

In order to participate, Foertsch had to achieve a personal fundraising goal – his was $2,500 – that would contribute to a collective fundraising goal of $480,000 (ultimately, the 167 hikers in the challenge raised a total of $481,668). While he beat the bushes for donations, of course, he also had to hit the trails.  

But not only was he taking 17 credits during his first semester after transferring from Palomar College, Foertsch, 32, also was limited by the work demands of his wife, Samantha, a weekend site supervisor for Imaging Healthcare Specialists, and by his duties as a father to Eliza, then 5.  

Thus the killer Wednesdays.  

“It was one brutal hike a week, then a little bit of running,” he said. “That’s all I had time for.” 

The Trailblaze Challenge is split into two sessions, and Foertsch registered for the second one, which took place on June 2. He and his family drove north to Big Bear Lake the previous day, with the hikers gathering for a carbo-loading pasta dinner on the night before. When he awoke well before dawn for the event, the door of his hotel room was decorated with streamers and and pictures drawn by the Make-A-Wish kids – a message of thanks for his fundraising efforts. 

It served as a reminder to Foertsch about why he was doing it. 

“The fact that you’re helping kids is a big motivator,” he said. “If my daughter had cancer, I would want her to have a wish.” 

Feeling spry, Foertsch ran the first 12 miles of the challenge before slowing down to a nice, steady pace. With about six miles left, however, the muscles in his legs began locking up, and he was forced essentially to limp his way to the finish, where he was greeted by his wife and daughter. He fell just short of his target of eight hours. 

“It was brutal. I was in agony,” Foertsch said. “I was hobbling down the mountain, and Eliza was like, ‘Yay, Daddy, you did it!’ Then some people helped carry me over to a place to sit down and hand me a pizza.” 

Foertsch developed his interest in hiking in, of all places, Antarctica. After serving for 4 1/2 years in the Marines, mostly at Camp Pendleton, as an air traffic control radar technician, he exited in 2014, in part because of a shoulder injury. A short time later, he accepted a seven-month contract through the Navy to do some work at McMurdo Station, a research center on the tip of Ross Island in Antarctica.  

Frustrated by gaining about 20 pounds after he left the military and feeling cooped up in the research station, he started climbing some of the nearby mountains, including Mount Erebus, the southernmost active volcano on the planet. When he returned to California, he signed up for a hiking club on Facebook, through which he learned about the Trailblaze Challenge. 

Foertsch hasn’t decided whether he will do the challenge again this year. Besides his studies – he's on track to graduate in December 2019 – he's also an intern working in analytics at the Veterans Center as part of the Veterans to Energy Careers (VTEC) program, which seeks to facilitate the transition of vets like Foertsch into STEM fields.  

Whether he trailblazes or not this summer, though, Foertsch is proud of what he accomplished. 

“When I was in the military, I never deployed, and I always felt kind of useless after I got hurt,” he said. “So I wanted to prove something to myself. I’ve always had these pie-in-the-sky dreams, and a lot of taking on the challenge was about proving to myself that I could do it.”  

Media Contact

Brian Hiro, Communications Specialist

bhiro@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7306

But before putting the finishing touches on your list of New Year’s resolutions, let’s take a look back at some of the most-talked-about stories of 2018.

The University received national recognition, celebrated numerous achievements and broke records, including its highest number of diplomas awarded in May.

Viasat Invests $1.5M in Support of Engineering Program

Feb. 8, 2018

Cal State San Marcos’ burgeoning engineering program took another major step forward in February. President Karen Haynes announced during her annual Report to the Community address that global communications company Viasat, together with several employees, has invested $1.5 million to become the founding partner of the CSUSM engineering program.

Overcoming Adversity to Earn Degree

Feb. 26, 2018

Riley Bender’s grades were so dismal as a teenager that she ended up at a continuation school as a high school junior. But ask Riley about the 180-degree turn her life took at CSUSM, and she is hesitant to talk about her many successes. “I still feel this thing where I can’t talk about how well I’m doing above a whisper because it feels like it will just vanish into thin air,” Riley said.

Finding Purpose From Difficult Times

March 27, 2018

Erika Martinez had been through these kinds of nights before. Her father high or drunk, throwing whatever he could get his hands on, waking up the neighbors in the middle of the night with his yelling. But something changed for Erika on this particular August night in 2016.

The Quiet Path to Biochem Degree

May 2, 2018

Jenny Veyna is proud of her many achievements. A biochemistry major, Veyna became a first-generation college graduate in May. But when Jenny visits the families of her parents in their native Mexico, she doesn’t exactly shout out what she has done from the rooftops. She knows that an American student who happens to know her way around a chemistry lab might be of keen interest to Mexican drug cartels.

From Center Stage to the Commencement Stage

May 10, 2018

Dwaine Collier wasn’t supposed to be at commencement in May. Not after being born to a mother addicted to drugs. Not after bouncing between family members and foster families for most of his childhood. Not after attending 17 different schools before he reached high school. But, thanks in large part to ACE Scholars Services, Dwaine was at graduation, the proud recipient of a degree in visual performing arts.

Life with No Destinations

Aug. 1, 2018

Like many great stories, it began over cocktails. Somewhere between a Scotch Egg and an Old Fashioned, alumna Danika Garlotta’s husband, Chris, turned to her and said, “Let’s take a sabbatical.” It was unexpected, unthinkable and completely exhilarating. With no itinerary and no end game, she began sharing their adventures in their travel blog aptly named “No Destinations.”

Taking a Bite Out of Hunger

Aug. 23, 2018

Even though a significant number of CSUSM students are dealing with issues of food insecurity, a survey showed that barely half of students had heard about the new Cougar Pantry and its stockpile of free food for the hungry, and less than a quarter of students knew where the pantry is located. Enter a team of business majors who tackled a goal to raise awareness of the campus resource.

CSUSM President Karen Haynes Announces Retirement

Sept. 25, 2018

Dr. Karen Haynes announced that she will retire as president of CSUSM at the end of June 2019. Haynes arrived at CSUSM in February 2004. At the time, the university was just 14 years old with a student population of about 7,000 and an alumni base of 13,000. Under her leadership, the campus has flourished to a student body of 17,000, with 45,000 alumni.

Bringing Public Health Information to the Homeless

Sept. 28, 2018

For Sharon Hamill, it’s all about WGYLM? The letters stand for “What Gives Your Life Meaning?” which dovetails with Hamill’s role as the faculty director of the CSU Institute for Palliative Care at Cal State San Marcos. Hamill is a major advocate of initiating tough but vital conversations on advance health care directives.

A Labor of Love for Business Dean

Oct. 16, 2018

At the peak of Palomar Mountain, more than 5,000 feet above sea level, sits the house that Jim Hamerly built. Built, in this case, didn’t mean hiring a contractor and writing checks. Hamerly built the house. The property includes thousands of cedar trees. And, thanks to Hamerly, it includes about 50 sequoias. Much like the house, the sequoias are a labor of love.

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Zheng is one of the program’s first two faculty members, and he has been working on the curriculum and outreach since this past summer. The other inaugural faculty member, Dr. Simon Fan, arrives in January.

“There are an increasing number of universities in the country that have an independent software engineering program, and this is a great opportunity to have an impact on building something new,” Zheng said. “We held outreach workshops, and current students will enroll in upper-division software engineering courses next year. We’re also generating interest from students looking at transferring here from the community colleges.”

CSUSM launched its Bachelor of Science degree program in software engineering thanks to a $6 million Hispanic-Serving Institutions STEM grant from the U.S. Department of Education, a $1.5 million donation from Carlsbad-based communications company Viasat and its employees, and a $100,000 gift from San Marcos-based Hunter Industries. The donation is funding the renovation of laboratories and classrooms, purchasing new engineering equipment and instrumentation, and supporting faculty and student work. Construction of a new CSUSM Viasat Engineering Pavilion is now underway.

“Software engineering is a rapidly developing field in which many new software methods and tools are being created,” Zheng said. “It is essential to keep up with the latest research and be able to quickly adapt the latest research into your curriculum. That certainly presents a challenge, but it also provides opportunity. We are excited about the possibilities.”

Zheng’s research interests include software engineering, software architecture, software product lines, and self-adaptive software systems. One of his recent papers (52 pages) titled “Maintaining Architecture-Implementation Conformance to Support Architecture Centrality: From Single System to Product Line Development” was published by the "ACM Transactions on Software Engineering and Methodology," a flagship software engineering journal. Zheng has published in several journals, and he has presented at a dozen conference proceedings and workshops across the globe.

He earned his Ph.D. from the School of Information and Computer Sciences at the University of California, Irvine in 2012; his master’s degree in computer science from Hong Kong Polytechnic University in 2005; and his bachelor’s degree in computer science from Tsinghua University in 2000. It was while he was at the University of California, Irvine that Zheng found his passion.

“I started working on the software engineering research when I was a Ph.D. student at the University of California, Irvine,” Zheng said. “I joined a world-class research group – where the REST architecture style was born – led by my Ph.D. adviser, Professor Richard N. Taylor. I had opportunities to work on some exciting research projects on software architecture. I realized my passion lies in software engineering.”

Zheng launched his career in 2001 as a software engineer at the IBM China Software Development Lab in Shanghai, China.

“I wanted to have industry experience before I pursued my education at graduate school,” he said.

While pursuing his graduate studies, Zheng worked as a research assistant at the University of California, Irvine’s Department of Informatics in 2009, where he also served as a lecturer. After earning his Ph.D., he served as an assistant professor at the University of Missouri-Kansas City for several years.

Zheng noted he is one of several people who are working on the software engineering program. CSUSM Drs. Ricardo Fierro, Youwen Ouyang, Fan, Stephen Tsui and Anna Woodcock, along with CSUSM’s Jeffrey Morales and Cal Poly San Luis Obispo’s Dr. David Janzen, are among the many others.

“Just like the field of software engineering itself, this has been a team effort,” Zheng said. “Collaboration is vital.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

CSUSM Giving Day is held in conjunction with the international effort known as Giving Tuesday. Last year, CSUSM’s 24-hour campaign broke records and received 684 gifts that totaled more than $250,000, thanks in part to a dollar-for-dollar match from Jack Raymond, chair of the CSUSM Foundation Board. On Nov. 27, Raymond will once again match all donations to Cal State San Marcos, up to $1,000 per gift. He hopes his match will inspire others to give from the heart.

“It’s exciting to see our campus and community rally around the University causes that are important to them in a fun and yet competitive way,” he said. “I enjoy watching the leaderboards each year – and this year, I’m looking forward to being on campus for Giving Day and seeing the action live.”

With more than 100 programs and initiatives to support at CSUSM, the University’s Giving Day focuses on the heart and draws inspiration from heart idioms with the overarching theme of “Give with the Heart of a Cougar.” The campaign goes beyond financial goals and strives to grow participation, which is the paramount evaluation of success for Giving Day.

Challenge Grants Raise the Stakes
This year, 13 donor-funded challenges will help incentivize giving. With an additional $10,000 on the line, each gift could result in a bonus donation up to $2,000. The challenge grants are generously funded by Stone Brewing Co. co-founder Steve and Laura Wagner and Alumni Association President Nathaniel Keifer-Wheals '09.

Many of the challenges are playfully named – like the Early Bird Challenge, which will give an additional $2,000 to the fund with the largest number of participating donors before 6 a.m. The Happy Hour Challenge encourages alumni giving between 4-6 p.m., awarding a bonus $500 for one lucky  fund that receives an alumni gift during those two hours. Social media challenges, including use of the hashtag #HeartofaCougar, or direct messaging a selfie video declaring “I gave because ...” offer  bonus cash prizes for the programs and initiatives across CSUSM that are participating in Giving Day.

“CSUSM Giving Day is a unique opportunity for a new generation of Cougars to support what they love about their University,” said Sean Briner, who oversees annual giving. “When the Cal State San Marcos community comes together to give, the collective impact is enormous.”

Visit csusm.edu/givingday for more information and to give.

Media Contact

Christine Vaughan, Creative Communications Officer
cvaughan@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-4409

As a high school student at El Camino in Oceanside, Rincon’s time and thoughts focused on soccer. School was something to do between practices and games. Certainly, spending time in a science lab was one of the last things he wanted to do.

And then something changed. After graduation, he took some classes at MiraCosta College and got introduced to the wonders of chemistry. A couple of professors became mentors, he joined the Bridges to the Future program there, and he decided to continue his education at Cal State San Marcos beginning this fall.

His path continues to take him places he could never have envisioned.

Rincon was recently honored by the nonprofit Minority Access with an impressive third-place finish in a student research competition. He was selected from CSUSM’s Summer Scholars Program, which helps undergraduate students develop their research skills while working closely with a faculty mentor.

CSUSM was also honored for the third consecutive year as an institution committed to diversity by Minority Access, which serves to improve the higher educational, professional and managerial utilization of underrepresented populations.

Rincon worked closely on his research with Julie Jameson, a CSUSM associate professor of biology.

“It was my first project with her,” Rincon said. “This program gave me a foot in the door to actually do the research myself, to be able to do my own project.”

Their research centered around the function of T cells, particularly those that live on the epidermis, or top layer of skin. When introducing a certain chemical messenger called IL-18 into an invitro culture of T cells, they discovered that they produce a higher level of defense mechanisms against pathogens when one has an infection.

“Anthony came to my lab originally as a Bridges student from MiraCosta, and he immediately impressed me with his enthusiasm for learning about research,” Jameson said. “He is very motivated to get his Ph.D., and I have no doubt that he will be successful. He has been working with another student, Isaac Gonzalez, on his current project and together they discuss their results, analyze data and interpret their findings. These are all high-level skills for such a young researcher.”

Jameson’s lab at CSUSM focuses on researching how obesity and type 2 diabetes block or severely hinder T cells’ normal ability to heal wounds.

“If diabetes patients have chronic non-healing wounds they are at a higher risk to get infected and can consequently have a limb amputated,” said Rincon, who is a first-generation college student. “That’s exactly what my life goal is – I want to cure a disease one day.”

Rincon was awarded a $1,000 travel stipend, which he used to travel to Maryland to present his research as part of the Office of Inclusive Excellence. While there, he got to network with a senior adviser from NASA and earned the third-place award in public health.

It has been quite a journey for someone who just a few years ago thought about soccer most of his days.

“I’m still on two soccer teams because I love it so much,” said Rincon, a biology major who wants to pursue his Ph.D. and eventually teach the next generation of STEM students. “Not only do I want to do the best for myself, I also want to impact the community around Cal State San Marcos. I’ve already started by working with young Latino men who are STEM majors but have no idea what they want to do. I want to get them interested and ask questions about a field they just don’t know about.”

That idea of paying it forward is undoubtedly in Rincon’s future. It took the right mentors at the right time to inspire him, and he plans on giving back in a similar fashion.

“Anthony is also dedicated to his family,” Jameson said. “They are his foundation and support his college aspirations. He is a role model to his siblings and even acts as a role model to young scientists on our campus who are biology majors. These are some of the reasons that Anthony has been chosen as a RISE scholar in OTRES. Anthony often tells me that his mentor at MiraCosta changed his life path, and now he will be dedicated to do the same for other young students.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

The recipients are:

• David Falconer, who served in the Marines as a computer network administrator. He is pursuing a bachelor’s in computer science and engineering.
• Alexandria Harding, who served in the Navy as an electronics technician. She is pursuing a bachelor’s in biology and aspires to have a career in the medical field.
• Michael Jones, who served in the Navy as a sonar technician. He is pursuing a bachelor’s in computer science.
• Daniel Vandiver, who served in the Marines as an aviation mechanic. He is pursuing a bachelor’s in computer science and aspires to work as a software engineer for flight operations.

Each student will receive $2,500 to help them earn degrees in STEM fields.

“CSUSM is extremely proud of these distinguished veterans for receiving the SDMAC Military Veteran Student of the Year Academic Scholarships,” said Patricia Reily, director of Veterans Services at CSUSM. “We look forward to seeing them graduate and pursue meaningful careers in the STEM fields.”

CSUSM in national rankings

• CSUSM has been ranked among the top universities in the nation for creating opportunities for students to improve their lives and the lives of their families. CSUSM was listed 52^nd out of nearly 1,400 universities in the Social Mobility Index (SMI) developed by PayScale and CollegeNET. The SMI measures the extent to which a college or university educates more economically disadvantaged students at lower tuition.

• CSUSM was ranked 45^th among Western colleges in Washington Monthly’s “Best Bang for the Buck” listing and 90^th for “Master’s Universities.” That’s five places higher on the West list and 54 spots higher on the Master’s list compared to last year. More than 200 universities were ranked on the West list and nearly 700 on the Master’s list.
• CSUSM was ranked 45^th in Hispanic Outlook on Education Magazine’s list of “Top 100 Colleges and Universities for Hispanics 2018” for total bachelor’s degrees granted.

Undergrad research conference

CSUSM was selected to host the 2019 Southern California Conference for Undergraduate Research. The event, held in November each year, includes schools from throughout Southern California. The 2019 event will be the first held in San Diego County.

The conference aims to provide a forum for the presentation and discussion of the best research, scholarship and creative work of undergraduates in the region.

Kang’s book receives more honors

History professor S. Deborah Kang, who received two prestigious awards in the spring for her book, “The INS on the Line: Making Immigration Law on the U.S.-Mexico Border, 1917-1954,” has received four additional honors: She won the Berkshire Conference of Women Historians Book Prize; the Americo Paredes Book Award for Best Nonfiction Book on Chicano/a, Mexican American, and/or Latino/a Studies; the W. Turrentine Jackson Award from the Western History Association; and she was named a finalist for the Weber-Clements Book Prize.

Earlier this year, Kang received the Henry Adams Prize from the Society on History in the Federal Government and the Theodore Saloutos Book Award from the Immigration and Ethnic History Society.

Extended Learning dean receives Chancellor’s Award

Mike Schroder, dean of Extended Learning and associate vice president of International Programs, was recognized by the California State University system with the 2018-19 Chancellor’s Award for Administrator Excellence and Innovation through the Edward M. McAleer Jr. Excellence and Innovation Awards program, which honors outstanding contributions in support of CSU Continuing and Extended Education.

The chancellor’s award was presented on Oct. 10 at a CSU systemwide conference for Extended Learning.

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Marisol Clark-Ibanez, a sociology professor and the faculty director of the National Latino Research Center at Cal State San Marcos, had written to Salvador, asking if he would be willing to draft a letter of support for a grant to bolster the success of undocumented students at the University. Salvador, a senior who’s on track to graduate in the spring with a degree in biotechnology, is one of those undocumented students, one of almost 400 attending CSUSM. He’s also a passionate advocate for undocumented issues. He eagerly agreed. 

When the boat returned to the Pacific Ocean, with the high seas as his muse, Salvador wrote his letter. He wrote about his experiences and struggles as an undocumented student on a college campus. He wrote about what he perceived as a lack of resources. He wrote about how students like him stood to benefit from the proposed grant. 

“It was almost poetic because I was on the open seas reflecting on what she had asked me to do,” Salvador said. “It’s cool now that I look back on it.” 

Even cooler: Four months after Salvador wrote the letter, and about six months after Clark-Ibanez first learned about the grant, CSUSM has been approved for UPRISE, which stands for Undocumented People Rise in Solidarity and Empowerment. It’s actually a joint grant, a collaboration between CSUSM and MiraCosta College to support undocumented students at both schools – and, just as importantly, their families. UPRISE will receive $235,000 over one year, but Clark-Ibanez believes the funding will be extended to three years if both colleges deliver the results they expect. 

“We wanted to do a collaboration; that’s what we intended to do,” said Clark-Ibanez, who wrote the grant proposal with Karina Duarte-Braunstein, a counselor at MiraCosta. “Together we have a lot to offer. We share so many students.” 

The grant comes not from a federal or state source, but from a private initiative called the California Campus Catalyst Fund, which was founded by educators, funders and advocates, and will dole out nearly $10 million over the next three years to campuses representing the state’s three public higher education systems: California Community Colleges, California State University and the University of California. CSUSM was one of only four CSU campuses to receive funding. 

In applying for the grant, Clark-Ibanez and her MiraCosta colleague relied on a data-driven formula – “what do the students need,” she said, “not what we think would be awesome as a professor or administrator.” Last summer, she performed a survey to solicit input from more than 60 undocumented students at CSUSM.  

What the survey revealed is that the most tangible benefit of UPRISE will be expanded legal services on campus. CSUSM has a longtime relationship with a nonprofit called Unitarian Universalist Refugee and Immigration Services and Education (UURISE) that Clark-Ibanez envisions becoming more active and covering at least initial consultations on immigration issues.  

Last week, for example, Salvador met with a lawyer on campus regarding the renewal of his application under the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) policy, and his fees were paid for. 

“We’ve definitely been offering sporadic things, and now is the time to offer comprehensive,” Clark-Ibanez said. “Going from sporadic to comprehensive is where our campus is.” 

Part of that comprehensive approach is greater outreach to the families of undocumented students. UPRISE will include the expansion of MiraCosta’s entrepreneurship training to CSUSM for both students and their parents and loved ones, and the University will host family nights on campus to honor cultural wealth and make sure the ins and outs of the program are understood.

“What happens to students’ family members will impact what happens to the student,” said Geoffrey Gilmore, the associate vice president of Student Academic Support Services, who assisted Clark-Ibanez with the grant proposal. “In providing that support for the family, we also are providing support for the student. That’s the intention.”

Salvador is excited about the potential of the family-based programs to help his parents. His father, Arnulfo, is a commercial and residential painter. His mother, Maria, babysits five children, one of whom is Salvador’s 8-year-old brother, Noe.

His parents immigrated to the United States from Mexico in 1995, when Salvador was three months old, in search of a better life than what they experienced as children. Growing up in the small town of Miahuatlan in southern Mexico, Salvador’s mother would have to fetch water from a nearby river in buckets and harvest coffee every morning, and that was before embarking on the two-hour walk to school.

Salvador can’t help but become emotional when he thinks about the sacrifices his parents have made for him and his two brothers (the middle son, Chris, is 21).

“It’s been 23 years since Mom or Dad has seen their parents, and that makes me sad,” he said. “I think they’re just tired of working. I think, with this program, it will make them feel less alone. I can see my parents benefiting from the entrepreneurship workshops, maybe starting a small business.”

Salvador’s family moved to San Marcos from the Koreatown neighborhood of Los Angeles when he was 8, but he actually started his college career at UC Santa Barbara. It wasn’t a good fit. Hurt by a paucity of resources for undocumented students and his own poor decisions, he was academically dismissed after three semesters.

Doubting his ability as a student, he returned home and worked for six months – as a Walmart associate, as a cook at a Mexican restaurant, as a painter, as a cement mixer.

“For the first time, I had money in surplus, but I had no fulfillment,” Salvador said. “I wasn’t proud of what I was doing.”

After two years taking general education courses at Palomar College, he transferred to CSUSM last fall, and almost immediately became actively involved on campus, whether it’s doing biological or sociological research with professors or advocating on behalf of undocumented students and other underrepresented groups.

Salvador is proud of the work he has done at CSUSM, but the lingering uncertainty around his legal status comes with challenges – challenges that he hopes UPRISE will help to ameliorate.

“Being undocumented is a source of pride and motivation,” he said. “My documented peers conduct research and get paid for their time in lab. I don’t, so I have to work two separate jobs in addition to being a full-time student in the sciences. And it’s been difficult finding funding to attend conferences that I am invited to.

“I just have to work twice or three times harder to find the things I am looking for. But I am happy because I love everything I am a part of.”

Media Contact

Brian Hiro, Communications Specialist

bhiro@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7306

And, in her current job as the assistant director of diversity and minority affairs for the Division of Medical Sciences and the Graduate School of Arts and Sciences at Harvard University, Gonzalez also will conduct some business -- continuing her outreach to try to convince students from underrepresented backgrounds to pursue careers in STEM and to dream big in their academic ambition. 

To be sure, Gonzalez has a compelling tale to tell. The daughter of parents who sought asylum from violence-stricken Guatemala when she was a girl, she overcame undocumented status to make it to CSUSM, attained a master’s after facing deportation proceedings, and went on to earn a Ph.D. in biology at Harvard, perhaps the most prestigious institution of higher learning in America. 

“She’s a walking, talking billboard for student success,” said Minerva Gonzalez, the director of CAMP at Cal State San Marcos and one of Karina’s first mentors when she arrived at the University in 2004. “Her story is so powerful. She has fulfilled her destiny. She knows the impact of being out there and talking to students.” 

Gonzalez was only 11 when her family left Guatemala, which was embroiled in a brutal, decades-long civil war. She recalls a bus trip into the city with her mother and younger brother during which a man tried to kidnap her brother – essentially rip him from his mother’s arms – in full public view. 

“I grew up knowing a lot of violence, knowing that it wasn’t a safe place and I couldn’t go out alone because someone could kidnap me,” Gonzalez said. “I was overprotected because it was such a violent place.” 

After receiving death threats, her parents applied for asylum and moved in with Gonzalez’s aunt in San Marcos – two families of five squeezed into a one-bedroom apartment. Her father found work in landscaping.  

Gonzalez didn’t speak any English when she entered sixth grade at Woodland Park Middle School. She taught herself the language by copying words from children’s books onto flash cards, then entering the words into her mother’s translator device. For seventh and eighth grades, she switched to San Marcos Middle School, where she learned about and was accepted into the AVID (Advancement Via Individual Determination) college readiness program. 

“That caught my interest because my parents were always talking about education,” Gonzalez said. 

Her passion for science blossomed at San Marcos High. Entering with the goal of becoming a medical doctor, Gonzalez discovered chemistry as a sophomore, but that burgeoning interest was eclipsed the next year when she took an honors class in genetics.  

“I was hooked. I loved it and just wanted to learn more,” she said. “I would stay after school and talk to my teacher, and go home and explain things about cells and DNA to my father, who probably had no clue what I was saying but was willing to listen and learn.” 

Gonzalez knew she wanted to attend college, and had the grades to do so, but her undocumented status precluded her from pursuing federal financial aid. CSUSM was the ideal destination because she could live at home (her family ultimately bought a house in San Marcos), and her parents were able to cobble together enough money to afford the low tuition.

At CSUSM, Gonzalez quickly found a home in the lab of biology professors Thomas Wahlund and Betsy Read, where she says she could be herself without being judged. Outside the classroom, she similarly was embraced through CAMP, a national program that aims to help students from migrant and seasonal farm worker backgrounds to succeed in college. A member of the third CAMP class at CSUSM, which initially hosted it in 2002, Gonzalez and her cohort participated in a five-week summer program before receiving a host of services during their freshman year at the University.

“She was way ahead of the game,” Minerva Gonzalez said. “She helped tutor some of our other students in math. You could tell from the very beginning that this student was going places.”

Karina wondered, though, how far she could go without legal protection. And in the summer of 2009, after the first year of her master’s program, she confronted the very real possibility of having to leave the country entirely.

When her parents sought green cards, Gonzalez, then 21, was told that she had aged out of their asylum case and would have to apply on her own. After struggling to find and pay for a lawyer – the family of Wahlund, who had died of cancer in 2008, helped cover her expenses – she sought to avoid deportation through what’s called a special rule cancellation, whereby adult family members of U.S. residents can stay if their leaving would represent an extreme hardship (Gonzalez’s parents depended on her for translation and medical help).

She describes her deportation hearing on Aug. 26, 2009 – she recalls the exact date – as the worst day of her life.

“Somebody gets to decide whether or not I get to stay in the States or go back to a place that I no longer remember because I left when I was 11,” Gonzalez said. “I had worked so hard and everything could be trashed, and one person got to decide what my future would be like.”

The judge granted her a green card, opening the door for Gonzalez to seek financial aid and – thanks to her outstanding academic qualifications – gain admission to Harvard’s doctoral program.

But the Ivy League school didn’t have anything like CAMP, and Gonzalez struggled with the cross-country move in more ways than one.

“When I got to Harvard, the difficulty for me was finding a community, finding a family, a support network,” she said. “I was coming to a place where I knew no one, though I was trying to be optimistic and take it as an adventure.

“And though I felt prepared, there were some things I didn’t have a strong background in when I started here. I tried to get help, but I was made to feel small and that I didn’t belong by a few people.”

Gonzalez fought through the adversity and finished her Ph.D. in 2016, two years after she gave birth to twins (Dante and Elena, both now 4); a year later, she became a U.S. citizen. She has considered a career in science – either as a professor or researcher – but has decided that she can have a greater impact by helping the next generation of scientists steer clear of the pitfalls she experienced early at Harvard.

Her choice was reaffirmed in July when she participated in the SACNAS Leadership Institute in Washington, D.C., a five-day course that provides leadership training for underrepresented minority scientists.

“I have this sense of urgency in regard to what I’m doing now in diversity and minority affairs given my experience as a graduate student at Harvard,” Gonzalez said. “My focus is trying to build a vibrant, supportive and welcoming community among minority students so that if anyone is struggling, they have a family – a supportive network they can go to.”

Media Contact

Brian Hiro, Communications Specialist

bhiro@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7306

Watching from a distance, he could see the bird dive after its prey and then return with the prey in its mouth, soon to be impaled.

It was what happens in between that time, from the point of the attack to returning with the prey, that intrigued Sustaita.

Not only has Sustaita discovered some answers to that question, but the results of his research have been published in Biology Letters, a peer-reviewed scientific journal that publishes high-quality papers from across the biological sciences.

“I had never seen shrike attacks that up close and personal before, so the whole thing was a new, exciting experience to witness how they do what they do,” said Sustaita, an assistant professor of biological sciences at Cal State San Marcos.

Sustaita’s interest in predatory birds began as a child growing up near Woodland Hills, north of Los Angeles. His backyard abutted a state park with open land and myriad opportunities to observe hawks and other birds.

Drawn to the power of predatory birds like hawks and falcons, Sustaita wanted to learn more about the biomechanics of their abilities. For his Ph.D. dissertation at the University of Connecticut, Sustaita chose to focus on shrikes in conjunction with his adviser, Margaret A. Rubega, who became a co-author on the paper published in Biology Letters. Susan M. Farabaugh, the associate director of recovery ecology for San Diego Zoo Global, was also a co-author.

Shrikes are small predatory songbirds known for impaling their prey. While birds in general can focus on a wide variety of foods -- from insects or vertebrates to seeds and fruits -- these feeding specialties are associated with certain types of beaks that are more efficient for particular food types. However, Sustaita notes that shrikes are able to eat both insects and small animals effectively with their beak shape.

Though shrikes are small – Sustaita compares the weight of a shrike to that of a Hershey Bar – they are able to catch and kill animals as large or even larger.

The research was conducted on San Clemente Island in a collaboration with the San Diego Zoo Global Institute for Conservation Research and the U.S. Navy, which operates the island.

The zoo and Navy have worked together to breed an endangered subspecies of shrike and release it back to the island as part of a shrike recovery program. The birds are fed live prey as part of the process of ensuring that they are prepared for release, and Sustaita’s team was allowed to set up high-speed cameras to capture video of shrikes attacking their prey.

“This behavior happens so quickly,” Sustaita said. “You can catch glimpses of it with the naked eye and you can kind of see what they’re doing, but you don’t understand the intricacies until you actually slow things down and see what happens, literally bite by bite by bite.

“I commend the zoo and the Navy on their willingness to undertake this. They have a mandate for the conservation of this endangered subspecies. They breed them, and they have a fantastic operation. We came in with this request to learn a little bit more, and their response was entirely positive. The more you learn about an organism’s natural history, the better you can manage and hopefully conserve that species. We were happy to strike up this partnership that benefits everybody.”

One of the most surprising aspects of the research results for Sustaita was learning how fast the shrikes work, grabbing prey by the neck and shaking it violently nearly a dozen times in a second to kill it.

“It’s the blink of an eye,” he said, “the attack, the head-shaking behavior and then they’re done, they’re off.

“You really get an appreciation for the sheer force of these little birds, the vigor with which they attack and kill their prey. It’s amazing.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

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Growing up in Escondido, Lorena and her dad, Manuel, would watch old episodes of “Star Trek: The Original Series” – a show that went off the air in 1969, almost three decades before Lorena was born – and she would marvel at the exploits of Captain Kirk, Spock and the rest of the USS Enterprise crew. 

The show made her want to learn more about science and to explore the mysteries of space. It made her want to become the first person in her family to go to college.  

Now a senior applied physics major at Cal State San Marcos, Lorena this summer received a considerable boost toward achieving her “Star Trek”-inspired life goal when she participated in a 10-week astrophysics internship at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, one of the world’s premier institutions of scientific research.  

The internship was part of the CAMPARE program, a network of 23 California State University schools and California community colleges from which students are recruited to participate in undergraduate summer research projects. Within CAMPARE, there is a newer program called CHAMP (CAMPARE-HERA Astronomy Minority Partnership), which gives students from backgrounds underrepresented in STEM an opportunity to study cosmology and radio astronomy at one of seven universities – including MIT – partnering on the Hydrogen Epoch of Reionization Array (HERA) project, a state-of-the-art radio telescope being built in South Africa.  

“I’ve always been interested in astrophysics, and I’ve only done condensed matter physics,” Lorena said. “I didn’t think I was going to get into the program, but I thought if I don’t try, obviously I’m not going to get anything.” 

Lorena was one of only four students from CAMPARE universities selected to do their research at MIT. After a one-week radio astronomy “boot camp” in New Mexico designed to give the interns some of the skills they would need to succeed in the program, Lorena headed off to Cambridge, Mass., where she was given a $5,000 stipend and provided with an apartment near campus. Outside of a couple of trips to Mexico – her mother is from Mexicali, just south of the U.S. border near El Centro – Lorena never had been outside California. 

“The first two weeks, I felt like I was in denial,” she said. “It was a weird experience, but I got to live independently in my own apartment, go to work. It was awesome.”  

Under the guidance of Jacqueline Hewitt, the director of the MIT Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Lorena tested and compared two radio telescope designs as part of improvements to the HERA project. HERA is a telescope that’s designed to detect a particular wavelength of light emitted by hydrogen atoms during what’s called the Epoch of Reionization, which scientists believe started about 400 million years after the Big Bang. By analyzing the data, scientists hope to answer the question of when and how the first stars formed out of cold clumps of hydrogen gas and started to shine – when, in other words, was our “cosmic dawn”?

Besides her work with Hewitt at MIT, Lorena and the other interns took a trip to West Virginia to visit the Green Bank Observatory, the largest fully steerable telescope in the world, and test one of the antenna feeds.

“That was an awesome experience because there was no phone service, no Wi-Fi, nothing,” Lorena said. “We couldn’t even drive cars with sparkplugs in the area because it’s a radio quiet zone. The little town, Green Bank, has a population of about 160, so there was only one small convenience store.”

Lorena returned from MIT armed with an abundance of fresh knowledge and a substantial lift in self-confidence. She was the only one of the four interns who isn’t an astronomy or astrophysics major; CSUSM is testing an astrophysics class for the first time this semester, and Lorena, of course, is taking it.

She also has begun applying to graduate school programs, with MIT as her first choice. Coming from a family where college never was thought of as an option, she plans to pursue a Ph.D. and aspires to become an astrophysics professor.

In her career objective, Lorena has a good model in Stephen Tsui, an associate professor in physics who has been her faculty mentor since she transferred from Palomar College two years ago.

“When we first met, we talked about her ambition to become an astrophysicist and chatted a little about our common fandom in ‘Star Trek,’ ” Tsui said. “She reminded me of my friends back when I was in college.”

Like Lorena, Tsui says he was inspired to be a physicist by watching “Star Trek: The Next Generation” as a kid. Professor and student still talk about the show frequently – Lorena sometimes calls Tsui “Captain,” and he calls her “Cadet.” An artist on the side, Lorena even drew a picture of her lab group set on the bridge of the Enterprise-D from “The Next Generation” series.

With "Star Trek" as her guide, and a career in astrophysics possibly in her future, Lorena is clearly on track to live long and prosper.

Media Contact

Brian Hiro, Communications Specialist

bhiro@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7306

After joining SPS, Jesus started attending conferences and participating in physics events on campus. He even served as the group’s treasurer during the 2017-18 academic year.

Jesus’ work paid off in another way as he was selected to receive the 2018 Trustees’ Award for Outstanding Achievement, the California State University’s highest recognition of student achievement. Jesus was named a Trustee Emeritus Murray L. Galinson Scholar.

The CSU recognizes 23 students every year – one from each CSU campus – with the Trustees’ Award, which accompanies a donor-funded scholarship ranging from $6,000 to $12,000. The awardees will be publicly recognized during the CSU Board of Trustees meeting in Long Beach on Sept. 11.

Students are selected for their exceptional efforts in the classroom and community. Awardees demonstrate superior academic performance, personal accomplishments, community service and financial need. Many have shown inspirational resolve along the path to college success and are the first in their families to attend college.

“These student scholars embody the leadership, diversity and academic excellence the California State University is known for,” said CSU Chancellor Timothy P. White. “They have traced unique paths to their goal of a higher education and serve as powerful examples to their families, communities and California. The awards will give these high-achieving and deserving students even more opportunities to attain their academic and career goals.”

The Trustees’ Award is just the latest honor for Jesus, who was recognized in June with a Society of Physics Students Leadership Scholarship, awarded to students who have exhibited outstanding academic and personal achievements.

In May, Jesus was part of a four-student team honored with the Library Award for Undergraduate Research, Scholarship and Creative Activity, a CSUSM honor recognizing students demonstrating sophistication and originality in their research projects and creative works.

Jesus, who will graduate next spring with a bachelor’s in applied physics, spent the fall 2016 semester as an intern for the Science of Undergraduate Laboratory Internships program at the Princeton Plasma Physics Laboratory in New Jersey. This summer, he was an intern at the National Institute of Standards and Technology.

Jesus is also an Alliance Ambassador for CSUSM’s Alliance to Accelerate Excellence in Education, which works collaboratively with regional partners to ensure that all K-12 students have access to a college education and are successful in persevering toward a degree.

More than 340 students have been honored with the Trustees’ Award since the scholarship program was established in 1984 by the William Randolph Hearst Foundation. In 1999, the William Randolph Hearst Foundation partnered with the CSU Board of Trustees to supplement the endowment with contributions from CSU Trustees, CSU Foundation Board of Governors, and private donors. Each student scholarship bears the name of a donor.

About California State University San Marcos

Building on an innovative 28-year history, California State University San Marcos is a forward-focused institution, dedicated to preparing future leaders, building great communities and solving critical issues. Located on a 304-acre hillside overlooking the City of San Marcos, it is the only public four-year comprehensive university serving North San Diego, Southwest Riverside and South Orange Counties.

The University enrolls 17,000 students. With approximately 2,000 employees, the institution is a Great College to Work For® (The Chronicle of Higher Education). As a recipient of the annual HEED Award since 2014—a national honor recognizing U.S. colleges and universities that demonstrate an outstanding commitment to diversity and inclusion—CSUSM is committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment.

It didn’t take long for her to realize she had nothing to worry about.

“As long as you have the motivation, you can do it,” said Marissa, one of 30 incoming Cal State San Marcos freshmen who participated in the three-week program last month.

CSUSM was one of four California universities to host a CSSI-Extension this summer. The program introduces incoming college freshmen to computer science through interactive, hands-on activities culminating in a presentation of group projects.

“We’re excited about this program and the opportunity to build confidence and community among students who have historically been underrepresented in STEM career fields,” said Ray Sawyer, a Student Development Specialist at Google.

More than 100 incoming freshmen applied to the program at CSUSM.

Youwen Ouyang, chair of the Department of Computer Science and Information Systems, led the program. The students learned basic programming fundamentals and worked in small teams with one of six teaching assistants to design and develop their own applications. Jeffrey Morales, the Engineering Pathways Advisor, also worked with participants on developing their soft skills.

The program was funded by a Hispanic-Serving Institutions STEM grant from the U.S. Department of Education.

“The CSSI program is the beginning of our efforts to have students traditionally underrepresented in STEM participate in grant-related activities and increase their graduation rates,” said Ricardo Fierro, associate dean of the College of Science and Mathematics and project director of the grant.

Students lauded the program both for the computer science knowledge they gained and the opportunity to collaborate with faculty, staff and other students.

“Not only did we get to learn how to code in all these languages, but we made connections with faculty, the TAs and with each other,” said Anahi Badillo, a program participant.

“This program really encouraged me to get more involved,” added Thao Phung. “In high school, I wasn’t in any clubs. When I saw the email about this program, I wasn’t sure. But I took a risk, and it paid off. I made a lot of friends, and it was really fun.”

On the final day of the program, the teams presented their apps to the entire group and other invited guests. One of the apps was geared toward tourists visiting San Diego; another would enable CSUSM students to determine when and where pick-up games for a variety of sports are being played; and a third aimed at informing users about the latest trends in books, games, movies and music.

It wasn’t just the participants who found the program valuable.

Samuel Mueller, one of the teaching assistants and a veteran, enjoyed tutoring the incoming freshmen in the summer program.

“I’m passionate about getting computer science out there,” said Samuel, a second-year computer science major at CSUSM. “A lot of people don’t know what they’ll be good at until they try it. It’s important that they get the opportunity to explore different elements of it and build their confidence.”

Samuel noted that the program introduced him to industry professionals through field trips to San Marcos-based Hunter Industries and Google in Venice Beach.

“The students arrived wondering if they belonged in computer science,” Fierro said. “The program provided them with the opportunity to meet other majors and learn and enjoy basics of coding and teamwork. The field trips added an extra dimension to the program. Soon they realized they do belong here. They’re identifying now as computer scientists.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

CSUSM is one of just six institutions throughout the nation selected for the 2018 award.

The award includes an $18,500 grant that will allow the Chemistry & Biochemistry Department to bring to campus a leading researcher in the chemical sciences to give two lectures – a popular lecture and a more technical one – and to interact substantially with undergraduate students and faculty during the visit.

More than half of the grant will go to support the summer research of two undergraduate students.

The Jean Dreyfus Lectureship for Undergraduate Institutions is sponsored by the Camille & Henry Dreyfus Foundation, which promotes research and lectureships at primarily undergraduate institutions.

National Honor for Sigma Delta Pi

CSUSM’s Psi Epsilon Chapter of Sigma Delta Pi, the National Collegiate Hispanic Honor Society, has been named an “Honor Chapter” for its outstanding activities in 2017-18. It is CSUSM’s second straight year receiving the distinction.

Only 10 of the more than 615 chapters of Sigma Delta Pi received the honor, which is based on the caliber of chapter projects that reflect the society’s mission of honoring excellence in the study of Spanish, contributing to cultural understanding and upholding its goals.

Kendrick an AACN-Wharton Fellow

Lorna Kendrick, director of CSUSM’s School of Nursing, was among 30 academic nursing leaders selected to participate in the American Association of Colleges of Nursing-Wharton program, Aug. 6-9 in Philadelphia. The annual four-day program is taught by Wharton faculty, who present content designed to advance chief academic administrators to a higher level of leadership.

Student Receives NSCS Award

Luna Prieto earned an Induction Recognition Award from The National Society of Collegiate Scholars for $1,000. The award is given to students who exemplify leadership and excellence through their academic achievement.

Alumna Part of ‘Rising 25’

Linsey Bahl, who graduated with a bachelor’s in marketing in 2016, was recognized as a member of the “Front Office Sports Rising 25 Award Class of 2018.” The class includes 25 professionals in the sports business industry. Bahl, a marketing coordinator for Fox Sports San Diego, was selected from among 140 nominees.

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

The awards recognize faculty leaders who have implemented innovative practices that significantly improve student success.

“World-class CSU faculty are leading the charge as our university continues its remarkable progress in improving student learning and degree completion,” said CSU Chancellor Timothy P. White. “These exceptional recipients demonstrate leadership in their respective fields and incorporate cutting-edge techniques into curriculum. Their commitment to student success ensures that the value of a CSU degree continues to increase.”

A selection committee composed of faculty, student representatives from the California State Student Association and staff members from the CSU Chancellor’s Office reviewed 366 nominations to identify the inaugural awardees.

As part of the recognition, awardees will receive a $5,000 cash award and $10,000 will be allocated to their academic department to support ongoing innovation and leadership to advance student success. Funding for the awards is provided by generous grant support from the College Futures Foundation and the James Irvine Foundation, which see faculty innovation and leadership as vital to improving outcomes for California’s diverse students.

“Dr. Hamadani is creating an academic experience that helps our students discover where their interests intersect with the cutting edge in their field,” said Katherine Kantardjieff, dean of CSUSM’s College of Science and Mathematics. “By actively working to instill creativity, curiosity, critical thinking and innovation in our students, Dr. Hamadani is helping to prepare our students to be productive members of an agile, resilient and inclusive STEM workforce.”

Faculty innovation is crucial to reaching the ambitious student success goals outlined in the CSU’s Graduation Initiative 2025. This system-wide effort advances specific goals to eliminate equity gaps and significantly improve degree completion.

Award recipients will be formally honored in mid-October at the third annual Graduation Initiative 2025 Symposium hosted this year in San Diego.

About California State University San Marcos

Building on an innovative 28-year history, California State University San Marcos is a forward-focused institution, dedicated to preparing future leaders, building great communities and solving critical issues. Located on a 304-acre hillside overlooking the City of San Marcos, it is the only public four-year comprehensive university serving North San Diego, Southwest Riverside and South Orange Counties.

The University enrolls 17,000 students. With approximately 2,000 employees, the institution is a Great College to Work For® (The Chronicle of Higher Education). As a recipient of the annual HEED Award since 2014—a national honor recognizing U.S. colleges and universities that demonstrate an outstanding commitment to diversity and inclusion—CSUSM is committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment.

President Karen Haynes, the senior president in the California State University system, opened the 2018-19 academic year with her 15th CSUSM Convocation address on Thursday, Aug. 23.

Speaking to hundreds of CSUSM faculty and staff members, she highlighted recent University achievements and set the tone for the new school year.

“CSUSM is a special place. It’s not just a campus, not just a workplace, not just any university – it’s a home,” Haynes said. “For the majority of us, our work is not just a job but a calling. A calling to higher education, to solve society’s most pressing issues, to promote wellness and prosperity in our communities, and to empower students to embrace the rich and infinite possibilities that lay before them.”

Among CSUSM’s students this fall are nearly 2,500 freshmen and more than 2,000 transfer students. All enrollment figures are considered preliminary, with final totals determined after the end of the fourth week of classes.

New faculty, staff and programs

Emiliano Ayala began his appointment as dean of the College of Education, Health and Human Services in July. Ayala has served in the CSU for more than 17 years as a faculty member and a department chair, as well as in various administrative leadership positions. He came to CSUSM from Sonoma State, where he served as director of assessment and accreditation in the School of Education.

The University’s much-anticipated engineering program launches this fall with software engineering. CSUSM will add electrical engineering in fall 2019, pending final approval from the CSU Chancellor’s Office.

A stackable certificate program in EngiBeering, which explores the science and engineering behind brewing craft beer, also begins this academic year through Extended Learning.

Technology Learning Center

The University has transformed its main open computer lab, Kellogg 2000, into the new Technology Learning Center (TLC). This updated space in Kellogg Library addressed student feedback and concerns gathered from more than 550 voluntary responses that expressed a strong interest in seeing the lab upgraded with new technology and new work spaces.

The TLC project included a full remodel of the room, new furniture and new computers with large monitors. The updated design replaces the prior high-density layout with an open, efficient and flexible space that features individual technology pods, large collaborative work spaces, ergonomic and innovative seating, and curved and height-adjustable tables.

The TLC is available to CSUSM students 24 hours a day, five days a week.

Extended Learning building

Construction continues on CSUSM’s new Extended Learning building. Part of a public-private partnership, the project includes a 135,000-square-foot, six-story building, an accompanying 709-space parking garage and a pedestrian bridge over Barham Drive. The project is expected to be completed in time for the fall 2019 semester.

Weeks of Welcome

The annual Weeks of Welcome starts Aug. 24 and runs through Sept. 9. It includes dozens of free events to welcome students back to campus.

See the Weeks of Welcome calendar for a complete schedule.

20^th anniversary of athletics

A year after completing the transition to NCAA Division II, the CSUSM Department of Athletics has another reason to celebrate as it marks its 20^th anniversary in 2018-19.

Beginning with six sports in 1998 – men’s and women's golf, men's and women's cross country and men's and women's track and field – the program has grown to include 13 teams.

Summer snippets

• More than $190,000 was raised and a record number of gifts were received in support of student scholarships during the University’s annual gala on June 2.
• CSUSM was one of four universities in the country selected to host Iraqi students as part of the Iraqi Young Leaders Exchange Program during the summer.
• The University was among 57 colleges and universities selected for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Inclusive Excellence Initiative, which provides $1 million in grant support over five years for each institution.

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

CSUSM will receive $842,267 from the NSF’s Robert Noyce Teacher Scholarship Program for a project titled “Cultivating STEM Teaching Identity in Noyce Teacher Scholars.”

Rong-Ji Chen, an associate professor in CSUSM’s School of Education, is the principal investigator on the project. He is joined by co-principal investigators Chuck De Leone, professor of physics; Linda Holt, professor of mathematics; and Paul Jasien, professor of chemistry and biochemistry. Other collaborators include MiraCosta College, Palomar College, Escondido Union High School District, San Marcos Unified School District and Vista Unified School District.

Other CSUs that received Noyce awards are Chico State, San Diego State, San Francisco State, Cal Poly San Luis Obispo and Stanislaus State.

Shapiro Named 2018 Fellow

Adam Shapiro, a professor of sociology, was named a 2018 Fellow in the Behavioral and Social Sciences Section of the Gerontological Society of America, the nation's largest interdisciplinary organization devoted to the field of aging.

Shapiro was one of 89 exemplary professionals selected as a GSA fellow, the highest class of membership within the GSA. It is an acknowledgment of outstanding and continuing work in gerontology.

The new fellows will be formally recognized during at the GSA’s 2018 Annual Scientific Meeting in November.

Hamill Appointed WSCUC Commissioner

Sharon Hamill, a professor of psychology and faculty director of the CSU Institute for Palliative Care at CSUSM, is one of seven new commissioners appointed to the WASC Senior College and University Commission (WSCUC). Hamill’s appointment began July 1.

Commissioners serve three-year terms with the possibility of re-election to a second term.

Leadership Award

Neal Hoss, vice president of Finance and Administrative Services, was among nine people honored for their leadership during the North San Diego Business Chamber’s annual Celebration of Business.

The North San Diego Business Chamber Leadership Awards honor individuals who have positively impacted another individual, a business, organization or agency, or their community.

NSCS Gold Star Chapter

CSUSM’s chapter of the National Society of Collegiate Scholars (NSCS) has been recognized as a Gold Star Chapter for the 2017-18 academic year. Fifty-three of the more than 320 NSCS chapters received the designation.

Gold Star Chapters were recognized as leaders in implementing engaging, student-centered events on their campus and in their local community.

Inclusive Excellence Initiative

CSUSM was among 57 colleges and universities selected for the Howard Hughes Medical Institute Inclusive Excellence Initiative, which provides $1 million in grant support over five years for each institution.

The Inclusive Excellence Initiative aims to catalyze schools’ efforts to engage all students in science regardless of background. That includes underrepresented ethnic minorities, first-generation college students and working adults with families.

Commendation for Women’s Volleyball

The women’s volleyball team, which became the University’s first program in the NCAA Division II era to travel abroad when it played three matches in Italy last month, will be given a commendation at the San Marcos City Council meeting on Aug. 14.

Top Honor for Sigma Alpha Epsilon

CSUSM’s chapter of Sigma Alpha Epsilon received the John O. Moseley Zeal Award, which recognizes the chapter that best exemplifies a model chapter in the fraternity.

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

When Downie introduces herself as a craft beer historian, jaws drop and questions begin to pour in. It’s an unexpected title for a librarian, especially one who five years ago couldn’t stomach the taste of beer. While today she favors a good mead, stout or fruit sour over the iconic hoppy India Pale Ales of the region, she knows craft beer and is leading the effort to preserve its history, which dates back 150 years in the region.

From capturing that history to launching a first-of-its-kind EngiBeering™ program, beer initiatives are bubbling up at Cal State San Marcos.

A FLAVORFUL HISTORY
The first recorded brewery to pop on the scene in San Diego was Chollas Valley Brewery in 1868 by German immigrant Christian Dobler. Naturally, German-style lagers were the preferred brew at 5 cents a glass. Agriculture dominated the region’s industry and a small handful of breweries emerged in that first wave before Prohibition.

The second wave of craft beer in San Diego (1933-1983) brought mixed results and several false starts. Home winemaking was legalized, but not home brewing, which included the sale of supplies to make beer. At first, alcohol could only be served in restaurants, not bars or saloons in California. Confusion over government regulation and taxation stalled business. Four breweries came and went. Some closed operations, others moved north to Los Angeles.

For three decades, craft beer production disappeared in San Diego, unable to compete with brewery giants like Coors, Budweiser and Pabst Blue Ribbon.

In 1978, President Jimmy Carter signed legislation that permitted home brewing. By 1983, California legalized the sale of craft beer, ushering in the third and current wave of craft beer for San Diego.

Bolt Brewing opened in Fallbrook in 1987. Then came Old Columbia Brewery, the first craft brewery of Karl Strauss and his cousin, which was soon renamed Karl Strauss Brewing Company. It is the longest continuously open brewery in San Diego.

Downie points to a pivotal moment that may have clinched San Diego’s place in beer history. In 1997, a consortium of craft brewers came together to form the San Diego Brewers Guild.

“It was Greg Koch, the founder of Stone Brewing Co., who said, ‘We can work together or fail separately,’ and it feels apropos to say, but the rest is history,” Downie said. “One characteristic that has undeniably influenced the success of craft brewing in our region has been the genuine collaboration among craft brewers.”

Today, San Diego boasts the title of “Capital of Craft” with over 150 licensed brewers. And it’s a powerful economic engine, producing more than $870 million in output annually.

In August 2017, the University Library launched the Brewchive™, a comprehensive archive celebrating the San Diego craft brewing industry. The collection is one of only a handful of specialty archives nationwide focused solely on beer.

“They put their heart and soul into this industry and we want to make sure that history is preserved and celebrated,” said Dr. Jennifer Fabbi, dean of the CSUSM Library.

The initial idea for an archive to record and preserve San Diego brewing activity was at the suggestion of Char Booth, associate dean of the library and a home brewer.

Tap handles, growlers, beer lists, coasters, recipes, brewing logs, manifestos and marketing materials are all part of the growing collection of the Brewchive™. As the library collects and digitizes these historical documents and artifacts, it is also curating signature collections, including the Stone Brewing Co. Collection and Women in Craft. Oral histories told by homebrewers and professionals are also featured in the online archive.

“Our business students and the students enrolled in the upcoming EngiBeering™ program can learn from both the successes and failures the local breweries have gone through,” Downie said.

RAISE YOUR HAND AND RAISE YOUR GLASS
This fall, the University will welcome its inaugural cohort of students into the EngiBeering™ certificate program. The two-part certificate, or what’s referred to as a stackable certificate program, explores the science and business of craft brewing.

“Industry leaders need to fill this critical gap in their workforce,” said Dr. Jackie Trischman, biochemist and program director of EngiBeering™. “They need trained professionals who have business insight but also know the science of making exceptional craft beer.”

Some of the courses for the 18-month program include recipe development, sensory evaluation to identify flavors and beer quality (yes, students will actually drink beer), learning the brewery processes, the evolution of beer, brewing science and an internship. Unlike traditional classes, EngiBeering™ lab courses will happen on-site at local breweries. And most notably, the program’s teaching faculty are professionals currently working in the industry.

“It’s exciting to me because there is more science involved in beer production than people think,” Trischman said. “A brewer is a scientist.”

EngiBeering™ was developed by eight CSUSM faculty across three colleges in partnership with more than 12 brewers including alumni Kyle Adams ’13 of Prohibition Brewing Company and Mike Stevenson ’12 of Culver Beer Company.

“The brewing community is one of the most congenial and positive groups I have ever met,” Trischman said. “The love for their craft shines through their work, and it’s that same passion that built this program.”

THE CRAFT BUSINESS
As a prominent industry for the local economy, generating more than $100 million in tax revenue annually, craft brewing is a serious business. Measuring its impact and predicting its growth is in the hands of business researchers at CSUSM.

Since 2015, the College of Business Administration has published its semiannual San Diego Craft Brewer Confidence Index, a survey conducted in partnership with the San Diego Business Journal, that gauges local brewer confidence in the industry. The latest report, released in April, revealed that brewers continue to display an impressive level of optimism in their businesses. Nearly 64 percent expect to add employees and 32 percent expect their total barrel output to increase from 11 percent to 20 percent in the next year. Business confidence is a predictor of industry growth, according to researchers.

The college also produces an annual Economic Impact of Craft Breweries Report, in conjunction with the San Diego Brewers Guild and the San Diego North Economic Development Council, analyzing the impact of the industry on the region. On Oct. 10, the college will host the Craft Economic Summit, unveiling its latest findings and discussing trends and forecasts for the craft brewing industry.

“The industry is thriving,” said Ed Ashley, director of business community relations for the college. “Stone Brewing Co. grew up a nine-iron away from us and our campus has grown right alongside it. We share the heart of the brewers and the love for the craft.”

WHAT'S THE CATCH? A BASEBALL IN A BEER
Gabrielle DiMarco was simply enjoying a beer and a ballgame on June 5 at Petco Park.

While it was mostly a forgettable evening for the Padres, who lost 14-1 to the Atlanta Braves, it turned into a life-changing experience for Gabrielle when a foul ball landed in her beer cup.

That alone likely would have gotten Gabrielle on the nightly sports highlight shows. What followed made the Cal State San Marcos literature and writing studies student a social media sensation.

Gabrielle, with encouragement from the surrounding fans, proceeded to drink the entire beer with the baseball still firmly planted in the cup. Video from the moment went viral with Gabrielle even receiving marriage proposals from as far away as Australia.

“I’m going to keep it in that cup forever,” Gabrielle told The San Diego Union-Tribune. “I’m never taking it out. It’s a trophy.”

The event is free and open to the public. Light refreshments will be served.

CSUSM’s College of Science and Mathematics hosts the Summer Scholars Program each year to actively engage undergraduates in STEM research. Working closely with faculty mentors, students gain hands-on experience in highly interdisciplinary projects and learn to apply new instrumental techniques and analytical methods.

“The Summer Scholars Program helps students determine which career path might be appropriate for them and it opens their eyes to a world of careers out there that they didn’t know existed,” said Julie Jameson, an associate professor of biology at CSUSM who co-directs the program with fellow biology professor Betsy Read.

The 10-week program concludes each year with the Summer Scholars Poster Showcase where participants share with the community the methods, results and interpretation of the work they have done over the summer.

The Summer Scholars Program is supported by a generous gift from ViaSat, Inc., and sponsored by The San Diego Foundation.

What: Summer Scholars Poster Showcase, hosted by CSUSM’s College of Science and Mathematics

When: 9 a.m.-noon, Thursday, Aug. 9, 2018

Where: University Student Union Ballroom on campus of Cal State San Marcos

Cost: Free

Parking: Free parking will be available in the University Parking Structure

About California State University San Marcos

Building on an innovative 28-year history, California State University San Marcos is a forward-focused institution, dedicated to preparing future leaders, building great communities and solving critical issues. Located on a 304-acre hillside overlooking the City of San Marcos, it is the only public four-year comprehensive university serving North San Diego, Southwest Riverside and South Orange Counties.

The University enrolls nearly 17,000 students. With approximately 2,000 employees, the institution is a Great College to Work For® (The Chronicle of Higher Education). As a recipient of the annual HEED Award since 2014—a national honor recognizing U.S. colleges and universities that demonstrate an outstanding commitment to diversity and inclusion—CSUSM is committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment.

After joining SPS, Jesus started attending conferences and participating in physics events on campus. He even served as the group’s treasurer during the 2017-18 academic year.

Jesus’ work with SPS paid off in another way this month when he received an SPS Leadership Scholarship in the amount of $2,000.

SPS Scholarships are awarded to students who have exhibited outstanding academic and personal achievements. The scholarship funds are made available through donations by members of Sigma Pi Sigma, an honor society that is part of SPS.

“My goal in SPS was to be a leader and take our chapter further in the science community,” Jesus said.

CSUSM’s chapter attended multiple national physics conferences this year, and Jesus helped inform and encourage students to attend. He also mentored students in his research lab and assisted classmates in their physics courses.

“Jesus has a lot of impressive qualities,” said Justin Perron, an assistant professor of physics and CSUSM’s SPS faculty adviser. “In the classroom it is clear he is very intelligent, has a very strong work ethic and is genuinely interested in the underlying physics. The combination of these traits inevitably leads to excellent performance in his classes.

“Outside of the classroom, through his involvement with SPS, he shows an impressive amount of initiative and independence. Whenever he gets an idea for an event or activity he doesn’t hesitate to do what it takes to make it happen, and he does so with minimal guidance.”

As one example, Perron cited an outreach event that CSUSM’s SPS chapter hosted at the Palomar Planetarium. Perron said the event required significant organization and logistics, including raising funds from multiple sources, organizing volunteers from Palomar, CSUSM and local industries, and arranging travel and permission slips from multiple middle schools.

Perron said Jesus led a team of SPS members and identified all of the necessary tasks for the event to be a success while solving any issues that cropped up.

“His independence made my role as an adviser extremely simple,” Perron said. “Every time he updated me it was almost shocking that he didn’t need any help from me and that everything, even with an event of that size, was under control. That sort of independence is rare, especially in an undergraduate student.”

Jesus credits SPS for getting him more involved with the physics community. It wasn’t until he became a member that he attended a physics conference or participated in a physics event on campus.

“It is motivating to know you have a group of people with you chasing the same dream,” he said. “SPS has provided enormous amounts of opportunities, including outreach, research and travel.”

Jesus said he will use the scholarship to help pay summer tuition and start saving for graduate school. He is spending much of his summer in the Washington, D.C., area for an internship with the National Institute of Standards and Technology – and he noted that the internship opportunity came through his association with SPS.

Jesus will graduate from CSUSM next spring before pursuing his Ph.D. in plasma physics.

But before he leaves, Jesus plans to encourage more CSUSM students to join him in SPS – and he emphasized that SPS is open to all regardless of their major.

“I tell people not to worry – we don't do any math in the club,” he said. “We like to blow things up, watch movies and have fun with the community through outreach.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

HHMI announced Wednesday that CSUSM was among 33 colleges and universities joining 24 institutions selected in 2017 for the Inclusive Excellence Initiative, which aims to catalyze schools’ efforts to engage all students in science regardless of background. That includes underrepresented ethnic minorities, first-generation college students and working adults with families.

“In the College of Science and Mathematics, we are committed to preparing our graduates to be productive members of an agile, resilient and inclusive STEM workforce,” said Katherine Kantardjieff, dean of CSUSM’s College of Science and Mathematics. “This grant will enable us to implement practices that instill creativity, curiosity, critical thinking and innovation in our students, thereby creating academic experiences that help students discover where their interests intersect with the cutting edge of their field.”

Selected schools will work with HHMI and its partner, the Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U), to engage in the process of culture change.

During two rounds of selection in 2017 and 2018, HHMI received applications from 594 colleges and universities. From those, 140 were invited to submit full proposals for plans to develop more inclusive environments for their students.

Each of the selected schools has committed to working closely with HHMI and the AAC&U Inclusive Excellence Commission for five years to evaluate its progress and refine its approach.

CSUSM’s proposal focuses on faculty development in research-based student learning; advising and peer mentoring focused on students’ science identity; and creation of inclusive pedagogies.

About California State University San Marcos

Building on an innovative 28-year history, California State University San Marcos is a forward-focused institution, dedicated to preparing future leaders, building great communities and solving critical issues. Located on a 304-acre hillside overlooking the City of San Marcos, it is the only public four-year comprehensive university serving North San Diego, Southwest Riverside and South Orange Counties.

The University enrolls nearly 17,000 students. With approximately 2,000 employees, the institution is a Great College to Work For® (The Chronicle of Higher Education). As a recipient of the annual HEED Award since 2014—a national honor recognizing U.S. colleges and universities that demonstrate an outstanding commitment to diversity and inclusion—CSUSM is committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment.

In the decades since, women have become much more represented in the growing field of STEM, and Kantardjieff is a proud manifestation of that.

On May 3, Kantardjieff, the dean of the College of Science and Mathematics at Cal State San Marcos, was rewarded for her work at the university as one of six winners (out of more than 70 nominees) of the Pinnacle Award, in the category of Individual in Education. The awards, which honor those who elevate, advance and promote women working in the STEM fields, is given by Athena, a San Diego-based professional association dedicated to advancing women in STEM.

Kantardjieff had been nominated for the Pinnacle Award once before, when she first came to San Marcos as the founding dean of the college in 2011, for her long career as a professor at Cal State Fullerton and Cal Poly Pomona. But the recognition during the gala ceremony at the Hyatt Regency La Jolla was more important to her this time.

“When my name got announced, even though I thought I’d prepared myself, it was unexpected for me,” Kantardjieff said. “I don’t think it really occurred to me how much it meant to me until I actually got up to the podium because I had to stop and collect myself. It still kind of chokes me up. To be honored by your peers like that, it validates your purpose.”

Since Kantardjieff was hired to start up the College of Science and Mathematics, the student population has grown by 131 percent, the faculty has increased by 50 percent, and the number of majors has doubled. But her impact goes beyond mere statistics. With a focus on the needs of the region, she has helped broaden the college to encompass programs as diverse as biotech, cybersecurity, wildfire science and even craft beer. Under her leadership, the college brought software and electrical engineering from concepts to approved programs in only four years.

And she has overseen the development of a college that now includes more than 60 percent female students and a female faculty percentage in the 30s.

“Even though I was honored as an individual, you have to have a team and collaboration, and it takes that incredible faculty and staff to make things happen,” Kantardjieff said. “You have to have good soil to make the garden grow.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

“After that conversation, I started thinking, and it was like, ‘Why don’t I just show him instead of telling him?’ ” Arevalo recalled. “You know, walk the walk, not talk the talk. So I went back to school determined to pursue my lifelong dream of becoming a nurse.”

On May 19, Arevalo graduates from Cal State San Marcos with a bachelor’s degree in nursing. She picks up her diploma a day after her son, Angel Vidrio, secures his bachelor’s degree from CSUSM in biology.

“It’s pretty cool to graduate with your son,” said Arevalo, 39.

“No question,” agreed Angel, 22. “I’m really proud of what we’ve both done.”

Both grew up in San Diego’s North County, Arevalo graduating from San Marcos High School in 1996 and Angel graduating from Vista High School in 2014. Arevalo had planned to go to nursing school after high school, but those plans were put on hold when she became a mom at age 17. Instead, she enrolled at a technical school and secured the training needed to work as a medical assistant for the past 20 years, including 16 at Rady Children’s Hospital in San Diego.

“Going to college wasn’t something I could do at that point,” she said.

That changed when her son entered high school. She enrolled at MiraCosta College as a returning student in 2011. Raising three children (Angel has two younger brothers) and working full time, it wasn’t easy. Initially, one class per semester was all she could handle. But Arevalo persisted and earned her associate degree in liberal arts in May 2015.

She began the nursing program at CSUSM that fall. By that time, Angel was a CSUSM sophomore.

Said Arevalo: “At first, he was like, ‘Great mom. You had to go to the same college I’m going to? You couldn’t pick another one?’ But it’s worked out well. Our schedules are very different. We’ve crossed paths a few times and he’ll say ‘Hi.’ He doesn’t totally ignore me.”

It’s not that bad, Angel said. In fact, Angel, his brothers, his mom and stepdad, and his grandmother all live together just a mile or so from campus. “It’s not as though we don’t see each other.”

But there have been some comical moments.

“The first time we both went to school, my grandma dropped us off and we both got out with our backpacks and I looked at her and said, ‘All right. Have fun. I guess,’ ” Angel said.

The two occasionally run into each other on campus, but not often. Arevalo’s clinical work for her nursing program included assignments at Tri-City Medical Center in Oceanside, Palomar Medical Center in Escondido, the VA Healthcare System in La Jolla, and Balboa Naval Medical Center in San Diego, in addition to an externship at the UCSD Medical Center and an internship at Sharp Grossmont Hospital in La Mesa. Her pediatric rotation was at Rady Children’s Hospital. Between the clinical assignments, studying, and taking care of her family, she had to cut back her hours at work.

“It was brutal, I’m not going to lie,” Arevalo said. “At the beginning of every semester I kept asking myself, ‘Why am I doing this?’ But when you set a goal for yourself and you have the support of your friends and family, you do what you have to do.”

Once she passes the National Council Licensure Examination needed to start working as a registered nurse, Arevalo has a job waiting for her at Rady Children’s Hospital.

“It’s going to be beyond awesome to be able to stay at Rady Children’s Hospital and work with the nurses who have been my mentors over the years,” she said.

Angel will spend the next year at Palomar College preparing for his master’s program in genetic counseling. He’s hoping to enroll at UC Irvine in the fall of 2019.

“It was a great decision to come here,” he said of CSUSM. “I’m glad I was able to share this with my mom.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Honorees were nominated by faculty or staff and endorsed by their college’s dean. Here is a closer look at each award recipient:

Lilia Lopez, B.S. Business Administration with a Marketing focus

President’s Outstanding Graduate

Dean’s Award, College of Business Administration

Dean of Students’ Outstanding Leadership Award

Lilia was not just a student leader at CSUSM. She showed that she truly cares about her fellow students and their future success.

Through her work with the Latino Business Student Association and the Cougar Career Closet, Lilia provided resources for students that will not only help them achieve their goal of receiving a successful college education, but will also increase their chances of finding a job.

Lilia’s drive and determination has turned the LBSA into a thriving student organization helping future Latino leaders by offering employment opportunities, mentorships and useful workshops. The student organization’s success is largely due to Lilia’s role as marketing director as she helped increase membership and engagement of its members.

Lilia was also at the heart of the success of the Career Closet, which provides professional clothing for students throughout the University who may not be able to afford or obtain proper attire for career or professionally related events. She led the effort to launch the closet by organizing all the documentation, designing communication materials and physically sorting through the donations and setting up the room.

Through Lilia’s efforts, a space was allocated in the Career Center, and a College of Business Administration grant funded clothing racks, hangers and shopping bags.

Lilia also mentors students through LBSA’s recently implemented ambassador program in which students interested in graduate school are trained by current members of the student organization. Through this experience, she has discovered her own leadership style and improved her leadership skills.

Last semester, when Lilia and her team delivered a presentation to the City of San Marcos, the city manager questioned whether Lilia and her classmates were truly students due to their professionalism and the quality of their recommendations.

Veronica Gandara, B.S. Biological Sciences

Dean’s Award, College of Science and Mathematics

Growing up in Sweden, Veronica’s father stressed the importance of a good education. Even though he never attended high school, he wanted his daughter to have a better life. Veronica was 12 years old when he died, and her dreams of higher education faded after his death.

After graduating from high school, she traveled to the United States where she met her husband, who encouraged her to return to school. It only took one semester before Veronica realized that she was in the right place. She finally felt like she was headed toward a meaningful future.

Veronica is the first in her family to graduate from college. When her grandmother lost her battle with cervical cancer, Veronica volunteered for the American Cancer Society’s Discovery Shop to honor her grandmother’s memory. Spending time around cancer survivors and later around cancer patients during an internship at Palomar Hospital helped her develop a deep admiration for those affected by disease. She intends to pursue a medical degree in psychiatry.

Veronica excelled in the classroom at CSUSM, graduating with a 4.0 grade-point average despite a challenging course load.

Justin Mulvany, M.S. Mathematics

Dean’s Award, Graduate Studies

Justin will graduate with a 4.0 grade-point average, putting him in elite company. Of the 54 graduate students who have gone through the mathematics master’s program, only two others have achieved this feat.

Justin changed majors twice as an undergraduate, starting in literature and writing studies before moving to economics. He began taking mathematics courses to better prepare for graduate school and discovered an aptitude for proof-based and applied mathematics courses, leading him to switch to a mathematics major. Through his studies, he has obtained a solid foundation in theoretical subjects such as analysis and topology, and their applications to fields like probability theory, optimization and numerical analysis.

While at CSUSM, Justin has also taken the opportunity to teach. Each semester, he was selected for a Graduate Teaching Assistantship. In this role, he assisted professors teaching upper division courses by grading, lecturing and holding office hours. These experiences strengthened his understanding of fundamental mathematical subjects and allowed him to grow as an educator.

Justin will pursue his Ph.D. in Data Science and Operations at the Marshall School of Business at the University of Southern California. His goal is to become a professional academic researcher, using mathematics to study complex problems arising in operations research.

Tomas Simunovic, M.A. in Education

Dean’s Award, College of Education, Health and Human Services

Tomas persevered despite a challenging journey to graduation. Seemingly endless doctor’s appointments and surgeries due to medical issues and physical disability limited his access to education. He has endured 73 surgeries in his life. Through these experiences, he was inspired to support students who, like himself, required a special type of teaching and support.

Tomas said he has received tremendous support over the years from family, educators and CSUSM’s Disability Support Services. This has encouraged him to take every opportunity to “pay it forward” by helping children in the community with disabilities and health needs.

After receiving his bachelor’s in human development in 2013, Tomas worked as an instructional aide for children with disabilities. This is where he discovered his passion to become an education specialist and he returned to CSUSM for his Multiple Subject and Mild/Moderate Education Specialist teaching credentials.

Tomas’ master’s is focused on special education. An education specialist at Rancho Buena Vista High School, he is researching nutrition and how it can support children with autism. His goal is to create a guidebook for parents and teachers that will help support children through diet and nutrition. He hopes to develop this guidebook into a professional development opportunity for educators.

Yomira Zamora, B.A. Criminology & Justice Studies

Dean’s Award, College of Humanities, Arts, Behavioral and Social Sciences

Yomira was honored for her academic achievements, her service to CSUSM and her commitment to enhancing the communities in which she lives and works.

Earning a bachelor’s is just the beginning for Yomira. She plans to attend law school and plans to advocate for people of color and transnational immigrants.

During middle school, Yomira saw how her brothers were funneled into the school-to-prison pipeline. She felt helpless because she was uneducated about the legal system. When her father was deported, she was forced to cross the border every day in order to graduate high school. It is her struggle to be with her family that has motivated her to persevere and fight for her educational dreams.

At CSUSM, Yomira has immersed herself in student organizations. She was elected by the student body to serve as the vice president of Student and University Affairs on the ASI Board of Directors. In this role, she founded the Lobby Corps, an organization for students with a passion for advocating for higher education policy.

Yomira also authored a resolution supporting Project Rebound, a program supporting formerly incarcerated students, and she supports Transitions Collective, a student organization that serves as a support system for system-impacted and formerly incarcerated students.

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

After rising to some 75,000 feet – or nearly 25 miles – high enough to capture the curvature of the Earth, the balloon and its data, carefully tracked by a group of Cal State San Marcos science students, landed safely 56 miles from the launch site.

Welcome to Dr. Michael Burin’s Physics 480 class, which, for the first time tasked students with planning, designing and completing a high-altitude balloon launch aimed at collecting and interpreting data – all part of a hands-on, project-based experience to prepare them for future careers in the sciences.

“It was quite an interesting class,” said Christopher Delgadillo, a senior graduating this spring with a degree in applied physics and plans that include earning a Ph.D. “Unlike any other course I’ve taken in the Department of Physics.”

The mission was straightforward enough.

“I wanted to do something a little different this year, so we decided to try out a high-altitude balloon launch,” Burin said. “The main goal is for students to become more familiar with how to obtain data, while also introducing them to working with teams and deadlines.”

Twenty students broke off into different teams, each provided with operational requirements to meet within a set budget and timeline. Ongoing design reviews were held to improve the probability of mission success. All prototyping, and testing of the payload and flight systems, took place at Open Source Maker Lab in Vista – a high-tech, digital fabrication hub for members to collaborate, innovate, design and build almost anything – under the direction of president Dan Hendricks.

The course culminated with an April 14 launch in Borrego Springs. The landing came 56 miles away outside of Plaster City in the Imperial County desert. Data was analyzed at CSUSM in the following weeks.

“Overall, the project went very well,” said Burin, Department of Physics chair. “It provided our students an opportunity to engage in scientific research outside of the campus, which is what they’re going to be doing in real life.”

Alyssa Martinez agreed. The CSUSM junior is majoring in applied physics with plans to earn a Ph.D. in medical physics and launching a career in oncology. She was responsible for determining where to launch from, what the weather would be like, where to land, and other logistical elements.

“We started from nothing, just an idea,” Martinez said. “We had to determine how to get a payload onto this balloon and send it off into inner space, all while ensuring sensors were properly connected to gauge various data.”

“I greatly enjoyed this project,” Martinez continued. “I’m going to be doing a lot of research in the future, and this was a great exercise in engaging how to engage in research in the real world.”

Her team was so motivated by the effort that several students are taking it upon themselves to improve upon their work and engage in a second launch this summer.

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

But when Jenny visits the families of her parents in their native Mexico, she doesn’t exactly shout out what she has done from the rooftops. She knows that an American university student who happens to know her way around a chemistry lab might be of keen interest to Mexican drug cartels.

“I’ve never heard of anyone being kidnapped for being a biochem major,” she said, “but I wouldn’t want to put myself in that position.”

Or, as Jenny wrote in the commencement speech she submitted, “Whenever I do visit my family in Mexico, I don’t speak of my major, I don’t speak of my accomplishments associated with my major because you never know what ears are listening or what mouths are talking.”

Jenny grew up in Ventura, one of four daughters of Juan and Esperanza Veyna, who both immigrated to the United States and met while working for the same agricultural company in Ventura. Every summer, the girls would pile into their dad’s truck for a road trip to Mexico, where the family would spend several weeks each at a ranch in Jalisco owned by Esperanza’s father and with Juan’s relatives in the city of Zacatecas, more than 200 miles to the north.

“I loved it,” Jenny said. “On my mom’s ranch, we would milk cows in the morning, jump in the manmade lakes, help my grandpa farm. You felt liberated. And on my dad’s side, I had all my cousins there, so I enjoyed all of it. We would find our own fun.”

As Jenny got older, though, the cartel violence grew worse. When she was in high school, Jenny remembers, the family had to cancel a planned trip to Zacatecas because of a string of grisly murders in the city. And then the scourge of the cartels hit disturbingly close to home when two individuals she closely grew up with were kidnapped, both at least four years ago. Reasons for their kidnapping or why they were targeted still remain unknown. Neither has been heard from since, she says, adding, “We don’t know if they’re alive or not.”

Jenny and her twin sister, Jocelyn, both ran cross country and track at Foothill Technology High in Ventura, and their high school coach’s connection to Cougars coach Steve Scott led to them being recruited by Cal State San Marcos. Jenny competed for two years before deciding to concentrate on academics, and during her sophomore year she switched her major from biology to biochemistry because she enjoyed the challenge.

This year, as a senior, she worked in the research laboratory of chemistry professor Robert Iafe on two projects, including a chemical education project in which her goal was to develop an alkene reduction procedure that could be accomplished in a second-semester undergrad organic chemistry lab. The challenge was that the procedure had to be safe, reproducible and limited to only five hours.

“Jenny has really impressed me as a research student,” Iafe said. “Through her experience in reaction planning and troubleshooting, she is learning to become an independent researcher. It is also great to watch her confidence grow in the research setting.”

Jenny liked her time in the lab, but she discovered that the work is too solitary in nature. A people person, she plans to go to physician’s assistant school after graduation.

And at the commencement ceremony, far removed from her parents’ native land, she will feel no compulsion to conceal her area of study.

As she wrote in her speech, “Here at CSUSM, I don’t need to hide from anyone or anything, and I can proudly say: Mom and Dad, I am almost officially a biochemistry graduate, and I hope you are as proud of me as I am of myself.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Until now. Thanks to a three-year, Cal State San Marcos-led effort funded through a National Science Foundation grant, Mitra and nearly 60 other North County high school girls are learning the ins and outs of computer coding as part of a larger effort to increase the number of women motivated to pursue careers in the field of information communication technology. The grant’s second year culminates with an April 28 showcase at Rancho Bueno Vista High School, where participants – who belong to what they affectionately refer to as the CodeQueens Club – will talk about their projects, detail the technology involved, and answer questions from judges.

“We’ve learned so much over the past year, it’s going to be exciting to show how far we’ve come,” said Mitra, who was part of a team that created an educational game app addressing environmental issues. “We’ve worked so hard as a team and have been so determined to develop this app. We’re really looking forward to it.”

Presentations at the April 28 showcase are scheduled to begin 1:30 p.m. at the Rancho Buena Vista High School Performing Art Center, 1601 Longhorn Drive in Vista, 92081. Awards will be announced at 3:15 p.m. CodeQueens from Rancho Buena Vista High, Mission Hills High, San Marcos High, San Pasqual High, and Oceanside High schools will be there with family and friends.

“Most of these girls had no coding experience and knew next to nothing about computer science before they became involved with this program,” said Dr. Anna Woodcock, research faculty at the CSUSM Psychology Department who is a co-principal investigator for the grant officially known as “Inspiring Commitment for STEM Career Paths through Extended Women’s Hackathons.” Dr. Youwen Ouyang, who chairs CSUSM's Computer Science and Information Systems Department, is the principal investigator on the project and Dr. Moses Ochanji, an associate professor in the College of Education, Health and Human Services' School of Education, is a co-principal investigator on the grant.

Unlike traditional, all-day hackathons, the extended “hackathon” stretches over 16 weeks and involves teaching girls from five North County high schools how to design a computer game, how to code, how to work in teams, and how to manage a project.

“There is a persistent underrepresentation of women in coding and computer science, especially among women of color, and among Latinas in particular,” Woodcock said. “The showcase is an opportunity for these students to say, ‘Hey, I’m here, and look what I can do!’ ”

Suzanne Newman, a Mission Hills High School journalism instructor who encouraged Mitra to take part in the CodeQueens Club, said the impact of the grant-funded effort is beyond profound.

“I have students who come from poverty-stricken backgrounds who feel empowered by the coding skills they have learned in CodeQueens,” she said. “I have students who don't even have their own computer at home, who have learned about a whole new world and new career choices because of the guidance they are receiving from CodeQueens tutors at Cal State San Marcos. “I also have students who had no idea that coding skills could be used in such a variety of career choices from nursing to business.”

Added Woodcock: “This showcase illustrates to others that just because someone may not have access to a computer or WiFi at home, or have an AP class in computer science at their high school, or may not have a parent or family friend who is a programmer, that does not mean that they can’t learn how to code and won’t have a seat at the tech table. These girls are incredibly creative and bright and have many skills and a lot of promise. It’s up to us to help them realize that promise.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

It turned out to be a good move.

“I signed up for a general chemistry course, and it just changed my life,” Oakley said. “I was captivated at how from a small set of elements we can design and create vastly complex molecules that serve to benefit humankind in so many different ways.”

His passion is paying off. With plans to enroll in a Ph.D. program this fall, Oakley was chosen as a finalist for the Glenn Nagel Undergraduate Student Research Award at the 30^th Annual California State University Biotechnology Symposium in Santa Clara from Jan. 11-13. A student team led by Oakley and mentored by Professor Robert Iafe investigated new chemical methods for designing molecules using gold catalysis to synthesize a structural scaffolding found in various medications. Oakley mastered a novel, multi-step synthesis of a 1,1‐diarylmethane, resulting in a presenting-author manuscript submitted to an international peer-reviewed organic chemistry journal.

Oakley’s was one of several CSUSM teams at the symposium.

“I’m just really happy to represent my school and the Iafe Lab at Cal State San Marcos,” Oakley said. “A lot of hard work went into this research, and it truly is an honor to be recognized.”

The symposium is among the most prestigious of its kind in California, and it brings together CSU students, faculty and administrators with biotech professionals working in academia, government and industry in an effort at broadening exposure to cutting-edge biotechnologies and innovation, and the spectrum of career paths available in the life sciences.

“The CSUPERB Symposium gives students a unique opportunity to discuss their scientific discoveries with a wide scientific audience,” Iafe said. “The chemical transformation that James researched simply cannot be found in an organic chemistry textbook because it wasn’t discovered yet. Students at CSUSM are truly pushing the frontiers of science.”

Iafe’s research interests are in manipulating organic compounds for pharmaceutical uses, and he is known for involving students in his projects. In 2016, Iafe earned the Award for Outstanding Faculty Student Collaboration, Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry, at CSUSM.

Oakley will enter a Ph.D. program in organic chemistry this fall. He has so far received offers of admission from Princeton University, the University of Wisconsin and the University of Illinois. His goal is to become a medical chemist and develop new compounds to treat various maladies.

Not bad for a student who never took more than the required science courses to graduate from Valley Center High School.

“My success speaks to the impact that Cal State San Marcos has,” said Oakley, who still draws often and sometimes sells his artwork online. “It’s such an amazing place, a school that allows you to find out what you’re really interested in and where the student-faculty collaboration is so special.”

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Haynes made the announcement during her 14th annual Report to the Community address in front of more than 600 individuals representing a broad cross section of regional business, nonprofit, education and government leadership.

“Their visionary support will create the future Viasat Engineering Pavilion,” Haynes told attendees, “with funding to renovate classroom and lab space, purchase new equipment and instrumentation, and support the work of our faculty and students — quite literally creating pathways to educate the next generation of talented engineers.”

Building on the success and reputation of CSUSM’s Computer Science & Information Systems and Physics programs, the University will begin its Bachelor of Science in software engineering this fall with a degree in electrical engineering anticipated to begin in fall 2019.

“Viasat is engaged with CSUSM and our community for the common good, moving forward together to enhance the intellectual and economic life of our region and the state,” said Katherine Kantardjieff, dean of CSUSM’s College of Science and Mathematics. “Viasat believes in the University’s importance in our region’s success.”

Other private-sector partners are also investing in engineering at CSUSM. San Marcos-based Hunter Industries has made a $100,000 gift to fund a design lab that will be a hub of collaboration, hands-on design and innovation.

“Viasat and Hunter Industries are sending a strong message that an investment in CSUSM is a strong one, with qualified, workforce-ready graduates as the almost immediate return,” Haynes said. “Together, we are stepping forward to expand the boundaries of what is possible, for our University and for our region.”

The gifts from Viasat and Hunter Industries are part of CSUSM’s $50 million campaign, Forward Together, a united effort to prepare tomorrow’s leaders, build great communities and solve critical issues. Learn more about the campaign online.

About California State University San Marcos

Building on an innovative 28-year history, California State University San Marcos is a forward-focused institution, dedicated to preparing future leaders, building great communities and solving critical issues. Located on a 304-acre hillside overlooking the City of San Marcos, it is the only public four-year comprehensive university serving North San Diego, Southwest Riverside and South Orange Counties.

The University enrolls nearly 17,000 students. With approximately 2,000 employees, the institution is a Great College to Work For® (The Chronicle of Higher Education). As a recipient of the annual HEED Award since 2014—a national honor recognizing U.S. colleges and universities that demonstrate an outstanding commitment to diversity and inclusion—CSUSM is committed to creating a diverse and inclusive environment.

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President Karen Haynes announced during her annual Report to the Community address that Carlsbad-based global communications company Viasat, together with several employees, has invested $1.5 million to become the founding partner of the CSUSM engineering program.

“Their visionary support will create the future Viasat Engineering Pavilion,” Haynes told more than 600 attendees, “with funding to renovate classroom and lab space, purchase new equipment and instrumentation, and support the work of our faculty and students — quite literally creating pathways to educate the next generation of talented engineers.”

Building on the success and reputation of CSUSM’s Computer Science & Information Systems and Physics programs, the University will begin its Bachelor of Science in software engineering this fall with a degree in electrical engineering soon to follow.

“Viasat is engaged with CSUSM and our community for the common good, moving forward together to enhance the intellectual and economic life of our region and the state,” said Katherine Kantardjieff, dean of CSUSM’s College of Science and Mathematics. “Viasat believes in the University’s importance in our region’s success.”

Other private-sector partners are also investing in engineering at CSUSM. San Marcos-based Hunter Industries has made a $100,000 gift to fund a design lab that will be a hub of collaboration, hands-on design and innovation.

“Viasat and Hunter Industries are sending a strong message that an investment in CSUSM is a strong one, with qualified, workforce-ready graduates as the almost immediate return,” Haynes said. “Together, we are stepping forward to expand the boundaries of what is possible, for our University and for our region.”

An engineering feasibility study was conducted on behalf of CSUSM in 2015, confirming what the University has long believed – it’s a much-needed program in the region. While there are other engineering programs in Southern California, the study highlighted how CSUSM is in a prime position to draw from existing curricula and faculty expertise while appealing to the hiring needs and goals of local industry.

In September 2016, CSUSM was awarded a $6 million, five-year grant under the Hispanic-Serving Institutions STEM Program, providing foundational funding for the engineering program.

With Thursday’s announcement of the Viasat gift, the University is continuing to secure the funding that will make the engineering program a success.

“Perhaps the biggest contribution to our future workforce is the work that Viasat is doing with CSUSM to develop signature engineering programs that address critical workforce needs,” Kantardjieff said. “Viasat’s major financial commitment to our new engineering programs indicates a shared commitment to building a regional comprehensive university that meets the needs of our region and the state.

“With Viasat’s support, we will be able to create and sustain engineering programs of exceptional quality that will provide transformational and life-changing opportunities for our students.”

The gifts from Viasat and Hunter Industries are part of CSUSM’s $50 million campaign, Forward Together, a united effort to prepare tomorrow’s leaders, build great communities and solve critical issues. Learn more about the campaign online.

Media Contact

Eric Breier, Public Affairs Specialist

ebreier@csusm.edu | Office: 760-750-7314

Despite her encouragement and his desire to pursue higher education, there was still the matter of preparing for the rigors of college as a first-generation student.

As Damien began applying to schools, he received an email that would change his path. It was from ACE Scholars Services, which supports former foster youth at Cal State San Marcos.

“ACE helped me ease into the college transition,” Damien said. “Back in Moreno Valley, my foster mom always told me I needed to go to college. But no one in the family went to college so no one knew how to prepare me. I knew what I needed to do grade-wise, but from that point it was ACE guiding me on the next steps.”

Damien completed those next steps, graduating from CSUSM in December with a bachelor’s in computer science.

“Damien is an inspiration,” said Jim Mickelson, the founder and director of ACE Scholars Services. “He had to face some incredible barriers to reach his goal, but he never wavered from his dream. His story is the story of CSUSM.”

Now Damien is preparing for a new adventure – a move to Tokyo where he will work as a front-end developer for Togo Securities.

Taking a beginning course in Japanese at CSUSM led Damien to spend a year studying abroad in Japan.

Damien immersed himself in Japanese culture while studying abroad, even choosing not to live in a dorm with other English speakers so he could better learn the nuances of the language.

The time he spent in Japan fueled a desire to return, and Damien continued to study Japanese when he returned to CSUSM, always with the plan to pursue his dream of moving there after graduation. But those dreams nearly were derailed two years ago after the death of his foster mother.

“I had no motivation to study and do schoolwork,” he said. “Even though I was seeing the counselor, grade-wise everything was dropping. Combined with what had happened, I thought I was going to have to drop out of school.”

Damien said Mickelson got him the help he needed so that he could continue working toward his degree.

“He knew something was wrong,” Damien said. “At the time, I didn’t want to talk to anyone, but I’m thankful for it now.

“I had no idea how much support I would get from ACE when I came to CSUSM. I thought I’d be able to come in and talk to them, but it went way deeper than that.”

Said Mickelson: “It has been a joy working with Damien. He is a special young man who will go far.”

Damien also credits computer science professor Rika Yoshii not only for helping in his studies, but also for providing valuable advice on landing a job in Japan. Damien, who worked in CSUSM’s Instructional & Information Technology Services department for most of his time at the University, said Yoshii recommended that he visit Boston for a job forum that includes numerous Japanese companies.

By the time he returned from the forum, Damien was receiving emails from Japanese recruiting companies attracted by his skill set.

As he prepares to embark on a new chapter in his life, Damien is grateful for his time at CSUSM.

“There was a time when I thought I wouldn’t make it,” he said. “I’m thankful I was able to get to this point.”