Each year hundreds of CSUSM friends and donors, regional business and civic leaders, alumni, faculty, students and staff attend the annual gala. This year, guests will enjoy an enchanting evening with live music, casino games, silent and live auctions, gourmet dining, hosted cocktails and dancing. Proceeds from the event support innovative research, student programming and the professional development of faculty. Tickets are still available for $250 a person.

"For over 26 years, Cal State San Marcos has proudly worked to prepare its students as tomorrow’s leaders, build great communities and solve critical issues,” said CSUSM Foundation Board Chairman Jack Raymond. “Join us as we celebrate this truly unique university and raise funds to promote its future success.”

CSUSM would also like to thank this year’s sponsors:

Gold Sponsors ($10,000)

CSUSM Extended Learning

The QUAD

Tri-City Medical Center

Silver Sponsors ($5,000)

Hunter Industries

Jack and Caroline Raymond

Rincon Band of Luiseño Indians

Stone Brewing, Co.

University Auxiliary and Research Services Corporation (UARSC)

Cocktail Reception Sponsor ($5,000)

Markstein Beverage Co.

Table Sponsors ($3,000)

Community Strategies Group, Inc. & Newland Communities

CSU Institute for Palliative Care at San Marcos

CSUSM Alumni Association

CSUSM College of Business Administration

CSUSM College of Education, Health and Human Services

CSUSM College of Humanities, Arts, Behavioral and Social Sciences

CSUSM College of Science and Mathematics

CSUSM Community Engagement

Josh & Jacqueline Pack

Kaiser Permanente

Palomar Health

PCL Construction / Gensler

Carmen Rene

The San Diego Foundation

ViaSat, Inc.

Vista Community Clinic

Welk Resorts

Valet Sponsor ($2,000)

Cox Communications, Inc.

Sponsorships are still available. For more information as well as ticket sales, visit: www.csusm.edu/gala or call 760-750-4408.

Formal Launch

CSUSM President Karen Haynes officially kicked off the campaign during an on-campus event on Sunday, September 20 attended by approximately 200 key donors, community leaders, alumni, students, faculty and staff in the University Student Union ballroom.

“Donor support is already making a real difference at our University,” said President Karen Haynes. “Today, it’s time to take our efforts to the next level through our first major philanthropic campaign. No other university in the CSU system, and likely in the nation, has attempted a comprehensive fund raising campaign at our age. Our goal is audaciously bold, but it befits our audaciously bold aspirations.”

Since CSUSM began the campaign’s quiet phase to prioritize needs and establish fund raising goals, donors have contributed more than $26 million—bringing the campaign nearly halfway to its goal.

Regional philanthropist Darlene Shiley provided the lead gift to Forward Together with a donation of $3 million, supporting the CSU Institute for Palliative Care, launched at Cal State San Marcos in 2012.

“I’m a proud Cal State San Marcos donor,” Shiley remarked at the campaign launch event. “It is three years to the day that we launched the Institute for Palliative Care. And whether it’s through the Institute or through the work of the professors here, all working side-by-side in matters related to everything from health, education, economics, the environment, the arts, sciences, business…this university is advancing innovation in great areas that we need to be looking at.”

Forward Together is designed to build upon the University’s 25-year history of serving the region of Northern San Diego, Southwest Riverside and South Orange Counties. The theme is a tribute to the groundswell of partnerships and community support that initially advocated for the university and has continued to sustain and grow it over the years.

“Like our University, this campaign will succeed because of the collective contributions of countless individuals,” said Haynes. “It starts here and it starts now. Working together, we are capable of incredible things.”

Preparing, Building, Solving

Jack Raymond, chair of the CSUSM Foundation Board and a leading community supporter since the University’s inception said, “What we have achieved since opening our doors 25 years ago has been truly remarkable—but we can’t stop here. The need within our region is extensive and the demand on our University is great. Undertaken at this pivotal moment in our institutional and regional history, our campaign is not just inevitable, it’s imperative. We must succeed—and we will succeed!”

The campaign is focused on enhancing CSUSM’s strengths by:

• Preparing Tomorrow’s Leaders

• Building Great Communities

• Solving Critical Issues

The highest campaign priority, with a total fundraising goal of $25 million, addresses the need to prepare students to become tomorrow’s leaders through scholarships, working scholarships and graduate fellows as well as through the support of CSUSM’s one-of-a-kind programs for former foster youth, veterans and other at-risk populations.

Another $5 million will go toward initiatives that build great communities through The Alliance to Accelerate Excellence in Education and K-12 outreach, athletics, on-campus artistic and cultural performances, and enhanced university art venues, rehearsal spaces and laboratories.

The campaigns goals also include $20 million for solving critical issues through innovative academic programs, cutting-edge research and faculty development as well as via the CSU Institute for Palliative Care at Cal State San Marcos.

Generous Supporters

Since the quiet phase of the campaign began in January 2012, hundreds of donors have made gifts of every size to the campus. Notable donations include:

• $3 million from regional philanthropist Darlene Shiley for the CSU Institute for Palliative Care. Palliative care is health care that focuses on relief of suffering and improving quality of life for those with serious or chronic illness. A portion of Shiley’s gift helped launched the Institute at CSUSM in 2012.

  $1 million from CSUSM Foundation Board Member Esther Stearns and her wife, Jan, for ACE Scholars Services, a unique program that provides services and resources to former foster youth.In recognition of their gift, the University named the program’s newly renovated space the Jan and Esther Stearns Center for ACE Scholars.

• $1 million from the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians to CSUSM’s California Indian Culture and Sovereignty Center in support of research and efforts to preserve the heritage of Californian Indians. Opened in 2011, the Center is the only one of its kind for the state, facilitating a sense of community and belonging among the Native population both on and off campus.

• Over $700,000 from Price Philanthropies for the Alliance to Accelerate Excellence in Education, the umbrella organization that administers CSUSM’s ten guaranteed admission agreements with regional school districts. These agreements help students become college-ready with the aim of reducing high school dropout rates and increasing college access to the most at-risk and underserved populations.

• A generous provision from his estate through a planned gift from CSUSM Administrator Emeritus Peter Zwick to provide scholarships for international students coming to CSUSM and the Zwick Study Abroad Scholarship, which assists students who want to study abroad for a full semester or longer.

CSUSM will update supporters on campaign goals and progress through its newly launched campaign website: www.csusm.edu/forwardtogether.

“I got a call from the athletic director at Cal State San Marcos while I was driving from Fresno to Los Angeles,” Saia recalled. “I had never heard of Cal State San Marcos before, but I drove down, took a look around and thought, `Wow, this is a great school with great people, and it would be great to start a program from the ground up.’”

Indeed, when Saia arrived in 2010 Cal State San Marcos didn’t even have a basketball program.

He has since built a powerhouse. The Cougars have won 30 or more games in back-to-back seasons, were voted No. 1 in National Association of Intercollegiate (NAIA) rankings 11 times and have made three consecutive trips to the NAIA National Championships tournament.

“He started from nothing and went out and found athletic players who were fun to watch,” said San Diego Union-Tribune sportswriter John Maffei. “He has really brought a lot to the university.”

Now Saia and the Cougars are taking the next step in their journey: the University this fall competes in its inaugural season at the NCAA Division II level. That comes after CSUSM earlier this year broke ground on a state-of-the-art, on-campus arena that will allow the Cougars to play its home games at home. Until now, `home’ games were played at MiraCosta College gym in Oceanside.

“The new Sports Center is going to be a rallying point for the region,” said Saia. “Having supportive fans in the stands allow our student athletes to perform at their maximum potential. When you add a great team with a great home fan base, you are a formidable opponent.”

The competition will be tougher at the NCAA level, the Cadillac of college hoops. What’s more, CSUSM's new conference, the California Collegiate Athletic Association (CCAA), is the premier league in NCAA Division II. Its teams have combined for 153 Division II national championships—the most of any conference in the country. But CSUSM is ready to represent.

“It’s exciting to be a part of the NCAA and the CCAA conference,” Saia said. “It’s an excellent conference with excellent coaches, so it will be a challenge. The schedule from top to bottom is pretty tough. But basketball is basketball no matter if it’s NCAA Division I or NAIA. The fundamentals don’t change. You’re helping to mentor and develop student athletes so they can get a degree and be successful in life. As for the game itself, if you don’t execute, you’re not going to be successful.”

Saia has found success everywhere he’s gone. As the starting point guard at Sir Francis Drake High School in Marin County, Saia helped lead his team to capture two California state championships during his junior and senior seasons in 1981 and 1982.

A talented recruiter and an offensive mastermind, Saia came to CSUSM with 14 years of coaching experience on the NCAA Division I level, including a seven-year tenure as the top assistant coach at UCLA and one year at USC. Saia has helped more than 15 players onto rosters of NBA teams, including Baron Davis, Earl Watson, Jason Kapono, Nick Young and Matt Barnes. He also has coached at UC Berkeley, Indiana State, Fresno State and Columbia College, in addition to Fresno Pacific.

Saia’s first year at CSUSM was spent establishing the new basketball program. He attracted a crop of NCAA Division I and junior college standouts to join him at San Marcos, and immediately scheduled exhibitions against NCAA Division I programs. The first game the new Cougars played was an exhibition against a San Diego State University team coming off a Sweet 16 appearance. At a nearly sold-out Viejas Arena in San Diego, Saia’s squad made a run every time SDSU started to pull away.

“It was like the movie Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid where Butch and Sundance keep looking back at this posse that’s chasing them and asking, `Who are those guys?’” Saia said. “That’s what the SDSU folks were saying.”

Forward Together: Cougar Athletics

Today, the Cougars are on the map. And so is the CSUSM Athletics Department, which is now raising funds for student-athlete scholarships, athlete services and The Sports Center. Together, these initiatives are part of the growing momentum for creating a stronger community not only at Cal State San Marcos but beyond.

“Over the program’s history, generous students and donors have helped us transform dirt lots into athletic fields, enabling lifelong lessons in teamwork, persistence and leadership,” said Director of Athletics Jennifer Milo. “With campaign support, we can further enhance playing and practice facilities, grow scholarships and provide our student-athletes with an even greater experience so that they can be the best that they can be. In doing so, we also create a powerful source of Cougar pride.”

And as for Saia, he is as excited about the future as he’s ever been.

“We envision this program to grow into a top contender on the NCAA Division II level.”

To learn more about Forward Together: The Campaign for California State University San Marcos and how you can help build great communities through athletics or other initiatives, visit: www.csusm.edu/forwardtogether

Lacking family support, Karen fought through self-doubt, wondering if she would be able to finish her degree. She credits ACE Scholars Services—CSUSM’s one-of-a-kind program serving former foster youth—for providing the guidance, support and listening ear that helped her rise above the difficult circumstances of her childhood to succeed in college.

“As a student from ACE Scholars Services, I am represented, known and loved. They are my family,” she said.

ACE Scholars Services connected Karen to academic and career support services and helped her navigate the complex financial aid and registration process, allowing her to focus her energy on her studies. The Jan and Esther Stearns Center for ACE Scholars has become a new haven, a place where she can study, receive guidance and connect with fellow students.

“Despite not growing up with a traditional family, I try to surround myself with people that support me and help me improve," said Karen. "The ACE staff always make themselves available and they truly care."

An undergraduate in biotechnology, Karen had the opportunity this past summer to gain hands-on scientific experience through the Summer Scholars Program, a coveted research-based internship where students work in labs on campus under the oversight of science faculty members. Her faculty mentor, biology professor Betsy Read, supervised Karen’s research on the mutation rate of a strain of marine algae when exposed to ultraviolet light.

“In my laboratory student-researchers are invaluable in terms of moving high-risk experiments forward to help advance new areas of study,” said Read. “Students like Karen bring energy and fresh ideas to a topic and often stimulate me to think in new and different ways.”

Forward Together: Offering Support and Changing the Statistics

Jim Mickelson, director of ACE Scholars Services, knows how high the odds are stacked against foster youth seeking brighter futures. He says only about half of foster youth nationwide obtain a high school degree. And of those graduates only about three to five percent attend college, with half of those students actually earning a four-year degree.

“Over the now almost four decades that I have been a social worker in child welfare, I’ve explored every way possible to improve the quality of life for young people,” said Mickelson. “I worked in child abuse prevention; I worked to change public policies to serve more children; I even worked one-on-one with foster youth. Through it all I eventually came to the belief that one true thing can best help challenged youth—education. Education is key.”

Since the program’s founding in 2007, CSUSM has established memorandums of understanding with two counties—San Diego and Riverside—to ensure that young people emerging from foster care in the University’s region will have a guaranteed seat if they meet admission standards. CSUSM also guarantees admission to graduates of San Pasqual Academy, a residential high school for foster youth in Escondido.

ACE Scholars Services is truly making a difference. Over three times as many foster youth persist to graduation at CSUSM compared to their peers at other universities nationwide. And now through the campaign, Cal State San Marcos is raising funds for scholarships, working scholarships and expanded programming, ensuring that ACE Scholars Services can help former foster youth excel academically and personally.

As for Karen, she plans to finish her degree next May and has plans for a career in healthcare administration where she can combine her passions for science and helping others with her gifts in leadership.

“As ACE Scholars we are all trying to break the statistics,” she said. “We know the odds are stacked against us but we want to impact and inspire other students like us.”

To learn more about Forward Together: The Campaign for California State University San Marcos and how you can help prepare tomorrow’s leaders through ACE Scholars Service and other initiatives, visit: www.csusm.edu/forwardtogether.

Professors who work closely with the Institute say integrating curriculum from different disciplines—also known as interprofessional education—is common sense. Suzanne Moineau, a speech-language pathologist and chair of the Department of Speech-Language Pathology at CSUSM, is among them.

“Quality of life is a central element of what we’re teaching in speech-language pathology, and palliative care is all about improving quality of life in individuals with chronic illness and their families,” said Moineau. “Most health care professionals at one point or another work with people with chronic conditions, so palliative care is critical.”

Moineau has been supportive of the California State University Institute for Palliative Care since it was established at Cal State San Marcos three years ago, and she served on a planning and implementation committee that took the early lead in planning for activities specific to the CSUSM campus. The Institute is a statewide initiative to educate current and future health care professionals, as well as community members, to ensure that patients who are living with serious or chronic illness and their families have access to palliative care. The California State University Institute for Palliative Care now includes centers at seven CSU campuses.

Palliative care has been shown to extend the life of a patient, improve his or her quality of life and reduce stress on caregivers and families, and Moineau was among the faculty members from four different departments of the College of Education, Health and Human Services at CSUSM who collaborated last year with consultants from the California State University Institute for Palliative Care to pilot, the Palliative Care Interprofessional Experience for Students, an interprofessional education program with a palliative care focus. Using the framework developed by the Institute, over several months, faculty from the School of Nursing and the Departments of Kinesiology, Social Work and Speech Language Pathology developed two palliative case studies based on actual patients with chronic obstructive pulmonary disease and traumatic brain injury.

“At the Institute we rely on faculty to work with us to integrate palliative care interdisciplinary practice into student learning” said Helen McNeal, executive director of the CSU Institute for Palliative Care. “We are grateful to the faculty and students at CSUSM for being the pioneers on this project and for being such dedicated supporters of our work, right from day one.”

Sixteen students then participated in interprofessional team activities, including a problem-based learning component and simulated patient/family interviews. CSUSM faculty and Institute consultants will discuss the project in detail during the Second Annual CSU Palliative Care Symposium scheduled for Oct. 6 and 7 in San Marcos.

Molly Abbott, who graduated from CSUSM last spring, took part in the interprofessional education project. Now she’s a speech pathologist at Scripps Memorial Hospital in La Jolla.

“My understanding of palliative care prior to the IPE project was limited,” Abbott said. “I thought palliative care was confined to hospice or end-of-life care. Taking part in the project showed me that palliative care goes far beyond that and is really about improving the quality of life for any patient with any chronic condition. It’s all about comfort care.”

An example of how palliative care works can be found at the CSUSM Speech-Language Clinic where graduate students—under the guidance and supervision of state-licensed and nationally certified speech-language pathologists—are incorporating palliative care in serving people with neurological impairments to improve speech, language and cognitive skills.

Wrote one client in the clinic’s newsletter, The Wave:

“Now, in my third semester of being a client at CSUSM, I am living much more independently than before. I can now cook a meal for myself (healthier and less expensive than always eating out!), and through being aware of how I handle my divided attention, I can accomplish more things. Therefore, I can keep up with the speed of life.”

Forward Together: The Critical Need for Palliative Care

The need for palliative care is reaching critical proportions. By 2030, 1 in 5 Americans will be over the age of 65, and 90 percent of Americans will have at least one serious or chronic condition. Now, Cal State San Marcos is raising funds through its historic campaign to support the Institute in addressing the critical shortage of nursing, social work, spiritual and other professionals with palliative care skills and training—and to refine the model being developed locally for replication at other interested universities across California.

Sharon Hammill, a CSUSM professor of psychology who serves as faculty director for the CSUS Institute for Palliative Care at Cal State San Marcos emphasizes the case for support.

“We need to focus on educating both the current and future health care workforce so that everyone who needs palliative care will be able to get it,” she said. “By integrating palliative care into the curriculum for health care professionals, in addition to broad-based integration across the curriculum in other disciplines, we are training future doctors, nurses and social workers in palliative care practices, as well as educating consumers of health care services.”

To learn more about Forward Together: The Campaign for California State University San Marcos and how you can help solve critical issues through the CSU Institute for Palliative Care or other initiatives, visit: www.csusm.edu/forwardtogether.