|
|
Cool RSS Feeds
Comedians
Financial
Musicians
News
|
|
Long Beach City College
The Viking Newspaper
Spring, 2013
I'm the Copy Chief and a Staff Writer for The Viking Newspaper at Long Beach City College. Sometimes, my articles don't make it into the print edition, so here is an archive of my unpublished articles.
If you'd like to read published articles I've written and the rest of The Viking Newspaper, click here to read those articles.
LBCC Chorale Students visit NYC and Yosemite
May 2, 2013
Last week, 32 choral students visited New York, Yosemite, California and Fresno, California on a cross-country trip to sing and invite high school seniors to attend LBCC.
While the students were in New York, they visited several high schools, to recruit new students for LBCC’s music department. They stopped at Lakewood, Wilson, Cabrillo and Jordan high schools and connected with young minds.
Sarah Twilley, 30, a chorale arts major and the ASB Representative of Arts, said, “The bus ride is a great part of the whole tour experience. (It’s) a chance to chat with choir members you don't know as well.”
Daniel Diaz, 20, a music major, said, “I played the clarinet and bass clarinet. My most memorable experience was going to the Broadway showing of Matilda. I loved that movie growing up as a kid and seeing it on Broadway was just awesome. The music was great and I enjoyed getting to meet some of the actors and musicians afterwards.”
Diaz is transferring to either Cal State Long Beach or Cal State Dominguez Hills. He wants to become a music teacher at a high school or college, but he also wants to continue playing with small ensembles.
Guitar major Steve Garland played one of his solos at two of the concerts and percussion major Ricardo Alvarado also had the opportunity to play drums on a few pieces. Stephen Shaw-Naar accompanied the group by playing piano.
The reason for traveling around the country was “to get out and perform! Without a doubt, singing at the base of Yosemite Falls (was most memorable). We all hiked up there as a group and then sang three of our pieces over the sounds of the roaring water! We started attracting a tiny audience as well. It was just a thrill!” Twilley said.
Stopping at Fresno State University, they worked with choral music education specialist Tony Mowrer. Mowrer preached to the choir and taught the conductors.
Another highlight of the trip was performing at two churches, Sierra Lutheran Church in Auberry, California and the Yosemite Valley Chapel, where they played to a full house.
LBCC’s choir department takes two trips each year. The first one is in Spring and the other one is in Fall. This Fall, choir students are traveling to San Francisco to attend the Music Association of California Community Colleges conference. At the MACCC conference, students will join singers from across the state to form one big choir. After rehearsing with a guest conductor for three days, they will perform in front of an audience.
The Spring 2014 trip will be to San Luis Obispo, California.
Custodian Rena Phen Wins an Award
May 2, 2013
LBCC Custodian Rena Pheng won a classified employee of the year award for her excellent work on campus, after being nominated by LBCC’s Board of Trustees.
“When all is said and done, LBCC really is the best place to work at. Cheap, yet a great education. (There are) easy going colleagues, understanding and supportive directors, including administrators. What more can a girl ask for, besides bright and shiny things?” she said.
Phen thanks the Board for nominating her and wishes everyone success and happiness. Her and four other nominees received this year’s awards, which includes $500 and a plaque.
Students Puzzled About New School Sign
April 18, 2013
On Monday, April 8, the LAC’s A building was finished and open for business, but the engraving didn’t reflect the college’s name.
Instead of writing, “Long Beach City College,” the sign says, “Long Beach Community College.” It is unclear whether it’s just an error or whether the artist intended to add the word “District” at the end because the former doesn’t exist and the latter does.
Austin Chase, 19, an audio production student, said, “I didn’t notice it until today.” It was Tuesday, but it was Chase’s first day back from Spring Break because he doesn’t have Monday classes. “That sign says City College,” he said as he pointed to another sign. “This sign says community,” he said and pointed to the engraved sign.
ASB Treasurer, Kristen Payne, said, “I like the idea that it makes you think about the fact that we are a community within Long Beach, but I hope the school will fix it before the Fall semester of new students.” She added that she’s very curious to hear what the school will say.
Mark Taylor, Director of College Advancement, Public Affairs and Governmental Relations said, “College staff noticed the error during installation, but due to the design and type of construction it was deemed too costly to change.” Taylor described it as an oversight by CS Legacy, the construction company and said it would be too costly to change or fix.
Ronald Johnson, 27, a radio and television major, said, “It should say Long Beach City College, not Long Beach Community College.” He noticed how a sign directly behind it said the college’s name correctly. “We should also get some more plants in here. This is a city, not a desert,” he added.
Ben Fernandez, 30, a nursing student, said, “I think they could fix it, but it doesn’t bother me too much. I’m just glad the construction is done.”
Long Beach’s Vice-Mayor Robert Garcia, who helped push for the ballot measure to fund campus upgrades did not return our request for comment.
Generous Students Donate Blood and Bone Marrow
April 18, 2013
Students give blood donations and schedule bone marrow donation appointments.
The American Red Cross and Asians For Miracle Marrow Matches visited the LAC on April 10 to take blood from students and sign them up for bone marrow donations.
Crystal Winston, 25, a kinesiology major, said, “I’m happy! I get to save three lives. I just squeezed a ball three times and it didn’t hurt. The only thing that hurt was getting my finger pricked,” she said.
According to Amy Papageorges, Senior Acting Manager of the American Red Cross, they collected about 75 donations. She was pleased with the amount of units and said it was similar to past collections.
Karen Plaza, 19, a nursing student, said, “They found my vein on the first time.” Plaza was nervous because she didn’t know if they’d be able to find her vein, but she said it took about 30 minutes and no problem occurred.
Unlike the last blood drive, this time a bone-marrow collection company visited. Hispanic outreach and recruitment coordinator Sara Arroyo said about 20 people signed up for the registry. Their table connected them with potential student donors, but donations were taken at a later date.
The next campus blood drive is Wednesday, May 1 and Thursday, May 2 at the LAC.
Students Experience Mixed Results With WiFi
April 18, 2013
The campus WiFi speed varies depending on your location at school.
When students want the strongest WiFi signal, they won’t find it near the B, C, F, O2 or MM buildings because they’re using older technology.
Racy In, 25, a nursing major, likes to use the Internet in the Library. “I use it on my laptop in the library and on campus, but it drops, sometimes,” he said.
“We see on average over 3,400 concurrent users on our wireless network Monday through Thursday. In a single semester, we have seen over 20,000 unique devices that have connected to our network including, cell phones, tablets, laptops, iPods, etc.,” said Associate Vice President of IITS Jay Field. He also said the strongest signals are coming from the new buildings from the bond project T, DD/EE and A.
When asked about viruses, Field said, “We do not have many problems with viruses since the traffic is limited to HTTP/HTTPS and it is firewalled from the internal LBCC network. However, we do see many machines that connect to our network that are infected. We encourage users to make sure their personal machines have up-to-date anti-virus protection.”
Ian Eung, 32, a business accounting major, said, “I like it. I use it in the library with my laptop and it’s reliable.” Eung is finishing his associates degree this semester and continuing his education at Cal State University Dominguez.
LBCC uses 208 access points to deliver the internet to students. Access points deliver wireless internet to users by connecting to a wired network or router. According to Field, the college has 26 Aruba (802.11n), 112 Cisco (802.11n) and 70 Cisco (802.11g) access points around campus. The Wireless N machines run at approximately 100 Mbps and the Wireless G devices go up to 54 Mbps.
“We use CENIC (Corporation for Education Network Initiatives in California), an educational ISP used by the UC, CSU (and) CCC systems as well as other universities,” Field said.
When asked why port 21 was closed, he said, “We have allowed only HTTP/HTTPS (ports 80 and 443) to reduce our security risk and potential bandwidth abuse. While this doesn’t include FTP, many applications today work as web apps using either port 80 (http) or port 443 (https).” He continued and said, in the future, the school may allow students to login to utilize more services.
Field said he expects to upgrade to the 802.11ac technology when it becomes available in 2014. He also expects to add more wireless access points throughout campus, to improve the signal strength.
Field said, “There is a Technology Oversight Task Force and we will need new student representatives next year. Students are also welcome to email me their concerns or suggestions at jfield@lbcc.edu or call my assistant, Kelly Garcia, at (562) 938-4535 to make an appointment to see me.”
|
|
Please use the search engine below to search this blog's archives.
|
|
