Learn How to Become a Music Entrepreneur

SF Artist Garrick Davis Will Discuss His Experience in the Music Industry

What does it take to become a music entrepreneur? San Francisco artist Garrick Davis will discuss his experience in the music industry as part of an ongoing series of workshops sponsored by the Cañada College Center for Entrepreneurial Opportunities designed to help budding entrepreneurs.

The workshop will be held from 2 to 3:15 p.m., Thursday, May 15 in the Grove. It is free and open to the public.

"Rock, Blues, Funk and Passion" describe both the musical influences and the dynamic performance style of the San Francisco guitarist/singer/songwriter.

Davis has toured the past 10 years on the West Coast. Davis performs regularly as a soloist, particularly at The Union Room at Biscuits and Blues in downtown San Francisco where for the last three years he has taken full advantage of the opportunity to hone his performing skills and command the stage in front of international audiences who readily purchase merchandise and stay in touch beyond the initial encounter. He takes particular delight performing with his band with whom he shares an insatiable love and respect for but is happiest with any configuration that includes his son Zach on piano and supporting vocals.

Davis teaches guitar privately in the San Francisco Peninsula area with a roster that includes both children and adults, some of which can be seen on his YouTube Channel. Garrick has conducted public group classes for the City of San Mateo, Oakland Feather River Camp and Oracle Corporation. Davis is a cheerleader, respecting his student's pursuit at whatever level they may be.

Davis recently released his fourth album, the pure acoustic “The Good Road”.



Cañada Students to Present Research at Engineering Conference

Jesus Garcia

More than a dozen current and former Cañada College students will be presenting original research at this year's American Society for Engineering Education Pacific Southwest Conference, April 18-20, in Riverside.

Students will be presenting the results of their summer research internships funded through the NASA Curriculum Improvements and Partnership Award for the Integration of Research (CIPAIR) Program. All of the students were mentored by San Francisco State University engineering faculty during their internships.

For Jesus Garcia, the CIPAIR summer internship at SFSU focused on a phenomenon called Soft Oxide Breakdown in the performance of integrated circuits. Led by SFSU Professor Hamid Mahmoodi, the student researchers investigated whether or not Soft Oxide Breakdown could be prevented.

"If it can be prevented, the integrated circuits found in home appliances, computers, cell phones, televisions, and medical devices would last longer," Garcia said. "This would save consumers money."

Garcia and fellow student Hector Prado will present a paper at this week's conference titled, "Engaging Community College Students in Research using Summer Internship on Analysis of Performance Degradation of Integrated Circuits Due to Transistor Aging Effects in Nano-Scale." They will also present a poster describing their research.

Garcia said he's not nervous about presenting at the conference because he's presented at other professional conferences while at Cañada. "On the contrary, I'm excited and looking forward to another good experience."

Garcia said the summer internship at SFSU helped him learn how to conduct research and work with groups of researchers. "These are two very important skills for engineers," he said. "The internship also helped me become a better analyst, critical thinker, and problem solver. This internship is a perfect opportunity for students who have no previous experience to gain real-world knowledge in the field of engineering."

Two other groups from Cañada will be presenting at this week's engineering conference. They will describe their research on integrating earthquake engineering into the community college student educational experience and engaging underrepresented community college students in engineering research.

For Garcia, this is one of his final opportunities to represent Cañada before he transfers to a four-year university next fall.

"I've been accepted to Cal Poly San Luis Obispo to study mechanical engineering but I'm still waiting to hear if I've been accepted to UC Berkeley or UCLA," he said. "I'm interested in the fields of medical devices and aircraft design."

Amelito Enriquez, Professor of Engineering and Mathematics at the college, said the partnership between Cañada, SFSU, and NASA Ames that has been developed through the NASA CIPAIR Program has created opportunities for students to excel. "These students are doing research, writing, technical papers, publishing, and presenting in professional conferences - something I did not get to do until graduate school. At this upcoming ASEE Conference, they are the only community college students and perhaps the only undergraduate students who will be attending and presenting. I am really proud of what they have accomplished.

Here's the complete list of current and former Cañada students who are co-authors of three papers and three posters that will be presented at the conference.

First Name	Last Name	Major
Jose	Carrillo	Electrical Engineering
John	DeAndreis	Civil Engineering
Jesus	Garcia	Mechanical Engineering
Xenia	Leon	Electrical Engineering
Joshua	Lohse	Computer Engineering
Peter	Moala	Civil Engineer
John Louie	Paulino	Mechanical Engineering
Hector	Prado-Guerrero	Computer Engineering
Enrique	Raygoza	Mechanical Engineering
Agustin	Robles	Civil Engineering
Alam	Salguero	Electrical Engineering
Ellaine	Talle	Electrical Engineering
Jose	Valdovinos	Civil Engineering

New Exhibit Features "Recycled" Art

Ethan Estes Recology: Urban Opportunists, 2012

The Cañada College Art Gallery continues its Spring, 2013 season with Do Not Throw Away: Art from Recology San Francisco’s Artist in Residence Program, a unique presentation of artworks made from recycled materials, videos, digital images, and photographs by artists including Alex Nichols, Adrienne Pao, Lauren Scott, Bill Russell, Cherie Johnson, Linda Raynsford, Ethan Estess, Sharon Siskin, Dio Mendoza, David Hevel, and Nomi Talisman.

 
The exhibit will be on display Tuesday, April 16 through Thursday May 9. An opening reception will be held Wednesday, April 17 from 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. The Cañada College Art Gallery is located at 4200 Farm Hill Blvd. Student Services Building 9, Room 152, Redwood City. Gallery hours are Mondays, 10:30 a.m. to 4 p.m.; Tuesdays 11 a.m. to 5 p.m.; Wednesday's 10:30 a.m. to 2 p.m., and Thursdays 1 to 6 p.m.

The Artist in Residence Program at Recology San Francisco is a unique art and education program that provides Bay Area professional and student artists with access to discarded materials, a stipend, and a large studio space at the Recology Solid Waste Transfer and Recycling Center. By supporting artists who work with recycled materials, Recology hopes to encourage people to conserve natural resources and promote new ways of thinking about art and the environment.

The Cañada College Art Gallery presents exhibitions to the public, focuses on an interdisciplinary interpretation of art and culture, and serves the public of San Mateo County, the college community, and beyond. All exhibitions and gallery events are free and open to the public. For more information, please contact the Cañada College Humanities and Social Sciences Department at (650)306-3336 or visit our website www.canadacollege.edu

An Interview With Redwood Symphony's Eric Kujawsky

(The following is an interview conducted by David Meckler, Professor of Music at Cañada College and Redwood Symphony Board Member, with Dr. Eric Kujawsky, Founder and Music Director of the Redwood Symphony. It previews this Saturday's performance at Cañada College).

The Redwood Symphony

David Meckler: Hello, Maestro Eric! This interview is being posted on the Cañada College website for all staff and students, as well as the other San Mateo Community College District campuses. I bet they'd be pleasantly surprised to know that one of the Bay Area’s most notable symphony orchestras is not only based at Canada College, but is free for all SMCCD campus staff and students. Here's your chance: What can you say about Redwood Symphony that would make them want to come to one of your concerts, such as the one coming up on April 13 in the Canada College Main Theatre? 

 

Eric Kujawsky: Having taught at all grade levels, from kindergarten to college, I have seen firsthand that so many people grow up with the absolutely false idea that classical music is boring, and too "upperclass."  I do absolutely agree that the way it has been traditionally marketed has been counterproductive! Redwood Symphony concerts are meant to be a reenergized approach to a very old art form, one which happens to have a huge library of wonderful works written by men and women still writing today.

When I founded Redwood Symphony in 1985, it was my intention that we would be a very non-traditional kind of orchestra.  We've tried to innovate in every possible area, from programming to how we dress to concert format.  In addition to standard repertoire, we feature music written by living composers, and we also do music that is generally considered too risky or ambitious for an all-volunteer group, especially Mahler symphonies, Stravinsky, Bartok, Adams, etc.   Our concerts aren’t stuffy, but they are really engaging, informative and eye-opening—so to speak—and our audiences are trending younger and more casual than you’ll see at most orchestra concerts.  We're attracting a healthy combination of both experienced and non-experienced listeners, all ages, who share an appetite for a range of music.  Check out redwoodsymphony.org to find out what we've accomplished (mostly at Canada College; thank you, CC!), sometimes with very little financial resources.  There are free downloadable tracks from our six CDs (available at iTunes and amazon.com) and a complete listing of what we've performed in the past, including many premieres and big projects.  Also, please check out Redwood Symphony's Facebook page and "friend" the orchestra!  It's a good way to get the latest classical music news and information on upcoming concerts and to see a bust of Beethoven in various disguises.

We made our second appearance at Davies Symphony Hall last summer, to great reviews.  In our future is this Saturday's concert at Canada’s theatre, and then two concert performances of Sondheim's Sweeney Todd on June 1 and 2, and free outdoor concert in Redwood City on June 29 and an all-Beatles appearance at Redwood City's Fox Theatre on August 10 with the White Album Ensemble:  all original Beatles arrangements with additional symphonic orchestrations.
 
David Meckler: The program this Saturday, April 13 at 8 p.m., brings together arrangements of Persian music, a new symphony by American composer Christopher Theofanidis, and a practically unknown major early work of impressionist composer Claude Debussy. How did this combination happen?

Eric Kujawsky: I found the Theofanidis through a review in the San Francisco Chronicle by Joshua Kosman. He liked the piece, so I listened to excerpts on iTunes, bought it, and loved it enough to put it in front of a long line of pieces that have been waiting many years to get played! It is such a brilliant work. Its originality comes mainly from its wonderfully alive, shimmering kind of sound, not quite as much as its musical content, which is very accessible without seeming to be derivative. I believe that Theofanidis' first symphony is a potentially popular work, especially for its delightful second movement, a graceful dance done up in an enchanting, faux-Mantovani orchestration that I love because it sounds retro and new at the same time.

I know Raeeka Shehabi-Yaghmai from when she sang in our recent concert production of Mozart's great opera Don Giovanni ("Don Juan"). She brings an emotionally complete involvement into whatever she sings and I always enjoy working with her. David Garner is the wonderful composer who is bringing this music to life with a symphony orchestra. I always love to perform works in this ethnic, or folk category, as evidenced by many inclusions of Bartok, Kodaly, Lutoslawski, Lou Harrison, etc. Great stuff! These Persian songs, which we're doing with English supertitles, are dynamite in Raeeka's performance. Every rehearsal with her is a revelation.

I can't leave out the opening Petite Suite, by Claude Debussy. He wrote it very early in his career, for piano four hands. A colleague of his orchestrated it years later, and it is one of the most beautiful works by Debussy I know of, a real find. Considered together, the three pieces - Persian, Theofanidis, Debussy - are a great example of the kind of unusual programming that we're known for doing. What we have is really quite a fresh program, music that is uniformly delightful for any concert - goer.

Did I mention that almost all of Redwood Symphony's concerts are free for everyone 18 and under?

Jane Rice Hired as Instructional Designer

Rice replaces Ricardo Flores who transferred to Skyline.

 

 

Jane Rice has been hired as the new instructional designer at Cañada College and she’s eager to work with faculty to help them develop online courses. Rice replaces Ricardo Flores, who transferred to Skyline College.

Rice began her career as a faculty member, teaching German Studies and Women’s Studies at both Penn State and the University of Arizona. She left her faculty position at the University of Arizona to move back to the Bay Area. She has worked as an instructional designer at the UC Berkeley Extension and San Jose City College as well as for a San Jose tech company producing tutorials.

“It’s important that faculty know I’m on campus and I’m here to help them,” she said. “I can help them design online courses from beginning to end or just offer technical assistance in a variety of areas. It really depends on what they need.”

Rice will be visiting division meetings to meet faculty members and offer assistance. “Having taught in the classroom, I understand the types of questions faculty members have when it comes to developing online courses.”

Rice said she will sit down with interested faculty, look at their student learning outcomes, and help them a design a course that meets their needs. “Developing a good online course is more than just offering the standard classroom lectures online. It’s important to think about what you want students to learn and then design interactive learning opportunities around those learning outcomes.”

Student-to-student interaction and student-to-faculty interaction are essential to a good online learning environment, Rice said. This can be accomplished through a variety of ways, such as creating a group project for students to develop a Wiki on a given topic.

“Online learning has changed tremendously over the past 10 years,” she said. “Students expect feedback on questions within 24 hours, which is our policy at Cañada. Courses are designed to provide access to both students and faculty.”

Rice said she is developing a calendar of workshops including introductory workshops for faculty interested in designing their first online courses. The complete list of workshops will be listed on the campus calendar.

Cañada Alum Isaiah Roggow Prepares for Med School

Roggow will focus on primary care for the needy

Former Cañada College student Isaiah Roggow has been accepted to the UC Riverside School of Medicine where he will study to become a primary care physician.

Roggow will be part of UC Riverside’s inaugural medical school class. The UC Riverside School of Medicine is California’s first new public medical school in four decades.

“My intention is to become a primary care physician, likely in family medicine, and work in a medically underserved area,” Roggow said. “I will be able to leverage my training in nutrition to better serve my patients.”

Roggow attended Cañada for several years before transferring to UC Davis in 2010. “Cañada has a strong honor society, Phi Theta Kappa, and the leadership and interpersonal skills I gained were put to good use at UC Davis,” he said. “It was through PTK and my subsequent projects that assisted me in preparing for medical school.”

In addition, Roggow said faculty and staff at the college were eager mentors. Cathy Lipe, coordinator for the Math, Engineering, Science, Achievement (MESA) Program worked with Roggow to make thoughtful choices about his academic path towards a career in medicine.

Roggow was part of the MESA program and was a tutor for the school’s award-winning Math Jam program. He also tutored biology, English, and economics and was the co-founder of the Latino Empowerment Alliance, which worked toward increasing awareness in the school’s Latino population about the opportunities available at Cañada.

As a member of Cañada’s Pre-Med Club, Roggow helped promote the American Medical Student Association’s annual conference held in Davis, which he would later work for when he transferred to UC Davis. “Working for the AMSA Conference greatly enhanced my networking and organizational skills, which played an important role in being accepted to UC Riverside’s School of Medicine.”

If Roggow could offer one piece of advice to current Cañada students it would be to sit in the front of class, study hard, and find a faculty mentor. “There are so many resources available to help students succeed and the faculty is willing to help students. I had about seven mentors at Cañada, and each had a unique perspective, but they all helped me achieve my academic goals.”

Former Cañada Student Monique Ellis Teaches Others

Ellis is working as a teaching assistant at East Palo Alto Academy.

 

 

Monique Ellis (L) with EPAA teacher Misla Barco

Monique Ellis will never forget Cañada College professors Bob Lee and Michael Stanford. Lee, a professor of sociology, and Stanford, a professor of history, inspired Ellis to become a role-model for others in her East Palo Alto neighborhood.

Ellis graduated from Palo Alto High School in 2007 and initially attended the University of Pacific. After completing a semester, she withdrew because tuition costs were unaffordable for her family. She returned home, enrolled at Cañada in the spring of 2008, and completed her general education courses, where she met both Lee and Stanford.

“Attending Cañada was probably the best decision I ever made,” she said. “I really benefited from the small class sizes and professors who actually care about their students succeeding. Because of this support, I gained a wealth of academic confidence and skills.”

In the summer of 2010, Ellis transferred to UC Berkeley where she applied her newfound skills. “I was able to flourish at UC Berkeley, which is known for its rigorous curriculum. Also, because tuition at Cañada is affordable, I was able to save money to put towards the cost of tuition when I transferred.”

Ellis said Stanford and Lee took a sincere interest in her both as a person and a student, pushing her further academically than she was willing to push herself. “Before I ever thought of pursuing a graduate degree, they were both encouraging me to do so and I’m now planning to go to graduate school in two years. They gave me the skills, courage, and confidence to succeed in my educational pursuits. I remain close with them and they still mentor and give me guidance from time to time. I cannot emphasize enough just how grateful I am to have such wonderful mentors who believe in me.”

Now, Ellis has returned to East Palo Alto and she is mentoring students at East Palo Alto Academy, a Stanford University affiliated small public charter high school within the Sequoia Union High School District.

“I love that I get to work with students from my community and be a positive role model for them,” she said. “To show them that being a person of color from East Palo Alto is not something to be ashamed of and that you can succeed despite circumstances and environments that you feel may hold you back. This, coupled with students’ curiosity and excitement for learning, have encouraged me to consider a career in education.”

Ellis said the stigma associated with attending a community college is unfounded. “Going to a community college does not mean you’re less capable than students who go to four-year colleges and universities.”
 





Math Jam Program Honored with J. Russell Kent Award

Professor Michael Hoffman and Amanda Pitts

Cañada's Math Jam Program will receive a J. Russell Kent Award from the San Mateo County School Boards Association at a special ceremony on Monday, May 20 at the Crowne Plaza Hotel in Foster City.

Math Jam is one of 19 educational programs in San Mateo County that will be recognized and is the only college program receiving the award. The awards are given to outstanding and innovative programs either in the classroom or outside. Programs must promote student success, employ a high degree of creativity, and demonstrate transferability. Named after the past San Mateo County Superintendent of Schools, J. Russell Kent, SMCSBA initiated the award program in the 1980-81 school year.

Math Jam is an intensive, two-week, Math Placement Test preparation program for students who wish to test into a higher level math course or would like to review math concepts in preparation for upcoming math courses. The program's goal is to improve student success in math courses and thereby reduce the completion time for an associate degree or to transfer to a four-year institution.

Math Jam began in 2009 and was originally modeled after programs elsewhere in the state. Math Jam has four major goals:

• Help students progress faster through the school's math sequence to enable them to transfer to a four-year school earlier or to complete an associate's degree earlier.
• Recruit as many students as possible into STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) majors.
• Increase students' awareness of the tools and skills they need to be successful college students.
• Develop a community of learners among program participants.

The first Math Jam illustrated the power of the program. Nearly 94 percent of the students who took the Math Placement Test a second time scored higher after completing the two-week program. More than 63 percent improved their scores enough to be placed into a higher math course than their pre-Math Jam results.

While Math Jam began with STEM funding and was originally designed to recruit students into STEM majors, it has now grown to include students from all majors. “It also helps students in the social sciences, art, and humanities,” Stringer said. “The primary goal of the program is to help students progress through school faster, regardless of their major.

The program is funded by a grant from the U.S. Department of Education.

"Initially, we recruited students into the program who tested into a level of math lower than expected or just below the cut-off score for the next higher class," said Janet Stringer, Dean of Science and Technology.

The following year, the program had grown to 129 students with similar success rates and now Math Jam has grown to more than 200 students. The college has added evening Math Jam sessions as well as two additional one-week mini-Math Jam sessions, both day and evening, serving more than 300 students every year.

Amelito Enriquez, professor of mathematics and engineering at Cañada College, presented a paper about the success of Math Jam at the 2012 American Society for Engineering Education Conference in San Antonio, Texas last June. Titled “Strengthening the STEM Pipeline through an Intensive Review Program for Math Placement Testing”, the paper received the Best Paper Award from the ASEE Mathematics Division.

This past January, Professor Michael Hoffman and Cañada students Amanda Pitts, Bushra Bibi, Jose Covarubias, Rolando Del Valle, and alumnus Christina Arenas traveled to the Joint Mathematics Meetings in San Diego to make a presentation on the success of the program.

Hoffman said Math Jam does more than just help with test scores. “It builds community among teachers and students,” he said. “As a teacher, I can watch tutors as they explain math concepts to students. I am able to observe how the student learns and the best concepts to use to convey the lesson. As teachers, we get together after these sessions and really discuss the practice of teaching.”

Pitts, who serves as a Math Jam tutor, said students forge friendships with other students, tutors and professors and when they begin class, they feel like they have a support network. The program has about one tutor for every five students.

"The efforts of our faculty and staff in developing Math Jam has led to both improved student success and brightened the spotlight on Cañada College as a program innovator and model for colleges across the nation," said Cañada College President Larry Buckley.

Cañada has used the Math Jam model to create similar programs in physics, English and reading.