2009 Summer events

This summer, Beta Zeta Nu members, officers and advisers met several times to discuss new and ongoing projects, as well as the Honors Topic in progress. As the summer progressed, we participated in several different events, including a 4th of July Parade, a tree planting project and a leadership event, summaries of which will appear in a later post.

We resolved that every time members create and engage a project make would write reports on these projects summarizing the project, who participated, our goals for the project and the outcome. We’re sure that these summaries will help guide our project design and focus in the future as well as provide inspiration readers and future members.

We also spent time consistently coordinating events supporting this year’s honors topic. We reviewed different books in related to the Honors Topic and possible projects, including but not limited to "The China Study" by Dr. Colin Campbell. After discussing possible projects and events, we decided on several new projects as well as reengaging community partnerships from last year. As part of our ongoing partnership with Garfield school, members will be creating a project for Garfield students to educate them on the stock market, investment and money management, which will ultimately be tied back to economic policy. There will also be a presentation related to education, focusing on whether college is necessary and/or the consequences of a less affluent or unequal education.

The chapter also discussed possible service projects for the upcoming year. So far we have considered several options, some of which include planting a garden and doing volunteer landscaping at a homeless shelter through the Shelter Network in Menlo Park, sponsoring a team for the Project Read Trivia Bee, pruning city trees, hosting events for Be the Change Day and helping with state beach and dune restoration projects in Half Moon Bay. Other events in the future may also include helping collect fish data aboard a research vessel in partnership with SF. We’ll also be using social networking sites to get member feedback on such events and recruit volunteers.

As part of our activities on campus, we’ll be redesigning our PTK information and display case to show recent events through photos, brief summaries and invitations to view our blog. We’re also considering different ways to help ease the impact of the state budget cuts on campus, and offering our assistance in any way we can to counselors and administrators. As such, we’ll be greeting and guiding students through the administrative building for the first few weeks of school to help students avoid lines up to 3 hours long.

We're all excited about a new semester and helping our fellow students and community at large.

Upcoming Events

Meetings
• Tuesdays at 2 PM

Immigrants Day Festival
• Saturday, May 16th throughout the day
• It will be at the History Museum (2200 Broadway) and Courthouse Square in Redwood City
• It will have great music and food
• We are looking for volunteers
• If you are interested please contact Kayla at BetaZetaNuNews@yahoo.com for more information

Afternoon of Academic Excellence
• May 30th at 2 PM at Cañada College Main Theater
• Looking for volunteers for event
• If you would like to volunteer or need more information please contact Kayla at B€etaZetaNuNews@yahoo.com

Former President Honored

Beta Zeta Nu's former president and active member, Alex Garcia, has been honored with winning a $60,000 Jack Kent Cooke scholarship. Below is an amazing story of his life by Canada's Director of Marketing and Public Relations, Robert Hood.

High School Dropout, Jailbird, Earns $60,000 College Scholarship to Pursue Economics Degree at UC Berkeley

Redwood City’s Alex Garcia will be honored on May 7 at a ceremony at Cañada College.

Alex Garcia spent his 20th birthday in the San Mateo County Jail, a high school dropout addicted to drugs. On Thursday, May 7, - nearly five years later - Garcia will be honored as one of only 50 community college students nationwide to receive the prestigious Jack Kent Cooke Foundation’s Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship.

Garcia, 24, will be recognized at the annual Transfer Reception at Cañada College. It starts at 2:30 p.m. in the Main Theater Foyer, 4200 Farm Hill Blvd., in Redwood City.

“I was arrested six times and was headed to prison,” Garcia said. “I was sitting in jail, my mom had maxed out her savings to pay for a lawyer to keep me out of prison and a guard came up to me and said I was nothing but a no-good gang-banger and I would spend the rest of my life in prison. It was at that point I said ‘no way, it’s not going to play out this way.’ ”

Garcia was released into a drug rehabilitation transition house in Redwood City and decided to enroll at Cañada College. “I hated school with a passion,” he said. “But I knew I needed more than a GED to succeed in life.”

It was at Cañada that Garcia met Paul Roscelli, professor of economics. He had scored an A on an economics test in Roscelli’s class and went to visit the professor during office hours. It was there that Roscelli challenged him. “He told me I was too smart not to pursue a first-class education,” Garcia said. “I was considering transferring to a university but he challenged me to apply to Stanford, Cal and other top schools. It was a verbal slap in the face.”

Roscelli recruited Garcia to be part of Beta Zeta Nu, Cañada’s chapter of Phi Theta Kappa, the national honors society for two-year colleges. Garcia became co-president of the club and spearheaded several community activities including planting more than 50 trees in Redwood City, organizing debates on the Iraq War, and talking to potential students about the value of education.

“He told his story to about 500 of our students and they were absolutely mesmerized,” said Linda Haley, director of Cañada’s Community-Based English Tutoring (CBET) Program. “You could have heard a pin drop. They saw how it was all about the decisions one makes - decisions to join gangs and continue that lifestyle, or the decision to achieve an education and open doors in that direction. Alex's decision and steadfast commitment to his goals have gotten him where he is, and his audiences take note of that and are inspired by his story.”

Roscelli calls Garcia one of the most gifted students on campus. “He has earned A’s in all three of my economics classes as well as an A in my financial accounting course. The average grade in these courses is a C. His talents are enhanced by his life experience and together you get a student that is mature, accomplished, and a proven contributor to the college community.”

Garcia said he was surprised to receive the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation’s Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship. “So few students receive it,” he said. “My plan is to major in economics at Berkeley and then go straight to grad school. My goal is to attend an Ivy League school.”

The Jack Kent Cooke Foundation’s Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship makes it possible for the nation’s top community college students to complete their bachelor’s degrees by transferring to a four-year college or university. The foundation provides up to $30,000 per year to each of approximately 50 deserving students selected annually, making it the largest private scholarship for two-year and community college transfer students in the country.

Garcia is the second Cañada College student to receive the Jack Kent Cooke Foundation’s Undergraduate Transfer Scholarship. Viviana Alcazar received the scholarship in 2004, graduated from Stanford University, and is currently working on her Ph.D. at UC Berkeley.

Highschool Outreach

Beta Zeta Nu, honoring our commitment to scholarship and service activities, decided to organize activities to promote Canada College new Honors Program. Four of our members went to Wood high school,Sequoia High School, Carlmont High, San Mateo High School. Rene Rivera, Jonathan Werden, Ashley Cohen and Sofia Lozano helped the out reach embassadors to explain en encourage high school seniors to join our new honors program!

Fourth Garfield Presentation

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On April 29, 2009, Alex Garcia, Rene Rivera, Astrid Caballero, Sofia Lozano and Clay gave the fourth presentation at Garfield Middle School with Youth Adelante. This time, the members created a power point presentation about leadership. The chapter members talked about what does it mean to be a leader, and specific steps to achieve goals. They also talked about their experiences as leaders and Honor students. Chapter members shared their goals in life and encouraged the kids to write down their goals as a way to make them concrete and easy to remember. After the presentation they organized a game that taught kids to plan ahead and reconcile needs and desires. The class divided into four groups. Each group had a budget and a list of things they needed to purchase. The kids budget their money and prioritized items in consensus.

This project, allowed us be role models for kids that are endangered of bad environments or neighborhoods with gangs and drugs. By doing this presentation, PTK was able to promote Engineering and the sciences to the kids at Garfield. We may have made a difference in the life of these children by what we are doing. We were able to see that we may not be able to change the world, but we understand that if we can make a change in these kids lives, that’s a plus for us and our community.

International Convention

This year, the international convention was in Grapevine, Texas. Our chapter sent 5 of our members, Ashley (co-president), Jonathan (VP of fundraising), and new members Rachel, Yvette and Clayton. The advisors that came were Professor Roscelli and one of our newest advisors, Professor Swanson. The convention was extremely successful as we won multiple awards for our achievements and learned a lot about future events we can do and how to make them successful. Our members and advisors went to multiple educational forums in order to learn about different aspects of the honor society and on the last day, we held a meeting to report back to the group everything we learned and how we can make our chapter even stronger next year. We were fortunate this year to see two keynote speakers - Robert F. Kennedy Jr. (environmental activist) and Dr. Fareed Zakaria (CNN correspondent). Both speakers taught us a lot about the world we live in and what we can do to improve it. We hope our chapter can do as well next year, if not better!

List of Awards
Administrator Awards of Distinction
Dr. Steve Runnebohm, Alpha Omega Alpha Chapterm Mt. San Antonio College
Shirley B. Gordon Awards of Distinction
Dr. Chris McCarthy, Beta Beta Sigma Chapter, Napa Valley College
Mr. Tom Mohr, Beta Zeta Nu Chapter, Canada College


Distinguished Member Awards
Jeremy Madrigal, Beta Zeta Nu Chapter, Canada College
Elizabeth Fein, Beta Eta Psi Chapter, Sacramento City College
Jon Fournier, Beta Theta Kappa Chapter, Butte College
Eric Nolan, Alpha Omega Mu Chapter, Irvine Valley College


Distinguished Chapter Officer Awards
Helen Hagler, Beta Theta Kappa Chapter, Butte College
Richa Pandey, Alpha Omega Mu Chapter, Irvine Valley College
Rene Rivera, Beta Zeta Nu Chapter, Canada College



Distinguished Advisor Awards
Paul Roscelli, Beta Zeta Nu Chapter, Canada College
Kurt Meyer, Alpha Omega Mu Chapter, Irvine Valley College


Leadership Hallmark Awards
Beta Zeta Nu Chapter, Canada College
Beta Theta Kappa Chapter, Butte College
Alpha Omega Mu Chapter, Irvine Valley College

Top 100 Chapters
Beta Theta Kappa Chapter, Butte College
Alpha Omega Mu Chapter, Irvine Valley College
Beta Eta Psi Chapter, Sacramento City College
Beta Theta Omicron Chapter, Skyline College
Beta Zeta Nu Chapter, Canada College
Beta Beta Sigma Chapter, Napa Valley College

Distinguished Chapter Awards
Beta Eta Psi Chapter, Sacramento City College
Beta Zeta Nu Chapter, Canada College
Alpha Omega Mu Chapter, Irvine Valley College

Officers Needed!

Interested in being behind an award winning chapter? Please come to our meetings on Tuesdays at 2 or e-mail Kayla at BetaZetaNuNews@yahoo.com for more information.