News – Angelica Wallingford

Schools in PSFA announce new directors

Two schools in the College of Professional Studies and Fine Arts will have new directors for the fall 2018 semester.

Charles Friedrichs and J.D. Hopkins, the current directors of the School of Music and Dance, and the School of Theatre, Television, and Film, will be stepping down from their positions at the end of the semester. The announcement for the director position was announced in November 2017, according to Eric Smigel, a music professor and search committee chair.

Candidates for the director position for both schools will tour the campus throughout March, while final candidate for the School of Theatre, Television and Film is scheduled after spring break.

“The process just takes a while and a faculty position has to be set aside, the dean has her concerns,” Friedrichs said. “She sets aside then they get a committee and they do the advertising and now they are in the process of bringing somebody… for interviews.”

Friedrichs decided to retire a year and a half ago after 42 years of teaching, with the last five of those as the acting director. For Hopkins, his decision to leave the director position at the School of Theatre, Television and Film was due to a strong internal pull towards his loves of teaching and research.

“I’ve had a great experience running the school and working with my colleagues,” Hopkins said. “I think we’ve came out of the recession over the last six years and moved into a really strong position in a lot of measurable ways.”

Hopkins also serves on the hiring committee for the director position of the School of Music and Dance. He said it was decided by PSFA Dean Joyce Gattas that the directors wouldn’t be involved in hiring for their own position, a policy she’s held for a long time.

“There was some discussion on whether or not there would be looking for an internal candidate or doing a national search, and it quickly moved to the direction of national search,” Hopkins said.

Of the roughly 60 applicants for the director position for the School of Music and Dance, Scott Lipscomb from the College Conservatory of Music at the University of Cincinnati, John Sposato from the University of Houston and Elizabeth Cooper from the University of Hartford were chosen for on-campus interviews.

The candidates for the School of Theatre, Television and Film are Niyi Coker Jr. from the University of Missouri-St. Louis, Andrew Shea from the University of Texas-Austin and Ann Archbold from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

“The Dean will make her decision after that (visit) and offers will go out. I wouldn’t venture to speculate on the timeline after that point,” Hopkins said. “We intend to have decisions made by the end of the semester.”

Even with changes to leadership, Director of Jazz Studies Bill Yeager feels optimistic about the future of the School of Music and Dance.

“We have the very best instructors available in all areas and an amazing amount of student talent,” Yeager said. This high level of teaching, combined with outstanding students, ensures a bright future.”

Firedrichs’ last day is acting director will be May 31 while Hopkins is slated to stay on until June. The new directors’ contracts will begin on July 1.

Originally published in the Daily Aztec in April 2018.

SDSU Jazz Ensemble honors late alumnus who left behind $750,000 endowment

The San Diego State Jazz Ensemble dedicated its Nov. 7 concert to late alumnus Pitt Warner after it was announced in late October that the longtime jazz musician left a $750,000 endowment to the Jazz Studies program at the School of Music and Dance.

The Pitt and Virginia Warner Jazz Studies Endowment will support the Jazz Studies program and its students by providing funds that include scholarships, travel, equipment, conference and musical festival attendance, music commissions, music purchases, guests artists and clinicians, according to Director of Jazz Studies Bill Yeager.

Warner, who died in 2016, was a renowned jazz drummer who not only played on SDSU’s jazz ensemble for many years, but also performed with many other bands, including local Latin jazz group The Bordermen.

Jazz ensemble drummer and SDSU graduate student Justin Joyce became acquainted with Warner through the Jazz Studies program and said he said he thinks that Warner’s gift was an amazing contribution to the music department because of massive funding cuts that arts programs have taken in recent years.

“The music departments are folding, like all the way ,going down to elementary school and it resonates coming up to the top too,” Joyce said. “I mean, it’s like (the business college) would get something like $3 million and us, we’ll get like $28,000… So it’s a great thing that he left it to us.”

Warner also left behind equipment for jazz students, including two complete drum sets and multi-track recording equipment worth over $100,000, Yeager said.

“He left so much gear for us, and , as a drummer, I’m very thankful, but as a musician I’m even more thankful,” Joyce said. “He was a great guy, a great musician.”

Music entrepreneurship and business freshman Derrick Kennedy Martin Jr. said he thinks that the endowment will give great opportunities for music students, especially when it comes to the possibility of traveling and experiencing different musical styles and cultures.

“It provides us with opportunities that we wouldn’t otherwise be able to have as jazz students,” Martin Jr. said. “(The endowment) has the potential to provide us with different countries to be able to play with where you get different styles of music and styles of people and it’s just a great cultural experience from all types of musicians and people.”

Along with Warner’s endowment, the Jazz Studies also has Eugene and Barbara Bowman Endowment Fund, worth $150,000, which was awarded to the department two years ago.

The endowment was Warner’s second gift to the university. After his wife Virginia, an SDSU alumna with a degree in English, died in 2012 he gave a donation for the Pitt and Virginia Warner Suite in the Department of English and Comparative Literature.

Originally published in The Daily Aztec in November 2017.

Friends of SDSU launches drive to put SDSU West on 2018 ballot

Friends of SDSU, a group dedicated to a ballot initiative for the creation of a new west campus for San Diego State on the current site of SDCCU Stadium, began its signature gathering efforts Oct. 21, the day of the university’s homecoming football game.

The group hopes to get the SDSU West Campus Research Center, Stadium and River Park Initiative on the November 2018 ballot. The initiative would allow for the sale of much of the SDCCU Stadium site to SDSU, freeing the university to build a satellite campus in Mission Valley that could potentially include student housing, research and technology facilities, a river park and a new multi-use stadium.

The choice to start signature gathering during the culmination of San Diego State’s homecoming festivities wasn’t a deliberate one, but rather one of serendipitous timing, said SDSU West spokesman Fred Pierce.

“It coordinated perfectly with our schedule,” Pierce said. “We had a 21-day notice period where when we published the initiative, we had to actually print it in the newspaper. And it just so happened that when we looked at the schedule, 21 days ending up on homecoming was perfect timing.”

For the initiative to appear on the 2018 ballot — alongside the rival SoccerCity plan — it needs to receive more than 71,000 signatures from San Diego residents by the end of December. The group anticipates a healthy level of support, especially from alumni.

“One in seven college graduates in San Diego attended SDSU,” Friends of SDSU steering committee member Gina Champion-Cain said in an Oct. 20 press release. “We’re hoping to see these proud alumni at the game and convert their support of the university into a signature for its future.”

The group had booths set up at various places around SDCCU Stadium before Saturday’s football game, staffed with dozens of signature gatherers and flyers about the initiative for uninformed or interested voters.

One signature gatherer, Stephanie Mercy, said she believes San Diego needs a sports team and could see SDSU West as a viable option, but that she’ll hold out until both the initiatives are released for San Diegans to make the final decision.

“At this time I don’t know, let’s see both proposals and make a decision on Election Day,” Mercy said. “It’s a way of giving us choice and I’m all about choice.”

However, the stadium is just the beginning. Pierce said SDSU is landlocked, and that expansion would not only bring more potential students to San Diego State, but more innovation in research, technology and business.

“We need room for growth for new students, we need growth for research activities, technology transfers and business incubation,” Pierce said. “We also need a new football stadium. It’s been threatened that they are going to tear down Qualcomm and the stadium that the opponent initiative, SoccerCity, has proposed doesn’t work.”

Pierce cited the large stadium attendance from this season as a prime example why he believes SoccerCity’s stadium plan isn’t a viable option. SoccerCity’s stadium only allows for 30,000 seats, less than half of the over 70,000-seat current stadium.

The stadium seems to be the turning point for potential voters. Longtime SDSU football and Major League Soccer fan Jose Flores said he is leaning toward SDSU West but wants to hold out to see stadium renderings before making a final decision.

“Being a fan of both (SDSU football and Major League Soccer) I’m kind of torn,” Flores said. “It seems like SDSU West would have the bigger stadium and it could cater to both sports but I would love to see what the designers come up with before making my mind up.”

Along with SDCCU Stadium, signature-gathering efforts also launched at different locations around the city, with nearly 75 signature gatherers available to share information with voters, Friends of SDSU said.

Originally Published in The Daily Aztec in October 2017.

Alumnus gives back to SDSU with tutoring business

Inside an overcrowded Love Library students sit, study, cram and stress for their upcoming tests and quizzes. In the case of 27-year-old San Diego State University alumnus John Glick-Scroggins, the hustle and bustle of studying for classes became a growing business venture that took its shape from years of helping his fellow peers with the very same issues.

Glick-Scroggins, a Bay area transplant and 2014 SDSU graduate, started tutoring his classmates at age 16. However, he didn’t actually seriously start thinking of tutoring as an actual business until he began tutoring his friends in college. After working for various tutoring companies and seeing the way both students and tutors interacted, he officially started contracting with tutors and opened MathWizJohn’s Tutoring the year of his graduation.

“I was able to see how beneficial one-on-one learning was not only for a student’s grade, but also for their academic and self confidence,” Glick-Scroggins said. “I quickly noticed certain inefficiencies in their programs that, when fixed, could allow for a better dual-sided approach to both learning environments for students and the stability and standard for the role of a tutor.”

Glick-Scroggins’ passion for helping others reach their potential is evident. He beams with pride when he talks about how he and his team of tutors work with students of all backgrounds, including students with developmental and special needs, and how everything is specialized to that student’s individual need.

“I’ve always just been intrigued in finding a way to give to everybody else the fulfillment that I found in my studies,” Glick-Scroggins said.

He says his tutors, who total about 100, are put through a rigorous interviewing process before being hired.

“The value of the organization lies in the value of the tutors,” Glick-Scroggins said.

Christopher Williams, who has been a tutor with MathWizJohn’s Tutoring for one year, completed his undergraduate degree in applied mathematics and economics at UC Merced, has a masters of science in economics and finance from the Barcelona Graduate School of Economics and is currently working on a master of applied statistics through an online program at Pennsylvania State University.

“I have had a lot of good students who are excited to learn, mostly they just need to build up their confidence,” Williams said. “I had two students who went from petrified and failing the previous semester to (getting) As and Bs and (being) confident the next.”

SDSU sophomore Jenn Schwager has been using John’s tutoring service since last year and specifically sought out MathWizJohn’s Tutoring because she said it was “tailor-made” for the student client. She said the price, availability of one-on-one sessions and tutors in specialized subjects were all appealing factors for her.

“Here at San Diego State, our prices range from $40-$50 an hour,” Glick-Scroggins said. “This is where I built my home, my original nest, and at San Diego State I’ve always committed to not raising the prices here.”

One of the other areas that MathWizJohn’s Tutoring covers is test prep. SDSU business administration senior Rebecca Reiner said that while learning in large lecture classes is doable, it’s often difficult to get professors’ attention to ask questions and get clarification.

“John was able to work with us in a small group, which was very beneficial for me,” Reiner said about the test prep services. “I was able to learn the concepts and understand it to my best ability during class, and then when I was at tutoring I would be able to specifically ask for help on certain topics.”

Glick-Scroggins says that he owes this passion for helping students from his own experiences growing up in an environment that nurtured his talent for mathematics and at the end of the day, he hopes that he can instill the same self-confidence in the students he and his tutors help and be a positive educational influence in their lives.

Originally published in The Daily Aztec in September 2017.