Online Students Climb at UC San Diego Extension

Online students now comprise 22 percent of continuing education enrollees at the University of California San Diego Extension, according to Elizabeth Meyer, director of online learning.

During the 2010-2011 academic year, fully online classes at UC San Diego Extension served a record 12,610 enrollees in 909 courses, up from 791 classes the previous academic year.

Meyer credits the strong demand for fully online courses to the sluggish economy and changing attitudes.

“Successful working professionals recognize that keeping their skills fresh is a good career move, especially in a down economy,” says Meyer.  “We’ve made it easy for them by offering individual courses and full certificate programs online. Project management, sustainability, accounting, digital arts, education, and healthcare all have increased online enrollments.”

Another myth that has been debunked is that students must be technically savvy to participate in online classes. “No doubt taking an online course is a different experience from taking a traditional classroom-based course,” says Meyer. “Students need to feel comfortable sending e-mail, be familiar with programs like Microsoft Word, and have time management skills to get assignments done, but that’s it.”

Overall UC San Diego Extension served a record 56,589 enrollees in 2010-11, which translates to 25,972 students in 4,327 courses. Additionally another 38,141 individuals were trained throughout the western United States by UC San Diego Extension certified instructors.

UCSD News on the web at: http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu

Problems In Higher Education Target of Scholarship Winner

Gregory Murphy

University of California San Diego graduate Gregory Murphy has been selected to receive a University of California Alumni “Change the World” Scholarship from UC San Diego Extension to study finance as part of plans to create an organization to help college students.

The UC San Diego Extension Scholarship Committee cited his commitment to developing a sustainable business solution to help address several problems in higher education.

“First and foremost is the problem of affordability and access,” says Murphy ‘08. “College tuition costs have increased 30 percent the last ten years and with the state’s structural deficit problems, that scenario is likely to worsen in the next decade.”

According to Murphy, currently a policy adviser for San Diego County Supervisor Greg Cox, there are three main challenges.

“First, roughly two-thirds of undergraduate students graduate with student debt, and of those students, the average debt is $24,000,” says Murphy. “The second major problem is the rate of graduation. Only 60% of students at public four-year institutions graduate within six years of matriculation. Finally, the third major problem is unemployment. Almost 10% of recent graduates are unable to find jobs. Meanwhile U.S. employers can hardly recruit enough employees with backgrounds in science, technology, engineering or math. We need to re-tool our workforce.”

The company Murphy is creating offers a sustainable business solution to these challenges under a new form of corporate governance. “A Benefit Corporation integrates the public benefits of a non-profit organization with the structural incentives of a for-profit company,” says Murphy.

The scholarship is awarded to UC graduates who demonstrate outstanding promise and potential.

Murphy, who graduated in 2008 with a bachelor’s degree in political science, will use his scholarship to pursue a certificate in finance. All of the more than 1 million UC alumni are eligible to apply for merit scholarships of up to $5,500 to enter any continuing education certificate or special study program offered by UC San Diego Extension.

All persons who have received a bachelor’s degree or a graduate degree from any UC campus are eligible to apply by completing an online “Change the World” Scholarship form from the extension.ucsd.edu/scholarships Web site before the next deadline date of January 15, 2012.

What does it mean to change the world? The definition is purposely broad, and can range from cultural enrichment to regional economic development. UC San Diego Extension is looking to reward alumni with the promise and potential to improve the quality of life in San Diego, and beyond. In the application essay, potential recipients can explain how they would help California build a globally competitive talent pool, accelerate economic vitality or foster community-building conversations if they receive this advanced training.

Certificate programs offer a practical, concentrated study in a specific professional area and most can be started any academic quarter. For the convenience of working adults, classes for most of UC San Diego Extension’s certificate programs and specialized study programs are held evenings and weekends on the UC San Diego main campus and two other locations in University City and Mission Valley.

UC San Diego offers approximately 80 certificates or special study programs. Some areas of possible study for career changers or those wishing to add new skills to their resume include: Business; Digital Arts; Education; Engineering and Defense Technology; English Language Studies; Foreign Languages; Healthcare and Behavioral Sciences; Humanities and Writing; Information Technology and Software Engineering; Law; Leadership and Management Development; Life Sciences; Occupational and Environmental Safety and Health; Photography, Art and Music, and Public Service, Social Responsibility and Sustainable Business.

Certificate programs at UC San Diego Extension have never been more popular.  This past year UC San Diego Extension had approximately 56,000 enrollees, which translates to a record 26,000 students in more than 4,900 courses.

The “Change the World” scholarships are automatically renewed, provided the recipient continues to pass their coursework and remains active in the certificate program. Scholarships cover tuition only, are non-transferable and carry no cash value.

Scholarships are awarded each academic quarter. Applications must be received by January 15, April 15, July 15, or October 15. Recipients and non-recipients are notified by email by March 15, June 15, September 15 and December 15. Applications will be considered for the upcoming quarter. The UC San Diego Extension Scholarship Committee will review scholarship applications four times a year and reserves the right not to award a scholarship.

UCSD News on the web at: http://ucsdnews.ucsd.edu

What Do Gene Krupa and Joshua White Have In Common?

By Stan Walens

Six years ago, a young scholarship student by the name of Joshua White came to the UC San Diego Jazz Camp and showed such enormous talent as a jazz musician that we were simply blown away. We have been keeping in touch with him since his first year at Jazz Camp, and are happy to report  that he placed second in the prestigious Thelonious Monk International Jazz Competition.  Joshua was recently interviewed by the San Diego Union-Tribune, and he said something that struck a bell with me.

Q: What was the bigger thrill, meeting President Obama or getting praised face to face by Herbie [Hancock]?

A: Even though I love President Obama and I loved speaking to Herbie and getting that kind of encouragement and validation, the highlight for me was taking the stage and having everyone listen while I painted musical pictures over the silence…Being able to take this artistic journey was the biggest thrill.

It’s learning the love of performing that makes music such a central part of someone’s life. Joshua’s comment made me think back to how I got started on a lifelong music-making career myself. Back longer ago than I care to reveal, when I was 5-years-old, my father took me to a concert given by the great jazz drummer, Gene Krupa, who was a longtime friend of his. At the time, Krupa was staging “drum duels” with jazz drumming legend, Buddy Rich. I can remember sitting in a darkly-lit nightclub, surrounded by a miasma of cigarette smoke and the pervasive smell of scotch, watching those two amazing musicians, mesmerized by just how much fun they were having playing. To me, no one conveyed the sheer love, the unending thrill, of being a drummer more than Krupa.

After the performance, my dad took me up to meet his longtime friend, and Krupa, seeing how intensely I was staring at his drum kit handed me his sticks and said, “Here, kid. Go wild.” I sat down at his drum kit and made what must have been a truly horrible cacophony. Krupa picked up another pair of sticks and started playing one of the side drums, setting a rhythm for me to follow. There I was having a drum duel with Gene Krupa! I think the smile on my face must have been a hundred miles wide. After we finished, Krupa looked at my father and said, “He’s a natural,” patted me on the head, then turned to his left and said, smiling, “You’d better watch out, Buddy!”

Simple gestures of encouragement can change our lives when it comes to expressing ourselves. Because of Gene Krupa’s kind words, I started taking drum lessons as soon as I could after that; and then eagerly began learning other instruments as well. But what Krupa passed on to me was one of the greatest gifts a musician can bestow: he showed me the sheer joy of performing, of painting over the silences with sound, of connecting to oneself and others through music. And that’s the primary thing I look for in all of our Performing Arts instructors. Whether it’s Music, Acting or Dance, our Performing Arts instructors are themselves dedicated performers who love what they do, and the core of their teaching is passing on that feeling to others. They have an intense love of their art that is infectious and life-affirming.

Please join us in one of our upcoming acting, dance, singing, piano or guitar courses here at UC San Diego Extension, and take some time to get in tune with your inner performer.

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Stan Walens is Program Representative for Humanities and Performing Arts at UC San Diego Extension. He holds a Ph.D. in Psychological Anthropology, and specialized in the relationship between art, religion, and family dynamics in both Native American and contemporary American cultures. He plays nearly two dozen instruments, lectures and writes program notes for many San Diego music organizations, and has avid interests in history, politics and culture, biology, performance studies, theatre, film and dance. He is a compulsive birder.

Former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell to Speak Out on Regional Innovation Clusters

Exclusive Global Summit Features Government, Academic and Business Leaders

Former U.S. Senator George Mitchell, named by TIME magazine as one of the 100 most influential persons in the world, will lend his voice to a global summit on growing the economy through regional innovation clusters.

Twenty years after Harvard Business School professor Michael Porter introduced the concept of regional innovation clusters—geographic concentrations of firms and industries that do business with each other and have common needs for talent, technology, and infrastructure—many success stories have emerged about the academic partnerships, new financial models and critical role of government.

Regional innovation clusters are now a major focus of economic and policy discussion in both industrialized and developing economies. Hosted by CONNECT, a nonprofit innovation business accelerator, the Global CONNECT Summit will be held December 7-9, 2011 at the Hilton La Jolla Torrey Pines.  The program will examine the role of research funding, regulations and tax incentives, new financing models, academic institutions and commercial organizations building regional innovation clusters and effective mentoring, education, networking and recognition programs for entrepreneurs in the United States and around the world.

The economic virtues of regional innovation clusters are many. A business in a cluster area increases its access to a highly specialized workforce, professional expertise and networks of collaborative synergy.  For the past decade national and state/provincial governments have viewed regional innovation clusters as a proven way to create jobs and grow the economy.

For Global CONNECT Summit event details, and to register for the public event, please visit the registration website http://www.connect.org/email/global-connect/GCS_eb102711.html

 

In the wake of the recent recession, a broad range of business leaders, policy analysts and academics have advocated a regional innovation cluster growth model that depends less on bubbles and consumption and more on the production of lasting value in metropolitan economies tied to research universities.

“CONNECT has successfully mobilized the San Diego region’s industries, research institutions, capital sources, professional services providers and policymakers over the past 26 years to develop one of the largest innovation hubs in the world,” says Camille Saltman, president of CONNECT.  “Regional innovation clusters will be participating in the Global CONNECT Summit to learn from San Diego’s experiences as well as other successful and evolving models of innovation acceleration, financing and commercialization. Senator Mitchell will help provide a global perspective on the need for government, university researchers, venture capital firms, workforce organizations and catalyst organizations to collaborate in growing regional innovation clusters.”

On the world scene, Mitchell most recently served as U.S. Special Envoy for Middle East Peace from January 2009 to May 2011. Prior to that he had a distinguished career in public service. He was appointed to the United States Senate in 1980 to complete the unexpired term of Senator Edmund S. Muskie, who resigned to become Secretary of State. Senator Mitchell went on to an illustrious career in the Senate spanning 15 years.

For six consecutive years he was voted “the most respected member” of the Senate by a bipartisan group of senior congressional aides.

In the world of business, Senator Mitchell served as Chairman of the global board of the law firm DLA Piper, the lead sponsor of the Global CONNECT Summit. He was also Chairman of the board of directors of The Walt Disney Company; a member of the board of the Boston Red Sox; and a director of several companies, including Federal Express, Xerox, Staples, Unilever and Starwood Hotels and Resorts.

In 2000 and 2001, at the request of President Clinton, Prime Minister Ehud Barak, and Chairman Yasser Arafat, Senator Mitchell served as Chairman of an International Fact-Finding Committee on violence in the Middle East. The Committee’s recommendation, widely known as The Mitchell Report, was endorsed by the Bush Administration, the European Union and by many other governments.

CONNECT has organized the Summit with University of California Extension’s Global CONNECT organization.  Other presenters include Donna Harris, Managing Director, Start Up America, Irwin Jacobs, PhD, co-founder of Qualcomm and Chair, of the Board of Trustees of Salk Institute and Mary Walshok, PhD, Associate Vice Chancellor for Public Programs and Dean of UC San Diego Extension, and co-author of Closing America’s Job Gap. 

Sponsors of the summit include DLA Piper, Johns Hopkins Medicine, and the Consulate of Canada.  Canada, Colombia, Denmark, Germany, Norway, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Sweden, Taiwan, and the United Kingdom will be represented by presenters or attendees.

Attendance is limited to 100 people, with a limit of three attendees per organization, to allow for ample opportunity for both presentations and networking. The cost to attend is $1,500 per person (lodging not included).

 

 

 

Clinical Trials for Latin America Hosts Free International Seminar at Hospital Angeles in Tijuana

The University of California San Diego Extension Certificate Program in Clinical Trials for Latin America will co-host an international seminar from 5 to 8 pm Thursday, December 8 along with Hospital Angeles in Tijuana, Baja California, Mexico. The seminar on conducting clinical trials in Latin America, which will be in Spanish and English, is free but advance registration is required.

The certificate program was created to increase the administrative and regulatory skills of health professionals working in clinical trials in Latin America. From its beginning, the online and live versions of this program (in-person workshop taught in San Diego) have received excellent reviews and are becoming in great demand among professionals from Mexico, Dominican Republic, Chile, and Peru among other countries.

For registration in the U.S., contact Saytel Lopez at 858-534-9278 or email s4lopez@ucsd.edu. In Mexico, contact Fernanda Valdez at 01152+664-6351903 or email dirmedica.hti@saludangeles.com.

“We are very excited about the progress we have made and what the future holds for this program”, explains Leonel Villa-Caballero, MD, PhD, the director of the clinical trials certificate program in Spanish. “We are certain that our professional program is helping clinical trials professionals to better perform their daily activities and we are making a positive impact in the region.”

According to Villa-Caballero, Latin America has become very attractive for large U.S., Canadian  and European pharmaceuticals  currently struggling with financial  problems and  it certainly represents an affordable solution for multi-site clinical studies.

“We are also thrilled now to partner with the Hospital Angeles  group with the goal of updating the knowledge base among their  health personnel interested in clinical trials.” affirms Villa-Caballero.

Hospital Angeles group (HA)  is the largest private hospital network in Mexico. It includes approximately twenty top-of-the-line hospitals in the most important cities across Mexico. HA group, with approximately 2,500 physicians in its network, represents a role model of modern and high quality medicine in Latin America. In 2006, Hospital Angeles launched a branch in Tijuana and has attracted many talented physicians and  health professionals  from the Baja California region.

“There are many well prepared clinical researchers and physicians from our group looking to become principal investigators or participate in multisite-clinical trials”, states HA Tijuana Medical Director Cesar Amescua, MD. “At the same time, there is a clear perception of the need for educational programs in clinical trials to fulfill the demand of knowledge in this field. The certificate offered by UC San Diego Extension appeared at the perfect time for our academic growth.”

A selected HA group of professionals attended the live workshop in San Diego offered last May.

“I discussed with HA education leaders the benefits of this program for my staff and we want to make this program available to the rest of our medical group and to other HA physicians from other sites in Mexico as well” concludes Amescua.

The seminar will be hosted by HA medical leaders and the agenda includes a lecture with preliminary results of a phase 1 study currently performed by Amescua,  a lecture on angiotensin in translational  medicine by Laurence Brunton, PhD, UC San Diego pharmacology  professor and a presentation of  the certificate program in clinical trials by Villa-Caballero.

Paying More Than Lip Service to Going Global

Lee Ann Kim

Former San Diego TV news anchor Lee Ann Kim has a few well chosen words for job seekers and career climbers. She can vocalize the speech in one of four languages.

“In any job today employers are looking for people who are bilingual, trilingual and quadri- lingual,” says Kim. “We now live in a global society. Speaking foreign languages just makes you more marketable.”

Kim, a high-profile anchor at KGTV/Chanel 10 for 13 years, covered many big stories including the Cedar Fires, Santana and Granite Hills high school shootings, the Heaven’s Gate suicides and the Republican National Convention. She left the station in 2008 and today is making news as the founder and driving force behind the San Diego Asian Film Foundation, the presenters of an annual film festival that has attracted more than 100,000 movie goers.

San Diego Asian Film Festival

Kim believes you can never start too soon to learn the vocabulary of the global economy.

“My husband, Louis Song, and I are both ethnically Korean and we just enrolled our two children in a magnet Mandarin Chinese school” says Kim. “They are in Mandarin immersion so by the time they graduate from high school and speak fluent Chinese they can go anywhere in the world because that is the number one language in the world. “

Kim was born in Seoul, South Korea and emigrated to Chicago at the age of three. In addition to Korean, English and Spanish, she also “speaks” American Sign Language. She might need to learn Mandarin to keep up with the kids.

“I learned most of my English from television shows like The Electric Company and Sesame Street, says Kim. “I can sing all the jingles from TV in the ‘70s.”

Lee Ann Kim with actress Sandra Oh

She studied Spanish for four years in high school and was a journalism major and Spanish minor at the University of Maryland. She chose Spanish for practical reasons that paid off in her career.

“I knew if I was going to pursue journalism then Spanish would be a better language than German, French or Japanese,” says Kim. “In many of the TV markets, like Houston and San Diego, if you are equal to someone else on your resume but you speak a second language like Spanish or Chinese, then you are the one they will hire because we now live in a global society. That second language is extremely important.”

Growing up as an Asian American immigrant in the Midwest in the 1970s, Kim says she felt isolated and marginalized. Adults made fun of how her parents spoke (despite her father being an M.D.) and others made her and her three sisters feel that they didn’t belong in America.

Lee Ann Kim with actor George Takei

“I was constantly asked, ‘Where did you come from? Are you Chinese? Japanese? What’s Korean?’ So I grew up as a storyteller answering these questions,” says Kim. “My mom, who couldn’t speak English well, always told me: ‘No matter what you say and do, people don’t see you, they see all of us.’ My goal through journalism, storytelling and the film foundation is to show people that if we understood that we are really all the same, then the world would be a better place.”

Her San Diego Asian Film Festival first began in 2000 as a three-day event at the University of San Diego. Kim had no prior film festival or fundraising experience, but came up with the idea while serving as president of the San Diego Asian American Journalists Association. With the help of filmmaker Mark Arbitrario, film critic Beth Accomando, local journalists, and a team of passionate volunteers, the festival opened on August 9, 2000 with a sold-out screening of The Debut and ended with the Sundance Grand Jury Prize winner Girlfight with director Karyn Kusama in attendance. About 3,500 people attended the first festival, showing there was a demand for independent cinema.

Lee Ann Kim, Executive Director, San Diego Asian Film Foundation

The second film festival moved into a commercial theatre venue (Hazard Center in Mission Valley) and took place in September 2001, two weeks after the 9/11 tragedy. The 80 films that premiered provided a way for San Diegans to heal through stories that promoting tolerance and cross-cultural understanding. Soon after, the festival achieved 501 (c)(3) status, becoming the San Diego Asian Film Foundation (SDAFF) in 2002. Since then, the foundation has premiered more than 1,000 films and videos from around the world. Celebrities in attendance have ranged from Margaret Cho and Grace Park to George Takei and MC Hammer.

Kim has received numerous community service awards for her commitment to mentoring young people. The advice she gives to those that she mentors and employs is to get involved in your community as a volunteer, stopping making excuses about what you don’t know, and surround yourself with people who are smarter than you.

“You know what sucks? To be the smartest person in the room,” jokes Kim. “That’s because you are always telling people what to do and you can never learn. Life is a process of learning. You can never know enough. Always have people who are smarter than you that you can learn from and grow. I always hire that way too.”

To begin your process of lifelong learning, visit UC San Diego Extension today!