Category Archives: Administrative

President Buchman updates the community at All Hands Meeting

buildings and facilities-3797Approximately three times a year, President Lorne Buchman holds an “All Hands” meeting to update the community on the status, plans and priorities of collegewide initiatives. The All Hands meetings are customarily scheduled shortly after Board of Trustee meetings to allow the President to announce any decisions or areas of focus for the Trustees. On March 16, President Buchman updated the group on current priorities for the Trustees and College leadership.

Space planning and facilities upgrades are always moving targets. The College is mindful of the fact that moving is stressful and disruptive and the Facilities and Campus Planning department is spending considerable time looking at alternative scenarios to achieve a planned end result with the least disruption. One of the big issues presented to the Board of Trustees was the question of whether to prioritize building out academic spaces and completing essential building upgrades over building student housing. The College and the Trustees recognize that student housing is a significant concern for the student body and entering students. On the other hand, it is critical that the College create appropriate space for each academic program, including providing necessary shops, equipment, other student services and galleries.

The College decided on the following drivers for decisions regarding sequencing and implementation of facilities updates

  • Must be education focused
  • Must include removal of the Annex
  • Make all possible efforts to move programs only once
  • Balance interim needs with permanent spaces
  • Consider available space
  • Maintain maximum classroom counts
  • Achieve long term vision of redistribution
  • Consider financing strategies and constraint

Most importantly, should the College decide to update academic spaces prior to building on-campus student housing, the Trustees intend to launch a simultaneous initiative to address housing and affordability issues for students. Preliminarily, there are discussions surrounding the option of providing housing allowances or pre-leasing buildings in the surrounding area or along the Metro Gold Line. Any initiative surrounding student housing will have affordability as its primary goal. You can see various scenarios for who will be housed and where on the walls of the break room on the fourth floor of 1111 and will be posted on the Facilities and Campus Planning section of Inside ArtCenter later this month

President Buchman also reported on the ways ArtCenter is taking action regarding issues of diversity, equity and inclusion as detailed in a recent campuswide email from the Council on Diversity and Inclusion:

  • Personnel—the College is actively recruiting for a new Discrimination, Harassment, Retaliation Administrator and Title IX Coordinator; two new outside Contract Title IX/Discrimination, Harassment & Retaliation investigators; and is currently drafting a job description for a new Coordinator of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion, that will report directly to the President.
  • Training—We are exploring training options for employees, including exploring mandatory diversity training for all staff and faculty. We are also simultaneously exploring cultural sensitivity training for all students and/or expanded intercultural co-curricular programs; and piloting a design culture immersion program during the Summer term to help international English language learners to adapts to ArtCenter and the U.S.
  • Communication & Support Systems—Art Center is committed to better communication with student, faculty and staff; streamlining existing reporting structures; exploring best practices in regards to sexual harassment, based on the work of fellow institutions; looking at issues of access and affordability; and developing new strategies with the Board of Trustees to address issues of homelessness and chronic hunger, as well as catastrophic loss of financial resources

The President also reminded the community about the upcoming WSCUC accreditation visit and reported on the results of the Shared Governance Assessment Task Force. The complete All Hands address to the community, as well as earlier All Hands meetings, can be viewed here.

Board of Trustees Sets Tuition Rates for Fiscal Year 2018

buildings and facilites-2875

At its recent meeting in February, the Board of Trustees set tuition rates for the next Fiscal Year. Effective Fall 2017, the tuition rates for full-time Undergraduate degree students will be $20,704 per semester; full time graduate student tuition will be $21,881 per semester; part-time undergraduate and graduate tuition will be $1,726 per unit and $1,824 per unit respectively. The Universal Access Fee for all students will be $300. Tuition rates will remain in effect for Spring and Summer 2018.

Fresh Food Round the Clock at South Campus

micromarkets

Micro markets are now open and serving food 24/7 in the 950 and 870 buildings at South Campus. There are plenty of food options at the 950 micro market, located on the mezzanine. You can choose from sandwiches, salads and other fresh food that is prepared daily and stocked twice a day. There are also a number of frozen food options, including entrée items, White Castle burgers, breakfast sandwiches and frozen burritos. There are two coffee machines, one offering regular coffee and one offering espresso-style drinks. The espresso machine uses Peet’s Coffee that is fresh ground for each drink and it makes a mighty tasty cappuccino. There is also a wide candy selection, plenty of snack options and a number of ice cream choices. The micro market is a grab-and-go operation, where you select your choices and pay at a self-serve machine, similar to a grocery line self-pay. You can use your credit card or load cash onto a special micro market card.

The micro market at the 870 Building is smaller, almost a mini-micro market, but still offers fresh food items, cold beverage selections and a coffee machine. You will need to use a credit card to obtain your items, with payment based on a system of weights and measures.

Both micro markets are accessible 24/7 so you can choose your favorite midnight snack to get you through your latest project. But don’t grab and walk off without paying because the micro markets are monitored round the clock with video surveillance.

These micro markets are welcome additions to our South Campus, where the food offerings were slim for students studying into and through the night. Sodexo is maintaining the markets and is open to suggestions for items to be included.

Please send your thoughts to catering@artcenter.edu and make sure to note that the suggestion is for items to be carried in the South Campus micro markets.

Spring 2016 orientation: Back-to-school pro tips for surviving and thriving at ArtCenter

 

Student orientation

Student orientation

Ah, the first day of school. It’s an initiation fraught with the anxiety of the unknown and flashbacks to the horrors of middle school cafeteria mishaps. Fortunately, ArtCenter has built in a full schedule of activities to provide a soft landing to incoming students and their families.

Orientation Week’s busy agenda features social mixers and in-depth information sessions on everything from campus sustainability to the infamous ArtCenter critique. Students are also matched with Orientation Leaders, who act as guides, companions and resources for the latest insider information on navigating the academic, social and geographic peculiarities of life at ArtCenter

In the spirit of optimizing the orientation week experience for the incoming class of 2016, we’ve compiled the following authoritative collection of pro tips from our Facebook community of current and former students to help ArtCenter newbies avoid rookie mistakes.

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A celebration of dedication: Art Center employees recognized for years of service

Hillside Campus in 1978. Image courtesy of College Archives.

Hillside Campus in 1978. Image courtesy of College Archives.

Martina Navratilova defeated Chrissie Evert for the “ladies” championship at Wimbledon, Sony introduced the Walkman and Midnight Express was playing in theaters. The year was 1978, when Hillside Campus had been occupied for about two years, South Campus didn’t exist and three people started their careers at Art Center.

One of those people is Stephen Nowlin, vice president of the Williamson Gallery. “I’ve been pretty fortunate to have watched Art Center from up close through the years—first as a high school student visiting the little hallway gallery on 3rd street; then as a graduate student at the Pasadena campus; and as an Admissions counselor, teacher, web producer and, for most of that time, as the Williamson Gallery’s director. The most impressive thing for me through all those years and roles, I must say, has been the consistency of high quality in the work produced by Art Center’s students. It never ceases to amaze me.”

Every year Art Center celebrates employees who have reached significant milestones in their careers. On September 23, 2014, almost 60 individuals were recognized for having 2013 work anniversaries of 10 or more years. The occasion was commemorated with a formal luncheon and presentation of the service awards hosted by the Human Resources Department. Earlier this year a luncheon was held to commemorate those having work anniversaries in 2012.

“Art Center students are supported by dedicated staff and faculty who do everything they can, directly in the classroom or indirectly behind the scenes, to help students achieve their goals to become professional artists and designers,” said Nancy Duggan, Executive Director, Human Resources. “It is our pleasure to honor these individuals.”

Art Center President Lorne M. Buchman kicked off the presentations with a word of thanks, which was followed by the awards ceremony.

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View from the Bridge: Student work is Art Center’s greatest attribute

President Lorne M. Buchman admires student work by Tammy Chang (BFA 12) in his office.

President Lorne M. Buchman admires student work by Tammy Chang (BFA 12) in his office.

Art Center’s Hillside Campus is extraordinary for so many reasons—its internationally recognized modernist steel-and-glass structure; its iconic bridge; its idyllic placement in the hills above the Rose Bowl—but for all its wonders, its single greatest attribute is its front-and-center placement of the student gallery. Walk into the building and the message is clear from the start: student work is what this college is all about. It was truly an inspired choice by architecture firm Craig Ellwood Associates.

And what work our visitors discover! Repeatedly, they are dazzled by the ideas on display—the cleverness, the innovation, the beauty—and compelled by their fine execution. They immediately know our school is filled with talented, dedicated and professional students, and they get a palpable sense of the capabilities of our graduates. We’re known for that, and the gallery has done an incredible job of presenting our brand to the larger world.

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Art Center challenges career changing creatives to ponder: Why work?

Ad for Art Center's Why Work campaign

Ad for Art Center’s Why Work campaign

Why work?

It’s a compelling question; but one most of us are too busy working to contemplate. Beyond the practical necessities of gainful employment, however, lies a whole set of considerations that have more to do with personal fulfillment and authentic creative expression. It may seem like a luxury  to factor these qualitative variables into one’s employment equation. But in today’s growing creative economy, there’s a strong argument to be made for cultivating a career that leverages those right brain talents.

Art Center has long been a training ground for those seeking to land a day job that also happens to be a creative calling. It’s a defining characteristic of both the College itself and its students, faculty and alumni. It also happens to be the driving force behind the College’s new “Why Work” campaign developed by award-winning advertising firm WONGDOODY, which hinges on one question:  “Why work for a living?” Because the corollary to that question is that when you love what you do, you’ll never work a day in your life. Compelling, isn’t it?

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Los Angeles Times praises Art Center’s “smart growth” to meet increased demand for fresh design talent

The newly purchased Mullin Building, at 1111 Arroyo Parkway

The newly purchased Mullin Building, at 1111 Arroyo Parkway

We’ve been talking with Los Angeles Times’ higher education reporter Larry Gordon for a few weeks  about businesses aiming to sharpen their competitive edge by hiring top design talent. Gordon was intrigued by the notion that corporate leaders have realized market domination in the new innovation economy requires a brain trust of superior design thinkers. Savvy consumers have become more and more discriminating in their choices when purchasing everything from smart phones to urban mobility devices.

Art Center’s record enrollment growth since 2009 is a clear signal of the global increase in demand for innovative design education. The booming interest in design also illustrates corporations’ recognition of the expanding importance of the creative professions to a healthy global business climate. And this increasingly design-centric paradigm is exemplified by Art Center’s continued physical expansion, with the completion of the new HQ for the Fine Art and Illustration Departments at 870 Raymond and the announcement of the purchase of the Mullin Building at 1111 Arroyo Parkway.

Read on to see what Gordon discovered in his conversations with Art Center students and faculty about how the recently opened “Post Office Building” is meeting their needs for light-filled visual art making spaces, and what President Lorne Buchman had to say about the College’s latest acquisition along Pasadena’s “Innovation Corridor.”

Outgoing Grad Art chair Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe on teaching, beauty and art’s unlikely logic

Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe

Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe

After logging 11 years as Chair of Art Center’s Graduate Art department, Jeremy Gilbert-Rolfe handed over the reigns to incoming co-chairs Diana Thater and Jason Smith. Gilbert-Rolfe has spent a total of 28 years on Art Center’s faculty, and will migrate into a full-time teaching position in 2015 after a sabbatical during which he’ll dedicate himself to one of the many writing projects vying for his attention (see Q & A below for details).

Throughout his tenure with the college, Gilbert-Rolfe has had a hand in educating an impressive array of art world luminaries, including Lynn Aldrich, Lisa Anne Auerbach, David Bailey, Olivia Booth, Mason Cooley, Aaron Curry, Kevin Hanley, Nate Hylden, Melissa Kretschmer, Sharon Lockhart, T. Kelly Mason, Rebecca Norton, Steve Roden, Sterling Ruby, Frances Stark, Jennifer Steinkamp, Alexis Marguerite Teplin, Diana Thater, Pae White, Jennifer West and T.J. Wilcox. At the same time, he has distinguished himself as a formidable writer and critical thinker, best known for probing philosophical and aesthetic ideas around beauty and other issues informing the way we interact with art.

Gilbert-Rolfe makes clear in his candid and enlightening responses to our questions below that he will continue to build upon this legacy as an educator and critic.

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View from the Bridge: Grounded in reality and ready for professional liftoff

Students present work to Honda Research and Development executives.

In a Sponsored Project, Graphic Design student Sungmoon Chung, center, presents work to alumnus and Honda R&D Americas Division Director Dave Marek (BS 87 Industrial), far right.

Summertime is traditionally set aside for leisurely activities—poolside lounging, pleasure reading and, at least through June, watching the Stanley Cup Final.

But here at Art Center, our students are as busy as ever. Many students continue their studies through the Summer term, while others, thanks to our dedicated staff in the Office of Career + Professional Development, scatter across the globe working as interns at an impressive array of organizations. It’s amazing, really, when you stop to look at where our students have landed internships:

  • Illustration student Adriana Crespo is at design firm IDEO in San Francisco;
  • Film student Juliana Rowlands is at director Roman Coppola’s production company The Director’s Bureau in Los Angeles;
  • Transportation Design student Harrison Scott Yen is at Chrysler’s Street and Racing Technology division in Michigan;
  • Graphic Design student Siyun Oh is at the Museum of Modern Art in New York;
  • Transportation Design student Yang Fu is at vehicle manufacturer Renault in France;
  • Product Design student Benji Kurada is at Google in Switzerland; and
  • Transportation Design student Sean Peterson is at Suzuki Motor Corporation in Japan.

I could go on, but I think you get the picture. These are not your everyday assignments; our students are working with some of today’s most prestigious companies.

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