CAMPUS DIGEST

CAMPUSDIGEST

A Merced College News Magazine Vol. VII Edition V Published by the Office of Institutional Advancement December 2017

President A lot of good work done in 2017Page 2

Captain Williams Merced campus welcomes a new head of police Page 4

Debate Team Newly es-tablished club garnering attention Page 6

HonoringOur Vets

The Merced College lawn played host to the fifth annual Field of Honor during the week leading up to Veterans Day. Approximately 1,000 U.S. flags were on display.

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By Chris VitelliSuperintendent/President

The holiday season is filled with hustle and bustle. If your calendar—both personal and professional—looks anything like mine, then you are spread thin with cele-brations, events, performances, family functions, and more. If not carefully managed, a season intended to bring joy can easily be overshadowed by numerous distractions, “to-do’s,” and of-ten stress. I say all of this with hopes you are finding peace and joy (and hopefully well-needed rest) during this time of the year.

The end of the year is often a time to reflect on successes and possible resolutions as well. This has been a year to cele-brate at Merced College. I am proud of the outstanding work and accomplishments complet-ed by all of you in 2017, to name just a few:

1. Re-affirmation of Accredita-tion—team effort and well-de-served!

2. Energetic and positive start of the year with Convocation and Convocation Carnival

3. Renewed sense of collegiali-ty and professionalism

4. Successful opening of the In-terdisciplinary Literacy Cen-

ter—great job BSOTT Team!5. Opening of the new 1st Lt.

Peter J. Gallo Veterans Re-source Center

6. Hugely successful Merced College Blue Devil Football Season

7. Opening of a new Student Food Pantry by ASMC

8. Start of the development of a new Educational Master Plan

9. Championship winning Ani-mal Science Team

10. Opening of a new Digital Mu-sic Lab

11. Increased focus on sustain-ability efforts (new water bot-tle stations, paperless efforts, and more)

12. Once-in-a-lifetime gathering to watch a once-in-a-lifetime solar eclipse

13. Increases in grant funding14. Another successful Merced

River Literary Review15. New Office of Institutional Ef-

fectiveness16. Successful transition to a To-

bacco-Free Campus17. Increased campus dialogue

and communication (multiple forums, listening tours, and more)

18. Innovations in teaching and learning (English accelera-tion, guided pathways initia-tives, and more)

19. Increased high school out-reach and college classes

20. Expansion of prison educa-tion program and first inmate recognized as MC Student of the Month

Merced College is on the cusp of great things and being a col-lege known for innovation. As we enter 2018, I am hopeful we continue to focus on how we can meet the needs of our diverse student population, de-velop programs that close the achievement gaps, and work as a team to institute transforma-tional change for the community we serve.

Thank you for all you do. Mer-ry Christmas, happy holidays, and Happy New Year! Here’s to another successful year in 2018.

Plenty to be Proud of in 2017CAMPUS DIGEST DECEMBER 2017

A number of telescopes were set up in the Quad for students and staff to enjoy the solar eclipse at the start of the fall semester.

CAMPUS DIGESTDECEMBER 2017

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CAMPUS DIGEST DCEMBER 2017

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December EventsMonday, Dec. 11All Day -- Final Exams6 p.m. -- RN Graduation

Tuesday, Dec. 12All Day -- Final Exams2 p.m. -- Merced College Board of Trustees Meeting

Wednesday, Dec. 13All Day -- Final Exams5:30 p.m. -- Nurse Assistant Graduation

Thursday, Dec. 14All Day -- Final Exams2 p.m. – Staff Holiday Reception in Cafeteria

Friday, Dec. 15Final Day of the Fall SemesterAll Day -- Final Exams2 p.m. – Merced College vs. Butte at the San Joaquin Delta Classic7:30 p.m. -- Community Performance: Merced College Community Chorus in MC Theatre

Saturday, Dec. 16TBD -- Merced College at the San Joaquin Delta Classic7:30 p.m. -- Community Performance: Merced College Community Chorus in MC Theatre

Monday, Dec. 18Winter Break, Campus Open

Tuesday, Dec. 19Winter Break, Campus Open

Wednesday, Dec. 20Winter Break, Campus Open

Thursday, Dec. 21Winter Break, Campus Open

Friday, Dec. 22Winter Break, Campus Closed

Monday, Dec. 25Christmas, Campus Closed

Tuesday, Dec. 26Winter Break, Campus Closed

Wednesday, Dec. 27Winter Break, Campus Closed

Thursday, Dec. 28TBD – MC Women’s Basketball at the Cuesta Tournament Winter Break, Campus Closed

Friday, Dec. 29Winter Break, Campus ClosedTBD – MC Women’s Basketball at the Cuesta Tournament

Saturday, Dec. 30TBD – MC Women’s Basketball at the Cuesta Tournament Monday, Jan. 1Winter Break, Campus Closed

Tuesday, Jan. 2 Winter Break, Campus Open

Wednesday, Jan. 3 Winter Break, Campus Open5 p.m. -- MC Women’s Basketball at Porterville7 p.m. -- MC Men’s Basketball at Porterville

Thursday, Jan. 4Winter Break, Campus Open

Friday, Jan. 5Winter Break, Campus Open3 p.m. -- West Hills at MC Women’s Basketball5 p.m. -- West Hills at MC Men’s Basketball


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Merced Campus Welcomes Captain WilliamsSitting in the Mer-

ced College Police De-partment office, new Captain Matt Williams reminisces about his childhood and growing up on a farm outside of Merced. He said his fa-ther’s influence under-scores his outlook on working in public ser-vice and being a valu-able employee.

“From the time we were old enough, we were working,” Williams explains. “We grew up in a military family and we were raised to put forth our best effort in everything we did, be it school or otherwise.”

That drive has led Williams to wear many different hats over the years. He’s added one more as the Merced College Police Captain, replacing Tom Trinidad, who retired at the be-

ginning of the school year.

Williams comes from the City of Merced Po-lice Department, where he worked in various ar-eas of law enforcement -- including Special Op-erations -- for twenty nine years. While join-ing Merced College is a change of pace for him, he said that work-ing here is like returning

home.Like many of Merced

College’s current stu-dents, Williams grew up around agri-busi-ness while helping with his family farm. After joining the military out of high school, and spending four years as an Army Ranger, he re-turned to Merced Col-lege in search of an As-sociate’s Degree while working graveyard shifts at Merced PD in 2001. Earning a degree was key in obtaining his first promotion on the force.

“At the Department, without a degree, you can’t move forward,” Williams said. “I knew that if I wanted that pro-motion, I needed to get my degree.”

Having endured sim-ilar schedules to those of the students he now

protects, Williams feels a kinship with them. The knowledge that these students are not only at-tending school, but also pushing themselves, as he did, allows for better communication between himself and others on campus. His personal experience of the perseverance, discipline and fortitude current students prac-tice motivates him in his role as chief of the cam-pus police.

“We’re all here for the students.” Williams said, “An educated so-ciety is less likely to be involved with law en-forcement, but when they are, we want to make sure that it’s pos-itive and that they leave a situation feeling better than when they came.”

-- Submitted by Alessandria Pedretti

Captain Matt Williams

Art History Professor Tricia Cooper recently took students from her Ancient to Gothic class to the Egyptian Museum in San Jose. Forty five stu-dents from the Merced and Los Banos campus-es made the trip.

CAMPUS DIGEST DECEMBER 2017

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Debate Team Winning Over College CircuitThere was a time not that long

ago when Jessee Espinosa was unsure if he’d be graduating from high school.

Fast forward a few months lat-er and the Merced College fresh-man can say with all sincerity that he’ll be running for president of the United States someday.

These two realities may ap-pear to be in stark contrast of one another, but Espinosa’s dedication towards school and his future have changed dramat-ically thanks to his participation in the Merced College debate team. The ability to eloquently articulate an argument based off

of facts instead of emotion has awakened a passion in Espino-sa that he didn’t know existed.

“The thing about this type of debate is it forces you to stay up to date on current events,” Espi-nosa said. “Because of that, you learn a lot about government processes and the way the world works. So not only are we learn-ing how to develop our argu-mentative skills, but we’re also learning real-world applications for these skills.

“A lot of debaters go into law, advocacy or politics because of that.”

Despite the four-member

team (Espinosa, Gustavo Gar-cia, Alex Dickson and Jasmine Reeves-Thomas) coming to-gether for the first time in Sep-tember, Merced College has seen nothing but early success. After taking multiple awards from their first two tournaments, the team currently ranks 43rd in the National Parliamentary De-bate Association Rankings out of 250 schools and is ranked 14th among community colleges.

Parliamentary debate is a limited-prep competition where two competing teams are given

From left: Merced College debate team members Alex Dickson, Gustavo Garcia and Jessee Espinosa prepare a mock argument during a recent practice.

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a prompt – usually on a current event or problem – and then 20 minutes to research it and create an action plan. The teams of two then present their arguments back and forth over the course of 42 minutes.

The success comes as no sur-prise to debate team coach Pro-fessor Elizabeth Patterson, who has seen the group’s dedica-tion and tenacity from day one. After all, the first major win for co-founders Espinosa and Gar-cia win was convincing the Col-lege that the team should exist in the first place.

“We’d done debate together in high school at Buhach Colo-ny and were in the same statis-tics class talking about how we should get involved with the team at Merced College,” Garcia said. “It turns out there was no team, there was just a debate club and it had no returning members.

“We decided we’d start a new one. The old club didn’t com-pete, though. They just got to-gether and talked, so we needed to change the by-laws and do a lot of research on what it would take for our team to compete.”

In addition to the paperwork and steps involved in putting any organization together, Espinosa and Garcia had to deal with the logistics of funding the operation.

“We had to seek out and get a lot of signatures from around campus,” Espinosa said. “We had to participate in Title IX and discrimination seminars. We had

to recruit so we could compete. We had funding challenges.

“Straight fundraising, es-pecially with a club our size, doesn’t bring in enough money. You have to pay entry fees, trav-el costs and sometimes pay for hotels. It’s been really difficult.”

The team hopes that contin-ued success will lead to them being recognized as an accred-ited organization on campus and receive direct funding from the school or garner sponsorships from the community at large.

They’ve been able to compen-sate for lost practice time so far by having a former All-American debater as a coach.

“I had a tremendous oppor-tunity, receiving a scholarship to go to St. Mary’s College in Moraga,” Patterson said. “Pretty much every other weekend we

were flying to tournaments. My partner and I were ranked in the top 50 of individual debate part-nerships my final year, so I abso-lutely have the experience.

“When they approached me about starting the team, they were so determined and con-vincing it was hard to say no. We don’t have the same advantages as the four-year programs or es-tablished junior college teams, but California is where the com-petition is. So, if they’re compet-ing here, they’re doing well.”

The ultimate goal is to par-ticipate in Nationals at Daytona Beach, Fla. in the spring. Every-one acknowledges quite a few hurdles remain before that can become a reality. For now, the club is focused on growing their numbers heading into the spring semester.

DEBATECountinued from Page 6

Jessee Espinosa, left, and Alex Dickson run through a practice debate.


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Merced College Holiday Party


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Even in defeat, the 2017 Merced College football team provided excitement.

Down two touchdowns in the fourth quarter of the Living Breath Foun-dation Bowl, the Blue Devils turned in a dra-matic finish. Chance Young Jr. returned an in-terception for a 26-yard touchdown to trim the lead to seven and re-cord-setting quarterback Frank Cocio found Cole Brown for a touchdown pass with 11 seconds re-maining to tie the game and force overtime.

Merced (9-2) scored on the opening series of overtime, but Los Med-anos (9-2) quickly an-swered and opted to go for the win instead of forc-

ing a second overtime. Craijon Menefee hauled in a well-designed two-point conversion to give the Mustangs a 29-28 victory.

It was a disappointing end to a special season for the Blue Devils, but as head coach Bob Ca-sey told his players af-ter the game, there was nothing for them to hang their heads about.

Merced College played in its second straight bowl game for the first time since the 1996 and 1997 seasons. It was the program’s first nine-win campaign since 1995 and just the fourth in school histo-ry. The Blue Devils also captured a share of the Golden Coast Confer-

ence title, the school’s first conference crown since 1997.

The team did it all in dramatic fashion, win-ning four of their 11 con-tests by eight points or less and having their only losses come in overtime.

The unit’s accom-plishments earned them a clean sweep of the league’s post-season honors. Freshman run-ning back Hanisi Lot-ulelei was named the league’s Offensive Play-er of the Year after rush-ing for 1,384 yards (good for second in the state) and six touchdowns. Freshman defensive end David Perales earned Defensive Player of the Year after racking up a state-best 14 sacks to

go along with 64 tackles and three forced fum-bles. Casey was named the Coach of the Year, his first in his eighth year with the program.

Lotulelei and Pera-les were joined by 10 fellow Blue Devils on the all-conference list. Cocio (QB), Nick Cook (WR/all purpose), Elijah Macklin (WR), Dallas Reins (OL), Jonte Fred-erick (OL), Joseph Lema (K), Ronnie Reyes (DL), Soane Voahea Jr. (LB), Danny Chavez (LB) and Jac Yoruw (DB) were all named to the first team. The group can expect even more accolades when the All-State and All-Region teams are announced in Decem-ber.

Photo by Steve Whitaker Hanisi Lotulelei

Photo by Steve Whitaker David Perales

MC Football Turns in Season to be Proud of


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Alice Nguyen

has been an Internet

Service Special-

ist with Merced College

for three years.

Six Questions With Alice Nguyen

What’s your position here?Nguyen: Internet Services SpecialistHow long have you worked at the Col-lege?Nguyen: Three yearsWhat’s your favorite part about the College?Nguyen: The campus makes a strik-ing first image with its well-maintained grounds and open spaces.What’s your favorite part about Merced?Nguyen: I like Merced for its community and roots. My parents immigrated here in the 1960s and we now have three gener-ations here.What’s your favorite Merced College memory?Nguyen: I am a Merced College alum. I remember taking an anthropology class, which ended up being one of my favorites.What’s something you’re passionate about outside the world of academia?Nguyen: I’m passionate about food al-lergy education and awareness. My two children have over two dozen food aller-gies between them. Food allergies are life-threatening conditions and there’s no cure. So, when I get an opportunity to help people be aware of it, I point them towards food.allergy.org and just let them know about the condition.

Clamp Named Student of the Month

Michael Clamp is our November 2017 Student of the Month. Michael is an Atwater native and Atwater High graduate. He attended two vocational schools in the air-line industry and spent 20 years in customer service in the field.

After encountering a serious health issue, Michael decided to return to school in 2015 with the intention of acquiring an A.A. in Social & Behavioral Science and In-ternational Studies. He works hard to maintain his 4.0 GPA and Dr. Molina says she is impressed with how hard he works and how dedicated he is to both his family and his studies. Michael changed majors and will graduate with an AAT and transfer to one of our California State Universities to study Geography and either Meteorology or Earth Sciences. He is excited to be able to put his degrees to good use working overseas helping to create better lives for those who are less fortunate than he is.

Michael said that going to Merced College was an ex-periment and, according to Dr. Molina, it’s been a suc-cessful one.

“He is a motivator for other students to believe in the impossible and to never give up on their dreams even when unexpected catastrophic events happen,” Dr. Mo-lina said.

Michael was able to return to school with the help of his father, Richard Clamp. Professor Clamp taught Math at Merced College for 17 years. In his father’s honor, he established and maintains the Richard Clamp Memori-al Fund that sponsors scholarships for students who are enrolled in the EOP&S and DSPS programs. Michael formed a DSPS peer support group and his GPA was recognized by EOP&S in the both the Spring of 2016 and 2017. Among other activities, Michael mentors peers and fundraises for the Richard Clamp Memorial Fund. His travel to his wife’s native country, The Philippines, sparked his interest in book collecting for underprivileged schools and stems from his appreciation of the many books and services available at the Merced College Li-brary. He would “like to continue sharing this appreciation and knowledge of books and technology with other stu-dents in underserved countries (Dr. Molina).”

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