August 12, 2020

In this issue…

• Current News
• Family Updates
• Personnel Updates

Current News

CBU professor taking photography to new heights

Dirk Dallas, program director of graphic design and visual experience at California Baptist University, wanted to take his photography to a higher level. So he turned to drones.

“I love being challenged, whether that’s with new technology or new ideas,” said Dallas, assistant professor of graphic design. “The drone was all of that in one. I had to learn how to fly and how to capture good images from the air.”

It also merged two loves into one. Dallas loves to fly. Although he cannot fly a plane, he has his Federal Aviation Administration drone license, allowing him to operate drones commercially.

When he first turned to drones in 2014, Dallas attached a GoPro camera. Now he flies a DJI Phantom drone, a sophisticated system with a built-in camera.

“What I love about it is I can create imagery that is very unique,” Dallas said. “It’s still new and fresh and different.”

On one of his first flights, Dallas flew the drone a couple hundred feet up and tilted the camera down.

“To see myself tiny was humbling and it reminded me that in the grand scheme of things, I am but a small speck. At the same time, it was amazing because I know that even though I can feel small and insignificant, God loves me,” Dallas said.

Dallas started Instagram accounts, @fromwhereidrone—which has more than 230,000 followers—and @dirka. He also created a website with the same name and hosts an AdoramaTV web series, “From Where I Drone with Dirk Dallas.” He also created online classes for CreativeLive.

Dallas said he created the online community to let others share ideas and advice and ask questions about the new medium. They also could share photos.

“I wanted to highlight people I was meeting because I thought their work was so interesting,” Dallas said.

He recently released a book, “Eyes Over the World: The Most Spectacular Drone Photography.” It features 180 photos that were taken on all seven continents by Dallas and more than 125 photographers.

“I’m sharing other people’s work to show God’s beauty in the world,” he said.

Dallas has taught at CBU 10 years. While he does not teach his students drone photography specifically, he shares his experience with students. He also brings his experience of working with such clients as Audi, Nike, Disney, Starbucks and Ford.

“What I bring to my students related to drones is thinking differently. We want to do things that are unique, new and challenging,” Dallas said.

 

CBU professor helps fathers prepare for their role

When couples come to Riverside Life Services, Dr. Jeffrey Gage, professor of nursing at California Baptist University, is there to offer support to the men.

Gage has volunteered for four years at the pregnancy clinic, which primarily serves lower-income clients with unintended pregnancies. He began co-teaching parenting classes to couples. During that time, he also conducted research there about the fathers’ experiences of first trimester ultrasound.

“I heard men’s personal stories about planned and unplanned pregnancy, relationships with their own fathers, spiritual beliefs, apprehensions and their goals and aspirations for the future,” Gage said. “The findings enabled me to consider how we could enhance practice to promote positive fatherhood during a vulnerable time.”

About 18 months ago, Gage started Dads4Life, a father support and mentor program. Male volunteers welcome men when they visit the clinic with their partners. Dads4Life offers support such as an online parenting course, one-to-one mentoring and monthly meetings where dads and mentors get together to discuss various topics related to fatherhood.

Pregnancy often prompts men to evaluate their readiness to become a father and their commitments to relationships, Gage said. They seek experienced fathers who are willing to invest in their lives and provide support.

“Many men have grown up without fathers or positive role models,” Gage said. “Dads4Life is designed to address these needs by giving men the opportunity to develop personal relationships with mentors who desire to earn the right to speak into their lives and share Christ’s hope and love through all circumstances. We’ve already seen some life-changing effects from men’s involvement in Dads4Life.”

This past spring Gage received the alumni Humanitarian Nursing Award from the University of Missouri, Sinclair School of Nursing. It was given for “outstanding contributions to vulnerable populations” in recognition of his community work with fathers and families in Riverside.

“It was an honor to receive the award, but also it’s recognition of the commitment of our mentors and staff at Riverside Life Services who practically and prayerfully support the program to dads as a complement to the service with women and children,” Gage said.

Gage teaches research courses in the master’s and doctoral nursing programs. He uses his research as an example to explain the process of developing research partnerships, writing research questions and choosing appropriate methodologies.

“This enables students to understand the practical considerations of research in addition to the theoretical,” Gage said.

 

Professor studies supplementation and cardiovascular system

For the past several years, Dr. Jong-Kyung Kim, associate professor of kinesiology at California Baptist University, has studied how diet supplementation can benefit the cardiovascular system.

In the past 18 months, Kim conducted two studies looking at the benefits of grape seed extract (GSE) supplementation. The first project looked at physiological responses, such as resting blood pressure in obese individuals. The second looked at the effects of the supplementation on blood pressure during exercise and resting blood vessel stiffness.

“Cardiac patients cannot perform daily activity for a long period of time because they do not have enough blood flow to the muscles,” Kim said.

“Everyone knows that exercise is good medicine,” Kim added. “But individuals with obesity or hypertension, when they exercise, have an exaggerated blood pressure response. It can cause cardiac events, like a stroke or a heart attack.”

“The main goal of this project is to determine that GSE treatment improves blood flow to exercise’s skeletal muscle and then, in turn, improves exercise tolerance,” Kim said.

“One of the obesity-associated health abnormalities involves high blood pressure developing into hypertension and high arterial stiffness,” Kim said. “Our studies suggest that the GSE supplement can act as a non-pharmacological treatment to reduce blood pressure and arterial stiffness at rest and during exercise.”

Kim intends to do further research on this subject and to collaborate with a cardiologist group in Riverside to collect more data.

Two graduate students in the Department of Kinesiology assisted Kim with the studies. Katherine Dillon (’20) recruited participants, collected data and wrote the first draft of the manuscript for both studies.

“With writing up the manuscript, the knowledge I obtained from numerous other research articles I read in order to make sense of our study and what we have found through our investigation definitely helped me expand my knowledge. I feel [this] prepared me further for [pursuing] my Ph.D.,” Dillon said.

Brian Shariffi (’20) also recruited participants and collected data.

“This allows future studies to advance our knowledge in how GSE can potentially help improve lives,” Shariffi said. “Dr. Kim gave a good balance of guidance as well as independence, which helped further advance my skills not only as a researcher but as a teacher. This experience kind of was the starting point to my interest into pursuing a Ph.D.”

 

Division of Arts and Letters established at CBU

A new division has been created within the College of Arts and Sciences at California Baptist University.

The Division of Arts and Letters will consist of three departments: communication arts, history and government, and modern languages and literature. Approximately 630 students are pursuing a bachelor’s or graduate degree in those departments.

The college already has the Division of Natural and Mathematical Sciences and the Department of Aviation Science.

“The College of Arts and Sciences is so big and so diverse,” said Dr. Lisa Hernández, dean of the College of Arts and Sciences. “I hope by creating the Division of Arts and Letters, this is something bigger that the students can identify with and get a bigger feel for the different disciplines within the new division.”

Hernández said she hopes the new division will lead to a cohesiveness and to collaboration among the faculty and students. One of the goals is to offer an Arts and Letters Symposium, similar to the annual Natural and Mathematical Sciences Research Symposium.

Dr. James Lu, associate dean of the College of Arts and Sciences, said the goal is to expand the talents of the students in the humanities and social sciences.

“Our diverse programs all contribute to the healthy development of our students’ critical thinking ability. The faculty in this division serve as professional mentors to students,” Lu said. “We hope that by exploring the dynamic human experiences in society and at cultural and cross-cultural levels, our students will strengthen their spirituality and deepen their understanding of the real world, so as to thrive in their future professions and community services.”

 

Family Updates

CBU Recreation was featured in an article by Campus Rec magazine. The article, Fresh Programming Trends, focused on CBU’s programming and highlighted Ladies’ Night and Men’s Health Event held at the Recreation Center.

 

 

 

Dr. Scott Dunbar, associate professor of human resource management, Dr. Thomas Frederick, professor of psychology, Dr. Yvonne Thai, associate professor of sociology, and Dr. John Gill, associate professor of Christian studies, all for Online and Professional Studies, published an article in Mental Health, Religion & Culture (Vol. 23, Issue 2). It was titled Calling, Caring, and Connecting: Burnout in Christian Ministry.

 

 

Dr. Linda-Marie Sundstrom, associate professor of public administration for Online and Professional Studies, made a panel presentation at the virtual Association for Public Policy Analysis & Management Conference on July 23-24. Her research presentation was titled Impacts of Cultural Norms on the Success of Healthcare Public Policy: An International Comparative Study.

 

 

 

Philip Breitenbucher, assistant professor of social work, presented at a national webinar for Wellscreen.health on July 16. The webinar was titled Early Detection in Child Welfare: Connecting Families to Quality Treatment Services.

 

 

 

 

Dr. Virgo Handojo, professor of psychology, presented a workshop at the North American Association of Christians in Social Work – California Conference at CBU on Feb. 22. It was titled Love, Separation, and Violence: Implication for Clinical Social Work. Additionally, he presented a live webinar sponsored by Maranatha Christian University for Indonesian Psychological Association Continuing Education on July 23. It was titled Acceptance and Commitment Therapy for Stress and Anxiety during Covid-19.

 

 

Graduate students in the physician assistant studies program participated in a virtual outreach with children from the San Manuel Band of Mission Indians on July 15. The CBU students led the children through games and activities that taught proper hand washing, good exercise, sleeping and eating habits.

 

 

Dr. Kendra Flores-Carter, assistant professor of social work, Dr. Viola Lindsey, associate professor of social work, and Dr. Jennifer Costello, assistant professor of social work, held a webinar for Children First and Last Belize, a nonprofit organization, on July 25. The webinar, titled Helping Our Children Cope During Covid-19, provided parents, teachers, and child development professionals with information on the trauma of COVID-19 for children.

 

Dirk Dallas, associate professor of graphic design, gave a virtual presentation at the 2020 Capturing Wow Global Summit on July 7. The presentation was on drone photography and cinematography.

 

 

 

 

Dr. Andrew Harveson, associate professor of kinesiology, Dr. Levi Garrett, assistant professor of kinesiology, Dr. Dominick Sturz, professor of public health, all for Online and Professional Studies, and Yusuf Kaire, an OPS kinesiology graduate student, published an article in the International Journal of Sports Science (July 2020). It was titled Acute Effects of Neuromuscular Electrical Stimulation on Vertical Jump Performance.

 

 

Dr. Anthony Chute, professor of church history, and Steve Dahlgren, assistant professor of music, were affirmed as lead pastor and director of worship at Northpoint Church in Corona on July 5.

 

 

 

 

Dr. Raquel Ellis, assistant professor of social work, was recently appointed by the Council on Social Work Education to serve on its Council on Leadership Development for a three-year term. The council develops strategies that ensure an adequate number of leaders for the profession represent the ethnic and programmatic diversity of social work education.

 

 

 

Dr. Deron Walker, professor of English, published two articles. Empowering care’s effectiveness from high school math to college English was published in the Language and Language Teaching Journal. Teaching old dogs “new” grammar tricks with content-based instruction was published in the Journal of Studies in Education (Vol. 10, No. 3).

 

 

 

Dr. Thomas Frederick, professor of psychology for Online and Professional Studies, had an article published in the Journal of Psychology and Christianity (Spring 2020). It was titled Ignatian Spirituality and Psychotherapy.

 

 

 

 

 

Dr. Emily Hollinghurst (’08), adjunct professor of pharmacology, and her husband, Christopher (’16) welcomed a son on July 4. Ethan James Elmer Hollinghurst weighed 8 pounds 6 ounces and measured 20 inches. He joins sister Eleanor, 3.

 

 

 

 

Katelyn DeFoe, adjunct professor of adult health, and her husband, Robbie, welcomed a daughter on June 27. Gemma DeFoe weighed 8 pounds, 13.3 ounces and measured 21 inches.

 

 

 

 

Dr. Chase Porter, assistant professor of political science, and his wife, Natalie, welcomed a son on June 25.  Charles Lawrence weighed 8 pounds, 11 ounces and measured 20.5 inches. He joins brother Chase Jr., 3, and sister Mary Beth, 2.

 

 

 

Personnel Updates