In this issue…
Current News
Spring 2022 semester begins at CBU after brief delay
California Baptist University welcomed traditional undergraduate students back to classes for the first day of the spring 2022 semester on Jan. 18. The return followed a Spring Welcome event that introduced new freshmen and transfer students to CBU on Jan. 14.
CBU delayed the start of the spring semester by eight days due to a surge of the Omicron variant of COVID-19 in the southern California region. As classes resume, the campus community continues to follow health and safety protocols designed to help reduce the spread and impact of the virus.
New students moved into residential living areas on Jan. 14. The day included a welcome session that covered CBU’s vision, student services, and how to become involved on campus.
The students also participated in First-Year Experience (FYE) groups, which aims to help new students transition to university life and the CBU community. Gavin Andrew, director of First-Year Experience, said FYE helps students make connections and learn about the various resources available for Lancers to succeed.
Entering CBU during the spring semester, new students may believe that everyone already has an established friend group and feels connected, Andrew said.
“FYE leaders can play a pivotal role for these students and combat these false narratives. They can be that critical connection for a student to help make CBU feel like home,” Andrew said. “Our FYE leaders genuinely go above and beyond to help students feel a part of this campus because they were once new students themselves.”
Jensen Ventura, an aviation flight freshman and transfer student, chose CBU to be closer to friends and family and to grow in areas outside of his major.
“I’m looking forward to the community, to interact with a lot of people from different backgrounds, different goals, different study courses,” Ventura said.
Braelyn Prosser, a graphic design and visual experience freshman transferring to CBU, chose CBU after learning about the program and the community from a faculty member.
“I’m looking forward to pretty much everything,” Prosser said. “I’m excited for the community in the dorms. My previous school didn’t really have a lot of community there, so I’m excited for that. I’ve heard that my floor is really good.”
Endowed scholarship honors Dr. E.W. McCall Sr.
California Baptist University announces the Dr. E.W. McCall Sr. God’s Servant Endowed Scholarship. Established by St. Stephen Missionary Baptist Church (La Puente, Calif.), this scholarship fund honors McCall, a longtime trustee at CBU.
The donation of $125,000 was matched by an anonymous donor. In turn, both gifts were matched by institutional funds from the CBU endowment match program, making the scholarship fund total $500,000. The new scholarship will help reach more students on campus. To receive this scholarship, students must be a double major, with one of the majors in the School of Christian Ministries.
McCall, who passed away in April 2019, served as a CBU trustee 1993-2019, including two years as chair of the Board of Trustees. He pastored St. Stephen Missionary Baptist Church for 37 years beginning in 1970. During that time the congregation grew from fewer than 40 members to more than 4,000 members. Dr. Anthony Dockery is the church’s current pastor and chair of the CBU Board of Trustees.
Endowed scholarship honors Dr. Steve and Shirley Davidson
California Baptist University announces the Dr. Steve and Shirley Davidson Applied Theology Endowed Scholarship. Established by the Clovis Hills Community Church (Clovis, Calif.), this scholarship fund honors CBU’s friends Steve and Shirley Davidson.
The new endowment fund—$200,000 – which includes the gift from Clovis Hills Community Church, a match from a generous donor and an institutional match from CBU—will help support students enrolled in the Bachelor of Applied Theology (BAT) program in CBU’s School of Christian Ministries. The BAT program is primarily designed for those called to pastoral ministry or church planting.
For 50 years, the Davidsons have served in vocational and bi-vocational ministry, pioneering both parachurch and local church ministries. The Davidsons planted Clovis Hills Community Church in 1991.
In addition to being the founding pastor of Clovis Hills Community Church, Steve is a past chair of CBU’s Board of Trustees. He has been involved in the California Southern Baptist Convention as executive board chair and president. Shirley, a lifelong educator, has served the Clovis Hills School of Ministry as an adjunct professor and instructional advisor.
CBU graduate covering news in Washington, D.C.
Only a few short months after graduating from California Baptist University last May, Misty Severi (’21) landed a job as a reporter in Washington, D.C.
“Normally, what I do would take about two more years,” Severi said. “But because of connections and because of a love of journalism and going above and beyond what people expected of me, I got it before then.”
Her journey started at Bakersfield College, when her dad suggested taking a journalism class because she loved writing and talking with people. Severi ended up loving the profession. She continued her pursuit of journalism at Riverside City College before transferring to CBU.
At CBU, Severi was a reporter with the campus newspaper, The Banner, and held various editor positions.
“CBU Banner helps you learn how to do news reporting and how to write a story. It teaches you all the fundamentals,” she said.
Through CBU’s journalism program, which emphasizes multimedia reporting, Severi learned how to edit videos and record stand-ups. In one class, a guest speaker from The Press-Enterprise came and, after making a connection with her, Severi became a freelance reporter for the newspaper.
“My biggest takeaway is to take advantage of every opportunity CBU is introducing you to,” Severi said.
Severi was also a freelancer for The College Fix, a journalism website with college-age writers and podcasters. After graduation, she served as an intern at a news media outlet in Washington, D.C. Her connections at Fix then led to the Washington Examiner, where she now works as a breaking news reporter.
“My job is to literally follow the news. I think my favorite part of all of this is how much you learn. It’s never the same day twice,” Severi said.
Severi initially thought she would be an arts and entertainment reporter, but then the 2016 election happened. She was the news editor for the RCC student paper at the time.
“We are facing a really tough time in our country, with rapid changes. But the idea of democracy is more important than ever, and it can only succeed if the country is well-informed,” Severi said. “I decided to be a reporter because a reporter’s job is just that. We inform the electorate so they can make educated decisions that they view are important in how our country is run.”
Severi, who doubled majored in history along with journalism and new media, also enjoys the historical aspect of the D.C. area and even has a membership to George Washington’s Mount Vernon.
Severi learned perseverance as a teenager working to help support her family, and by dealing with health problems in recent years. From those experiences, her advice to students is to make the effort to go for what they want.
“You can find excuses to not do things,” Severi said. “I could have quit because of health stuff. I could have quit because of finances. I could have quit because of a million different things, but I wanted to be a reporter.”
Nursing professor learns about digital innovation
Last month Dr. Dayna Herrera, professor of nursing at California Baptist University, spent several days in Dallas at the 2021 Digital Academy: Building the Essentials Tool Kit with Digital Innovation.
The American Association of Colleges of Nursing (AACN) selected her and 29 other nursing faculty from 150 applicants from across the nation to participate. The event brought together faculty with Apple experts to develop digital projects around curriculum for nursing programs.
Herrera’s project focused on interprofessional partnerships, which bring students from various healthcare disciplines together to learn from, with and about each other in order to improve healthcare outcomes.
Every year since 2017, CBU has held an interprofessional education disaster simulation for its graduate students in health care programs. The event is the culmination of the interprofessional instruction students receive throughout the year. The past two years, the activity was virtual due to the pandemic.
The virtual event led Herrera to discover a gap when teams worked together online, she said. A software online program they used was not interactive and only one person could input information at a time. Searching for a solution, Herrera found an Apple program—Numbers—that allows for synchronous activity in collaborative groups.
“It will enhance a team’s ability to collaborate together so that everybody has access and everybody has buy-in,” Herrera said. “It’s more versatile.”
The program would help meet the needs of interprofessional education and bring in more community partners, such as other universities and public agencies, Herrera said.
“We have a lot of community partners that may not be able to be present, but they can come in synchronously, in a virtual activity,” she said.
Leading up to the digital academy and at the event, Herrera worked with Apple experts to learn more about the software program and other digital apps and tools to use in the classroom and the disaster simulation. She also learned about letting students be more responsible for their own learning by using creativity and tapping into the digital world more, she said.
“We’re going to be giving them digital tools to be able to make decisions together,” Herrera said.
Herrera said although she considers herself digitally minded, she sometimes feels she is slipping behind. The digital conference sparked excitement. Now she hopes to inspire students and fellow faculty members.
“The minute we stop changing the learning environment we become old school. We have to change with the culture, and while it’s really difficult to do that, it’s critical,” Herrera said. “I can walk through here and look at glazed over students in a lecture format with a PowerPoint on the screen and trust me, they are not engaged. They are used to highly interactive things, and we have to continue to meet that need.”
Family Updates
The Department of Aviation Science provided training for scouts in BSA (Boy Scouts of America) to meet the requirements for the Aviation Merit Badge on Dec. 11. Areas covered included aerodynamics, aviation careers, aircraft instrumentation and dispatch. The day included flight simulators, preflight walk around the CBU fleet and tours of airport control tower and fire and rescue area.
Dr. Virgo Handojo
Dr. Virgo Handojo, professor of psychology, presented at the international webinar on Modern Assessment and Intervention Psychology for Human Well-being on Dec. 3. His presentation was titled Psychotherapy and Virtual Reality: Stress Disorders.
Dr. Shawn Wilhite
Dr. Shawn Wilhite, assistant professor of Christian studies for Online and Professional Studies, published an article in the journal Studia Patristica (2021). It was titled “Was It Not the Only Begotten That Was Speaking Long Ago”: Cyril of Alexandria’s Christological Exegesis in His Commentary on Hebrews (Heb. 1:1–2).
Andrew Cress
Andrew Cress, director of special projects for Academic Affairs, became board president for the California Association for Institutional Research on Jan. 1. It is a one-year term.
Dr. Mark Kling
Dr. Linda-Marie Sundstrom
Dr. Mark Kling, associate professor of criminal justice, and Dr. Linda-Marie Sundstrom, professor of public administration, both for Online and Professional Studies, presented at the virtual Northeast Conference on Public Administration on Nov. 5. The title of the presentation was Bringing Diverse Voices Together to Address Rising Crime: Or Are We Becoming Ungovernable?
Dr. Victoria Brodie
Dr. Victoria Brodie, assistant professor of public relations, presented to the Western Region of Council of Governments’ Fellows on Dec. 10. The presentation was titled Communicating for Impact.
Dr. John King
Dr. John King, director of Mobilization, earned his Doctor of Philosophy from Southwestern Baptist Theological Seminary on Dec. 3. The title of his dissertation was Partnering Together in the Harvest: Evaluating the Shift from Short-Term Missions to Missions Partnership.
Carly Lynn Wolfe
Carly Lynn Wolfe, adjunct professor of English, was interviewed by Authority Magazine for an article titled How Journaling Can Help You Be More Calm, Mindful, and Resilient (Dec. 6).
Jessika Shields
Jessika Shields, adjunct professor of health sciences for Online and Professional Studies, has created the Parent Them Successful podcast, which provides parents with tips to help children succeed academically, socially and emotionally. The podcast includes interviews and parent testimonials.
Dr. Monica O’Rourke
Coe Michaelson
Lisa Friesen
Lisa Friesen, assistant professor of allied health; Coe Michaelson, men’s head soccer coach; Dr. Monica O’Rourke, professor of kinesiology; Keith Coury (’18); and Michelle Pinkney, a doctoral student in leadership studies, presented at the International Leadership Association Conference on Oct. 25. The presentation was titled Transformational Leadership: Challenges and Opportunities for Young Adults in Sport-Fitness Industries.
The Bachelor of Fine Arts Creative Writing program published an advent edition of The Dazed Starling: Unbound (December). It was edited by Dr. Erika J. Travis, associate professor of English and behavioral sciences, and included submissions from students, alumni and faculty. Faculty members included: Dr. Allan Bedashi, Dr. Noel Cooper, Dr. Gretchen Bartels-Ray, Jennifer Tronti, Dominick Dicus and Lynn Wolfe.
Laila Elise Little
David Little, assistant director of graduate admissions, and his wife, Jolene, welcomed a daughter on Dec. 21. Laila Elise Little weighed 6 pounds, 10 ounces and measured 20 inches. She joins sister Arayah 4 and brother Wesley, 1.
Personnel Updates
