On Tuesday, November 5, the Associated Students of Clark College (ASCC) and Activities Programming Board (APB) presented Democracy, Dogs, and Donuts to celebrate civic engagement on election day. Students handed out “I voted” stickers, provided voter information and delicious donuts. Therapy dogs — dressed flamboyantly in patriot red, white, and blue — mingled in the crowds to help soothe election anxiety.

For many Clark students, it was their first time being eligible to vote in either a general or a presidential election. ASCC student government led the effort to encourage new voters by hosting voter registration events on campus and directing students to the ballot box on campus.

ASCC Civics and Sustainability Director Keith Christian said, “ASCC and APB held the election day event as a way for Clark College students to celebrate our nation’s right to vote and get more engaged in the Clark College community. Helping Clark College students by engaging them in activities, volunteering, and getting more involved, we can find more ways to connect with each other and the community we live and work in.”

About ASCC and APB

The Associated Students of Clark College (ASCC) student government advocates and represents Clark College students by serving as the liaison between students and faculty, staff, administration, and the community.

The Activities Programming Board (APB) is charged with the creation of a comprehensive events calendar to include cultural, educational, family, and social events for Clark students both on-campus and virtually.

Photos: Clark College/Carly Rae Zent

Washington Secretary of State Steve Hobbs made two stops at Clark’s campus on June 4.

Veterans Center of Excellence

The secretary, who is an Army veteran and is an active lieutenant colonel with the Washington Army National Guard, first stopped in Clark’s Veterans Center of Excellence. Secretary Hobbs met VCOE staff and current student veterans, who had gathered for a barbecue to celebrate graduating student veterans. Secretary Hobbs shared his story about his working-class roots, military service, and his work as secretary of state.

He learned the value of hard work and education, but there was no money for college, so at age 17, he enlisted in the U.S. Army as a private and rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel with the Washington Army National Guard. He served in Kosovo and Iraq and was mobilized to command 750 service members during Washington’s COVID-19 response. As state senator, he worked with service members to develop legislation ranging from help in education, finding good family-wage jobs, and protecting veterans’ rights.

With help from the G.I. Bill, he was able to pay for college. He received an associate degree from Everett Community College and bachelor’s and master’s degrees in political science and public administration, respectively, from the University of Washington.

He is the first person of color to serve as secretary of state in Washington and only the second in state history who was born in Washington.

Donna Larson, associate director of the VCOE, said, “We were thrilled that Secretary Hobbs took time to visit our students. Being a veteran, he was able to connect with our students and offer insights into transitioning in public service.”

ASCC Leadership

Next, Hobbs sat down with ASCC student leaders to talk about what the Secretary of State does, the myriad services his office provides, the responsibility of being an elected official, the important role of youth voting, and about ensuring Washington’s election security.

A Running Start student who is 18 said she will be voting in her first presidential election in November.

Director of Student Life Sarah Gruhler, who had arranged the secretary’s visit, said, “The visit was a great opportunity for students to learn about the role of the Secretary of State. We really appreciated him encouraging students to vote.”

Learn more here: https://www.sos.wa.gov/.

‘Twas the week before finals

Clark students were stressed

So, they chilled with games and alpacas

At Clark’s annual Spring Fest.

Stress levels are high as Clark students are focused on studying for finals, writing papers, completing what they started so many months—or even years—ago.

Clark’s Activities Programming Board (APB) to the rescue with Spring Fest. Students, faculty, and staff gathered near Anderson Fountain and the grass near the Chime Tower for fun activities and games—all for free.

Students played and destressed in many ways:

• Climbed a rock wall
• Played on various inflatables including human foosball and hungry hippo
• Raced each other through the giant obstacle course
• Played giant Jenga and Connect Four
• Tried out the EZ beats drum battle
• Got sprayed-on temporary tattoos
• Enjoyed free ice cream treats
• Hugged and kissed therapy alpacas Napoleon and Jean-Pierre
• Got your photos taken with the roving photo booth
• And much more

Running Start students Callan Bixler and Lucille Ware sat on a bench eating ice cream. They had already played a game of giant Jenga and hugged the therapy alpacas. Finishing their ice cream, they headed to the bounce area before returning to studying for finals.

Dr. Edwards chatted with students at Pizza with the President on May 16 in Penguin Student Lounge. The informal lunchtime event is presented each term by Associated Students of Clark College (ASCC) to provide students with an opportunity to ask any questions of Dr. Edwards.  

ASCC President Casey Figone asked questions and fielded questions from other students. Here are highlights: 

Increasing in-person classes:  
“We’d love to see more students on campus. We’re striving to get more in-person classes, with a goal of 60% of classes in person and 40% hybrid/online.” 

Dr. Edwards

Encouraging students to get involved with civic engagement at all levels of government: 
“Going to Olympia and telling your stories as students is far more impactful than if I do it. Connect and find out what lawmakers are doing around student issues. Get involved at the state level, but also the local level. Find out who represents you.” 

Dr. Edwards

Criteria for adding new programs: 
“What we look for in adding programs: Is there a need? Do we have the capacity to offer the program? Does the program lead to well-paying jobs?” 

Dr. Edwards

Pizza with the President also is a time for the college president to ask students questions.

Dr. Edwards asked: “We are always trying to find ways to eliminate barriers for students and potential students. What are some of the barriers to attending Clark?” 

ASCC President Casey Figone answered: “Transportation. High gas prices. High housing costs. To afford rent, students often have multiple roommates. Students don’t know how to find affordable housing.” 

A discussion followed about resources for students to be informed. Dr. Edwards suggested College 101 and the college’s Financial Wellness Fair as starting points.  

Dr. Edwards asked, “Was Clark ready for you? The college should be student ready, just as much as the students should be college ready.”  

During the conversation, she told students: “This is a busy time of year for you, so hold onto your energy.” 

Fun facts about Dr. Edwards and Pizza: 

• Dr. Edwards’ favorite pizza is sausage, onion, and pepperoni. 
• As a Brooklyn, New York native, she grew up eating thin-crust pies. 
• When she traveled back home to Brooklyn to visit her mother for Mother’s Day, she said, “I made a point to have pizza.” 

Photos: Clark College/Susan Parrish

Felicia Lewkowicz, front right, stands with her family before they were exterminated by the Nazis. Photo courtesy of the Holocaust Center for Humanity.

On March 13, Clark College hosts Matthew Erlich of the Holocaust Center for Humanity as he describes the journey of his mother, an Auschwitz survivor.

The event, which is free and open to the public, will take place at 1:00 p.m. in Gaiser Student Center on Clark’s main campus, located at 1933 Ft. Vancouver Way. For maps and directions, visit www.clark.edu/maps.

Matthew’s presentation begins with a slide of Felicia as a young girl surrounded by her large family. One at a time her sisters, brothers, and parents disappear, leaving only Felicia and one sister and connecting her family to the stories of millions during the Holocaust.
Felicia Lewkowicz was born in Krakow, Poland in 1923. In March 3, 1941, the Nazis established the Krakow ghetto and Jews were required to wear armbands.

Felicia and one brother were sent by the Nazis to the Krakow ghetto while her mother and other siblings were sent to Tarnow, 70 miles away. Conditions in the ghetto were terrible, with very little food. Illness and disease ranrampant. Luckily, Felicia was able to get work outside the ghetto, cleaning the offices of German officers. One day she did not return to the ghetto, escaping to a train that took her to Vienna, Austria. On the way, she stopped in Tarnow where she saw her family for the last time.

Erlich’s story travels with Felicia through her experiences during the Holocaust and ultimately to the United States, where she and her husband, also a Holocaust survivor, raised four sons.

“People need to see where hatred leads,” Erlich says. “Especially today with the rise of neo-Nazi groups, Holocaust deniers, and those who would attack others for their differences. My mother’s Holocaust experience shows what can happen – and offers ways to fight against it.”

This event is organized and sponsored by the Associated Students of Clark College. For more information, visit http://bit.ly/2thpmS5.

If you need accommodation due to a disability in order to fully participate in this event, contact Clark College’s Disability Support Services Office at 360-992-2314 or 360-991-0901 (VP), or visit Gaiser Hall room 137, as soon as possible.

About Clark College

Located in Vancouver’s Central Park and serving more than 12,000 students per quarter, Clark College is Southwest Washington’s oldest public institution of higher education. The college currently offers classes at two satellite locations: one on the Washington State University Vancouver campus and one in the Columbia Tech Center in East Vancouver. Additionally, its Economic & Community Development program is housed in the Columbia Bank building in downtown Vancouver.

About the Holocaust Center for Humanity

Connecting lessons of the Holocaust to a broad range of relevant themes for our time, from injustice and bullying to discrimination, the Holocaust Center for Humanity has been teaching students to become engaged citizens and to speak out against bigotry and prejudice since 1989. The Center works directly with teachers, students, and community groups across the Northwest to provide educational materials, curriculum,
and interaction with local Holocaust survivors who tell their stories to 20,000 students of all ages each year. In 2015, the Center opened its museum to the public. 15,000 students of all ages tour the Center’s exhibits during a school year.

The Clark College Concert Choir visits the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music in 2015, where they performed for Dr. Christian Grasses, center, blue shirt, the conductor of the school’s concert choir. Photo: April Duvic.

Traditionally, the week after spring quarter ends is a time for students to rest and recover from the academic year. But not for the members of the Clark College Concert Choir, who spent four days performing and learning during an end-of-the-year trip to Los Angeles.

The trip, whose destination changes each year, is an annual tradition—a time for choir members to show off what they’ve learned over the past year and to get a chance to experience performing in front of new audiences. Last year, students traveled to New York to perform near the grounds of the former World Trade Center; the year before that, they visited San Francisco together with the Clark College Concert Band. This year the choir traveled by themselves. The trip, which is funded in part through the Associated Students of Clark College and in part through private fundraising by participating students, ran from June 21 to June 24.

The choir performed three concerts while in Los Angeles, the first of which was in the afternoon on the day they arrived. It was a community service outreach at the Los Angeles Veterans Administration Hospital and Care Facility, providing a Father’s Day concert for residents and their families and the staff at the hospital.

“The response from those in attendance was wonderful – the vets really appreciated having the choir perform,” said choir director April Duvic. “The students made such an amazing connection after they sang by going out into the audience and talking with the residents who attended the concert. It was life-changing for our students who had never had the opportunity to reach out and connect with vets like that before.”

The choir also visited the University of Southern California’s Thornton School of Music for a two-hour clinic with Dr. Christian Grases, the conductor of that school’s concert choir and an assistant professor in its department of choral and sacred music. They performed the Venezuelan folk song “Mata del Anima Sola” for him, in honor of Dr. Grases’ home country.

“Dr. Grases was able to impart incredible knowledge and really fire the choir up,” Duvic said. “He was amazed that the choir was from a two-year college. He enthusiastically invited the Clark College Concert Choir students to consider applying to USC and auditioning for the music department.”

The third and final official concert of the trip was hosted by All Saints’ Episcopal Church in East Los Angeles. The performance was attended by the church’s youth group and many members of the congregation and neighborhood, as well as by three Clark College alumni who live in the city. After the concert the youth group had an opportunity to talk with choir members about attending college and about the various educational plans the Clark students are pursuing.

“It was a positive experience for the Clark students to be able to talk about their college experience and encourage the church’s youth to go to college,” said Duvic. “The applause and standing ovation the choir received was a great way to end our tour.”

Ah, life in the Pacific Northwest! After a month of unseasonably sunny days, the Friday of Spring Thing featured rain and clouds. But like true Northwesterners, the Penguin Nation was undaunted by a little “liquid sunshine” pouring down on the annual event that celebrates the end of the academic year and the countdown to Commencement for our graduating students. Celebrants enjoyed free food and treats, inflatable obstacle courses, games, a climbing wall, and numerous other activities organized and provided by the Associated Students of Clark College. Here are a few scenes from a fun-filled day.

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Photos: Clark College/Jenny Shadley

Despite losing his legs at age 5, Spencer West recently climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro.

When Spencer West was 5 years old, he lost his legs to a rare genetic disease. “My family was told I would never sit up by myself, I would never be able to walk on my own, I would never have a normal life,” he said.

Yet West went on to disprove those grim predictions. Not only can he sit upright–he turned cartwheels in cheerleading competitions when he was in high school. Not only can he walk on his own–in 2012 he climbed Mt. Kilimanjaro on his hands. And while it’s true that West is not leading what many would consider a normal life, that’s because “normal” lives don’t generally include traveling the world on behalf of a global nonprofit, sharing the stage with the Dalai Lama, or being featured in major news media across the world.

West shared his story with a crowded Gaiser Student Center on March 7. He had been invited to speak by the Associated Students of Clark College. West, a motivational speaker who works for the global charity Me to We, raised a half million dollars through his mountain climb last year for clean-water projects in drought-stricken Kenya. He said he wanted to share some of the lessons he learned through that experience with students at Clark.

One of those lessons was the importance of asking for help. West didn’t climb Mt. Kilimanjaro himself–two of his good friends came with him and helped keep him going as he climbed 17,200 feet primarily on his own hands. In turn, he was able to help them when, near the summit, they became weakened by altitude sickness; West, it turned out, was one of those uncommon individuals not affected by altitude sickness, so he had the energy to encourage his friends during the final ascent.

The audience in Gaiser Student Center was clearly captured by West’s story. When he played video of himself and his friends pushing through their exhaustion to finally reach the mountain’s summit, the room erupted into loud cheers and applause, and several audience members could be seen wiping away tears.

West finished his speech by describing the manmade stacks of rock called “cairns” that other climbers had left along the trail to the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro–a way for climbers to tell each other that they were going the right way, and that someone had made it this far already. “We all have a capacity to be a cairn for other people,” he said. “We all need to be the cairn for ourselves, for our friends, for our family, and for the world.”

Photo: Clark College/Jenny Shadley