2003

Remember to see Rasmussen Art Gallery’s upcoming exhibit on the campus of Pacific Union College. The Art Department teachers and staff of PUC will showcase their best work of the past year during “New Work” from January 11 through February 9. This show promises diversity and innovation, as the artists explore new ideas and forms. Featured artists will be Jerry Dodrill, Milbert Mariano, Thomas Morphis, Cliff Rusch, Bob Seyle and Tom Turner, who range in disciplines from photography, painting, and drawing, to ceramics and digital media....

From February 15 through March 16, Pacific Union College’s Rasmussen Art Gallery will display a vibrant collection of paintings by Czech artist Jan Barta. The theme and title of the show is Doors, and features works inspired in different cities throughout the world. Barta has illustrated books and journals, worked with radio programs, and taught art to children. His work is described as being “full of humour and kindnes” and “neat and clear, mostly of clear and calm colours, and full of desire for harmony and understanding.”...

With flag raising, lamp lighting, and drum beating, the American College of Health Sciences in Sri Lanka celebrated its grand opening on January 12, 2003. Assorted prominent personages were present, including Sri Lanka’s Minister of Health. Dr. Julia Pearce, chair of the Department of Nursing at Pacific Union College, was a guest of honor and a speaker at the opening. Dr. Pearce traveled 22 hours from California to Sri Lanka to take part in the new school’s ceremony, taking with her a gift of 200 pounds of books which she and other PUC faculty and staff donated. She spent a week sharing with the administration about teaching methods and expectations at American colleges. They also discussed what it would take for the students to earn their associate’s degrees in Sri Lanka and then transfer to PUC to earn their bachelor’s degrees. The American College of Health Sciences is not a part of the Adventist educational system, but it has many connections. The founding doctor graduated from Loma Linda University School of Medicine. The school’s faculty includes a nurse who graduated from Walla Walla College and is married to a man working for Global Mission in Sri Lanka. Additionally, before opening,...

There’s a new look to the filming industry, and it is refreshingly centered on Christ. College students from all over the U.S. brought their best to the first annual SONscreen Film Festival held in Ontario, California. The festival gave young Adventist video producers the opportunity to showcase their original videos, network with industry professionals, and even win prize money. Christopher “Kit” Kohler, senior digital video technology major at Pacific Union College, received the second runner up prize of $1,000 for “Best in Show” (out of nearly 30 entries). In addition to Kohler’s prize money, the SONscreen Film Festival donated $1,000 to PUC’s technology department. Kohler’s winning video, “The Mike Copithorne Story”, depicted the life of a PUC alumnus who was paralyzed after a skiing accident. Copithorne, formerly a professional wake boarder, has managed to still remain active in water sports, fly fishing, and his love for Christ. The film centered on life, love, and hope—elements that encapsulate our walk with the Lord. “His life is a miracle,” said Kohler. “I thought it was a story that really needed to be told in the video medium.” Jon Wood, professor of technology at PUC, agrees that video cameras are becoming an important...

Have you ever wanted to do something big for Jesus, but didn’t know where to start? Several PUC students found their starting point this summer during a three-week mission trip to Ghana from August 26-September 18. Led by Dr. Warren Ashworth, professor of religion at PUC, nine students found out what it was like to preach to the masses—through a translator, that is. Their destination city of Kumasi in Ghana, West Africa, is the center of the Ashanti Nation, whose people speak Twi. The group’s mission was to present a total of 170 sermons in 10 different locations throughout the city. This meant that each team member would be responsible for 17 sermons, each aided by PowerPoint presentations and pictures—courtesy of Elder Bob Folkenberg, Global Mission Coordinator for the North Carolina Conference. “I was so proud of my students,” exclaimed Ashworth. “Each student on the team was able to get up and preach to their own ‘congregation’ with no formal training.” As a bonus, the daily presentations included segments from a video called "Jesus," that was actually in Twi! The PUC team had an unforgettable last Sabbath there as they witnessed 1,300 newborn Christians being baptized in a lake. Local...

Last year the Campus Center was washed-out and cold, like a neglected waiting room in a mediocre dentist’s office. This year, on a grey Tuesday evening, the overhead lights glow off the warm colors of the walls and little lamps throw swatches of light on the tabletops. Gossamer strands of Debussy’s piano music waft over miscellaneous people cushioned deep in a cluster of couches or assembled in a rough semi-circle of black chairs. The music whispers against a rank of artworks, which file in silent energy over the walls. It’s February 11. The just-hung collection of student artworks infusing the room with quiet fascination is called Gallery C. And the hushed band of artists and appreciators gathered near one end of the Campus Center is here to honor the gallery’s opening with a relaxed reading of student poetry. On the edge of the gathering, Campus Center director Chris Hagen gives off calm rays of amiable approval. It was his idea of filling the Campus Center’s warm, empty walls with student art that started all this. The Society Of Fine Arts (SOFA) officers, who picked up his idea, spread it around campus, added the poetry reading, and put up the artwork,...

Every program needs a mission, a central motivating focus. For more than six months, the leaders and students of Pacific Union College’s aviation program have been seeking their mission. Why should PUC have an aviation program, and why should students enroll in it? The answer, an almost ironic one, has come with strength and conviction, supported by many miracles: the mission of PUC’s aviation program is mission. This past summer, as the aviation department was seeking to clearly define its focus, the students and faculty found that they missed the vespers programs that occur weekly during the regular school year. So they established a Friday night aviation “summer vespers”, a process in which pilot and student Jason Miller was instrumental. This vespers, consisting of food, socializing, and Bible studies, continued throughout the summer, and after each meeting a group gathered to pray for miracles. These prayers were answered as aviation department chairman Nathan Tasker started making contacts and discoveries which would lead him to the conviction that “God is asking us to really get back into mission aviation.” Tasker has come to realize that the mission field has a gaping opening that must be filled, a pressing need for transportation...

t’s difficult for those who did not attend Pacific Union College between 1938 and 1985 to understand the colossal esteem PUC alumni have for Dr. Walter C. Utt. Hundreds of PUC graduates can hardly remember their “PUC days” without a fond memory of Dr. Utt. He was, it would seem, more than a just a history professor. He was a legend. In 1985, a few days before his 64th birthday, Walter Utt died. His untimely death was sad for a number of reasons. First, many incoming students lost the opportunity to enjoy his quick wit and riveting “conversational lectures” in the classroom. Second, as best-selling author and PUC alumnus Joe Wheeler said, “A little bit of myself died” the day Dr. Utt died. Most of Utt’s students would probably agree with that. And third, Dr. Utt’s primary research was never fully completed. He had set out to write the first authoritative biography of Claude Brousson, 1647-1698, a revolutionary preacher and Huguenot lawyer when it was a terrifying time to be either. Louis XIV’s absolutist state made it illegal to preach Protestantism in France, yet Brousson did. As a result, he was martyred. Dr. Utt’s extensive research went well beyond one...

The Rasmussen Art Gallery at Pacific Union College will be exhibiting their annual Student Art Show from April 17 through May 15. The best word for this show is “diversity.” Every year the show is new and unique, as young artists show the art they love and are exploring. With well over a hundred pieces exhibited, there is a vast variety of media, styles and subject matter. Categories of media include ceramics, drawing, graphics design, mixed media, opaque media painting, watercolor painting, photography, printmaking, sculpture and stained glass. PUC has a tradition of inviting some individuals involved in the arts of Napa Valley to be jurors of the student show. This year the jurors will be Adrian Gregorutti, a photographer from Rutherford and an alumnus of PUC, and Malia Hendricks, a painter from St. Helena who works in mixed media....

“Have you been in the library?” a fellow student asks me, near the end of the first week of spring quarter. “No...” I say, my voice trailing into a question mark. “They’ve already started making changes,” she says. “You should go see it.” I’m perplexed. These “proposed developments” are supposed to be vague dreams that come into being “when we raise the money” or “when we finalize the plans” – which means “when your great-grandchildren are attending college.” I’m also curious. I have long loved books and the worlds contained in them. My growing-up library was a bright place filled with wonder and delight. But here, at PUC, I quickly gave up the search for wonder and delight in our own library. The drab walls and stark lighting seemed to sap the life from the books. Last quarter, I noticed that the heavy earth-orange of the staircase walls had been covered with layers of white. I was grateful, but the change did relatively little for the overall mood of the place. If the library were just a building full of books, then it would make sense to wait and, when we raise the necessary funds, build a completely new library....