Search - Lainey S. Cronk

Decked with holiday finery and teeming with an array of visitors, the women’s dorm halls were bright and merry at the annual open house on Thursday, December 2. Christmas lights in every imaginable variety were draped over windows and strung from ceilings. There were chips and salsa, fudge, and other munchies in some of the rooms, and hot drinks in the foyers. There was much music and laughter and some attempts at movie-watching in the midst of the hubbub. Admittedly, there wasn’t a great deal of studying going on. Male students made up the bulk of the visitors, taking advantage of their one chance to see how the girls fix up their habitations or to hang out in the rooms of their female friends. But there were other guests as well; some teachers, community members, and assorted other friends made their way through the halls. “Open house is great,” says senior Joy-Anne Mitchell, “because you get to just hang out and have fun with people who don’t usually come to your room.”...

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,...

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...

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....

Pacific Union College's Rasmussen Art Gallery will be displaying the degree projects of PUC senior art majors from May 22 to June 15. The show will exhibit the projects of 19 senior students. A sense of variety is always a predominant quality of this annual show as art students display the paths of expression they have chosen to explore. Categories include fine art, graphic design, and photography. Fine art major Jacquelyn Hewitt created a work consisting of 24 paintings and 33 pages of fiction, working simultaneously on the two aspects. Hewitt feels that the effort the project required was worth while because, she says, "People do so many destructive things and make the world ugly; I'm trying to do the opposite, to add more beauty." Emily Bryner, a graphic design student, created a CD cover, press kit, and advertising material for a men's quartet based in Southern California. Says Bryner, "I love music, and have always been fascinated by the way album art draws potential listeners into the music."...

Midday is always a high-traffic time in the PUC cafeteria. But for three hours on Friday, March 7, there was an increased hubbub as PUC students, faculty, and PUC Prep students circulated through the building, visiting the 38 booths of the “Celebrate Health” fair. For nearly 10 years, the PUC Nursing Department has provided annual health fairs for high schools in the Napa Valley. This year, the nursing department set out on a new venture and, working with the PUC health services office, organized and implemented a health fair on their own campus. Distribution of health-care information was the basic goal of the fair. “We wanted to show the resources for health care that we have within the structure of the campus itself, as well as those we can access by networking with other services,” said Sandy Sargent, director of health services. More specifically, the BSN program and health services hoped to emphasize the importance of choices. “Our goal,” said nursing professor Carol Williams, “was to better serve the health care needs of the PUC student body while highlighting healthy choices, emphasizing that the decisions they make every day while they are young will have a major impact on future...

Pacific Union College’s Rasmussen Art Gallery will be displaying “Generations: A Family of Artists” from October 4 to October 26. The show will exhibit the work of John, Bryan, Will, and Jacquelyn Hewitt, four talented members of the same family. Their artwork reportoire includes watercolor and oil painting, sculpture, photography and ink drawing. The Hewitts are a diverse family. John is an E.R. doctor who teaches PUC’s annual summer art classes at the Albion Field Station in Mendocino. His three children decidedly have artistic blood running through their veins: Jacquelyn graduated from PUC with both an art degree and an English degree and is currently studying for her MFA in Ireland; William is a political activist who spent time in Palestine this past year and has done ink drawings of the Palestinian people; and Bryan is pursuing his MFA at the San Francisco Art Institute....