Eastfield College and the Dallas County Community College District Board of Trustees are proud to announce the hiring of Dr. Joy Gates Black for the position of Vice President of Student Services and Enrollment Management. She began her tenure on August 28.

Dr. Gates Black comes to Eastfield from San Antonio College, where she served as dean of Student Affairs. In that capacity she was responsible for ensuring that students were able to effectively navigate through the admissions and registration process and that students are provided with the support services they need in order to be successful. While at San Antonio College Dr. Gates Black was involved in a number of initiatives focusing on student success.  For the past two years she led the college’s Achieving the Dream initiative which focuses on increasing the success of students of color in developmental education, gatekeeper courses and as first time in college students. Dr. Gates Black was also the college liaison for a Lumina Foundation grant through the National Articulation and Transfer Network which focuses on streamlining the transfer process from community colleges to four year institutions.

Prior to joining San Antonio College, Dr. Gates Black held a number of positions in the educational community. These positions included: dean of Equity and Diversity and assistant vice president, Administrative Services (Los Angeles City College); assistant director, University Student Union (California State University, Northridge); Associate Dean (University of Redlands); Assistant Dean (Cambridge College).

“I’m excited to be here at Eastfield,” says Dr. Gates Black, “Eastfield is poised to have a terrific impact on the community with the new centers that are going to be built.”

The Dayton, Texas, native has an Ed.D. from Pepperdine University and a M.Ed and bachelor’s degree from Cambridge College in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Eastfield would like to extend a warm Harvester welcome to the following new employees:

Don Bright - Advisement	Jeff Hughes - S & PE
Angelia Brumley - Admissions	Dorothy Keylon - AS & M
Reginald Cajayon - S & PE	Victoria Lawson - Res & Comm Dev
Otis Collins - CAAT	Patricia McGowan - Business Office
Jill DeVito - Res & Comm Dev	Julie Meyer - Res & Comm Dev
Schneil Dunn - Advisement	Cynthia Miller - B & FA
Arturo Elizondo - Res & Comm Dev	Daymi Pardo - Res & Comm Dev
Ed Freiheit - AS & M	Patrick Patterson - SS & HS
Sherlyn Fulkerson - HR	Leslie Plumb - AS & M
Joy Gates Black - SS & E M	Rufel Ramos - L & L
Kevin Giles - CAAT	Craig Ramsey - Teacher Prep
Teresa Glover - Res & Comm Dev	Ahmed Rashed - AS & M
Valentino Gonzales - SS & HS	Ricardo Rodriguez - AS & M
Ronda Grandberry - HR	Michele Svatos - SS & HS
Tamara Guinyard - Admissions	KaSai Un - AS & M
Brenda Hardaway - Financial Aid	Larissa Washington - L&L
Donald Hellstern - S & PE

Eastfield's Social Work/Substance Abuse Program has been recognized as one of the largest programs in the state, and by the end of the semester all courses will be online. The long term goal for the program is to provide best practices training through multi-language modalities to every segment of our community. In addition, the program would like to provide interdisciplinary training with the Criminal Justice, Faith-Based and Child Development Programs. 

Phillip Ortiz, Social Work instructor, was selected as one of Who's Who AMONG Texas Executives and Professional Social Workers; George W. Bush, Gerontology instructor, was appointed a Board Member of the Southern Gerontological Association; and Gloria Hart-Jackson, SW/SA instructor, was appointed for two years on the Texas Drug Demand Reduction Advisory Committee (DDRAC).

The Dallas Chairman's Diversity Advisory Council of the FDIC (Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation) featured Eastfield art faculty, Carlos Rovelo, during its Hispanic Heritage Program Celebration on September 6. The audience of 75 federal employees learned about Hispanic culture and arts from Professor Rovelo whose broad artistic perspective results from extensive worldwide travel and education in four countries.

Eastfield's E-COP summer basketball league was a huge success for its first season with 118 community participants. Kudos to EFC Police Officer Paul Arroyo for designing and coordinating the community effort. The players learned about basketball fundamentals, sportsmanship through competition, and about college opportunities in their future. Ten of the participants enrolled in fall classes and Officer Arroyo will continue to mentor to 15 of the players.

Eight Guitar students, including newly graduated students to working/professional adults studying music as an avocation, and all ages in between, participated in the end of summer Guitar Recital on Aug. 10. The free recital featured soothing sounds of guitar music from duos, solos, and ensembles.

On August 12 Eastfield College held its 10th (and largest) Annual Senior Fest. It brought together more than 700 attendees and volunteers from across the metroplex. Featured lunch-time entertainment was Ransom Barbershop Quartet. Kudos to the Senior Fest Advisory Board and coordinator Janet Loper (Continuing Education).

John Emery (Continuing Education & Workforce Development) represented Eastfield at the annual Sharing Life Back to School event on August 12 at Lake Pointe (Mesquite Branch) Church; Eastfield College was a proud community sponsor for the third year.

Michael Martin, Eastfield College’s Head Baseball Coach, has been named the 2006 American Baseball Coaches Association and Diamond Sports Company National Coach of the Year for the National Junior College Athletic Association (NJCAA) Division III.  Coach Martin will be honored at the ABCA Hall of Fame/Coach of the Year Banquet on January 5, 2007, in Orlando, Florida.

Eastfield College’s James Watral, professor of Ceramics, is participating in the Teaching Clay in Texas: An Invitational Exhibition of Ceramic Educators in Texas at the Meadows Gallery at the University of Texas-Tyler.  The exhibit opens August 21 – October 6.

John Lewis, Art Specialist who assists James Watral in ceramics, is currently exhibiting his artwork at McLennan Community College in Waco. The exhibition is called Flavor Fortress and features painted ceramic sculpture; it runs through September 30. View images at www.500X.org.

David Willburn, Eastfield’s Gallery 219 Director, will have his work displayed during a show called New Embroidery: Not Your Grandma's Doily September 22–November 12 at the Contemporary Crafts Museum & Gallery in Portland, Oregon. Visit the Contemporary Crafts Museum web page for more information.

Email to Kathy Windrow, Art instructor:

Kathy,

I'm not sure if you hear this very often, but you changed the direction of my life in a profound and positive way. After leaving Eastfield, I finished art school in Cincinnati, Ohio where I got my BFA in Art History and sculpture. Last August I moved to New York and continue to make work, and write in most of my free time. I work at the Guggenheim Museum, as the ever illustrious Visitor Assistant. (The work is boring, but the place and the people are always fantastic.) You pretty much single handedly helped mold me into somebody who was capable of expressing enough of himself to cultivate possibility as opposed to repressive doubt. Of course I still doubt myself (as you no 'doubt' remember) but now I am so much more comfortable with the questions life poses me and I, in turn, pose to myself. And in the simplest and most important of ways, you helped me have faith enough in myself to get out of my parents' house, out of Texas, and into the exploration of the world...

Email to Don Baynham, Dean of Business & Fine Arts, from a former student:

Don,

This might sound corny but you popped into my head a few minutes ago. I am in the process of going through an Assessment Center for my job (I'm up for Lieutenant with the Nashville Police Dept.) and I thought of you. I'll never forget how you told this story in an Organizational Behavior class (around 1983) of waking up one day and deciding "to be the person you wanted to be" in terms of being dynamic, positive, extroverted, etc. You alluded to having to fake it for a while and then it eventually became your true personality! You said that the person you really want to be is really the person you are. That concept has stayed with me since then and it really changed my life.  I have never had a teacher quite like you. You were so interesting, positive, intelligent and captivating.  I'm glad to see that it has paid off for you and you are now an executive dean. That is awesome! I hope this email doesn't seem off-the-wall. I just wanted to let you know what an impact you made in my life just by being a business teacher back in the early 80's. It's amazing the impact that humans have on each other and some never realize it.