Toyota Needs an Image Mechanic

There are public relations firms that specialize in crisis communication. These firms help to restore a person's or company's good name. And Toyota is currently a huge example of a company facing a sudden image crisis. According to National Public Radio, Toyota's good name will not be restored overnight.

Scholarship for a Single Mom with a Good GPA

Here's a scholarship opportunity from GCC's Susan Borquez-Dougherty that sounds really good...

Hi all: Another terrific scholarship opportunity - the Hamilton Memorial Scholarship, (Mary Hamilton is a past board member and many of us remember her fondly). I am looking for a single mother who is transferring in September 2010 with a 3.0 GPA or higher. Very little competition and the award is $3000 paid in installments if the student stays in school. Please have any eligible students come to see me in SC202 and refer to Hamilton. Thanks again for your referrals. Susan

________________________________________________________________________
Susan Borquez-Dougherty
Scholarship Program Manager

Road Trip!

Kevin Meza, GCC's university transfer guy, is looking for students to go on a Northern California university tour during Spring Break. Anyhow, it looks to me like a good opportunity. Below is Kevin Meza's email...

Greetings!

I am pleased to announce that we secured funding (thank you ASGCC) and will be going on the Central and Northern California College tours during spring break (April12-14). Based on student interest, we will visit UC Berkeley, UC Santa Cruz, UC Davis, and UC Santa Barbara. The trip will include admissions presentations, college tours, student panels (featuring former GCC students), and sightseeing in San Francisco.

Students will also have the opportunity to ask:
“Kevin, will I be admitted to Berkeley?”
“Kevin, what classes should I take?”
“Kevin, do you perm your hair?”

Transportation and housing is only $20! Students have to pay for their own snacks, meals, and I “heart” San Francisco T-shirts.

Please announce in class and send them up to the Transfer Center (SR building, second floor) or download the application from the Transfer Center website ( www.glendale.edu/transfercenter). The priority deadline is Monday, March 8th at 5:00pm.

Fun fact:
For UC Berkeley:
Fall 2002 (the year before our first trip): 94 students applied and 42 were admitted.

Now:
Fall 2009: 274 applied and 76 were admitted.

Based on the support and encouragement from everyone on campus, GCC has almost tripled the amount of applicants and doubled the amount of admits to UC Berkeley. Thank you all!

Kevin Meza
Transfer Center Coordinator
Glendale Community College
1500 N. Verdugo Road
Glendale, CA 91208
(818) 240-1000 ext. 5820 ---

Oscar Snubs Leave 'Avatar' Actors Feeling Blue

Nearly everyone agrees that "Avatar" is a hugely successful movie at the box office, and some see it as worthy of an Academy Award for Best Picture. But individual acting performances in the movie by Sam Worthington, Zoe Saldana and Sigourney Weaver were not nominated for awards.

Turns out there is a controversy over just what constitutes acting. The three performers mentioned above spent much or all of their on-screen time as 10-foot-tall blue creatures. They acted out every move seen on screen, so it was much more than lending a human voice to an animated character. But it wasn't conventional acting either, since the on-screen characters were highly sophisticated computer renderings made possible through a technique called "performance capture."

According to this Los Angeles Times article, some believe that performance capture could make movie stars, in the conventional sense, obsolete.

If You're Watching TV, Raise Your Hand!

The business of figuring out who is watching what on television is increasingly complicated. Channel surfers watch 10 minutes of this station, 30 seconds of that station, and then flips through a dozen other stations. Viewers watching their favorite shows may be extremely successful at avoiding the ads. Still others are watching online or in other ways.

Nielsen Media Research, which has long measured television audiences, is straining to keep up with the new ways that we are watching television. National Public Radio reports.

Scholarship Opportunity

For those of you just coming into Mass Comm 101, Your Humble Blogger (AKA Mike Eberts) gets emails with scholarship opportunities. When he does, he dutifully posts said opportunities on Club Medianote in hopes that worthy and qualified MC101 students will apply. This opportunity came in today...

Hi all:

I have a great scholarship opportunity from the Alpha Upsilon Chapter of Delta Kappa Gamma Society. The award last year was over $1000. Eligibility requirements are:

Future teacher
Completed 60 units
2.5 GPA

If you know of a student who qualifies, please have them come to see me in SC202 ASAP to apply. An interview maybe required.

PLEASE HAVE THEM BRING THIS EMAIL WITH THEM. IF YOU EMAIL THIS INFO, PLEASE MENTION THE NAME OF THE SCHOLARSHIP AND HAVE THEM BRING YOUR EMAIL.

Thanks for your help.
Susan

________________________________________________________________________
Susan Borquez-Dougherty
Scholarship Program Manager

On Screen Screens

The longer Your Humble Blogger lives in the general vicinity of Hollywood the more he realizes that The Industry is made up of many little niches that create a few jobs here, a few jobs there. And they add up, helping the local economy.

One such niche is creating fictional computer screens for movies, which was the subject of a National Public Radio story. This led to a discussion about runaway production and whether our cash-strapped state and local governments should give tax breaks or other incentives to entertainment businesses.