Cougars & Mustangs 

I’d like to begin our session today by correcting an error I made not once but twice in a row over the last two weeks: Cal Poly is not, in fact, a University of California (UC), but instead a California State University (CSU). Given I’ve been writing these little pieces for about three years I should be tremendously embarrassed about this. If I’m going to make a throwaway joke it had better be accurate, lest I lose my nerd cred, and for as good riffing material as both Cuesta and Cal Poly make, I have a great deal of respect for both institutions, which I hope is fairly obvious. While there are 10 campuses in the UC system, there are in fact 23 in the CSU system. Just something to note. Mea culpa.

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While we’re on the subject of corrections and clarifications, from here on out, faithful and observant readers may notice something bizarre about the way I refer to myself in the third person. Masculinity is not something I’ve ever been terribly well-acquainted with as a descriptor for myself, and just as every student has his/her road that may take him/her from one major to another, and eventually out the door of a degree, so too, apparently, is my gender. So if you grow confused about why the Chris-Meister is suddenly a she, be aware that there was nothing sudden about it on my end and that it’s still me, being more me than I’ve ever been before.

“But wait!” I hear you cry, “what does this have to do with graphic communication?” I have no idea why you’re asking that. It has nothing at all to do with graphic communication. But if you’re really feeling this startlingly-spontaneous call to that particular field, I’m the last person to hold you back. Cal Poly will be hosting the International Conference for Graphic Communication Educators from July 5 to 10, which actually will be a combination of two other conferences joined as one: the 47th annual Conference for The International Circle of Educational Institutes for Graphic Arts, Technology, and Management; and the 93rd annual Conference for the Graphical Communication Education Association. Delegates from PrintEd will be there for a one-day conference of their own, and this all lines up beautifully with the 70th anniversary of Cal Poly’s Graphic Communication program. To partake in this extravaganza, I recommend visiting http://ic2015.calpoly.edu/index.html for information that I just couldn’t fit in this week.

She’s hip, she’s cool, she’s probably too goofy to ever be taken seriously as a journalist: Contributor Chris White-Sanborn wrote this week’s Cougars & Mustangs. Please, send collegiate news to [email protected]!