LOYOLA MARYMOUNT UNIVERSITY

Transcription

1 Timothy Psomas, 1963 July 13, 2011 Ubiqus/Nation-Wide Reporting & Convention Coverage 2222 Martin Street, Suite 212 Irvine, CA Phone: w Fax:

2 [START Psomas_1] MS. ARIANA QUINONEZ: I'd like to start with your background and what made you decide to go to Loyola. MR. TIMOTHY PSOMAS: At the time that was the only school I applied to and that's where I wanted to go. And I had decided that I wanted to study civil engineering. They had a program there. I had a lot of friends going to Loyola. And so I decided that that was the school I was going to go to. Not a lot of thought went into it. It was just kind of it just happened. Was the fact that Loyola is a Catholic, or a Jesuit institution important to you in your decision? It was. Yes, it was. It was important to me and my parents as well. Loyola's based upon three key principles: a commitment to social justice, academic excellent, and the education of the whole person. Were these three principles important to you before going to Loyola, and how did Loyola help develop them? I certainly was not aware of that when I was thinking about college. But my experience at the school particularly related to the education of the whole person, and certainly the Jesuit traditions of the school were very obvious and prevalent at the time. So those were things that I think were my primary take-aways- the values that I came away with. During your years at Loyola as an undergraduate I believe that ROTC was required. Do you have any specific recollections, or can you tell me a little bit about the program? Sure. It was a required activity. A required course, a required program. So everybody participated. So being something that everybody had to do, it was always kind of it wasn't taken too seriously, I guess that was the point for most. I enjoyed it because, although I was in engineering I was also active on the Loyolan newspaper and so they had a journalism group that was involved with the ROTC program, so that was my responsibility. So that kept me from Timothy Psomas 1

3 going out and marching around, and I'd just sit in an office and write articles about the ROTC and things that were going on. I think it was a good program. It had a lot of good structure, and interesting. The course work actually was kind of interesting. It was an interesting insight into some military training and background, so that it was interesting. You mentioned that you worked at the Loyolan. Can you tell me a little bit about what that was like while you were an undergrad? Sure. I had a hard time deciding exactly to stick with engineering, but it was my choice to be an engineer. But I also enjoyed very much language skills and English and all that. So I was always intrigued with that aspect the communication aspect. And so on the Loyolan I really enjoyed the association with people that were also interested in communicating and writing and all that stuff. So it was very enjoyable and something that I did. I served as editor not editor-in-chief, but various levels of editing on the newspaper. So I enjoyed it very much. You graduated in 1963, correct? So the late 1950s, early 1960s they were years that the cold war was kind of prevalent. What kind of impact did that have on the campus, or did it have an impact at all? The impacts that it had, to my recollection, were, first of all, just before I came on campus the older brothers and friends of mine had a lot of people in their class who were just returning from the Korean War at the time. And so there were a number of older students who had gone off and done military service and then came back to college, and a number of them had decided to go to Loyola. So it was a wider age group just preceding me, and I think that had- [END Psomas_1] [START Psomas_2] --impact on the teachers and the programs and all that. While I was on campus the cold war was not much of an issue until about my junior or senior year, and then the draft became a reality. And so there were people that were being drafted into the military. And a number of people opted to Timothy Psomas 2

4 join the military to volunteer and to take on officerships through the ROTC or through whatever programs. And so a number of my friends did that and took on military assignments and were career military because of all that. I did not. That was not my choice. My choice was to go out and begin working. And so I went in the other direction. That time period also comprised important years for the civil rights movement kind of getting it started. How integrated was Loyola in terms of race, and how conscious were the students regarding racial issues? I think everybody was aware of what was going on, but I don't think that there was a lot of angst. I think there was a lot more sense in the community, in Los Angeles at the time, of a more integrated community. So I don't think that the issues of racial segregation they were things that you read about that were occurring in different parts of the country, but for a college student at the time, for myself, it didn't have any relevance. It was like something that happened far away, and around me I didn't see any sense of that kind of issue or behavior. We had multiracial friends. And it was just a non-issue for me. Continuing on with the student population, you studied Loyola prior to the merger with Marymount. campus? What was it like living on an all-male institution I'm sorry, what the- I'm sorry. What was it like living at a campus that was all-male? Oh, it was great. I really enjoyed it. There's an element of education that I think is well-suited to educating men and women separately. Certainly through high school. And I just continued on in college and had a great time. I really enjoyed that. It made the campus a lot more laid-back and a lot more casual. And one less distraction on campus. On the other hand, there were a lot of women on campus from the Catholic women's colleges, or we were on their campus a lot so it wasn't that we were living in a sheltered world. Timothy Psomas 3

5 It was just that when we were there we were there to study and so I liked it a lot. It was fun. Do you have any specific recollections of student life? The dorms, food, campus activities? Just a period of a great time in my life. I really enjoyed campus life. I lived on campus for a short period. We lived very close to campus, so it certainly wasn't necessary. I think I lived on campus for a year and enjoyed it. At the time that I was there most of the fraternities were local fraternities. And so it was before the merger into the national fraternities. And so, again, there were a number of fraternities on campus at the time and over the course of the time that I was there I believe all of them merged into national fraternities. So it was, again, pretty laid-back and just a fun time of my life. It was great. I really enjoyed it. You mentioned your framework, Phi Sigma Kappa? That's what it was. It merged into Phi Sigma Kappa. When I was there it was called Sigma Rho. Could you tell me a little about that? Sure. It was basically, again, a local fraternity. It was organized primarily for inter scholastic [END Psomas_2] [START Psomas_3] --sports, having fun, being together. And many of the members lived in a house on the beach in the marina, which is now on the strand. And the name of the house was the Otter's Haunch. So that was a very popular place. So the people that didn't live there would spend afternoons over there and visit, and so it was a lot of fun. Can you describe the physical campus for me? How it was set up while you were an undergrad? The campus? Yes. Well, of course, there were the Quonset huts. I had many classes in Quonset huts. Since I was an engineer I was Timothy Psomas 4

6 fortunate to have many classes in the engineering building. So we were very fortunate that we had a pretty new building at the time. But we also had classes in the Quonset huts. The Student Union was also in a Quonset hut when I arrived on campus and it probably held 50 to 100 people at the most, and it was more like a general store than a community center. And so when the Malone Center was built, that was a big deal. It was really amazing. And so that was a big transformation on the campus. And about that time the Quonset huts started to come down and the campus began to expand the building footprint and the number of students. Pereira? What was the engineering building? Was that Pereira, right. As you mentioned, you were a civil engineering major. Can you tell me a little bit about that program? About the civil engineering program? Yes. Well, my father started his own business in civil engineering and surveying when I was about five years old. And so I kind of grew up with that. Having experienced it and lived it, that's what I always wanted to do. So I pretty much knew what I wanted to do. So when I came to Loyola I knew that that's what I wanted to study. And the thing that really impressed me, and that I really think back on a lot is the quality of the teachers, the focus on the education, and on developing students. The time that they devoted to being with us, to helping us with any problems, questions, issues, whatever they were always there. Great guys, and very well-plugged into the engineering community. So civil engineering has had a long tradition and a great record of placement of students in the L.A. community because the professors maintained those relationships with engineering employers. And so it's been, I think, an outstanding program from that standpoint that all the civil engineers were very quickly placed in jobs in the community. So it was great. And you've continued to maintain a strong connection to the LMU College of Science and Engineering. Timothy Psomas 5

7 What are some of the strengths, and are there any weaknesses of the college? And what would you like to see for the college in the future? Well, I think the college has matured very significantly, both in size and in terms of the kinds of programs. And I think the programs that are focused on multidiscipline and multi-perspective kind of approaches to problem-solving are the programs of the future. That's really where the future is. The notion of engineers going off in a corner and doing something that doesn't happen anymore. Everything is done in an environment of teamwork and collaboration with other disciplines and other perspectives on problem-solving. So it's a direction that I know the college is moving in and I think that's the right direction for the future. You also served as a trustee, right? Can you tell me about some of the issues or goals that you had to deal with during your tenure? As a trustee? Mm-hm. Well, I think one thing that we can all be proud of is the success that the trustees have- [END Psomas_3] [START Psomas_4] --brought to running the university. It's been very wellrun. We've always had great support by our benefactors. We've always had very good financial guidance. We've always had the benefit of strong leadership. So as a trustee, my personal interest is in the Catholic mission and identity of LMU. That's my favorite trustees committee that I serve on. And I think that it's an issue that is very important to the identity and the mission of the university. And so I think that the focus that needs to be placed on it is a key issue to the future of the university and how we position ourselves for the future. So I think that runs beyond touching the people that are unusually attracted to Catholic issues, to spiritual issues, Timothy Psomas 6

8 all the way down to individual course work and to an awareness at the level of the professors as to an awareness that they are in a Catholic institution and that there's opportunities to educate and to inform and to promote the Catholic mission and identity of the college. You also served as a member of OC Ambassadors. Can you tell me what the goal of OC Ambassadors is? Well, the Ambassadors, I think, primarily were interested in supporting and promoting the university to the Orange County community. And so the ways that we have done that is to provide opportunities for alumni to get together, socialize, understand what's going on, listen to Father President speak in the past. We've had Father Lawton come down. And we've had various people come and speak to alumni groups. But also social activities. And also a lot of interest in making sure that Orange County is sending the best students to Loyola Marymount University. So I think that's a big deal making sure that LMU is getting our share of the kids from Orange County that are the real good students and would make good students and alumni of LMU. So you've continued to maintain this connection with LMU for about 50 years now from when you started as an undergrad. What changes do you think have been the most important, and are there any that you're concerned about? Well, I think probably the most fundamental change, certainly, has been the coeducational campus and the merger with Marymount. That's certainly an obvious one. The other one is, I would say, more focus on the academic endeavors and raising the bar academically. That's clearly a direction that the university is going, and I think that's a good direction. That's very good. I think a sense of competitiveness will be very attractive to the alumni and to the prospective new students coming in. So raising the bar is a good idea intellectually. I think it also requires the university to be sensitive to serving the broader community and making sure that we're not avoiding, or not making room for a wide variety of members of the community that may not have that kind of intellectual capacity or grade level, but to maintain an ethnic balance in Timothy Psomas 7

9 the community and a balance of thinking and mental abilities at the university. [END Psomas_4] [START Psomas_5] Are there any changes that you'd like to see going into the future? Changes? Yes. Yes, a higher profile in basketball. Absolutely essential. It s very clear to me that unless we have a high profile in an athletic endeavor basketball is a good one that it's hard to get people's attention. And we don't have to be the best team in the league, but we have to be competitive every year. We have to be able to be the best team. We have to be in the top of the rankings, not the bottom of the rankings. It's good for the students, it's good for the alums, it's good for the community. It just serves the university well. So I think that's really critical. I think that's something everyone would like to see. What's your fondest memory of Loyola from your undergraduate years? It's got to be people. The professors, the administration, friends, all that stuff. It's all about people. Well, that's the end of my questions. Is there anything else you'd like to discuss, or maybe a story we might have missed? No, I don't think so. Okay. Well, thank you so much. [END Psomas_5] Timothy Psomas 8