Beebe & Serban Elected to United Way Board of
Directors
July 2008
 Gayle
Beebe assumed leadership of Westmont College as its eighth president on
July 1, 2007. He was formally installed as president on April 11, 2008
and was honored to have Mr. Steve Forbes and Dr. Steve Sample, President
of USC, as guest speakers. He, his wife Pam, and their three children
(Anna, 15, Elizabeth, 13, and Ricky, 9) have enjoyed their transition
into the Santa Barbara community. The family came from Spring Arbor,
Michigan, where Beebe served as president of Spring Arbor University for
seven years.
Beebe has spent his first year at Westmont meeting with faculty, staff
and students, as well as traveling extensively across the country
meeting alumni and friends of the College. Beebe succeeds Stan Gaede,
who accepted a position as scholar in residence and senior adviser to
the president at Gordon College in Massachusetts in July 2006.
Beebe attended Westmont for a semester in 1980 while earning his
bachelor’s degree at George Fox University in Oregon. He received
master’s degrees in divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary in
philosophy of religion and theology from Claremont Graduate University,
and in business administration in strategic management from the Peter F.
Drucker School at Claremont Graduate University. He completed his
doctorate in philosophy of religion and theology from Claremont Graduate
University in 1997. Prior to leading Spring Arbor, Beebe served as dean
of the school of theology at Azusa Pacific University.
Under Beebe’s leadership, Spring Arbor University was named a top-tier
university by U.S. News & World Report in its most recent America’s Best
Colleges and Universities publication. The Council for Christian
Colleges and Universities awarded Spring Arbor its 2003 Racial Harmony
Award, which honors institutions making considerable progress in the
areas of diversity, racial harmony and reconciliation.
Beebe has also been instrumental in improving campus facilities at
Spring Arbor, which recently completed a $45 million capital campaign,
including a major academic building. Spring Arbor has a 100-acre main
campus in south central Michigan as well as 14 satellite campuses
throughout the region.
 Andreea
M. Serban, Ph.D., serves as Superintendent/President of Santa Barbara
City College. In her role, she is responsible for providing strong
educational leadership and strategic vision for the three-campus system
and more than 90 satellite locations. SBCC currently enrolls more than
19,000 credit students each semester along with 50,000 Continuing
Education students annually.
Dr. Serban came to SBCC from South Orange County Community College
District in Mission Viejo, CA, where she was Vice Chancellor of
Technology and Learning Services. She is no stranger to SBCC having
joined the college in 1999 as its first Director of Institutional
Assessment, Research and Planning followed by Associate Vice President
for Information Technology, Research and Planning, a position she held
until 2006.
In addition to her positions at SBCC, Dr. Serban also held
administrative and faculty positions at University of Redlands,
Rockefeller Institute of Government, State University of New York System
Administration, Institute for Educational Sciences and University of
Bucharest.
She received a Ph.D. and a Master of Science in Higher Education
Administration from University at Albany, State University of New York
and a Bachelor of Science in Mathematics from University of Bucharest.
Dr. Serban is a published author, former editor of the Professional
File, a publication of the international Association for Institutional
Research (AIR), current associate editor of Planning for Higher
Education, the journal of the Society for College and University
Planning, and current executive editor of the Journal for Applied
Research in the Community College. She co-edited and authored monographs
and articles and is a frequent speaker at regional, state and national
events on knowledge management, performance funding and reporting,
assessment of student learning outcomes, enrollment management,
strategic planning, and technology applications. Dr. Serban is the past
president of the Research and Planning Group of California Community
Colleges, past Chair of the prestigious AIR Publications Committee, and
a current member of the Action Planning Groups for the implementation of
the basic skills and intersegmental transfer components of the Statewide
Strategic Plan for California Community Colleges.
She has participated in major statewide projects, including the
development of the accountability reporting framework and the
environmental scan for the statewide strategic planning for California
Community Colleges. She is one of the authors of "Basic Skills as a
Foundation for Student Success in California Community Colleges," which
has become the basis for the statewide initiative on student success and
basic skills currently under way. On February 23, 2008, this seminal
work was honored with the Mertes Award for Excellence in Community
College Research from the Association for California Community College
Administrators.
Dr. Serban is also a successful grant writer. She is currently directing
two $1.6 million dollar statewide projects: the Transfer Leadership
Center and Articulation of Career Technical Education Pathways to
Four-year Institutions.
|
News Releases/Media Contact