Pitzer College offers an innovative liberal arts education focused on a deeper under- standing of humankind within a governance structure that allows every voice to be heard equally and fully. Pitzer College creates a purposeful and meaningful environment in which students learn to lead proactive and exemplary lives within the global community. Pitzer’s interdisciplinary approach to the applied liberal arts serves as an exemplar of educational ingenuity. Pitzer’s excellence is recognized, praised and supported by educational leaders, college guides and philanthropic foundations nationwide.
This view of the Brant Tower includes a selection of the agave plants that populate the Pitzer campus.
PITZER COLLEGE 1 Our Mission
Pitzer College produces engaged, socially responsible citizens of the Pitzer College world through an academically rigorous, interdisciplinary liberal arts Core Values education emphasizing social justice, intercultural understanding and environmental sensitivity. The meaningful participation of students, Academic Excellence faculty and staff in college governance and academic program design Diverse Community is a Pitzer core value. Our community thrives within the mutually Social Responsibility supportive framework of The Claremont Colleges, which provides an unsurpassed breadth of academic, athletic and social opportunities. Intercultural Understanding One of America’s Best Colleges
Pitzer College is ranked 38th of 215 liberal arts colleges in academic reputation and as having the 38th lowest acceptance rate among the top tier liberal arts colleges, according to U.S.News & World Report. Pitzer College has begun its largest construction project since its founding with new residence halls that are socially and environmen- tally responsible and are being built to the strict standards of the U.S. Green Building Council. The College stands positioned to become one of the first colleges in the nation to replace all of its residence halls with LEED (Leadership in Energy & Environmental Design) gold-certified residence halls. Ten Pitzer College students received prestigious Fulbright Foundation Awards in 2005, a national record for colleges its size, totaling 21 awards for the past three years. Other student awards for 2005 included a Thomas J. Watson fellow, a McNair scholar, two Coro fellows, two Kemper Foundation scholars and a Public Policy and International Affairs fellow. The Grove House, a California Arts and Crafts bungalow, was saved from potential demolition when it was moved to Pitzer College in 1977 as a class project.
2 PITZER COLLEGE 3 Pitzer ranks as the fifth most diverse private coed liberal arts In Kaplan Publishing’s The Unofficial, Unbiased Insider’s Guide to the college in America by U.S.News & World Report, with students of 328 Most Interesting Colleges, Pitzer is cited as offering “the most cre- color representing 30% of the student body. ative curriculum of all The Claremont Colleges.”
According to U.S.News & World Report, Pitzer is 25th in the top The College is a member of the Consortium for Innovative tier of 110 liberal arts schools in the percentage of students studying Environments in Learning (CIEL), a group of the most progressive abroad. Pitzer College’s 25 international and domestic exchange pro- colleges working to reinvigorate American higher education. grams make it possible for students to study abroad for more than one semester. Pitzer is cited by the National Wildlife Foundation as one of the Pitzer is included in the Princeton foremost schools in the country for Environmental Studies. Review’s The 361 Best Colleges, which named the College as one of the “Best in The Fiske Guide to Colleges lauds Pitzer’s strong Media Studies the West.” Pitzer was one of 129 schools program. profiled in the first edition of The Best Western Colleges, and one of five profiled The Claremont Colleges Debate Union in which Pitzer Students in the regional guidebook series. participate ranked eighth out of 400 teams at the national debate championship. Pitzer College is one of the nation’s Laura Skandera Trombley most effective schools fostering social Pitzer offers 10 men’s and 10 women’s intercollegiate athletic President of Pitzer College responsibility and public service, accord- teams. Pitzer students also participate in The Claremont Colleges ing to The Princeton Review and Campus Club sports programs, which compete nationally. Compact. Pitzer College is one of 81 institutions in 33 states that The Princeton Review commends and features in its book, Colleges with a Conscience: 81 Great Schools with Outstanding Community Involvement.
Princeton’s profile on Pitzer College commends the school for its small classes, and friendly, happy and politically active students. In addition, the book describes the typical Pitzer undergrad as “passion- ate, creative, dynamic, and socially involved.” Pitzer College was ranked ninth most politically active and ninth for race/class interaction in the new edition of the book.
Classes are held outside year-round in beautiful Southern California.
4 5 Outstanding Joint Science Program
Pitzer, Claremont McKenna and Scripps Colleges share an interdisci- plinary Joint Science Department housed in the state-of-the-art W.M. Keck Science Center. Since 1992, nearly 81% of Joint Science students who applied were admitted to medical, dental and veterinary schools. By contrast, the national average acceptance rate is 43%.
Exceptional Media Studies Program
Pitzer College is the lead Claremont College for Media Studies. Pitzer’s own Media Studies program appeals to socially committed artists and showcases grass-roots filmmaking at its best. Films by three Pitzer Media Studies professors have been featured at the Sundance Film Festival. Other works by Pitzer professors: Alexandra Juhasz and Jesse Lerner co-edited F is for Phony, a study on fake docu- mentary practice and theory (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press); Alexandra Juhasz made “Video Remains,” an experimental video in the film festival circuit; and Ming-Yuen Ma was a Surdna Foundation Distinguished Visiting Artist in Film and Visual Arts, California State Summer School for The Arts (CSSSA).
The prestigious 51st Robert Flaherty Film Seminar was held at The Claremont Colleges during the summer of 2005.
TOP: Professor Gretchen Edwalds-Gilbert conducts research in a laboratory in the W.M. Keck Science Center. BOTTOM: Media Studies interns prepare a public service announcement at Univision Headquarters, Los Angeles.
6 PITZER COLLEGE 7 Major Student Awards
Between 2001 and 2005, Pitzer students earned the following awards:
Twenty-six Fulbright Scholarships Three Thomas J. Watson Fellowships Two Freeman Foundation Asia Fellowships Three Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarships One Woodrow Wilson Foundation Fellowship One Morris K. Udall Foundation Native American Fellowship Three Coro Fellowships Two Kemper Foundation Scholars Two American Sociological Association Minority Fellows One Teaching Assistantship Fellow from the French government [selected by the Institute of International Education] One Rudolph Polk Memorial Award in Music
Pitzer students enjoy a strong tradition of receiving major fellow- ships and scholarships. One Pitzer student received the Rhodes scholarship with six additional student finalists. In 2005, ten Pitzer College students were awarded Fulbright grants to continue in their fields of study—a record for colleges of less than 1,000 students. Since 1997, Pitzer students have won five Thomas J. Watson Fellowships, seven Rotary Ambassadorial Scholarships, six Freeman Foundation Asia Fellowships, five American Sociological Association Minority Fellowships (the highest number among colleges and uni- versities in the U.S.), one Morris K. Udall Foundation Native American Congressional Summer Internship, and one Woodrow Wilson Foundation Fellowship.
The Grove House provides comfortable spaces to meet, study or have lunch.
8 PITZER COLLEGE 9 Highly Selective
Pitzer College has the 38th lowest acceptance rate among the top tier liberal arts colleges for its fall 2004 entering class, according to U.S.News rankings. Fewer than 30 national liberal arts colleges have acceptance rates less than 40% as Pitzer did in fall 2004. The 2004-05 academic year set an all-time record for number of applications for Pitzer, and showed an increase for the eighth consecutive year.
Sports Year in Review
Pitzer-Pomona Sagehens completed a successful year in several men’s and women’s sports. Men’s basketball defended its Southern California Intercollegiate Athletic Conference Championship (SCIAC). A member of the men’s track and field team was the recipi- ent of a SCIAC award for his event. The women’s soccer squad earned the team’s first-ever trip to the NCAA playoffs in addition to its first SCIAC Championship in 15 years. The Sagehens women’s water polo team won its fourth Division III National Championship and finished second in SCIAC. The women’s water polo squad is consistently ranked in the top 5 nationally among Division III schools and plays a competitive non-conference schedule.
TOP: Students enjoy the beautiful weather of Southern California and develop lifelong friends. BOTTOM: The Sagehens women’s soccer team earned a visit to the Division III NCAA playoffs in 2005.
10 PITZER COLLEGE 11 Innovative Community Service & Outreach
Pitzer College’s focus on social responsibility and community service provides students with a plethora of volunteer opportunities on and off campus. Among the many programs offered through the Center for California Cultural and Social Issues (CCCSI), Pitzer students have the opportunity to conduct reading groups with women in recovery, tutor homeless and at-risk young children, or help young juvenile offenders achieve literacy at area probation camps. Jumpstart is a national nonprofit outreach program that pairs college students with preschool-age children struggling in the areas of communica- tion, literacy and social skills. The highly successful Jumpstart pilot program begun at Pitzer in 1999 has become the model for other programs at universities throughout the U.S. The College is also home to the Pitzer in Ontario (California) program that provides a framework from which social and urban issues can be effectively evaluated; community-based Spanish programs; early academic out- reach programs; and the Leadership in Environmental Education Partnership (LEEP).
Pitzer is also one of 15 California International Studies Project (CISP) locations, funded by the State of California to support the development of public school teachers through collaboration with faculty in social sciences and world history. There are 36 current and former Peace Corps volunteers who are alumni of Pitzer College. Pitzer College was invited to become one of 10 colleges forming the founding core of the national Project Pericles, which encourages lib- eral arts colleges to turn rhetoric into action by training students to be responsible citizens.
Jumpstart pre-schoolers enjoy activities during an annual event held on campus.
12 PITZER COLLEGE 13 Class of 2005 Attending Graduate Class of 2005 Majors and Professional School by Fields of Study
Other* Sciences/Math/Engineering Sciences/Math 7% 9% 3% Humanities Health Care and Social Services 9% 19% Social Business Sciences Technology 6% Humanities 52% 9% 32% Law Communications 16% * Other refers to special majors, most of which are interdisciplinary 13% Education 25% Class of 2005 Who are Employed 14% by Field of Employment 12 10 Nonprofits and 8 Social Services Recreation 15% 5% 6 Government Health Care 4% 4 5% Retail 2 2% Sciences 0 4% Psychology Sociology English & World Lit. Political Studies History & Art Art Media Studies Environmental Studies Intl/Intercultural Studies Economics Human Biology
Education Arts 25% 7% Business 33%
SOURCE: Office of Career Services, Office of Institutional Research
14 PITZER COLLEGE 15 Alumni Doctorates Notable Alumni
In the most recent data reported by the National Science Foundation, Pitzer College graduates are prepared to take on life’s challenges while Pitzer College ranked 8th in the number of alumni who pursued a making a difference in their communities. Pitzer’s many impressive Ph.D. in psychology, 29th in the number of alumni who pursued a alumni include such diverse individuals, with varied careers, as: Ph.D. in anthropology, and 38th in the number of alumni who pur- Arts: sued a Ph.D. in sociology out of 154 private colleges and universities. Matt Baer ’86, producer of films such as City by the Sea, Jack Frost and The Replacement Killers; Alumni Attend Prestigious Jenniphr Goodman ’84, independent filmmaker, co-writer and Graduate Universities producer of The Tao of Steve, a film that won critical acclaim at the 2000 Sundance Film Festival; John Landgraf ’84, President and General Manager of FX Pitzer College graduates have been accepted at the following presti- Networks; gious institutions: The American Film Institute, California Institute Jessica Hurley ’92, Emmy Award winner of Best Documentary for of the Arts, California Institute of Technology, Cambridge A Dose of Reality and Golden Mike Award winner for Best University, Columbia Medical School, Cornell University, Duke Documentary as producer, writer and host of Life Lessons, Truths and University, Harvard University, Johns Hopkins University, MIT, Consequences. Northwestern University, NYU, Princeton University, Stanford University, Tufts University, UC Berkeley, University of Chicago, UC Science and Research: Davis, UCLA, University of Michigan, USC, Washington University, Stuart Goldstein ’86, medical director of the Renal Dialysis Unit at and Yale University. Texas Children’s Hospital and associate professor of pediatrics at Baylor College of Medicine; Sue Celniker ’75, research scientist and co-director of the Drosophila Genome Center at Lawrence Berkeley Laboratories.
Nonprofit: Hunter Lovins ’72, President and Founder of Natural Capitalism, Inc. and named “Hero of the Planet” by Time Magazine in 2000; Kirsten Grønbjerg ’68, recipient of the 2005 Award for Distinguished Achievement and Leadership in Nonprofit and Voluntary Action Research from the Association for Research on Nonprofit Organizations and Voluntary Action (ARNOVA).
President Laura Skandera Trombley, California State Assembly Speaker Fabian Núñez ’97, and Núñez scholarship recipient Jason Rivera ’06.
16 PITZER COLLEGE 17 Notable Alumni (continued) National Grants
Education: Pitzer College received grants and contributions from foundations, Gary Kates ’75, Dean of Faculty and Vice President for Academic corporations, and government agencies, among which are The Affairs at Pomona College; Ahmanson Foundation, Atlantic Philanthropies (USA) Inc., the Avery Char Miller ’75, professor of American Environmental, Social and Cultural History and Director of Urban Studies at Trinity University. Arts Foundation, the R. Stanton Avery Foundation, The Booth Ferris Foundation, the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, The Freeman Public Service: Foundation, The John Randolph Haynes and Dora Haynes Fabian Núñez ’97, Speaker of the California Assembly; Foundation, The William Randolph Hearst Foundations, The William Emily Stevens ’71 and Yvonne Sanchez ’78, L.A. Superior Court and Flora Hewlett Foundation, the U.S. Department of Housing and judges; Urban Development (HUD), The James Irvine Foundation, The Debra Yang ’81, the first Asian American to be named U.S. Fletcher Jones Foundation, The Kresge Foundation, The Henry Luce Attorney for the Central District of California (the largest federal Foundation, the 3M Foundation, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, prosecutor’s office outside Washington, D.C.). the National Science Foundation, The Ralph M. Parsons Foundation, The Ann Peppers Foundation, the Mabel Wilson Richards Scholarship Fund, the John Stauffer Charitable Trust, The Harry W. and Virginia Robinson Trust and the Weingart Foundation.
In 2005, Pitzer’s Residential Life Project was advanced through $1 million in gifts from the Arthur Vining Davis Foundations, The Fletcher Jones Foundation, The Kresge Foundation and The Ralph M. Parsons Foundation.
Broad Hall was designed by Gwathmey Siegel & Associates Architects.
18 PITZER COLLEGE 19 Selected Faculty Achievements—Books
Nigel Boyle, Professor of Political Studies: FÁS and Active Labour Market Policy 1985-2004 (Dublin: The Policy Institute, 2005).
Paul Faulstich, Professor of Environmental Studies: Exploring Relationships Through Rock-Art: Colonialism, Landscape and Ecology (U.K.: Western Academic and Specialist Press, 2004). Co-edited with Paul Taçon, and Sven Ouzman. Peter Nardi, Professor of Sociology: Interpreting Data: A Guide to Understanding Research (Boston: Allyn & Bacon, 2004).
Judith V. Grabiner, Professor of Mathematics: The Origins of Cauchy’s Gregory Orfalea, Director of the Writing Center: The Arab Rigorous Calculus (MIT Press, 1981) was reprinted by Dover publica- Americans (Massachusetts: Interlink Publishers, 2005). tions in 2005. Thomas Poon, Associate Professor of Chemistry: Introduction to Jesse Lerner, Associate Professor of Media Studies: The Shock of Organic Chemistry (Hoboken, N.J.: John Wiley and Sons, 2004). With Modernity (Madrid: Turner, 2005). W. Brown.
Ronald Macaulay, Emeritus Professor of Linguistics: Talk That Hilton Root, Professor of Economics/Freeman Fellow: Capital and Counts: Age, Gender, and Social Class Differences in Discourse (New York: Collusion: The Political Logic of Global Economic Development (Princeton: Oxford University Press, 2005); Extremely Common Eloquence: Princeton University Press, 2005). Constructing Scottish Identity through Narrative (Amsterdam: Rodopi, Daniel Segal, Professor of Anthropology and History: Unwrapping 2005). the Sacred Bundle: Reflections on the Configuration and Discipline of Anthropology Now (Durham: Duke University Press, 2005). Co-edited with Sylvia Yanagisako.
Rudi Volti, Professor of Sociology: The fifth edition of Society and Technological Change (New York, Worth Publishers) was published in 2005.
Phil Zuckerman, Associate Professor of Sociology: Invitation to the Sociology of Religion (Routledge, 2003) was translated into Farsi and published in Iran in 2005.
20 PITZER COLLEGE 21 Faculty Recognition
Gretchen Edwalds-Gilbert, Associate Professor of Biology, received an NIH AREA grant, “Regulation of Spliceosomal ATPase Activity,” $150,000, 2005-07. Carmen Fought, Associate Professor of Linguistics, was featured on the PBS program “Do You Speak American?” She also served as the linguistic scholar. The program explored Chicano, the thriving, distinct street talk of the Los Angeles Latino community. Fought is the author of Chicano English in Context. David Furman, Professor of Art, received the Silver Prize at the 3rd World Ceramic Biennale, held in Icheon, Korea, April-June 2005. Judith V. Grabiner, Professor of Mathematics, received the Lester R. Ford Award at the Summer MathFest in Albuquerque, New Mexico. Professor Grabiner is the only individual to have received this award three times. Professor Grabiner received the award in recognition of her article, “Newton, Maclaurin, and the Authority of Mathematics,” which appeared in The American Mathematical Monthly, 111 (2004). Dan Guthrie, Professor of Biology, was elected to the position of Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Jim Hoste, Professor of Mathematics, received an NSF grant for the NSF Claremont Colleges Mathematics REU Site. Professor Hoste will be the principal investigator, 2005-08. Leah Light, Professor of Psychology, was elected president of Division 20 of the American Psychological Association for the 2004-05 academic year.
Faculty and students form meaningful friendships that last a lifetime.
22 PITZER COLLEGE 23 Leda Martins, Assistant Professor of Anthropology, received a $100,000 grant from NSF, a portion of a $2-million project to be carried out in collaboration with researchers at several partnering institutions across the country, to start a new four-year research project in the Amazon with the Macuxi Indian tribe.
Susan Phillips, Director of CCCSI and Faculty Associate in Urban Studies, received a Harry Frank Guggenheim Research Grant to study the impact of gang suppression on gang violence in Los Angeles. Barry Sanders, Professor of the History of Ideas, was named a Fulbright Senior Scholar for Fall 2005-Spring 2006 to study in Greece. Susan Seymour, Professor of Anthropology Emerita, was the recipient of the 2005 Stirling Prize, the Society for Psychological Anthropology’s annual award for the best published work in psycho- logical anthropology during 2003-04. The article for which the Stirling Prize was awarded is “Multiple Caretaking of Infants and Young Children: An Area in Critical Need of a Feminist Psychological Anthropology,” Ethos 32 (4), 2004. Daniel Segal, Professor of Anthropology and History, was the featured scholar at the University of Virginia’s Page-Barbour and James W. Richard Lecture series in 2005. This prestigious century-old lecture series invites one scholar to present three main lectures. Professor Segal’s lecture series was titled, Modernity and the History Monopoly or Why We Need Other Histories. Zhaohua Irene Tang, Associate Professor of Biology, was awarded a $340,000 three-year grant by the National Science Foundation Program of Signal Transduction/Cell Regulation.
The water in Pitzer’s low flow water fountain by the mounds is dyed orange at graduation.
24 PITZER COLLEGE 25 Nationally Recognized Intercultural & Language Education Programs
Through the study of language, culture and firsthand experience in communities worldwide, Pitzer’s External Studies integrates constructive learning with social responsibility. Beginning with the Pitzer in Nepal program in 1974, Pitzer offers programs in Botswana, China, Ecuador, Italy, Japan and Costa Rica. Pitzer College offers 25 exchange programs in Australia, Canada, England, Germany, Mexico, South Africa, Spain, Thailand, Japan, Ireland, Finland, Turkey and the U.S. Fifty-three percent of graduating seniors in 2004 participated in External Studies programs. In 2004-05, Pitzer students studied in 26 countries and studied 16 languages. In 2000, Pitzer initiated the first community-based Spanish pro- gram in the country. The program integrates intensive classroom instruction with practical learning experiences in the local Spanish- speaking community. Pitzer’s Program in American College English (PACE) trains international students in intensive academic English and American studies, and is recognized by the American Association of Intensive English Programs (AAIEP), the Japan Foundation for International Education (JFIE), the Latin American Scholarship Program for American Universities (LASPAU at Harvard), and the Embassy of the United Arab Emirates as one of the most effective language programs in the U.S.
TOP: Leanne Stein ’05 relaxes with her host sibling in a village in Botswana. BOTTOM: Pitzer College students hike along the Great Wall of China.
26 PITZER COLLEGE 27 A Strong Financial Future
Pitzer’s fundraising efforts continued to set records in 2004-05. Led by generous members of the Board of Trustees, more than 3,000 alumni, parents, faculty and staff, friends and organizations contributed to the College for a wide range of vital projects. The number of donors at the President’s Circle level ($1,000 and above) has increased by 42% during the past five years, while the 2004-05 Annual Fund grew by 10% over the previous year to reach an all- time high of $1,424,000.
Pitzer is currently raising funds for the Residential Life Project, which includes construction of three residence halls and program- ming to improve the on-campus experience for students. In 2005, the College raised $3,070,000 in new pledges for the project, bringing the total funds raised to date to more than $12 million of the anticipated $20 million goal.
Mirroring the financial security realized through a maturing fund- raising program, the College’s endowment has also experienced significant growth during the past five years, increasing by 33% to its current market value of $60.3 million in spite of significant market volatility. This growth is attributed to a combination of new gifts to support the endowment as well as careful attention to prudent, long- term investment strategies.
The graduating class of 2005 proudly displays the school colors of orange and white.
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