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A dozen new FAST Way students participated in a meet-up following the College’s New Student Kick-Start Program on August 13. A special thank-you to our FAST Way faculty and staff for making this event a welcoming and memorable introduction, helping students get a great head start on their college journey!

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The Miossi Gallery got some high profile visitors when they opened up on Saturday August 1 for the SLO County Library's Back-to-School Extravaganza. More than 200 very engaged visitors passed through the gallery's Not For Sale exhibition.

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Performing Arts conferred four Conservatory Awards on 4/10. The winners are:

Jude Johnson, Spencer Hafley, Christian Serna, and Tomsen Taylor.

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George Stone took his Recording Arts IV students to the NAMM show in January (Anaheim Convention Center).

Yamaha generously provided conference badges for all of the students at no cost!

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"To all of our backstage technicians, box office attendants, and house managers: Your jobs are weird-- mostly because, the better you are at your job, the less anyone notices you’re there. In the world of live performance, it's easy to correlate "attention" with "importance;" however, for us, it's crucial that you operate skillfully and discreetly.

You arrive early, you stay late, your patience is so appreciated, and your attention to detail keeps us all safe and operating without fail. You get our audience to where they're going, and you create magic through sound, lights, projections, allowing us all to enjoy and escape for a little bit together. What you do is a whole song and dance behind the scenes of actual singing and dancing.

You are as integral to the show as every performer, and we couldn't operate or have built as much as we have in the past eight years without you. Thank you for growing with us, as we have; we're so grateful for you!"

-Joan Hurwit

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We sat out the November power outage with pizza in the Arts Plaza and the lights came back on just as our panel of artists started talking about the show inside the gallery (photo 2)

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We had a great turnout for the Fall Print Sale! It was wonderful to see what the students have been making and to hear about their passion for the department and their experiences at Cuesta

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We had a great turnout for the lunchtime artist talk in the Miossi Gallery during Sung Won Yun's exhibit Inner Landscape

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Some students stepped out of the museum to enjoy the view of the LA skyline from the Getty Center on this beautiful November afternoon thanks to the Cuesta Foundation for their support of this high impact bus trip!

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Michelle Craig presented at the Afterlives Conference at Forest Lawn Museum in Glendale in November

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Michelle Craig presented at the Afterlives Conference at Forest Lawn Museum in Glendale in November

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She was presenting her research on Fez

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The Show Went On: CPAC Shines Despite Power Outage

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The Show Went On: CPAC Shines Despite Power Outage

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We are extremely grateful to the CPAC technical director, Clark Stewart, for expertly managing the unexpected power outage during the May 17th performance on both the CPAC and Experimental Theatre.

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We are deeply grateful to Dr. Jeremy Shermak (Journalism) and Professor Victor Lucio (Spanish) for their dedication and enthusiasm in representing the Languages and Communication Division at Cougar Welcome Day on Saturday, May 3, 2025.

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TellUs Reading and Student Award Celebration

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TellUs Reading and Student Award Celebration

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TellUs celebrated another year of creative collaboration with Fine Arts, culminating in a standing-room-only reading on May 15th, 2025. We are grateful to the dedicated team of English faculty, led by Dr. Amelia Marini, for planning another successful year of this inspiring partnership.

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Michelle Craig will be presenting to the Board of Trustees on April 2 about her sabbatical last semester and will be offering a Faculty Lecture on April 3 about her research and sabbatical in Morocco.

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A Cuesta jazz combo playing inside the Miossi Art Gallery during Daisy Patton's exhibition before the 40th Annual Jazz Festival Concert. I unfortunately didn't get a photo of the absolute All-Star band playing on the main stage of the CPAC.

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An awesome turnout of students for a lunchtime artist talk with Daisy Patton in the Miossi Art Gallery

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Fine Arts organized a fabulous bus trip down to LA for our students to check out the museums there, with partial support from a Foundation Grant. 48 students and 4 faculty/staff made a day trip to UCLA where we visited the Hammer Museum and the Fowler Museum. Everyone seemed to have a great time despite the rainy weather and got to see all kinds of great art. A few of us pictured here outside the Fowler.

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On Tuesday, February 12, Amelia Marini and Matthew Fleming staffed a promotion table for the Tellus Literary and Visual Arts Journal, passed out 50 donuts, and met with some wonderful students who checked out our past Tellus issues and were inspired to submit to the contest. Judges are currently reviewing submissions and will announce winners in the next couple of weeks.   Be on the lookout for a print making fundraiser on April 17th and the Tellus Contest reading on May 15th.

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Thank you for everything you’ve done for the Performing Arts Division over the past six years. You will be remembered for your friendliness, your amazing approach to multitasking, and your big smile. Best of luck with your new big job as the Executive Director at CMC Nashville, an immersive music program— we will miss you tremendously!

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The Book Arts class had a really cool paper marbling workshop with a guest artist. Pictured here is student Julia Freck with her marvelous creation

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Kudos to the Sculpture 1 students for their temporary installation outside of the Miossi Gallery. Abyssopelagic is a group project on display during the last week of classes and finals week Fall 2024

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Kudos to the Printmaking Class for another successful sale. All proceeds went directly to student artists. There may have been some print trading that was happening too. A lovely community event!

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Kudos to Ceramics on another successful Holiday Sale. Students and faculty selling their wares kept 50% of their sales and the other 50% went back into the program to bring guest artists to do demonstrations and give artist talks. They raised over $1K for the program!

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Kudos to Chair Beth-Ann Dumas and Faculty member Jeremy Shermak for Launching a Successful Outreach Program at the SLO Campus

On November 19 and 20, students gathered around an information table filled with treats, samples of past Cuestonian newspaper publications, and the chance to win a gift card by following the Cuestonian on social media. Have you signed up to follow the Cuestonian yet?

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World class musicians visit Applied Music class

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World class musicians visit Applied Music class

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Our Applied Music class was fortunate to experience performances from several professional musicians today.  In tandem with Festival Mozaic, Scott Yoo (Mexico City Philharmonic), Ben Ullery (LA Phil), Robert DeMaine (LA Phil), Xiaodi Liu (Savannah Phil) and Ieva Jokubaviciute gave solo performances and took Q&A with students.

They play Sunday at the Festival Mozaic Fall Chamber Concert held at the CPAC.

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Doug Highland's photo class visiting Saunders Shaw's Drawing class.

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Kudos to the Fine Arts for their Cross Disciplinary Day tours across the department to kick off priority registration for Spring semester.

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Kudos to Tim Stark and the Miossi Gallery for another great exhibition and artist talk with Jamil Hellu (pictured here).

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This year marked 21 years of our mega talented jazz faculty taking the stage to fundraise for Music Student Scholarship Awards raising $6500! Sponsored by George Drastal, and curated by Ron McCarley, the concert featured Dave Becker, Bob Bennett, Ken Hustad, Dylan Johnson, John Knutson, Ron McCarley, George Stone, and Darrell Voss. We estimate that, over the course of this fund’s lifetime, Cuesta Music Faculty have raised close to 100k!

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LangComm's Dr. Jeremy Shermak returns Public Address to the Rising Scholars Program at CMC.

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LangComm's Dr. Jeremy Shermak returns Public Address to the Rising Scholars Program at CMC.

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Kudos to Jeremy Shermak for teaching a Spring '25 Public Address course at CMC returning the opportunity for CMC Rising Scholars to complete Comm. 201.

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Poetry Reading with English Professor Bruce Badrigian

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Poetry Reading with English Professor Bruce Badrigian

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Prof. Badrigian captivated students from both English and Spanish classes with a moving poem inspired by a former student. The power of inspiration knows no language barriers. Thank you for your ongoing impact!

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Have you had the chance to catch up with English Professor Matt Fleming lately?

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Have you had the chance to catch up with English Professor Matt Fleming lately?

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I'm sure you probably have, given his relentless efforts to promote the English 201A Connect Thursdays Learning Community. His dedication shines through whether it's during the dynamic Connect @ Cuesta event as seen in this photo or at one of the ENGL 201A class presentations. We truly appreciate his unwavering enthusiasm and hard work.

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The Lang/Comm table was busy during the Connect @ Cuesta event. Jeremy Shermak, the Journalism faculty member, and Anna Paez, the Division Assistant, did an excellent job promoting the academic programs and various opportunities for the student newspaper the Cuestonian.

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Prof. Victor Lucio: New Faculty Rising JEDI Co-Facilitator!

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Prof. Victor Lucio: New Faculty Rising JEDI Co-Facilitator!

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Kudos to Spanish instructor, Prof. Victor Lucio, who has been selected in a competitive process as a faculty rising JEDI Academy co-facilitator. Victor will participate in training and mentorship this year, beginning his three year term as co-facilitator in 2025-2026. LangComm is proud to claim a JEDI Academy co-facilitator!

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The Outsiders from the Other Side exhibition has gotten some wonderful engagement. Extra Kudos to College Corp volunteer Nereida Herrera who did an awesome job translating for our artist panel!

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Kudos to student Catherine Edlebeck for getting the Art Club going! They had 13 people at their meeting today and elected officers. They meet every other Friday to make art and hang out.

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Kudos to all the faculty and students running the screen printing booth at the reception of the Student Annual Art Exhibition. It was a super fun interactive event that raised money for Tellus by screen printing a Tellus print designed by student Tasha Steinmaus onto items that people brought from home. Pictured here is David Prochaska, Inga Dorosz, Marcia Harvey and Brittany Mojo printing right on to a student's back!

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Margaret Korisheli hosted an art project in the courtyard for the Women in Art themed Cougar Social Hour on March 13.

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The entire boys water polo team (along with many other awesome volunteers) came out to the Ceramics Bowl-a-thon to make bowls that will eventually be auctioned off to raise money to feed the homeless at Echo Homeless Shelter's Empty Bowls fundraiser!

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Over 2 days close to 200 young women from the Grizzly Academy toured through our Facilities. Here they are checking out our open lab in the painting studio.

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Kudos to Tim Stark on another successful exhibition in the Miossi Art Gallery. Cobi Moules: Showering of Sparkling Bits has already had over 800 visitors and is still open for another week with 2 big events to go! The opening reception was fun (student pictured here enjoying the skin-like bench). Special events included a film screening of The Blob in the gallery and original commissioned dance performances by SLO Movement Arts Collective.

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Thanks to the fundraising of Etty Pacifico at Art Central in San Luis Obispo and her Annual "YART SALE", the Fine Arts Department was able to award 18 students each a $200 scholarship at the end of the Fall semester, administered through the Morro Bay Art Association. We look forward to continuing our partnership with these creative organizations to fund awards at the end of every Fall semester to help our students with the cost of supplies and encourage them to re-enroll in the Spring.

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Congratulations to the Ceramics program for a successful holiday sale! The sale collectively put over $1,000 directly into the pockets of students and over $2,700 into the Ceramics account to pay for visiting artists. Thanks to the students and faculty that donated pieces to the sale and students who donated a portion of their sales, we have funding to bring a visiting artist every month next semester!

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Richard Jackson successfully created a new Career Technical Certificate (CTE) program for Technical Theater. This new certificate will be a great new opportunity for students to gain the skills and credit in order to work in the theater industry. SLO County is in need of trained theater technicians to make our many fabulous local productions successful. Our students will be able to build and paint sets, set up and run lighting programs, and collaborate with the director. This CTE program is important to our students and the industry, but also fruitful for our college in that it opens up access to a lot of state and federal grants.

This was a year-long project to design the program and get approvals at all levels. Congratulations, Richard!

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Kudos to Cuesta's newest Spanish Instructor Victor Lucio for becoming the co-advisor for the Cuesta Pride Club.

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Kudos to Cuesta's newest Spanish Instructor Victor Lucio for becoming the co-advisor for the Cuesta Pride Club.

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The ASL department partnered with the Student Life and Leadership during the Cougar Social Hour on September 13 to bring deaf awareness to the college community. This was the inaugural Language Table event for the year and over 30 students from the ASL I and ASL II students attended. Jo Malizia (ASL Interpreter) reported that some students got to practice signing with a deaf student and they even exchanged phone numbers for more practice on their own. Kudos to Erich Tucker (ASL Instructor) and Anna Paez (Division Assistant) for coordinating this successful inaugural event!

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"The goal of the Wellness Program is to support Cuesta College students and employees in optimizing their health, and the health of our community."

Thanks to David Prochaska, Lead Faculty 2D Arts faculty, for volunteering his time in serving the community by offering Art & Wellness – Free Open Art Studio on Fridays 10 am-2 pm in Room 7125 on the SLO Cuesta College campus.

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Culturally Relevant Pedagogy Practices Grant

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Culturally Relevant Pedagogy Practices Grant

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Cuesta College has been awarded a $300,000 Culturally Relevant Pedagogy Practices grant from the Chancellor's office. Big props to Matthew Davis (English) for working closely with the Student Equity Initiative and His fellow JEDI facilitator, Katy Dittmer (psychology)to help secure the grant.
The grant will allow for significant continuation and expansion of the equity work that has been started by and ongoing in Cuesta programs like the JEDI Academy. The photo shown above is a demonstration of how Matthew creates a "strong sense of community and belonging" using JEDI Academy teaching practice for his students who actually stopped by to say hello at not seeing one another for the summer.

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Canguo Liu embraced supporting real-world connections in his Graphic Design 1 class with the Day One Assignment, having students learn basic skills on Day 1 to produce quick and easy flyers for campus events - that were then displayed in the "Student Art Gallery" outside the division and faculty offices.

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Kudos to our dedicated division assistants for their outstanding efforts in managing waitlists during the summer. Their hard work and commitment have played a pivotal role in boosting student enrollment and ensuring a smooth registration process. A special shoutout goes to the English Division Assistant, Anna Greene for working tirelessly in contacting multiple sections of waitlisted students. As a result, we saw an increase of 90 plus student headcounts for English from fall 2022 to fall 2023.

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Recording Studio with Morro Bay HS Students

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Recording Studio with Morro Bay HS Students

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George Stone and Dave Becker (Music) conducted a student outreach program in the recording studio on May 4th for Morro Bay High School's music department. The 90-minute presentation included a demonstration and a hands-on session for students to explore the Audio Technology and Recording Arts Program at Cuesta.

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The Foundation Grant Taskforce group from the English Division (from left to right: Jude Rock, Amelia Marini, Matthew Fleming, Matthew Davis, Sean Boling, Steve Leone, and Tom Patchell) worked on decorating the classrooms in the 3300 building with visual arts of inspiring writers and poets.

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Matthew Davis (English) brilliantly moderated the Q&A session with Sabaa Tahir, author of the #1 New York Times bestselling book All My Rage during the 2023 Cuesta Book of the Year event at CPAC on April 27. If you missed the event, you can visit Sabaa online at SabaaTahir.com and follow her on Instagram @SabaaTahir.

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On April 21, nearly 300 students from the local high schools visited Cuesta College to attend the Promise & Educate conference.  Thanks to the faculty and staff of the Fine Arts and Performing Arts Divisions, students from San Luis Obispo HS, Morro Bay HS, Central Coast New Tech, Nipomo HS, Paloma Creek HS/ACE Academy, and Templeton HS got to see the CPAC and the Arts Gallery during the campus tours.

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Nearly 200 Los Osos Middle School students were on campus to take part in the ‘College for a  Day’ event on Friday, April 17th to experience activities from various areas of study, and to sit in four ‘classes’ during the day. Thanks to Guy Kinnear (Fine Arts) for showing kids how to draw and to Tom Patchell (English) for showing kids around the SLO campus.

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April is National Poetry Month, and the Open Poetry Reading was live at the SLO Library on April 13th. English faculty Tom Patchell and Roland Finger and their students attended the "Step Right Up" event to read the poem of their choice. Some shared their own compositions to celebrate this special occasion.

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Kudos to Margaret Korisheli (Fine Arts) for sharing a memorable trip to visit sculpture programs in the Bay Area with Bo. They visited one large commercial foundry (Artworks Foundry in Berkeley - one photo shows a casting of a Dalai Lama statue in the process), one private program (The Crucible in Oakland), and two academic sculpture foundry programs: Chabot College and San Jose State. They toured other areas of the San Jose State art program and feel well-informed about recommending San Jose as a great transfer option for Cuesta students.

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Music Faculty Concert: one of our community's favorites

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Music Faculty Concert: one of our community's favorites

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Huge shoutouts to the following faculty team who performed during the concert on February 10th. We appreciate you!

John Knutson

Inga Swearingen

Mike Dana

Idona Cabrinha

Michael Walker

Emily Lanzone

Chad Ruyle

Bob Bennett

Zachary Deak

Ron McCarley

Cassandra Tarantino

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The arts community happily engaged in the Empty Bowls workshop in collaboration with ECHO Shelter led by Brittany and Wink (Ceramics). The bowls made by the workshop participants were donated to ECHO for its mission to support individuals and families in our community facing homelessness.

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Whimsical Drama Production Live in Vegas

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Whimsical Drama Production Live in Vegas

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For the fifth time, The Cuesta College Theatre Arts production was honored at the Kennedy Center American College Theater Festival. This year, bree and Richard led the team to Las Vegas and transformed the stage with brilliant acting and technical wizardry. We look forward to another year of top honors in theatre education! Check out this timelapse video showing the festival stage from scratch to finish. The video is presented by cast member and associate director of marketing, Ritchie Bermudez.

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For the 3rd time, the Cuesta Music Faculty team conducted successful outreach programs at Morro Bay and Arroyo Grande high schools. 12 Cuesta Music faculty performed jazz, classical, musical theater, and gospel music for approximately 80 students at each high school on Friday, February 3rd.

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Opening Reception for JooLee Kang: Rock Scissors Paper, Slug Frog Snake

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Opening Reception for JooLee Kang: Rock Scissors Paper, Slug Frog Snake

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The arts community came together to meet the artist during the opening reception, exhibit, and artist talk which were made possible by the Gallery team (Tim, Bo, and Magnolia) on February 3.

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Kudos to Beth-Ann (Communication) and Sean (English) for connecting with students in North County and providing them with academic tips and student support services available to them.

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Thanks to Magnolia and Bo (Fine Arts) for hosting a table and connecting with current and prospective students about the outstanding Arts programs we offer at Cuesta!