Stories

Fantastic Preparation for Both Academic and Industrial Work

What I learned about writing at CCS, and how it led to my first book

Harry Reese was my neighbor on Sueño in Isla Vista.  One day we said hello to each other on campus by the UCSB Library, and I found out who he really was.  He invited me to take his class which I did.  I was a senior then, and that encounter gave me the focus I needed. I think it was 1979 or 1980. I was an Art Studio major with an emphasis in printmaking.

Some relationships have the facture of fate. Only later do we realize that we had been searching for some people for years before meeting them--the impact of our meeting having been so strong that it reverberated backward in time. In that way, I have felt the effects of meeting Harry and Sandra all my life.

More than 30 years after leaving CCS I’m still using the methods I first discovered: be open to all the possibilities, plan a path and start simply, take time to evaluate, edit, and repeat.  The College of Creative Studies provided an environment of experimentation and a creative community where learning by doing was the culture.  I’m so fortunate that I found CCS.

The Literature major at the College of Creative Studies was the signature program at the onset of the College some 50 years ago. Several years ago the major was re-launched as Writing & Literature, and Kara Mae Brown came to CCS in 2015-2016 to become its Program Coordinator as well as a Lecturer in the UCSB Writing Program and the CCS Writing & Literature Program.

From an early age, Mark had two loves: mathematics and games. As he excelled through high school math, playing any game he could find along the way, he looked for a college that would challenge him academically

I had a series of remarkable classes in my freshman year of CCS Literature, including “Malaise, Melancholy and the Production of Art”, taught by Jacob Berman.

Deans, students, and staff will come and go; new CCS buildings may even come and go, but the home inside CCS will continue to morph around its central principles of creation and discovery.

 As I work through my third year in CCS physics, I’m incredibly grateful to the College of Creative Studies for providing me with a comprehensive education, both in the classroom and the lab.