Stealing from the sun: one man's story of sustainability

English professor charges his hybrid car in an unconventional and innovative way

ALEXIS CANELO NOAH GOLDBLOOM News & Campus Life Editor @alexiscanelo_ @Noahgoldbloom

Instructor of English Larry

Krikorian has no place to charge his electric vehicle on campus.

But he is not the only one.

Currently, there are no working electric charging stations at Pierce College.

Krikorian’s solution is to take matters into his own hands. He currently drives a Chevrolet Volt.

Krikorian charges his vehicle from his office using a heavy-duty extension cord which extends out of his window.

Krikorian said he is met with joking criticism from fellow faculty, one proposing he is stealing from Pierce. In response, he said energy is for everyone.

“Pierce has two sizeable solar power farms, one over here and one up on the hill,” Krikorian said. “The sun's energy for you and me is, for all practical purposes‒ infinite. Let's say I use 20,000-kilowatt hours while I'm working at Pierce for the rest of my career. What's infinity takeaway 20,000?”

Krikorian said the only person he is “stealing” from is the sun. He is motivated to drive an electric vehicle because he is conscious of pollution.

“I'm not pouring filth down the lungs of my colleagues' children,”

Krikorian said.

The college became aware of the issue after meetings with Union Chapter President Brian Walsh, Vice President of Administrative Services Rolf Schleicher, the Workers Environment Committee and the Department of Water and Power.

Associate Professor of Political Science Denise Munro Robb conducted a survey to get an idea of how many people on campus drive electric vehicles. Robb’s survey concluded that many professors and

The write path to success Student resources at new writing lab

JACKSON HAYANO Reporter @HayanoJackson

For years, students have brought hard copies of their essays to the Center for Academic Success hoping to get a 30 minute session with a random tutor.

This is now a thing of the past with the new Writing Center opening up on campus. Pierce College students will soon have a dedicated area to work on assignments and improve their writing. The new writing center is hoping to provide a more thorough, beneficial experience where, instead of just a review, students can work on the actual assignment with help from faculty members and tutors.

In the past, students who needed help on a writing assignment would bring in a hard copy to the Center for Academic Success (CAS) and have a thirty-minute session with a tutor who would review the paper.

“The new writing center is an attempt for us to change up our modality and be more accessible to all students,” said CAS Director Crystal Kiekel.

“The idea of a writing center is that students can come in and work on the process of writing. It will be in a computer lab, so that students can come in with nothing at all and they can just sit down and pull up a computer and start researching and writing with assistance from the tutors,” Kiekel said.

Currently, there will be an English tutor, an ESL tutor and an English faculty member working in the writing center. Their job will be to go around and assist students working at the computers, such as answering questions or offering suggestions on papers.

“In this writing center, students can go in and begin or continue working on a paper and get specific guidance from a tutor or teacher,” said English Professor Chris Corning. “They will be getting help as is needed.”

The new writing center was first conceived last fall as a response to Assembly Bill 705, which requires students in California community colleges to skip remedial English classes and go straight to English 101.

“We thought that this [Assembly Bill 705] would be a good opportunity to open up a new writing center,” said English and ESL Department Chair Brad Saenz. “We had to find a way to provide extra support to students who might have been in remedial courses [this year], but were instead placed in English 101.”

While the new writing center is a product of the English and ESL departments, its goal is to provide assistance to students writing papers in any subject or class.

“A person can come in and get help writing a paper on any subject, whether it be English, history or philosophy,” Corning said. “My vision for this is that the center can help students in any sort of writing.” jhayano.roundup@gmail.com a few of her students drive electric vehicles. Robb drives a Chevrolet Bolt.

The writing center will be open on Tuesdays from 12-5 p.m., and on Wednesdays from 1-6 p.m.

Brad Saenz said the project is in a beta stage, and that hopefully, the center will be able to expand its hours in the future.

Robb was personally motivated to drive an electric vehicle, because of what she calls the “end of the world.”

“Devastations already happened. We have massive wildfires and we have hurricanes, drought – It's here now. It's not something in the future,” Robb said

A meeting was held with Pierce College and the Department of Water and Power to discuss what is necessary for the installation of the charging stations.

Apotential roadblock is making sure one of the charging stations is in compliance with the Americans with Disabilities Act (ADA).

Paul Nieman, Director of Facilities, explained what is necessary for the space to be compliant.

“A space that is considered ADA compliant can not have a cross slope of any more than 2 percent in any direction. So there's some asphalt work that would have to be done, but we could achieve that and we could achieve the proper aisle space required for a van,” Neiman said.

Neiman said it may be difficult to ensure a safe path of travel between the charging station and the building.

“The problem is you also have to show that there's a path of travel that's compliant from the parking space to the building,” Neiman said

The cost of installation and maintenance should not be a hindrance, because of rebates and incentives. Neiman is looking to work with a company that will own and maintain the chargers.

“I want to find as a company that is willing to put the chargers in, they pay for all the costs, they maintain ownership of them and maintain them. They apply for the incentives that are available through DWP and keep all that money and then we just work out a little revenue sharing agreement,” Neiman said.

Neiman wants to ensure the project will not cost the college.

“My goal is to get it towards net neutral for the college. It's not costing the college anything. The increased electricity that is being used to charge these vehicles is not, we're not getting hit with that cost,” Neiman said.

If all goes according to plan the chargers should be installed this year, maybe even before summer, according to Neiman.