Santa Barbara City College’s chapter of Phi Theta Kappa recently inducted 77 new members into the international honor society. A total of 400 SBCC students are members of PTK. PTK is the largest and most respected honor society serving two-year colleges around the world. This organization recognizes academic achievement and provides opportunities for highly successful students at community colleges to participate in honors, leadership and service activities for the community. To join, students must have taken at least 12.0 units at SBCC and earned a GPA of 3.5 or higher.

The 2010-11 PTK student leadership and faculty advisors are: (Back row, l to r) Nicholas McCabe; Rani Ibrahim; Jonathan Arenas; Matthew Markonis; (front row, l to r) Mark Sanders, Faculty Advisor; Dr. Phyllisa Eisentraut, Faculty Advisor; Patience Ncube; Michael Schneider; Rayheon Hwang; Di Chloe Zhu; Hanguel Elizabeth Kim; Lee Sherry Leung; Kimberly Long; Pooya Jalali; Malin Harstad; Zi Wang; Grayson Arango, PTK Vice President; Hannah Stromgren, PTK President; and Dr. Manoutchehr Eskandari-Qajar, Faculty Advisor.

At Santa Barbara City College, PTK members recently have hosted fundraisers for Haitian earthquake relief, co-sponsored special events recognizing diversity on campus and volunteered at a local nonprofit organization as part of United Way’s Day of Caring.

Student President Hannah Stromgren is a double major in political science and international relations. A native of Sweden, Hannah said, “It’s an honor to be named PTK president. I want to give back to American society what they have given to me.” She plans to encourage change at the college through motivation and education and is described as a strong leader who is a role model to her peers.

New PTK inductee Moctezuma Vallejo-Howard, a graduate of San Marcos High School in Santa Barbara, is majoring in business and plans on transferring to a four-year university next fall. “SBCC and PTK are both tools to further students intellectually and socially.” He added, “Being a well-rounded person is every bit as important as being a good student, and both SBCC and PTK will help me accomplish these goals.”

SBCC inducted 77 new members into Phi Theta Kappa. Superintendent/President Dr. Andreea Serban (center) made congratulatory remarks at the ceremony.

PTK members have access to special scholarship funds and are also eligible to participate in the All-USA Academic Team program, co-sponsored by USA Today, and by extension, their own statewide academic teams. To date, SBCC has had three students earn All-Team USA honors with 11 students named to All-California Teams.

PTK is one of a series of programs at SBCC supporting students with high academic achievement to further their personal and academic goals. Others include the Honors Program, a specially designed curriculum to foster critical and creative thinking, writing, and oral communication; Sigma Chi Eta, the honor society for communication majors; the MESA Program for underrepresented high-achieving mathematics, engineering and science students; and the INSET Program (Internships in Nanosystems Science, Engineering and Technology), a summer research program sponsored by UCSB with participation by SBCC students.

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