Westmont will use the opportunity to say thank you to the Santa Barbara community for all the help, support and compassion it has received in response to the Tea Fire which swept through campus on Thursday evening. In addition to free admission, the Warriors plan to honor some of those who gave of themselves in protecting not only the Westmont campus but also the communities of Montecito and Santa Barbara.

Holy Names, which boasts a record of 14-3, is the champion of the California Pacific Conference consisting of teams from Northern California. Holy Names played two GSAC teams this year. The Hawks lost to Point Loma Nazarene by a score of 3-2 and lost to Fresno Pacific by a score of 3-1. Westmont tied Point Loma Nazarene 1-1 and defeated Fresno Pacific 3-0. The two teams had no other common opponents during the 2008 season.

Westmont and Holy Names last faced each other in 2006 in the first round of the NAIA Regional Tournament where the Warriors defeated the Hawks by a score of 2-0. The only other previous meeting between the two squads was in 2004 as part of Westmont’s Heritage Club Classic. The Warriors won that game by a score of 3-2.

Holy Names, which has outscored its opponents 70-17 this season, is led offensively by Mustafa Celik, a junior forward. Celik, who hails from Cologne, Germany, has scored 30 goals this season including a season high seven against Cal State Maritime. Holy Names has won its last 13 games.

Westmont is on a five game winning streak including victories over ranked opponents in its last three outings. Sophomore forward Anthony Niboli leads the Warriors with seven goals while senior midfielder Jonathon Schoff has recorded six goals and three assists. Except for two penalty kicks, Westmont has not allowed a goal since October 22 in a 1-1 tie with Biola. Senior goalkeeper Justin Etherton has tallied 64 saves and recorded a goals-against-average of 0.97.

The victor of Saturday’s game will advance to the second round where they will face the winner between sixth-seeded Park of Missouri (11-3-3) and Baker of Kansas (13-6-2). The second round, and all subsequent rounds, will be held at the 2008 NAIA Men’s Soccer National Championship Final Site which this year is Ramirez Field on the campus of Fresno Pacific. The second round game for the Westmont-Fresno Pacific winner will be held at 4:30 p.m. on Tuesday, December 2.

With more than 1,800 tickets reserved last year, the Westmont Christmas Festival has become a popular community tradition. This year the program features all the Westmont choirs as well as the Westmont Orchestra, Windancers, and student readers. Audience members will be invited to sing traditional carols throughout the performance.

Highlights of the program include Hugo Distler’s arrangement of the Christmas hymn, “Lo, How a Rose E’er Blooming,” and Felix Mendelssohn’s “A Star Shall Rise Up Out of Jacob” from the “Christus” oratorio. The finale of the festival features all the choirs together joined by the orchestra, Windancers, and a trio of faculty soloists in Ralph Vaughan Williams’ “Ring Out Ye Crystal Spheres” from the “Hodie” This Day oratorio.

“It’s a pleasure to offer this festive event to the Santa Barbara community while giving our students a wonderful opportunity to perform,” says Michael Shasberger, Adams professor of music and worship and the director of the orchestra and College Choir. “It puts us all in the Christmas spirit!”

Ficsor, professor of violin at Westmont, and Diemer, renowned composer and professor emeritus at UC Santa Barbara, are collaborating on a recording of Diemer’s complete works for violin and piano. Saturday’s performance will include Diemer’s “Catch-A-Turian Toccata” and “Homage á Paderewski.” Diemer transcribed the “Homage,” originally written for viola and piano, specifically for Ficsor. She will perform the piano part.

Diemer taught music theory and composition at UC Santa Barbara from 1971 to 1991 and played the organ for First Presbyterian Church from 1984 to 2002. She was composer-in-residence for the Santa Barbara Symphony from 1990 to 1992, and she has composed hundreds of works for chorus, orchestra, small ensembles and solo instruments.

The Santa Barbara Independent has described Ficsor’s playing as “luminous.” Last year, he released a CD of William Bolcom’s complete works for violin and piano. He also serves as an editorial adviser for publication through E. B. Marks/Hal Leonard Corp. for Bolcom’s works for violin and piano.

Other local musicians will also perform.

For more information about the concert, contact the Santa Barbara Music Club at (805) 683-0811 or info@sbmusicclub.org or visit www.sbmusicclub.org. For information about Ficsor and his collaboration with Diemer, please call (805) 565-6889 or e-mail ssquire@westmont.edu.

Pyron has led the chamber music master class in Santa Barbara since 1999. Participants this year come from as far away as Chicago.

An authority on the history of the instrument, Pyron taught cello and chamber music in London and at Willamette University in Salem, Ore. before coming to Santa Barbara, and is known for concert performances combining rare 18th century pieces played on period instruments with a more standard repertoire on a modern cello. She co-authored the book “Cello” with William Pleeth for the Yehundi Menuhin Series, and is founder and editor-in-chief of Grancino Editions, publisher of more than 100 unknown or forgotten compositions from the 18th century. They are taken from her collection of over 8,000 works uncovered during years of research in Europe.

For more information contact coordinator Zandra Hanson at (626) 585-1925 or zandrahanson@gmail.com.

Although globalization has reduced distances between cultures, improving cooperation to increase security, well-being and peace remains a challenge for the world community. In response to this challenge, Montgomery says many academic, political and economic voices in the U.S. have called on higher education to globalize their curriculum and encourage more students to study abroad.

“Many world leaders have declared that our rapidly globalizing world demands knowledge, understanding, and commitment to effectively negotiate cultural and national boundaries,” Montgomery says. “Global education—study abroad—has been identified as an important means of equipping future leaders with these abilities and qualities.”

Montgomery will share her views about the skills, knowledge, character traits and ethics that global education must cultivate in order to prepare future leaders to constructively meet these global challenges. She says community members involved with study abroad programs, educational or cultural exchange, relief and development work or cross-cultural service projects will particularly enjoy the presentation.

Montgomery earned her doctorate in anthropology from Michigan State University in 1989 and began teaching at Westmont in 1990. She and Mary Doctor, Westmont professor of modern languages, developed Westmont’s study abroad program in Mexico through the Irvine Foundation diversity grant. Montgomery has been the resident director of the Westmont in Mexico program in Querétaro, Mexico, in 2005 and 2007. Her areas of expertise include the cultural anthropology of Mexico and Central America, cross-cultural communication studies, international development, and gender studies.

The lecture is part of the Westmont Downtown lecture series, sponsored by the Westmont Foundation, reaching out and engaging the larger Santa Barbara and Montecito communities.

The T.B. Walker Foundation, an anonymous donor and others have committed $1.5 million to Westmont toward the creation of the college’s first endowed chair in the natural and behavioral sciences. The T.B. Walker Foundation Chair in the Natural & Behavioral Sciences will honor the work of an outstanding faculty member in biology, chemistry, computer science, engineering/physics, mathematics or psychology.

The chair will be awarded to a current Westmont professor every three to five years. This is the second rotating chair established at Westmont in the past year. In June, Rick Pointer, Westmont professor of history, was selected as the first recipient of the newly established Fletcher Jones Foundation Endowed Chair in Social Science.

The Walker chair includes a reduced teaching load (one less class each year) so the professor can focus on research.

“Not only does the new chair bring prestige to its holder and the institution, but the research opportunities will enhance students’ education as well,” says Warren Rogers, interim academic dean.

A professor will be named to the chair once all of the funding has been received.

Makoto Masuno returns to Westmont as assistant professor of chemistry after graduating from the college in 1997. Masuno transferred to Westmont in 1995 as a junior and chose chemistry as his major, but admits he hadn’t completed a single college chemistry course when he arrived.

“As a student, I was pleasantly surprised at the culture at Westmont where both the professors and my fellow classmates earnestly wanted to help me,” Masuno says. “Now I’m in the position where my mentors are my colleagues, and I have the opportunity to mentor students.”

He says it was the assistance he received from fellow classmates and professors that planted a seed in his heart. “I want to promote students to help and encourage each other, so I designed a faith and science attitudinal program, which reminds students the importance of building a Christ-centered scientific community.”

After graduating from Westmont, Masuno worked as a scientist at Miravant Medical Technologies in Santa Barbara in the research and development department for about three years. He later earned his doctorate at UC Davis and taught a course at Sacramento City College. Masuno currently researches in the field of marine natural product chemistry, isolating and elucidating bioactive molecules that derive from sessile marine invertebrates; for instance, he investigates marine sponges that may biosynthesize a helpful pharmaceutical.

“I have the distinct pleasure of being able to look at God’s creation at the molecular level,” he says.

“I chose these particular artists because of their characteristic surface decoration and notable style,” says guest curator Chris Rupp, who teaches sculpture at the college and is a ceramic collector and potter. “Each artist has a unique method of showing his or her process through the finished piece.”

Local artist James Haggerty is one of very few potters in the country to use the Persian Luster technique, which creates a shimmering metallic surface on his pottery. His pieces are delicately thrown and then glazed specifically to crater, fissure and bubble with an iridescent shine. Many pots are fired several times to achieve the desired results. Having dedicated his life to mastering the process, Haggerty is one of the best ceramic artists working in this style.

Functional pottery by New York artist Aymui Horie is characterized by playfulness and storybook decorations, often incorporating line drawings of animals, numbers, letters, and whimsical splashes of color. “I hope to impart a feeling of quietness and contentment,” she says. “Finger marks and dents are unconcealed and even celebrated, because what could be more comforting than the handmade?”

Californian Marc Digeros, the model shop manager for architect Frank Gehry, says his ceramic work reflects architectural ideas of structure and texture. He folds and joins slabs of clay to create his pieces, letting the seams and layers interact with colorful glazes to create the final form.

John Dix, an American-born ceramicist currently living and working in Japan, uses traditional Japanese materials and processes, including a wood burning kiln to create unpredictable finishes. His pieces often spend seven days in the kiln, producing finished glaze effects created from the path of the flame and the falling ash.

More information about each artist is available at the Arts at Westmont page on the Westmont Web site, www.westmont.edu.

Reynolds Gallery hours are Monday through Friday 10 a.m. to 4 p.m., and Saturday 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. For more information visit www.reynoldsgallery.org or call (805) 565-6162.

The 2008-2009 orchestra season is sponsored by members of the newly-formed Westmont Music Council, which includes Stephen Adams, Barrie Bergman, Dan Burnham, David MacCulloch and Lady Leslie Ridley-Tree. Also new this season is a music patron program. Patrons receive season tickets and preferred parking and seating at all orchestra concerts and the Annual Christmas Festival, and invitations to special musical receptions, in recognition of gifts of $100 or more.

The orchestra has taken many forms over time, and in the 1990s consisted of a few student musicians and several faculty and community members. In 2005, Michael Shasberger was hired as Adams Professor of Music and Worship, leading the department to form a full orchestra. With the hiring of world-class violinist Philip Ficsor and several adjunct professors in 2006, the Westmont Chamber Orchestra produced its first full season of concerts and touring with 24 student musicians. In 2007, the ensemble added a brass section and more strings for a total of 38 students, and this fall has grown into a fully symphonic orchestra. Two faculty members and a Westmont parent complete the ensemble.

The music program attracts increasingly talented students, and four of the orchestra’s 14 section leaders are high-caliber first-year musicians. Orchestra members come to Westmont from 12 states, Zimbabwe and France. Forty six students in the ensemble receive music scholarship funding, including 27 Adams Music Scholars. No venue on campus is big enough to house the orchestra and an audience. A chapel scheduled for Phase I of Westmont’s Master Plan will provide a performance space for this and other ensembles.

The program for the November concerts, “Words of Life, Words of Hope,” features Beethoven’s “Coriolan Overture,” Dvorak’s “Slavonic Dances,” and Copland’s “Letters from Home.” Students from the theatre arts department will read excerpts of letters to and from American soldiers from the Revolution through Vietnam. Professor Ficsor’s violin work will highlight Wieniawski’s “Polonaise.” For more information, contact Helen Park in the music department at (805) 565- 6040 or hpark@westmont.edu.

The construction signifies the start of the first phase of the college’s Master Plan, adding 166,000 square feet to the campus while maintaining more than 90 acres of landscaping or open space.

“This is an historic celebration for Westmont. Our students will directly benefit from the enhanced educational experience they’ll receive in these new facilities,” says President Gayle D. Beebe.

The ground breaking ceremony was planned several months ago to coincide with the annual October meeting of the Westmont Board of Trustees.

The Adams Center, providing classrooms, studios and offices north of Porter Theatre, has been designed with natural ventilation and lighting. Two pavilions sit on the landscaped roof of the main level, while the east pavilion houses the gallery and gallery reception area. A computer graphics lab and ceramics and sculpture studios and work areas occupy the street level.

Winter Hall, north of the Murchison Gym complex, will house offices, classrooms and laboratories for mathematics, computer science, physics and psychology. The top level has three office areas around a central atrium, one for each department. The offices are clustered around lounges designed for individual and group study. Each lounge opens on to a landscaped roof deck. Undulating Santa Barbara sandstone walls surround the middle level.

Eight years ago Westmont began a lengthy permitting process to update its previously approved Master Plan, undergoing an extensive environmental review and public hearings. Under the updated Master Plan, the college intends to build the Adams Center, Winter Hall, a chapel and a new residence hall in the first phase of construction and additional buildings in the future after a lengthy quiet period. Construction for the first phase is expected to take about three years to complete.

In May 2006, the college redesigned the project to incorporate guidance from the Montecito Board of Architectural Review and the Montecito Planning Commission, reducing total construction by more than 20,000 square feet and moving buildings away from the perimeter of the campus. The county imposed many new conditions as part of its approval, and the college has agreed to operate under a revised conditional use permit (C.U.P.) with 116 conditions, as compared to 31 under the prior C.U.P.