Community

College of Fine Arts and Production Professor Alison King always had an interest in writing, and when the brand 180 Degree Design + Build asked her to help them make their dreams of making a book a reality, King didn’t hesitate to give it a shot. “Making Architecture,” King’s collaboration with the architecture brand was recently self published and is being carried at Changing Hands bookstore.

There was no shortage of Christmas spirit at Andre’s House of Hospitality when Tim Haas and a group of GCU clarinet students and alumni performed a set of Christmas music for the homeless while they ate dinner Sunday evening. “When you get students that do these kinds of things, nothing’s better than that,” Haas said. “They touched people’s lives on Sunday night, and I couldn’t be more proud of them.”

GCU baseball players didn’t hesitate delaying their trips home for the holidays so they could help St. Mary’s Food Bank Alliance on Super Saturday. The team spent six hours at the Moon Valley Safeway collecting turkeys, nonperishable food and cash donations for the nonprofit organization, which expects more than 12,000 families to stop by today, Tuesday and Wednesday to pick up turkeys and other Thanksgiving meal items. “I could have left Thursday. But I had this; this is important,” said pitcher Cole Hoskins, who was planning to hit the road after his volunteer shift for a five-hour drive back home to Anaheim, Calif., for the holiday. The team collected more than $2,080 and 81 turkeys for SMFBA.

It didn’t take long for the new Innovation Center to get noticed by entrepreneurs across the Valley — it attracted 25 businesses in its first 2 1/2 months. The reason is simple: It has many aspects that make it an attractive deal, especially the fact that hiring GCU students is part of the package.

GCU in 2015 partnered with Habitat for Humanity to transform the Canyon Corridor. In those five years, the organizations have completed 606 repairs on 263 homes, and GCU and Grand Canyon Education employees have contributed more than $2.7 million to Habitat through Allocate to Elevate. GCU was honored Wednesday with the Spirit of Philanthropy Award by the Greater Arizona Chapter of the Association of Fundraising Professionals for its work with Habitat, which nominated the University for the honor.

When students strolled through the Promenade on Tuesday at the Lopes Launch Senior Sendoff Event, they were likely to run into a graduate of GCU now working in the community who had come back to recruit them. One organization, Central Leadership Institute, has hired GCU grads for seven of its 23 residency posts in the past four years — and it sent a GCU alum to get more.

Brian Mucyo’s Senior year at GCU is jam-packed with responsibilities connected to his passions, and he wouldn’t have it any other way. Mucyo was recently selected as the National Federation of the Blind of Arizona’s Award and scholarship recipient, as well as taking a seat on the Arizona Association of Blind Students board. October is meet the blind month and Mucyo hopes to help spread awareness of issues that affect people with visual impairments. “The thing that makes this award kind of special to me is that it’s an award where sure, I’m being recognized for the things I do, the effort I put into school and the passion I have for everything that I do but it’s not one of those awards that I’ll be getting where it kind of leads with ‘despite the fact that he’s blind these are all the things he’s doing and that’s so incredible that’s why we’re giving it to him.’” Mucyo said. “To me I feel like it’s affirming that what makes me special isn’t that I’m blind and somehow overcame it, no it’s just who I am as a person.”

Two years ago, the Cartwright Community Garden, which sits adjacent to Bret R. Tarver Elementary School and Marc T. Atkinson Middle School, was just an empty lot where a fire destroyed plans for a garden — and destroyed a mobile garden dubbed Gus the Garden Bus. Phoenix Fire Captain Austin Moreland, a GCU alum and former baseball player, couldn’t just let those plans fall by the wayside and enlisted the help of the community to restore the garden and create a new Gus the Garden Bus. The memorial garden was the site Saturday for the city of Phoenix’s Food Day and the Junior League of Phoenix’s Healthfest. GCU was there, with Canyon 49 Executive Sous Chef Michael Willison and members of the men’s baseball team, Milwaukee Brewers and the Learning Lounge to help inspire people to change the way they look at food.

Serve the City has done so much in recent years to help the neighborhood around the University, but there was a new twist Saturday. One of the homeowners is a recent GCU graduate and said something that you hear from a lot of students — they don’t want to leave.

Powered by midnight pizza and enthusiasm, GCU computer programming seniors Trevor Moore, Carter Rice and Jordan Riley emerged victorious at the PayPal Opportunity Hack last weekend, a marathon hacking event that spanned 18 hours over two days. The team designed an email gathering and management system for a small nonprofit called Zuri’s Circle, which helps the homeless, elderly and those in need. Judges awarded the team first place, which comes with a $1,000 award. That initial award will be followed by an additional $5,000 after the system is uploaded at the nonprofit before January deadline date. Two other GCU teams took home third- and fifth-place wins. “The PayPal engineers continue to be impressed with GCU students year after year,” said Dr. Isac Artzi, the college’s computer science faculty lead.