Community

For the second consecutive year, GCU made the top 10 of Niche’s Best College Campuses list, scoring a No. 7 ranking (up from No. 8 last year) for its college life — and the accolades don’t end there. The University also is No. 6 on the Best Dorms in America list and No. 7 in Best Online Colleges.

“We no longer have two communities of GCU and the Canyon Corridor, you now have one. GCU just happens to be a university within the corridor.” Isn’t that extraordinary? Those are the words of Habitat for Humanity’s Director of Sponsor Relations, Cassandra Jarles. The partnership between GCU and Habitat has truly impacted lives, from the families whose houses are revitalized to the employee volunteers who are blessed with being able to serve them. The partnership is on pace to revitalize its 200th home on the Oct. 27 Serve the City date, but there’s a lot of work to do to make it there. GCU and Habitat need you — yes, you! — to sign up for one of the fall’s employee volunteer events, the first of which is Sept. 21.

Grand Canyon University has three new members on its Board of Trustees: Peggy Chase, President and CEO of Terros Health; Dr. Lupita Ley Hightower, Superintendent of the Tolleson Elementary School District; and Marion Kelly, Director for the Office for Community Affairs at Mayo Clinic, have been added to the seven-member board that oversees the nonprofit university. That brings the total number of board members to seven.

With computing jobs in such high demand, it’s hard to find and keep skilled computer science teachers, said Corinne Araza, GCU’s Director of STEM Outreach and Program Development. It’s why the recent Code.org courses on the GCU campus were so important. About 90 educators from around Arizona gave up part of their summer to enrich their computer science knowledge, thanks to a partnership between GCU, Code.org and Science Foundation Arizona.

In 1978, Ray Arvizu led the Lopes to an NAIA basketball national championship. His impact on the community easily could have stopped there. But Arvizu dove into charity work in his hometown of Phoenix and for the past 14 years has run an event at GCU called Ninos Seguros. The back-to-school giveaway has a mission of teaching childhood safety and brings together the diverse community of Phoenix for a day of fun.

The best of the community is hiding in plain sight in GCU Arena, where by the end of the day the Back-to-School Clothing Drive will have provided shirts, pants, shoes, wallets, hair clips, school supplies and dental screenings to about 5,000 children, with 1,500 of those being foster kids. The event partnered with Arizona’s foster community this year to expand its reach, which means the world to foster parents. “They’ve been through a lot more than we’ll probably ever understand,” Josh Rice said

One thousand kids served, 4,000 to go: The Back-to-School Clothing Drive’s New Clothes, New Beginnings kicked off Monday with GCU Day. Lopes were out in full support of the weeklong event, which donates new clothes and other school supplies to local children. It’s in its fifth year of turning GCU Arena into a seven-department shopping center where children walk through and pick out fresh attire.

GCU News Bureau America’s Favorite Mascot, along with his entourage of GCU cheerleaders in tow, spent some quality time preparing families at UMOM for the new school year. The charity specializes in helping transform the lives of homeless families around the Valley, and this event was no exception. They decorated cookies and painted faces, and each child also received a backpack full of supplies and a gift card to purchase new shoes for school! UMOM Volunteer Manager Robin Telle praised GCU, saying, “The Spirit Team was amazing! They brought their game — lots of energy and fun. The kids loved them, and the parents did, too!”

DNA necklaces and DNA code bead bracelets just might be the unlikeliest type of jewelry. But they were a couple of the academic jewels made by seventh- and eighth- graders Monday at the Thunder Vision Biovision STEM Day Camp. It’s just one of four such camps — the others are Cybervision, Robovision and Technovision — unfurling this week on the GCU campus, courtesy of Strategic Educational Alliances. The camps serve SEA’s mission to support kindergarten- through 12th-grade students and educators while fostering a college culture.

Members of the GCU community — a student, a faculty member, an online staff member, a campus staff member and an academic leader — reflect on the meaning of Independence Day and describe how they will celebrate with family and friends.