Memorial Service, Wednesday September 17, 2014, Santa Monica College

 

Thank you for inviting me to join you in remembering my friend Randy. I’m Ian Walton, one of a long line of Past Presidents of the Academic Senate. Officially, I’m here today representing current Senate President David Morse. But I also bring greetings from several of my past president colleagues who worked with Randy over the years.

We all have deep memories of long, successful collaboration between Randy and the Academic Senate – both formal and informal.He truly believed that faculty and administrators working together could make things better for students.   And he believed in the value of statewide service.

I think, secretly, Randy always wanted to be a senate president when he grew up.  Eric Oifer and Lesley Kawaguchi told me that he was actually senate president here at Santa Monica College for a whole day.

David Morse relayed to me that Randy often joked that he was only one step away from becoming statewide Academic Senate President-- because every one of his faculty co-chairs of the System Advisory Committee on Curriculum in Sacramento later went on to become Senate President.

In addition to many Senate activities over the years, I enjoyed working successfully with Randy on a wide variety of other projects:
- on the RP Group BRIC Project right here at Santa Monica College – perhaps you could get the Institutional Effectiveness Committee to name a new, thoughtful outcome measurement in honor of Randy;
- on numerous accreditation team visits around the state – where he was a model for how to suggest valuable improvement without appearing to condemn;
- and appropriately enough, on a project for the College Brain Trust on how to improve communication between deans and faculty leaders.

Randy was always a joy to work with: 
-he was considerate and thoughtful;
-he was able to understand diverse points of view;
-and above all, he was willing to come up with creative solutions that would work for everybody.

The only thing that I won’t miss about him is his driving and navigation technique  –  he used to collect me at various southern California airports and it was always an unpredictable adventure.

I wish we had more leaders with Randy’s personality and skills.  Somehow he could combine meticulous care to detail, with surprising innovation.

 We’ll all miss him in our own unique ways  –  especially those of you in his college family here. Thank you all for gathering here to celebrate Randy.