Long Beach City College has experienced quite a transformation through it’s years and Nick Carbonaro, Camille Bolton, and Brian Garcia, all former LBCC students who have returned as employees, have witnessed some of the changes to the school currently accommodating 24,000 students.
From new social services to changes in original architecture from its founding in 1927, LBCC continues to adapt to meet the needs of its ever-evolving student body.
For Bolton and Carbonaro, their experiences at LBCC began as children, watching their fathers as teachers and before they were old enough to enroll, their connections to the college were already solidified.
Public Relations Coordinator Camille Bolton attended as a journalism major from fall of 1985 to spring of 1988 and always considered LBCC to be part of her plan.
“I always knew I wanted to come here, because my dad was a teacher here. I had really good memories of being here when I was younger, getting to be somewhere where my dad was, was kind of cool. He’d be recognized around town, and people would tell me, ‘your dad was such a good teacher.’ He had an impact on people, and I’d be like, ‘wow, that’s my dad,’” Bolton said.
“I was 16 when I graduated high school. I skipped two grades… So I didn’t ever really feel like I fit in anywhere, so I felt like I could start fresh here. I got really involved in the Viking [News] and ASB, and I felt at home. At sixteen, I knew I wasn’t ready for a university. It was a tough transfer, because I was so attached here.”
Business professor Nick Carbonaro, who attended LBCC from 2004-2006, then returned to finish his A.A in 2008 after graduating from USC, experienced a similar connection to LBCC since childhood.
“I was born and raised around here,” Carbonaro said, “My dad works here as well. He went to school here, he met my mom here and my grandmother worked on campus sometimes. It’s like a second home.”
Carbonaro was always aware of the value that an education at LBCC would give him, despite influences from his high school environment.
“It was expected for you to transfer out to a major university. My high school counselors hated me because I brought their numbers down,” Carbonaro said.
English professor Brian Garcia, who attended from 1999 on and off until transferring in 2004, didn’t have his path as clearly defined for him.
“For me, it was really aimless,” he said of his initial college experience. “Part of that was a lack of guidance. I was kind of unfocused. I was a first generation student and I didn’t really know what I was doing, or what questions to ask if I needed advice, so it took me a really long time, and I dropped out for a while, and was kind of back and forth,” Garcia said.
Garcia did not consider himself very active on campus during his time as a student, but attributed clarifying his path to some of his previous teachers.
“In classes, I liked writing and literature, and I had really good teachers and I found pretty quickly that not only was it something I was pretty good at but there were people who’d foster that curiosity and challenge me in a way that I didn’t necessarily feel in other environments.”
Garcia, who was hired at LBCC in 2016, uses this experience to better serve his students, keeping in mind the professors that motivated him.
“I have a better appreciation of the professors that did help me when I was a student. I appreciated them helping me then, but then I didn’t realize how much of an extra step it sometimes was. It would’ve been really easy for some of them to just let me pass through, and it wouldn’t have been anything against them. But some of them did see potential and guided me, some told me when I needed to follow through better. As a teacher I appreciate that more,” Garcia said.
Carbonaro’s view of teaching has also changed since his return to campus as a teacher in 2013, originally as an emergency substitute hire.
“You really appreciate [the teachers] more. You see the hours that go into it. Before you see them as a teacher assigning homework, and now you’re one of them,” Carbonaro said.
Bolton talked about her outlook from student to teacher at LBCC.
“I’ve always said about this place, you can make it whatever you want. We have something for everybody. You can be an A student and you can get challenged academically if you choose, and you can be somebody who’s looking around, not sure what they want to do. You can be as active as you want, or as inactive as you want, and you’re still going to get through. You have to make the time to make that connection. But we’re all here, we all just want to help,” she said.
Garcia added, “I’ve found that my colleagues really do try to lift up their students. I like that as a goal. I like that as a working environment, and something to strive for. I’m working to make it more accessible . . . We’re not only catering to a uniform population.”
Over the years, the campus has modernized, improving the infrastructure and curriculum.
“The campus has changed and became way more beautified,” Carbonaro said and reflected on the changes in the past years, “There were rabbits that would make holes that people would trip over all the time, and there was a hawk problem. There was this hawk that would circle around and snatch rabbits all day.”
“Of course, technology has also rapidly developed in recent years, altering classroom environments from previous years,” Carbonaro said and put this into perspective, “In 2004, there was no Facebook. I was one of the only students in class in 2004 to have a laptop to take notes. And now, I have a laptop cart for my classroom, so all my students are required to have a laptop in front of them.”
Carbonaro aims to connect to a continuously evolving generation through utilizing technology in his classroom, also emphasizing social media as a necessary step in many career paths nowadays.
Bolton talked about her experience in the journalism program as a student at LBCC.
“My major was journalism. We were there at a pivotal time. We saw the very first Apple machine, a computer, the very first semester with a computer. We typed up on this little machine, it was a hysterical little thing. It’s amazing how things have changed with that,” Bolton said.
Curriculum shifts have also reflected a change in societal needs, as Garcia said that he would love for there to be a greater emphasis on literature in regards to curriculum.
“But that also requires kind of a shift in the culture of the whole country,” Garcia said, “Literature is more and more becoming something seen as frivolous, kind of like a luxury rather than part of a well-rounded education. You see this on the emphasis of STEM education.”
“We need [STEM education] honestly, and I wish I’d paid more attention to that stuff when I was younger, but a strict emphasis on STEM with no complement of the humanities and critical thinking is actually kind of dangerous… I would like to see education get to a place where we do a better job of balancing those aspects of education rather than treating them as if they are in competition with one another. Right now, it feels that way, with fighting for resources.”
Garcia attributed this trend in education towards the current culture and pressure towards getting a job.
“It is by necessity, but I’d like to see a shift over my career. [As a student] I didn’t feel like there was as much pressure on instructors to push us through. I’d never advise a student to be as aimless as I was, but it was also kind of nice to be able to experiment. I feel like it would be really stressful for a student to do that now. There’s a lot more pressure on students to know what you’re gonna do, and get through it, and start your career now, start saving up money,” Garcia said.
In 1993, when Bolton was asked to come back originally as a limited term employee, she was immediately interested.
“My dad had always said, working at LBCC was the best job you could ever have. He loved his time teaching here. Students are here by choice. They wanted to learn. They wanted to better themselves. Oftentimes at university, teachers are more concerned with publishing and research and can’t devote themselves to their craft of teaching. The teachers have to love their subject here, and their students. Community college students are here because they want to be.”
And for students, LBCC has adapted to better meet the ever-changing needs of its population over the years.
“We’ve become much more of a social service, we are worrying about students’ food and shelter and clothing, and mental health,” Bolton said.
“Now we talk about it a lot more and we deal with it. We’re trying to find so many more ways to reach out and find out what the root is, and how we can help,” she continued, “The college has done very well at trying to embrace that. Before it was a lot more just about the classroom and teaching the subject. We’ve become much more aware of the external factors that are affecting our students.”
Garcia expanded on this sentiment.
“I do think that the focus on helping students achieve their goals has been refined. There’s consideration for various circumstances that students are in. Maybe they’re just general trends in education, like focus on equity,” he said.
Garcia explained certain circumstances have forced the institution to adapt, as an example, compared to his time as a student there are far more veteran students now who may have different needs and challenges.
“I think they’ve done a pretty good job of trying to make campus accessible to everybody,” Garcia said, “LBCC is more welcoming to students who are having a hard time being students, than a lot of places I’ve worked… The idea that you’d have a significant amount of homeless students would be something that have intimidated a lot of teachers, but here it’s something we’re ready to deal with.”
Carbonaro reminisced about the judgment he experienced as a high school student considering community college and how counselors discouraged attending LBCC.
“I knew so many students in my high school that settled and wanted to go to a prestigious school, but couldn’t get in, so settled for another school. They could’ve come here, brought their grades up and gone to that dream school.”
Carbonaro said luckily, the public perception of community college has become more positive over the years.
“My old high school that was so nose up about going to Harvard or Brown, they reached out to me two years ago and asked me to talk to our juniors and seniors and be on our career panel. It’s not as frowned upon now to go to a community college as it was then. There’s the push of community college being the first choice, instead of a backup choice.”
Bolton talked about how LBCC has positively shaped her life, her hopes of keeping the Viking spirit strong and strengthening LBCC’s alumni base for future generations.
“I met my very best friend here– we were on the Viking together. We were at each other’s weddings. I was there for 2 of her 3 kids being born, and we still see each other,” Bolton said.
“Everything good that happened in my life has basically happened here. My little girl, almost 25, took her very first steps here, over by the quad. Time with my dad here, time with my daughter here, I met my partner here, he works here. It’s my life,” Bolton said.
Garcia expressed his gratitude for his job at LBCC and his hopes for the future.
“You have bad days at work… I take a step back and realize my job is essentially to read books with groups of people and talk about those books, and help them write about what they’ve read. It’s really nice. My goal is for this to be the last job I ever have.”
Carbonaro shared his passion for LBCC in every aspect of his life.
“My son wants to be in my class right now… I’m like, ‘You’re in kindergarten. You’ve got a long time to go.’ But the community aspect of it, going to football games, going to basketball games, seeing people you know, not only as a student but now as a professor, and seeing my own students in the city is really full circle, which is really cool… I love this school, I really do. I don’t see myself leaving here at all.”
For some, LBCC is just part of the pathway towards a future career and for others, it has set the scene for pivotal moments, shaping their education and lives so much that they’ve returned.
For Nick Carbonaro, Camille Bolton, and Brian Garcia LBCC catapulted their educational and professional careers, ultimately bringing them back full circle as LBCC employees.