Teachers, Staff Pitch In to Clean Campus

Jay Porter spent the better part of Thursday morning wiping grime, cleaning screens and dusting keyboards on 87 computers in a lab at Ventura College.

And the part-time accounting teacher had an even grittier job planned for his afternoon shift. He volunteered to remove graffiti from a men’s bathroom.

“I do not like dirty sayings in front of my nose” in the bathroom, Porter said.

Porter was one of about 75 teachers, staff members and administrators at Ventura College who volunteered to help custodians spiff up the campus in time for the opening of the spring semester.

Most of the work was completed Thursday during a campuswide cleanup day. Instead of processing paperwork, the college’s staff waxed floors, washed windows, weeded flower beds and changed dirty filters on machinery.

“I left my computer at 9 a.m. and came out into the sunshine,” said Pattie McPhun, a college secretary, as she raked leaves from shrubbery in front of the administrative center. “It’s not a bad way to spend the day.”

The light work will help maintenance staff members prepare for the start of classes Jan. 18, said Robert Forest, director of maintenance and operations. His crew of 50 gardeners, custodians and warehouse workers has been trimmed by at least seven positions over the past five years due to budget cuts, he said.

Forest and college Vice President Ruth Hemming also hoped to foster team spirit among teachers, administrators and clerical staff members who run various campus departments.

“It’s good college relations for the staff to get outside and see what other departments are doing,” Hemming said. “It makes people feel better about their workplace.”

Oxnard College has held several similar cleaning days in the past with great success, Hemming said. This is the first time the Ventura campus has tried the volunteer program, she said.

Ernest Cajiuat was one of a handful of students who also pitched in. The 25-year-old liberal arts major works part time at the circulation desk in the college library, but Thursday he was washing windows.

While others said they volunteered for the jobs out of a feeling of campus pride and civic duty, Cajiuat’s motive had more to do with peer pressure.

“I saw everyone else working and I felt kind of guilty not doing it,” he said. “So I grabbed some window cleaner.”