You Can’t Keep a Good School, or Student, Down : Gritty CSUN scholars, top team, quake aid are sure signs

It happens. Your child is teething. Your pet is in heat. Your boss begins your job appraisal by forgetting your name. And the federal income tax return check arrives in the mail just in time to pay it all out on car registration and county property taxes.

At such times, it’s not uncommon for some people to wax nostalgic for less stressful times, like college. Generally, this is not a good idea.

You recall the very few responsibilities you had back then. Perhaps studying was your only real task. And today? Today you feel overwhelmed by the real world.

On the other hand, not every recent graduate looks back on such a calm scene. Among those who may not have such wistful recollections: those who are getting their degrees this spring at Cal State Northridge.

They are the Quake Survivors. They enrolled, studied, survived and studied again. How many other graduates have faced such obstacles?

Take 1996 CSUN graduate Janet Wilson. Thanks to the 1994 Northridge quake, she suffered through periods of living without gas or electricity. She told Times reporter Julie Tamaki how she became an expert at packing her bags and fleeing every tremor that shook her Valley home. To make matters worse, her unheated apartment led to respiratory problems that required hospitalization.

Wilson wasn’t the only member of her class to find herself stuck in a damaged apartment without utilities. Others, Tamaki reported, were forced out of their homes, and some lost the jobs that allowed them to cover the costs of their education.

Yet, Wilson overcame these obstacles. The 40-year-old single mother earned her graduate degree on schedule. This leaves her and many other 1996 CSUN graduates in a rather unique position. Life after college just might get easier. And if it doesn’t, by now they are certainly prepared for any roadblocks that life might throw down before them.

There were other signs that CSUN is turning a corner.

Last weekend, the CSUN Matador baseball team rose to unexpected heights, coming within one game of reaching the College World Series.

The team began the year with only modest expectations, with interim coach Mike Batesole. It soon became clear that Batesole deserves the job full time.

Coaches in the conference had predicted a fourth-place finish, at best, in the Western Athletic Conference. Instead, the Matadors won the league title and finished with a No. 10 national ranking in one major poll. Catcher Robert Fick was selected as an All-American. He merely had the best offensive season of any player in the nation.

Two other players were third-team All-American choices. At least three players seem certain to be selected in the major league baseball draft, and Fick and third-team All-American shortstop Adam Kennedy are trying out for the U.S. Olympic team.

Those events were followed by the news Thursday of a major campus reconstruction project.

CSUN President Blenda J. Wilson announced the beginning of a massive rebuilding blitz that will fully repair and modernize the earthquake-damaged campus within the next 24 months. The project is directly tied to additional federal grants totaling $61 million for work on 16 campus projects.

It all amounts to a well-deserved week of successes for Cal State Northridge.