UCI Profits as Rockwell’s CEO Retires
Rockwell International Corp., in a tribute to its departing leader, has donated $1.5 million to UC Irvine to create a high-tech multimedia learning and research center in honor of Donald R. Beall and his wife, Joan.
Beall, 59, formally handed over the final reins of power to his successor on Wednesday as Rockwell’s board of directors elected Don H. Davis chairman at the Costa Mesa company’s annual meeting. Davis succeeded Beall as chief executive in October.
Beall’s retirement, announced in July, brings an end to a highly regarded career during which the low-key executive transformed the aerospace supplier into a leader in electronics.
Beall, who led Rockwell for nearly a decade, will remain on the company’s board as chairman of a newly created executive committee.
The UCI gift was announced Tuesday evening to a surprised Beall, who is a member of the university’s Board of Overseers and the Graduate School of Management Board of Visitors, and is a longtime supporter of Orange County’s arts community.
Beall said he was flabbergasted by the announcement by UCI Chancellor Laurel Wilkening before a crowd of about 300 at the Four Seasons Hotel in Newport Beach. “I thought maybe there would be a gold watch,” he joked.
The company had wanted to find a way to honor Beall that combined his passion for education, engineering and art, said Christine Rodriguez, Rockwell’s director of community affairs.
The multimedia center, which will be at the UCI School of Arts, will contain cutting-edge technology that engineering, art and computer science students can use to create and display art and design projects. School officials said it would be the first of its kind in the UC system.
A “cyber cafe,” where students can discuss their projects over coffee, will also be part of the center.
The university’s K-12 outreach program, Digital ArtsBridge, will be expanded to bring grade-school children and their digital art projects to the new multimedia facility.
The UCI Art Gallery will be expanded and renovated to accommodate the center. Construction is due to begin in March 1999, and the center will open in November or December of that year.
A facility such as this has practical as well as aesthetic applications, said David Trend, chairman of UCI’s studio art department.
“The dramatic restoration of the California economy is largely due to the exploding multimedia industry, which has been held back largely by one factor--the lack of qualified applicants to fill the enormous demand for employees,” he said.
The digital effects industry, for instance, has been one of the fastest-growing in Southern California in the last few years because of the surging use of computer-generated images in filmed entertainment. But industry executives have complained that finding qualified workers has been difficult because applicants lack art and design education.
Last fall, UCI’s art school introduced a minor in digital arts, which quickly filled to capacity.
