Show Time at ‘The Beach’

Welcome to the Robert Maxson Show.

Not the weekly one the president of Cal State Long Beach presents on local cable television. That’s way too restrained. This is real time, beginning when the 61-year-old Maxson’s internal motor starts running--the moment he awakes.

Like a revved-up talk show host, the Arkansas-born president high-fives his way across campus, grinning, waving, pouring on the Southern charm. He slaps hands, dispenses hugs and moves frenetically from one animated conversation to another. All that’s missing is a cordless microphone.

Cal State Long Beach, one of Southern California’s largely faceless commuter universities, was once known as the “mausoleum on the hill.” Maxson runs the show like a man trying to turn it into the happiest place in Long Beach. In the manner of a candidate campaigning for office, he operates on a schedule tightly booked three weeks in advance, often beginning with a three-mile predawn run.

Behind the energy and a 200-watt smile is a steely-eyed toughness that has turned valedictorians into campus heroes and put the school’s fund-raising prowess on a list with elite universities.

By 7:05 a.m. on a recent day, cleaned up after his campus jog, Maxson is pulling out of the parking lot on his way to the monthly board meeting of the Long Beach Aquarium of the Pacific.

There is a can of Diet Coke in his car’s armrest cup holder, testament to both his careful diet and his defiance of his wife, Sylvia, a professor of education at the university who is forever warning him to cut back on caffeine.

Twenty-five minutes later, he is sitting at the aquarium board meeting in a 13th-floor law office overlooking Terminal Island, a gritty melange of shipping terminals, smokestacks, oil storage tanks and bridges. But there is nothing gritty about this group. Enthusiasm envelops the room. Positive thinking and rebuilding have become a religion in Long Beach, and the aquarium, set to open in June, symbolizes the city’s rebirth.

Jim Gray, president of Harbor Bank, and Renee Handler, who runs a public relations agency, are chairman and vice chairwoman, respectively, of the aquarium board. Both are active in university affairs.

“If I ask them to support my passions, then I have an obligation to support their passions,” Maxson says, a Big West Conference carryall slung over his shoulder as he leaves the meeting.

Maxson will spend the rest of the day on the sprawling 322-acre, 28,000-student campus until it is time to leave for an evening showcase of student films in Los Angeles. From his office he launches forays to the student union, classroom buildings, meetings, lectures and lunch, returning often for messages and refills of Diet Coke.

“Hi, sunshine,” Maxson says to Elizabeth Labrador, his scheduler. Raised in a small town in Arkansas on the banks of the Mississippi, Maxson went to a county school with a graduating class of 13 and brims with Southern colloquialisms.

Now he heads over to the university’s employee-of-the-month ceremony, where he poses for photos in front of a conspicuous red sign naming that portion of the walkway Terie Bostic Lane after this month’s honoree.

“Congratulations, Terie,” Maxson tells Bostic, who is loaded down with gifts--a university sweatshirt, a gift certificate for See’s candy and dinner for two at Tiny Naylor’s.

He leaves for a disaster preparedness meeting, but runs into four of his deans exploring one of Maxson’s deepest passions: a recruiting mission to Whitney High in Cerritos, one of California’s academically top-ranked high schools.

Maxson urges them on. When he came here three years ago from the University of Nevada, Las Vegas, he brought the notion of using privately raised funds to give full scholarships to a larger number of valedictorians from California. Three years ago there were 10 high school valedictorians on the Long Beach campus; today there are 131, and Maxson seems to be on a first-name basis with all of them. Among the benefits: the average SAT scores for entering freshmen have risen 30 points.

In an ongoing campaign, the university raised $25 million in private gifts of cash and equipment during the past academic year, winning honors for fund-raising from the Council for Advancement and Support of Education--one of only six winners in the state and the only one from the California State University system. At this point the school is halfway to a goal Maxson has set: $100 million in five years.

The deans, standing in a busy pedestrian intersection between the student center and the administration building, are hardly surprised to bump into Maxson.

“If you can’t get on his calendar, you can always wait for him out here,” says Keith Ian Polakoff, associate vice president for academic affairs, professorial-looking with a gray beard, wire rim glasses and a Harris tweed suit. “You know you won’t have to wait long before he passes by.”

At 11:10 a.m., Maxson starts back to his office, but he can’t resist stopping and joking with several students.

“Dr. Maxson is just the best guy in the world,” says Heather Wellborn, 18, who, with a friend, Erin Murphy, 18, is sitting at a picnic table outside the student union. “I run into him all the time.”

*

Back at his office, his staff is celebrating the 28th birthday of Krista Rios, an administrative assistant. “Happy birthday, Krista!” Maxson shouts out.

Then he sits down with Armando Contreras, his executive assistant, and his secretary, Sherrill Pieschel, to open mail, answer invitations, and discuss future appointments and events.

Among the documents awaiting the green light is Maxson’s latest column for the Daily 49er, the student newspaper, headlined: “Why I am so proud to be president of CSULB.”

“Is that it, guys?” Maxson asks, ending the meeting.

After a chatty phone call to Bill Stacy, chancellor of the University of Tennessee, Chattanooga, whom Maxson has invited along on a higher education consulting trip he has scheduled to the United Arab Emirates, he leaves for lunch.

“Naomi!” Maxson yells upon entering the Chart Room, an on-campus restaurant favored by faculty and administrators, getting the attention of the university’s student body president, Naomi Rodriguez. “Good speech yesterday. You were pumped.”

Maxson sits down with Karl Anatol, provost and senior vice president of academic affairs, for one of their periodic lunches, part business, part social. Without asking, the waitress brings Maxson his usual order: fresh fruit and a plate of steamed vegetables.

“There is a function just about every night. If you don’t watch yourself, it can get away from you very quickly,” he said, diving into the fruit.

Anatol served as interim president before Maxson’s appointment and was one of the final candidates interviewed by the university system’s board of trustees before it appointed Maxson president in 1994.

Maxson arrived still smarting from a highly public fight he waged with onetime UNLV basketball coach Jerry Tarkanian, who resigned in 1991 in the wake of recruiting scandals. Deep divisions developed on campus, with Tarkanian on one side and Maxson on the other. In Long Beach, Maxson works hard to keep campus tensions from developing. Anatol, the onetime competitor, is a fan.

“Bob Maxson every day walks right into the flow of [student] traffic,” Anatol says. “He demystifies the role of the university president. I visited him at UNLV. What he is doing here is the same thing he did there.”

After lunch, Maxson heads for a class he will teach. He’s done it regularly both here and in Las Vegas. On his way, he is hailed by Alan Avakian, 19, a former high school valedictorian from Fresno.

“We just recruited him,” Maxson says proudly. “He is a first-semester engineering major.”

Soon Maxson is delivering his twice-a-week lecture to an interdisciplinary honors class of 14 students in “Human Dynamics and Organizational Leadership.” He strolls back and forth, leans on the lectern, sits against the edge of a lightweight desk, and thanks the students for their patience when he leaves. “Hope you have a good week,” he says.

Maxson has just enough time to get to the library, where he will listen to a lecture by art professor Joseph Krause, whom he will present with a medallion for excellence. Krause, soon to retire after 50 years of teaching, expresses his dismay with students he believes are ill-prepared for college. “We’re in real trouble,” he says.

Maxson praises Krause’s independent spirit and maintains a happy face, but resists the message. “I don’t have a pessimistic bone in my body,” he says as he walks out of the library. “I haven’t been down two days in a row all my life.”

Now things get rushed. Maxson is due in Los Angeles at 6:30 for a screening of Cal State Long Beach student films that are being showcased at the Directors Guild of America Theater on Sunset Boulevard.

“Your university is alive and well,” he tells the students there. The films are polished, well received.

“Those kids--they looked like they had fun doing it,” Maxson tells Contreras.

It’s 10:30 as the car heads back down the Long Beach Freeway.

“How could anyone have had more fun than I had today?” he says. “It was a perfect day.”