|
For
City College’s 70th anniversary last year, Chancellor Philip
R. Day, Jr. asked history professor Austin White to prepare a 19-page
pamphlet about the school.
For White, that was merely an appetizer.
By summer — after two years of work
— White will complete his first full-length book. Titled “From
Dreams to Reality,” it will be a history of City College.
“As a historian, I was looking for
something original,” White said. “There’s been
no real history of City College, and certainly no one has ever written
a book about it.”
White, 75, has witnessed the college’s
development. A City College alumnus, he has taught at his alma mater
for 38 years.
“I’ve never tired of teaching,”
he said. “I’ve always said I’ll know time’s
up when I step into the classroom and can’t remember why I’m
there.”
White devoted this semester to finishing
the book. He took leave from his Tuesday and Thursday classes to
write and do research in the Rosenberg Library’s archive.
“It is an incredible effort,”
said Chancellor Day. “He has made a remarkable contribution
to the college family and to the larger community with this work.”
Before the book, White, a post-1900 U.S.
history specialist, co-wrote several historical articles and maintained
the Observer, a campus newspaper, from 1992 to 1998.
“Everything I wrote had to be true,”
he said. “I put myself in the face of the administration,
to put it mildly. They would get angry because they couldn’t
challenge me.”
In 1996, a court case concerning the funding
of Associated Students’ surfaced. Former Chancellor Evan Dobelle
was accused of taking AS money and transferring it to other programs.
“He was overspending and I called
him on it,” White said. “The Observer raised questions
… I took out a chancellor. To show my admiration for the current
chancellor, I retired the Observer.”
During his career at City College, White
served as chair of the Social Sciences Department from 1974 to 1990,
founded the Department Chairperson Council and was its president
from 1976 to 1988. He also served as vice chancellor for Planning,
Research and Institutional Development from 1990 to 1991 and as
executive vice chancellor from 1991 to 1992.
“I’ve never been bored at
CCSF,” he said.
White met his wife of 18 years, fellow
social sciences professor and Department of Chairpersons Council
Chair Darlene F. Alioto, on campus.
“I was an independent woman,” Alioto said. “Marriage
was never in the equation, but Austin certainly changed my mind.
We are truly soul mates.”
Alioto is White’s second wife. They
had been co-workers for several years before their relationship
blossomed.
“She was very reluctant to marry,
figuring I was on the rebound,” White said. “She didn’t
want to be a femme fatale, but I’m a very straight-forward
person — I have old-time values.”
Raised in San Francisco, White attended
George Washington High School before attending City College.
He received his bachelor’s degree
in history from San Francisco State University, while putting himself
through school as a stock boy at the Emporium.
“College isn’t user friendly,”
he said. “I had to work. I organized in such a way that I
could have time to study and eat.”
White was drafted into the Army during
the Korean War. Stationed at Fort Benning in Columbus, Ga., he stumbled
into teaching.
At the time, all enlisted men were required
to pass a ninth-grade level proficiency test or be discharged. To
remedy this, teachers were needed to instruct classes. After reading
about it in the base newspaper, White applied.
“When I went down and asked about
it, they said, ‘We want you to teach a class.’”
White taught basic middle-school curriculum
to 40 servicemen for eight weeks.
“They were the most attentive class
I’ve ever had. I told a joke, and they wrote it down.”
All of White’s students passed
the test.
“I discovered I really enjoyed teaching,”
he said. “So, I taught one more class before I left.”
After leaving the military, he attended
UC Berkeley, earned his master’s and worked as a substitute
teacher in the San Francisco Unified School District.
“Substituting was an interesting
experience,” he said. “You never knew what you’d
get. I once taught a women’s physical education class. There
I am in a suit. It wasn’t as well organized as it could’ve
been. It was really a test of whether or not I could handle teaching.”
A year later, he was awarded a yearlong
postgraduate fellowship to Columbia and Stanford.
“Columbia has a very different grad
school,” he said. “It’s unique. You were with
the best minds, who weren’t being bothered by upper-division
students.”
In 1956, White started teaching full-time
at Balboa High School. During his 11 years there, he married his
first wife and had two children, Allison and Devon. He created the
first advanced placement program in the nation, which brought him
to City College’s attention in 1968.
“It’s been a great life,”
White said. “I love the college and I love teaching.”
E-mail Alex Mullaney at amullaney@gmail.com
Top |
