CCC — The Comet — CCC Students First Celebration Oct. 23

I find it difficult to believe, but we are halfway through the Fall semester here at Coconino Community College.

Although the COVID-19 pandemic has profoundly affected the way we deliver courses at the college, our students have continued to make progress toward achieving their educational dreams a reality.

Some of our students have also told us, frankly, that as soon as it is safe to do so, they would like to see a return of in-person classes at CCC. We are listening, and we are planning, if it is safe to do so in the Spring semester, to offer a percentage of our courses in-person to help those students who thrive in a face-to-face setting. Social distancing, face coverings and other health measures will continue to protect students and instructors. If all in-person classes that students are interested in fill up, I invite them to take advantage of CCC’s new “waitlist” feature to save a place in line if a seat in an in-person course opens.

We will also continue our remote-learning ways of offering courses: through Zoom interactive videoconferencing and online.

So, it’s time to “Gear Up” and start making plans for the Spring 2021 semester. Advisors are standing by. The spring 2021 schedule will be published on Monday, Nov. 2, and priority registration for continuing students will be available at that time. Then, on Monday, Nov. 9, general registration will begin.

We are not out of the woods yet with the COVID-19 pandemic, but CCC is here, and we’re ready to help everybody who comes to us achieve their goals.

Onward! Let’s gear up for Spring!

Colleen Smith

The deep reds, oranges, purples and blues evoke a taste of dust, a dry feeling, a sense of expansiveness.

The art of Coconino Community College alum Jerrel Singer sings a heartfelt song of his Navajo Nation home of Gray Mountain and Cameron and what home means to him.

“Mostly, they’re places people don’t see much of the time because they’re literally driving by to get somewhere else,” Singer says.

His powerful work and the work of other CCC students and faculty are on display in the Comet Art Gallery, which recently returned home to the CCC Lone Tree campus after an extended exhibition at the Aspen Place. And even though the COVID-19 pandemic has closed the CCC campuses to public visitation, the gallery will still make its way out to the world digitally, with virtual exhibitions via social media, said Alan Petersen, CCC Fine Arts faculty.

“I wanted to continue the programming that we had begun at the Comet Gallery when it was in the Aspen Place,” Petersen says.

He adds that although the public won’t get a face-to-face interaction with the art, students, staff and faculty at CCC will have the opportunity to enjoy art in the Lone Tree Commons to brighten up the space and give it more life and vitality while the majority of students are learning remotely this semester.

Coconino Community College student Khadajha Young moved from her hometown of Kayenta on the Navajo Nation to attend CCC in Page.

She works full time at a local restaurant to support her 4-year-old daughter while she goes to school to study Hotel & Restaurant Management.

“Living in Page, there’s a lot of demand for it,” she said and smiled. “I would like to one day manage a hotel and restaurant.”

She doesn’t want to leave Page. It’s still close enough to her family in Kayenta.

She received the Page/Lake Powell Chamber of Commerce Scholarship and the SRP Navajo Scrubber Scholarship to attend CCC. She wouldn’t have been able to attend CCC without them.

“They are important financially,” Young said. “Going to school and having a job is difficult, and they make budgeting easier.”