March 25, 2014 Speaker: Chantal Sicile-Kira, Autism College – Living with Autism

Chantal Sicile-Kira’s passion for empowering others, her love of writing, and her personal interest in autism has led her to become an award-winning author of five books, speaker, and leader in the field of adolescence and transition to adulthood.   Chantal recently founded AutismCollege.com, which provides practical information and training on-line for parents and educators.

Chantal’s first  experience with autism was teaching self-help and community living skills to severely developmentally disabled adolescents in preparation for their de-institutionalization. Years later this experience would prove invaluable when her son, Jeremy, was born.  Chantal was told to find a good institution for him when he was diagnosed severely autistic. He graduated from Torrey Pines High School with a GPA of 3.78 and gave a commencement speech using voice output technology that still inspires many http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=O8cEtand01w (Preview) .

 Chantal has served on  the California Senate Select Committee on Autism & Related Disorders, and as  Co-Chair, South Counties Autism Regional Taskforce.  Chantal has written five books and her latest is Autism Spectrum Disorder (Perigee, 2005). Chantal blogs on HuffingtonPost.com, PsychologyToday.com, and AutismCollege.com.

Chantal has received numerous awards including Autism Society of America Literary Work of the Year Award; two San Diego Book Awards; National Autism Association 2013 Jo Pike Believe Award, the 2012 Baron Inspiration Award; Cure Autism Now  (Autism Speaks) Local Hero Award; and  named a 2013 Top Ten Autism Blogger and Social Healthmaker by Sharecare. AutismCollege.com is one of Ten Autism Tech Sites recommended by Mashable.com.

Chantal and her family have appeared on, PBS, Fox, and NBC and were featured in MTV’s True Life “I Have Autism;”  and were featured in Newsweek’s cover story, “Growing Up with Autism”

 

March 18, 2014 Speaker: Mario R. Borja, Aerospace Engineer – Building A Replica Chamorro Outrigger

Mario Reyes Borja is a Chamorro from the Mariana Islands.  He was born in Chalan Kanoa, Saipan, but grew up in Guam. He is the son of a carpenter and a fisherman. Mario earned his Bachelors in Aerospace Engineering from the University of Texas at Austin and completed his Masters in Astrodynamics from the Air Force Institute of Technology. He served 22.75 years in the military as a space systems surveillance engineer. He now lives in San Diego with his wife, JoJo.

Mario is an active member of the San Diego Chamorro community both as a cultural preservationist and a linguist. As a linguist he provides language interpretation and translation services for both federal and civil court systems.

As a preservationist he recently led the construction and completion of a 47-ft single outrigger canoe, a replica of an ancient Chamorro “flying proa” which was last sailed in 1742, nearly 270 year ago. This canoe was built from a single 125-foot redwood tree. Mario and his crew are currently learning how to sail this vessel of old with the goal of sailing it back to where its history began, back here to the Mariana Islands, a distance of nearly 6200 nautical miles, in early 2016.

Mario is here to share with us the story of this flying proa, the Sakman Chamorro, a bit more about his Chamorro culture.

March 4, 2014 Speaker: Mary Walshok, Ph.D., UCSD – Innovation & Entrepreneurship in San Diego

Mary Walshok, Ph.D. is an author, educator, researcher, and associate vice chancellor for public programs and dean of Extension at the University of California San Diego.

She is the author of more than 100 articles and reports on aligning workforce development with regional economic growth. She has authored and co-authored Blue Collar Women (1981), Knowledge Without Boundaries (1995), Closing America’s Job Gap (2011) Creating Competitiveness: Entrepreneurship and Innovation Policies for Growth (2013) and Invention and Reinvention: The Evolution of San Diego’s Innovation Economy (2013).

An industrial sociologist studying the dynamics of regional economic transformation, with a particular focus on how globalization and rapid changes in technology are affecting the social dynamics and economic challenges of regions across America, Walshok has researched various communities with support from the U.S. Department of Labor, NSF, and the Lilly Endowments.

She oversees a $50 million, 250-employee division that annually serves more than 65,000 enrollees through innovative local and online programs, as well as provides access to a vast array of intellectual resources through the award-winning UCSD-TV and nationwide through UCTV, which reaches over 22 million households and millions more around the globe on the Web. The Division also serves more than 3,000 foreign students annually.

She is currently serving on the boards of San Diego CONNECT (which she helped found in 1985), the United States-Mexico Foundation for Science, the International Community Foundation, La Jolla Playhouse, Olivewood Gardens and the Girard Foundation.