Professors of the Year - Crafton Hills College

Publish Date: May 22, 2015

Two professors holding awards

Andrews & Papas selected as CHC 2015 Professors of the Year

By RACHAEL M. GUSTUSON

Breanna Andrews and Dean Papas were selected by their peers as 2015 Outstanding Professors.

Breanna Andrews

Breanna Andrews teaches American Sign Language with a passion. She began working at CHC in 2009; first as an adjunct instructor and now a proud, full-time associate professor.  In addition to being an associate professor of ASL, she is department chair of the Communication and Language Department and co-chair of the Safe Space Allies Training Program at CHC.

Andrews feels fortunate to work at CHC.  "I love my job at CHC," she said.  "Since we are a small school, there is a ‘family’ feel on campus. I love my colleagues that I work with, the students are fantastic each with their own story, and you can’t beat the physical infrastructure and our views!”

Andrews is a California girl. She grew up in Santa Clarita, attended California State University Northridge and earned a bachelor’s degree in Deaf Studies. 

She said she remembers reading Sesame Street books as a young child when she was first exposed to Deaf culture and signing. "Later in fourth grade I learned about Helen Keller and was fascinated, but I was eight or nine years old and did nothing about it," she said. "When I entered high school, my dance team choreographer asked me to babysit her deaf daughter, and that was my motivation to start learning ASL. I signed up for classes at my local community college, even though I was only 13 years old and a freshman in high school. Once I started learning, I knew I never wanted to stop."

And she hasn’t stopped yet.

Over the last decade she has witnessed more schools offering ASL as a foreign language and accept it as a transferable course at the college level. "I have seen many hearing students want to learn the language and become immersed in the culture," she said. "It is my hope to see our society as a whole recognize that Deaf people are not disabled, but rather a cultural and linguistic minority."

Her dedication and enthusiasm earned her the Professor of the Year award. "I feel very honored and humbled that I was selected for this award," said Andrews. "There are so many wonderful professors on campus, I am happy and proud to be recognized as one of them."

Dean Papas

Dean Papas is a popular full-time English professor at Crafton and is the current chair of the Department of English and Reading and Professional Development Coordinator.

He grew up in Queens, New York and was hired at CHC in 2012. One of his greatest inspirations was Professor John Briggs of UC Riverside. It was at UC Riverside under the guidance of Briggs where Papas "developed a passion for basic English courses."

Although he has only been at Crafton for three short years, he has definitely grown to love it.

"I tell people all the time that I feel like I've won the lottery by getting the job at Crafton," said Papas. "That's how much I love it!" He lives a couple miles from campus. 

"Before I got the job at Crafton, I hadn't even heard of Yucaipa, but now that I live here, I'm surprised Yucaipa isn't as well known because to me it is simply one of the most beautiful places to live," he said.

Papas said earning Professor of the Year at CHC has been one of the biggest highlights of his career. "I'm so honored and humbled to receive this award," he said.  "We have so many deserving faculty that I'm truly blown away to have been selected when I am inspired every day by the excellence of so many of our faculty." 

Last year he received "Most Effective Communicator" at CHC, which is a special recognition by students.

Papas said he is encouraged that community college English departments all over the state are making exciting changes in curriculum and classrooms to better engage and support the success of students.  "It's exciting - the way that departments are taking research and data very seriously to figure out such things as how to better place their students and how to ‘compress’ and/or ‘accelerate’ students' time to completing their transfer English requirements.  It's also very exciting that community college English departments are thinking very seriously about Equity and how to increase access and opportunities for student populations that have been underserved."