Public Information Office: 209.588.5361 · Fax 209.588.5367

Local College Instructors

Named in National Who’s Who

Looking for the country’s best teachers? Look no further than Who’s Who Among America’s Teachers, which has identified and profiled the best educators in America since 1990.

In the publication’s latest edition, two of those top teachers are Columbia College professors: Dr. Paula Clarke, who teaches anthropology and sociology, and fire technology professor George Melendrez.

Who’s Who includes teachers from elementary schools through college but to be included in the elite list, a teacher must be nominated by current or former students, who themselves have made the National Honor Roll. It’s that aspect of the honor that makes it special to Melendrez.

“Personally, I feel it’s quite an honor,” he said. “We get a lot of recognition from our peers, but to receive recognition from a student who has been very successful, that’s very special.”

Melendrez, who has been at the college since 1991, teaches fire technology classes and runs the school’s Fire Academy. “I train students in all aspects related to fire fighting,” he said.

Clarke has been in the Who’s Who Among American Teachers before and so has her husband, Ted Hamilton, who also teaches at Columbia College. In addition, Clarke has been listed in Who’s Who in America and Who’s Who in the World. One thing she likes about the Who’s Who process is that it doesn’t just recognize celebrity teachers at Ivy League schools.

“Being in the Who’s Who doesn’t mean you have to be a famous person. It’s a way of recognizing people in their field, regardless of the extent of their notoriety,” she said. “It means being recognized at a very grassroots, fundamental level for making a contribution to your field.”

For Clarke, who earned her doctorate in human development and aging, that field is human reproduction. “My specific area of interest is childlessness and reproductive decline,” she said.

Clarke was recently invited to submit an article to a new encyclopedia of men and masculinity, focusing on the meaning of childlessness in men’s lives. She has written many papers and made numerous presentations at academic conferences on related topics.

Her studies center on how the traditional pillars that once defined adulthood – marriage, career and children – are changing, and the effect that has on individuals and society.

“Sometimes these changes are called new freedoms, but with new freedoms come new challenges,” she said. Clarke joined the Columbia College faculty in 1999 after teaching at St. Mary’s College of Moraga (California).

-30-

News Release No. 140-03

June 4, 2003

For Immediate Release

Attachment: Photos of Dr. Paula Clarke and George Melendrez

Dr. Paula Clarke

George Melendrez