Did you know that the Giles T. Brown Research Symposium is named for one of OCC's founding faculty members? Dr. Brown began teaching in our first semester, September 1948. He was a professor of History and very active in college life. He would have been proud of the Research Symposium, which is now in its 7th year and has grown to involve over 100 students doing 60 presentations. This year's presentations will occur on April 21st on the 3rd floor of the College Center.
During his career at OCC, Dr. Brown was the Faculty Association President, Chair of the Social Science Division, Advisor to the Alpha Kappa Gamma Honor Society, and Advisor to the International Club, among some of his activities. In the school newspaper Barnacle in 1948 -1949, you can see several mentions of weekly meetings for students to engage in open scholarly discussions on various topics. Some of these topics included Socialism, What is Education, Can we have Peace in our Time, to name a few. Dr. Brown also hosted several candidate debates at the college before the elections.
One of the best stories about Giles Brown is that he married Beth Cosner, the campus founding librarian at the College Chapel, in the fall of 1951. Giles said Beth wanted to get married at a place so special to them, and they recalled that it was a big campus event. They were married for over 40 years until Beth passed away in 1992. After Beth’s passing, Giles set up an endowment of $100,000 to support the library that Beth loved so much. Giles eventually set up an additional endowment of $100,000 to support the "academic mission" of the college. The academic mission endowment funds the expenses and scholarship awards at the Research Symposium.
Orange Coast College remained unique to Dr. Brown even after he accepted the position at the new California State University, Fullerton, in 1960 (initially called Orange County State College). Dr. Brown regularly participated in OCC's "Behind the Headlines" lecture series while working at CSUF. Being a founding faculty member at two colleges (OCC & CSUF) is pretty amazing. At CSUF, Dr. Brown was Chair of the History department, dean of graduate studies, and VP of Academic programs. At CSUF, he funded a "Thesis Award" given to talented graduate students, which is still offered today. He passed away in December 2013.
CSUF Giles T. Brown Annual Thesis Award: (from CSUF website)
An award of $1,000, along with an engraved plaque, will be given each year to the student whose master’s thesis represents the highest standard of scholarly accomplishment as determined by a panel of judges chosen from emeriti professors. Interested students should contact the Office of Graduate Studies or their graduate program adviser for further information on eligibility and deadlines.