October 2007 Archives

Saturday, October 6, 2007 - This past Saturday, if one ventured down to the weekly Farmers Market held on the pedestrian mall in downtown Riverside, they couldn't help but hear the sounds from a multicultural festival just two blocks away.

Flash: Out & About slideshow

The 9th Annual "Multicultural Family Village Festival" took place in front of the Riverside Metropolitan Museum, located on Mission Inn Avenue at Orange Street. Sponsored by the city-run museum, the modest festival included music, dance, arts & crafts and food from a number of local community groups.

The event gave us an excuse to revisit a special exhibit inside the Metropolitan Museum itself. The exhibit is the first of a two-part exhibit, "The Mission Inn: Celebrating 30 Years as a National Historic Landmark," which is being shared with the nearby Mission Inn Museum.

Part one -- "Creating a Legacy (1875 - 1955)" -- showcases personal artifacts from the Miller family during the Inn's early days, including paintings, photographs and a few pieces of furniture. Also on display is the original sketch (and U.S. Patent) for the Raincross symbol. The exhibit ends its 3-month run on October 14.

Part two -- "Saving the Community's Heritage (1955 - present)" -- documents the Inn during rough times following the end of the Miller family stewardship, the subsequent ownership changes and selling off of some of the Inn's treasures, the eventual multi-million dollar refurbishment and recent revival. This second exhibit opened last month at the Mission Inn Museum and runs through January 5, 2008.

Admission to both museums is free (though a nominal donation of $2 is gladly accepted).

Related

• Riverside Metropolitan Museum


• Mission Inn Museum

Rising seven spots from last year, the University of California at Riverside continues its upward climb in the latest rankings of the nation's top higher-learning institutions as compiled by Washington Monthly. The #15 ranking is another indication that UCR -- and the UC system in general -- remains one of the top public educational institutions in the nation.

2007
UC Riverside

But this is not your typical college rankings. No, it's not the usual rankings based upon money, popularity or prestige alone, but one that includes tangible results, particularly in terms of social mobility and community service:

The Washington Monthly list ranks 242 national universities according to three primary categories:

• performance as an engine of social mobility
• fostering scientific and humanistic research
• promoting an ethic of service to country

As such, 8 of 10 schools in the UC system are ranked, including 3 in the top 5: UCLA (2), Berkeley (3) and UC San Diego (4).

While 2 others rank in the top 15: UC Davis (8) and UC Riverside (15).

UC Santa Barabara (36), UC Irvine (49) and UC Santa Cruz (76) round out the UC rankings.

Locally, other large schools ranked as follows: USC (24), Pepperdine (56), University of San Diego (97), Caltech (141), San Diego State (145) and University of La Verne (186).

Texas A&M ranked first. But many other well-known national colleges didn't fare so well: Texas Tech (217), DePaul (150), Wake Forest (122), Arizona State (113), Boston College (109), Rice (103), Auburn (86), Princeton (78), BYU (68), Purdue (46), Vanderbilt (39) and Duke (29).

Two highly-regarded Ivy League schools -- Yale and Harvard -- were listed at 38th and 27th respectively.

Also of note were the rankings of a few local liberal arts schools: Claremont McKenna College (6), Pomona College (46) and Harvey Mudd College (65).

Related

• Washington Monthly - 2007 College Guide


• Washington Monthly - 2007 National University Rankings


• Washington Monthly - 2007 Liberal Arts College Rankings


• UC Riverside - Official Web site

Previous

• RaincrossSquare.com - UC Riverside given high marks (Aug. 2006)