Colin Underwood and Ju Yuen Lee, were honored at a luncheon on Thursday, April 6 in Sacramento after having been recently named to the 2000 Phi Theta Kappa All-California Academic Team.

There are approximately 1.4 million students in California’s 106 community colleges. Each community college can nominate two students. The students are ranked by grade point average, extracurricular activities, and volunteer work.

This year 27 students were selected to the First Academic Team, who receive $5000 to attend any California State University, and 27 students were selected to the Second Academic Team, they receive $1800 to attend a campus of CSU. Lee and Underwood were both second team recipients.

Underwood maintains a GPA of 3.8. He plans to transfer to CSU-Hayward and will major in Computer Multi-media. Underwood maintains the web page for the Marketing/Communications office at De Anza College.

He also designs and maintains the web pages for the Biological and Health Sciences division on campus. During the winter quarter he was involved with President of De Anza College, Martha Kanter’s office in a campus survey project with Phi Theta Kappa that will be used to increase volunteerism on campus and the community.

His other projects have included involvement in the development of the environmental sciences building, a state-of-the-art environmentally friendly structure that is still in the planning stage, and volunteering his time for KTEH’s fund-raising drives. Underwood is the outgoing Vice-President of Operations with Phi Theta Kappa and is a past Vice-President of Communications within the organization.

Lee’s maintains a GPA of 3.5 and has been accepted at UC Santa Barbara and UC Santa Cruz, but has set her sites on UCLA or Berkeley.

She is majoring in Economics and Mathematics. She has been an active member of Phi Theta Kappa, and has been involved with the club’s fundraising.

She also volunteers time to KQED’s pledge drives. Lee’s background is a little different perhaps than most people.

She is a product of the foster care system. Her first language is Korean, and she has put it to good use.

Lee volunteers at the Lucile Salter Packard Children’s Hospital in Palo Alto as a Korean language interpreter for low-income families.

She supports herself working as a teller for Bank of the West. In the past, she has tutored for Americorp; presently she is a teacher’s aide for Diane Mathios’s Math 10 class.

Lee credits her success in math to Mathios who Lee says; ” influenced me so much.” Lee feels she would have given up math if it had not been for Mathios.

Lani T. Bondshu is the ICC Representative for Phi Theta Kappa