HACOPIAN LEADS NEW YEAR AT GCC
Thursday, September 19th, 2013
Dr. Armine Hacopian
GLENDALE-Glendale Community College starts the year with the most
senior board member, Dr. Armine Hacopian, as one of the five board
members at the helm.
Dr. Armine Hacopian was reelected to the GCC board for a fourth term
last April. Due to her hard work, commitment, educational, and career
choices she has served as an outstanding role model for students.
Hacopian came to the USA at the age of 16, in 1969, unable to speak
any English. She had always been an outstanding student, so she was
determined to not allow a language barrier to stop her from achieving
and accomplishing. By the end of her first year, she had already
decided that she would choose the field of education as a career
path, with the goal to help newcomers overcome challenges faced when
migrating to the USA. To this day she is following her passion of
helping others through education, as was the promise she made to her
ailing father.
Hacopian’s father experienced the acts of Genocide, first-hand, at the
age of five, as he watched the slaughter of his mother and father and
his extended family, while hiding in the shrubs. Paralyzed with fear,
he didn’t move for several days. He was found days later and rushed
to an orphanage, where, along with scores of other homeless children,
he was subjected to abuse. Needless to say he grew up without any
love or tenderness, nor education. Later he became self educated
in the art of photography, and through great effort and hard work,
he was hired as the official photographer of the Shah of Iran.
Therefore, he raised his children by instilling in them the belief that
education was critical for success in life. He provided encouragement
that his children needed to focus and shine in at least one area,
to have big dreams, and never to forget to help those in need. Armine
being one of his children, took this to heart and based her life on
this one piece of advice.
In honor of her father, Armine became a life long learner, she
continued many years of education beyond earning a BA. With two
MAs, six credentials, and a doctorate in educational leadership and
supervision, Dr. Hacopian has become one of the first Armenian-American
women to break down career boundaries by seeking an elected political
office for an institution of higher learning.
Hacopian has learned from her mother how to be dedicated to an
organization with unconditional love, as her mother (Anelka Shirvanian
Shadakhouni) has been one of the longest serving members of ARS for
more than fifty years. Hacopian has brought that unconditional love
and commitment to GCC.
Throughout her career, Dr. Hacopian has been extremely busy in
leadership roles, helping her community thrive by belonging to various
community service organizations. Being a board member of the League
of Women Voters, the goal to educate the community to become better
informed voters has been an on going passion. Currently, she also
serves on the Royal Canyon Property Owners Association where she has
brought joint concerns between GCC and the neighbors for discussions
and solutions.
She was one of the co-chairs who helped pass a $98million dollar
bond measure for capital improvements at GCC. Through her genuine
hard work, and with the support of her co-trustees, the Garfield
campus construction plan received an additional funding of two
million dollars. Her new effort will be towards focusing on the
new construction plan – which will start very soon at GCC – of the
Student Services Lab building, where many of the student services
will be housed, built with state funding.
During her career, Dr. Hacopian has been an outstanding teacher,
department chair, counselor, and coordinator of Even Start Family
Literacy program, through which she was able to work closely with Head
Start and provide parenting classes and mitigate domestic abuse as
a result. She also was an ESL specialist, helping teachers improve
their skills as they worked with students, whose primary language
was not English.
In addition, she has been on K-12 and college accreditation teams,
both internal and external. She has presented at numerous conferences,
focusing on motivation, diversity, education, and workplace sexual
harassment prevention and its impact on victims. Serving on doctoral
dissertation committees has been another recent commitment of hers.
She was a consultant for the Department of Affirmative Action of
La County, where she was able to train sexual harassment prevention
and understanding differences to the executives and upper management
teams. A trainer of trainers, she has been a sought after consultant
in the areas of career transitions, diversity understanding, and
sexual harassment prevention, communication and conflict management,
program reviews and leadership evaluations, and motivating employees
are just to name a few.
One of Dr. Hacopian’s experiences most dear to her heart was being a
co-founder of a private Armenian School in Glendale (currently named
Chamilian and Tufenkian Preschool). For more than twelve years, she
was a member of the Western Prelacy Board of Regents dedicating her
time and commitment to Western Prelacy Armenian schools in California.
Due to her extensive accomplishments, dedication and service, Dr.
Hacopian has been recognized by being awarded various prestigious
honors. Most recently she was honored by the California State Senate
as “Woman of the Year” (2012), the Commission on the Status of Women’s
“Woman of Courage, Jewel of Glendale” award (2013), and a Congressional
Recognition as “Woman of the Year” (2013), awarded by Congressman
Adam Schiff. Other honors include the Armenian Cultural Conference
“Woman of the Year” (1997), the Armenian-American Chamber of Commerce
“Business Woman of the Year” (2009), and the Armenian Educational
Foundation’s “Educator of The Year” (2003).
Since 2001, she has been the president of the Glendale Community
College Board of Trustees for three different terms and as the past
immediate GCC board president, she dedicated all her energy toward
leading the college through a very tough budgetary cycle, and hiring
a new superintendent/president.
The best recognition for Dr. Hacopian’s hard work is the fact that she
had no opposition this last April for her fourth term election. She
appreciates the community’s trust in her efforts to be an excellent
Glendale Community College Board Member.
In an interview, Dr. Hacopian indicated that her best accomplishment
was to be married to Vahe Hacopian, a long time board member in
the Armenian Educational Foundation. It is important to note that
Vahe and Armine met each other when they were both in the AYF “Mousa
Dagh” Chapter. They have two daughters who have each gone to AYF Camp
since age eight, attended Tufenkian Preschool and Chamlian. For six
weeks as part of their missionary work in Armenia, both daughters
participated in Armenia’s Land and Culture organization, where each
stayed in Armenia’s Gogaran and Sagmosavank villages and proudly
helped excavate these churches, keeping Hacopian’s father’s (Sako
Shadakhouni) dream alive.
The Hacopian’s have five grandkids who attend Tufenkian Preschool
and Chamilian Elementary School.
http://asbarez.com/114090/hacopian-leads-new-year-at-gcc/