Jaffe, Finkel Elected SMC Board Officers

Louise Jaffe has been elected chair and David B. Finkel, Judge of the Superior Court (Ret.) vice chair of the Santa Monica Community College District Board of Trustees for 2009.

This is the first time that Jaffe has served as chair and Finkel as vice chair. Jaffe succeeds Rob Rader as chair and Finkel succeeds Jaffe as vice chair.

Jaffe, who was elected to the Santa Monica College Board of Trustees in November 2006, has lived in Santa Monica for more than 20 years. She first became involved in community and education issues through her daughters, Maggie and Nora, who have been educated in Santa Monica’s public schools.

Jaffe has been a PTA leader since the early 1990s, serving terms as PTA President for Will Rogers Elementary School, Santa Monica High School, and the Santa Monica-Malibu Council of PTAs. She has been honored with five PTA Honorary Service Awards and is the proud recipient of PTA’s highest award, the Golden Oak.

Jaffe founded the Santa Monica Lifelong Learning Community Project to create a shared community vision to realize Santa Monica’s potential as a model Lifelong Learning Community. She continues to write a monthly Lifelong Learning Community eNewsletter.

She is also a founding member of the political action committee Community for Excellent Public Schools (CEPS) and served as Co-Chair from 2003 to May 2006 when she stepped down to run for the College Board. During her tenure as co-chair, CEPS gathered 15,000 signatures from Santa Monica voters to qualify a charter amendment that would require the City to increase its funding to Santa Monica’s public schools. Just prior to the petition deadline, the City and the School District came to a contractual agreement, which has greatly improved funding stability, predictability, and quality for public schools, from pre-Kindergarten through the 12th grade.

Jaffe has a bachelor’s degree in biology from Antioch College and has taken classes at UCLA Extension (where she’s also taught), SMC, West Los Angeles College, and California State University at Northridge. Prior to marrying and raising a family in Santa Monica, she traveled extensively. She works in film, television, and education.

David B. Finkel is serving for the first time as Board vice chair

Finkel, a resident of Santa Monica for 44 years, was elected to the Board of Trustees in November 2006.

Finkel has had a long and distinguished career in public service and education. He is a retired judge of the Los Angeles Superior Court and a former judge and presiding judge of the Santa Monica Municipal Court. He also served on the Santa Monica City Council and as mayor pro tem.

Upon retiring from the bench in 2002, he served as an arbitrator and mediator for six years. Until his election to the SMC Board of Trustees, he was an adjunct professor of political science at the college, teaching U.S. and California government and politics with an emphasis on constitutional law. Since fall 2008 he has resumed teaching that course as a volunteer. He is currently a volunteer tutor at the SMC Counseling Center in English and Social Sciences. He is also a former faculty member of the California Judges College, teaching judicial ethics and fairness, and was a member of the Ethics Committee of the California Judges Association.

He received his B.A. from the University of Chicago and his J.D. from the University of Southern California School of Law.

He has been married to Bruria Finkel, an artist, for 43 years and is the father of four children, all educated in Santa Monica public schools. He has four grandchildren, three of whom attend Santa Monica public schools and the fourth of whom is 3 years old.