Chapman University

Following the April 3 game against the Denver Nuggets, 750 Lakers fans poured into the Lexus Club at Staples Center for the 4th annual Casino Night, a $500 per person benefit for the Los Angeles Lakers Youth Foundation, which promotes education, teamwork and self-esteem by focusing on sports and providing financial aid. Couple Khloé Kardashian and Lamar Odom took time to pose on the red carpet before heading toward the abundant buffets. It wasn't hard to spot the Lakers as most stood heads above others.

Last August, at a high-end hilltop Orange County restaurant, Bob Bassett told his fellow faculty members how he intends to make Chapman University's scrappy Dodge College of Film and Media Arts into what he calls "the film school of the future. " A major strategic component, said Dodge's longtime dean, would be spring's launch of Chapman Entertainment, a for-profit movie company that will make and distribute five to 10 feature films each year in commercially popular genres such as comedies and thrillers.

He was a man with a booming voice but one that calmed in times of crisis. Whether it was a teenager's personal drama or a community tragedy, the Rev. John Edward Nix-McReynolds was known for his calm, caring and focused demeanor — one that could bring people together. Nix-McReynolds, the senior pastor at Second Baptist Church in Santa Ana, died of liver failure April 2 at UCI Medical Center. He was 57. The church, founded in 1923 in various Santa Ana homes, is Orange County's largest and oldest predominantly black church with a congregation of more than 2,000, including people who come from Riverside and Los Angeles counties to worship.

Twenty-one Chapman University freshman listened intently this week as Nobel Peace Prize laureate and Nazi death camp survivor Elie Wiesel discussed the role of religion and morality in the face of immense, terrifying evil. Wiesel, 82, a witness to the human suffering experienced in the Auschwitz, Buna and Buchenwald concentration camps, was in his element — assuming the burden of memory for the millions who did not survive the Holocaust. The much-honored writer and professor clearly relished the exchanges in the main library at the campus in Orange.

In a high-stakes bid to raise its academic profile and help its alumni launch careers in filmmaking, Chapman University is creating a for-profit film production company that will make, own and distribute five to 10 feature films a year, college officials announced Wednesday. The new company, Chapman Entertainment, will be run by the school's Dodge College of Film and Media Arts. It's being billed by the liberal arts college and professional school, located in Orange, as the first venture of its kind associated with an academic institution.

Orange County arts aficionados enjoyed lower ticket prices in 2008-09, but the increased attendance wasn't enough to prevent a drop in box office revenue, a Chapman University study released Monday shows. For 24 nonprofit arts organizations surveyed both in 2005 and 2009, the average price dropped 15.5%, from $29.10 to $24.60, the study found. Paid admissions grew 11.6%, reaching 1.9 million. But the combined box office returns of the 24 arts groups were down almost 6% from mid-decade, from $49.7 million to $46.8 million.

This economic recovery has been, at best, sporadic. As stimulus spending slows and census jobs end, many fear that the employment picture will get worse rather than better. But a leading indicator of employment released Wednesday by Chapman University's A. Gary Anderson Center for Economic Research suggests that employment in the state could continue to tick up this year. It indicates that year-over-year job growth will turn positive in the fourth quarter of this year. "We're going to create enough jobs to be above what we were the year before, but the growth rate is going to be anemic," said Esmael Adibi, director of the Anderson Center.

At a private screening and reception Wednesday at the Dodge College of Film and Media Arts at Chapman University, filmmaker Matt Tyrnauer told the audience that "lightning struck for whatever reason" when his movie "Valentino: The Last Emperor" was released in March 2009. Tyrnauer said that he would have considered success a one-week run at a small New York theater. Yet in its first week, "Valentino" out-grossed the nation's then-No. 1 movies, "Knowing" and " Monsters vs. Aliens," on a per-screen basis and is still opening in countries around the world.

Kelsey Steinke thought of herself as a fairly bright college student -- except when it came to managing personal finances. "I knew very little," she said. "Not much at all." Compared to some of her peers, however, she was a downright prodigy. "I mean, there are some girls who don't know how to do laundry," she said. "If they can't do their laundry, how can they handle their finances?" That less-than-kind reality, coupled with a troubled economy that has frightened both novices and experts, has spurred renewed interest in teaching financial literacy to high school and college-age and younger students.

A Chapman University student group wanted to find a way to relieve stress during finals week, so it came up with an innovative approach: puppies. On Wednesday, in the middle of "cram week," a bunch of puppies will be stationed outside the university library for students to pet and play with. The event, called "Furry Friends for Finals," is being organized by the university's Active Minds club, which promotes mental awareness. "It has been proven that having a dog helps relieve stress, so we thought it would be a cute idea if we brought some furry friends on campus," said Jennifer Heinz, a sophomore and integrated educational studies major who helped organize the event.