Distinguished Alumni

David Dumais

Fire Chief, City of Torrance

Chief Dumais grew up in Torrance, CA and is a graduate of Torrance High School. He earned his Associate of Science degree from El Camino College in Fire & Emergency Technology in 1995 and then transferred to California State University, Dominguez Hills where he received his Bachelor of Arts degree in Physical Education/Biology.

Chief Dumais has been the Fire Chief for the City of Torrance since December 2022. He was hired by the Torrance Fire Department in 1987 and over the last 36 years, has served as a Firefighter, Fire Investigator, Firefighter Paramedic, Fire Engineer, and Fire Captain. During his tenure as Fire Captain, he provided departmental leadership and completed many in-service courses in Emergency Management/Disaster Preparedness and attended the Los Angeles City Fire Department Leadership Academy.

In 2003, Dumais was promoted to Battalion Chief, and in 2006, he was promoted to Deputy Fire Chief. In 2016, Dumais was assigned as Refinery Safety Coordinator to provide oversight of the Torrance Refining Company and the transition of the refinery from the ExxonMobil Corporation. In 2019, Chief Dumais was assigned to the Community Risk Reduction Division (CRRD) and appointed as Fire Marshal. Under Chief Dumais’ leadership, the CRRD was recognized as the 2022 CUPA Participating Agency of the Year for Refinery Safety.

Chief Dumais has been a member of the City’s Emergency Preparation Advisory Team working in the areas of emergency management, EOC activation, secondary EOC development, exercise design and planning, hazard mitigation planning, and critical Infrastructure identification. Among his many accolades, Chief Dumais was honored with the Torrance Unified School District “Golden Apple” Award for outstanding partnership with TUSD in 2019.  He is an adjunct Fire Technology instructor at El Camino College and was recently appointed to represent the California Fire Chiefs’ Association as the Certified Unified Program Agency (CUPA) Forum Board representative for Southern California.

Chris Mortensen

Senior NFL Insider, ESPN (Retired)

Chris Mortensen is an award-winning journalist and one of the most respected and accomplished reporters covering the National Football League today. A senior NFL Insider, Mortensen joined ESPN in 1991 and has appeared and contributed to many NFL programs, including: Sunday NFL Countdown, SportsCenter, ESPN Radio, ESPN.com, ESPN’s annual Super Bowl week and NFL Draft coverage. Last year, Mortensen announced that he was stepping away from ESPN after 33 NFL Drafts, to focus on his "health, family and faith."

Mortensen was honored by the Professional Football Writers of America (PFWA) with the prestigious Dick McCann Award for his long and distinguished contribution to pro football in 2016. Mortensen has covered every Super Bowl since 1985 with the exception of Super Bowl 50 when he was forced to take a leave of absence after being diagnosed with Stage IV throat cancer. In October 2016, the NFL Players Association recognized him with the NFLPA Georgetown Lombardi Award for his contributions to pro football and his courageous battle against cancer. Mortensen was also honored with the coveted George Polk Award in 1987 for his reporting, and the same year, won the National Headliner Award for Investigative Reporting. In addition to receiving numerous other journalism awards, Mortensen has been nominated for two Pulitzer Prizes.

A native of Torrance, California, Mortensen graduated from North Torrance High School before starting at El Camino College in 1969, the same year he began his journalism career with the Daily Breeze. He served two years in the Army during the Vietnam Era before he was honorably discharged.

Sabrina Steele

Executive Director, Corporate Affairs & Communications, The Aerospace Corporation

Sabrina K. Steele is executive director of the Corporate Affairs and Communications Division at The Aerospace Corporation, responsible for leading an integrated, national team of professionals to promote the company as a thought leader across the space enterprise. Steele manages Aerospace’s corporate communications needs, including public and media relations, internal and external communications, and innovative corporate strategy campaigns. Through the corporation’s brand and reputation programs, Steele communicates Aerospace’s role as the nation’s trusted and preeminent space enterprise. Additionally, she has led brand partnerships to connect the commercial and technology community with the nation’s military, intelligence, and civil space missions.

Steele leads her team across 22 corporate locations in 15 states. She also serves as executive champion of Aerospace’s Community Outreach Focus Area, the team charged with establishing community liaisons, expanding STEM scholarships to under-served communities, and conducting conversations on diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI). Reinforcing the corporation’s DEI actions, Steele was part of the Space Workforce 2030 team, an initiative in which space industry executives and CEOs pledged to create a more diverse and inclusive environment. For her work on Space Workforce 2030, Steele’s team was recognized with the Trustees’ Distinguished Achievement Award, the highest honor awarded at The Aerospace Corporation, which was established to increase diversity within the company.

Steele attended El Camino College from 1982 to 1984. She later transferred to California State University, Long Beach where she earned her bachelor’s degree in 1985, magna cum laude, in journalism, where she was named Outstanding Journalism and Humanities Graduate, a Scripps Howard Scholarship Honoree, and a Knight-Ridder Scholarship Honoree. Her education continued with two years of post-graduate coursework in Russian/Eastern European Studies. Before joining Aerospace, Steele was director of communications at Raytheon Space and Airborne Systems in El Segundo, California. Prior to that, she was an award-winning reporter/editor for the Press-Telegram, a Knight-Ridder newspaper in Long Beach, California.

Dr. Jennifer Taylor-Mendoza

President, West Valley College

Dr. Jennifer Taylor-Mendoza currently serves as the 13th president of West Valley College (WVC) and is the first African American educator to lead the institution. She is a longtime leader with over twenty years of higher education experience in both instruction and student services, mainly in the California community college system. In her various roles as a classified professional, tenured faculty leader, director, dean, vice president, and now president, Taylor-Mendoza’s areas of expertise include accreditation, dual enrollment, educational policy, enrollment management, global learning, guided pathways, online learning, professional development, strategic planning, and workforce partnerships.

President Taylor-Mendoza has found inspiration in the endless potential of community college students. She leads for social justice, recognizing our shared responsibility to address racism and to create a more just educational system of access, reward, and long-term equitable outcomes. The “obligation gap,” a term she coined, speaks to institutional responsibility. She is co-author of Minding the Obligation Gap in Community Colleges: Theory and Practice in Achieving Educational Equity. As Chief Instructional Officer, President Taylor-Mendoza served on the State Chancellor’s Office’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Statewide Implementation Workgroup in developing, implementing, and assessing DEI strategies to improve system wide equity outcomes for all of California’s community colleges.

As a public servant, President Taylor-Mendoza believes that healthy, vibrant communities increase enrollment, build public confidence, attract funding support, and impact local legislation. A proud community college alumna, President Taylor-Mendoza started her higher education journey at El Camino College, earning an A.A. in General Studies in 1998. She later went on to attain a B.A. in Psychology (California State University, Los Angeles), an M.S. in Counseling (California State University, Northridge), and a Ph.D. in Education (Claremont Graduate University).