Ryan ChartrandCal Poly journalism junior Anna Rose Luskin died June 22 after suffering major injuries when her car collided with a tree in Paso Robles the night of June 20, the California Highway Patrol said.
Luskin, 20, was, like many Cal Poly students, driving to her home in Redwood City for the summer. While headed north on U.S. Highway 101 with her brother, Daniel, 15, her car drifted into the dirt center divider for unknown reasons around 8 p.m., police said.
Officials reported that Luskin swerved back onto the road but then skidded off the right shoulder. Her car reportedly struck a large oak tree near Paso Robles Street with its left side, causing major injuries for her and minor injuries for her brother.
The Luskins were transported to Twin Cities Community Hospital. Anna Luskin died two days later at Sierra Vista Hospital, police said.
Luskin was one quarter away from taking the Mustang Daily class, where her byline would have been found in these pages.
“It’s such a loss,” said journalism department chair George Ramos who taught her in his public affairs reporting class. “She was a bright student and I think she had unlimited potential.”
She was on the staff of her high school’s national award-winning online newspaper, the Paly Voice. She also held an internship at the Palo Alto Weekly where she wrote columns, one of which was about how she had been accepted to Cal Poly.
“It (Cal Poly) offers courses in news writing, magazine writing and editing – exactly what I want,” she wrote. With her acceptance, she said, “I think I might finally be able to be at peace with myself, and with the world.”
“Anna at 18 is more mature and emotionally stable than I was in my twenties,” wrote her father, Stanford University professor Fred Luskin, in the same column. “She is both blessed and cursed with a strong desire to do well and a profound sense of responsibility.”
Luskin had a 3.3 cumulative GPA at Cal Poly and was specializing in print journalism.
“She was very careful about how she did her work and she took pride in what she was doing,” Ramos said. “She certainly was an asset to the department and to her interest in journalism.”
Journalism senior and friend Jennifer Ingan conveyed a similar sense of loss.
“She was really friendly and always helpful with assignments we had,” Ingan said. “She really seemed advanced for her age. She’d get As on her stories and she was a great writer.”
Luskin’s death marks the sixth Cal Poly student death in the past year.
“They’re all unanticipated accidents that are tragic and remind us all the time about how fragile life can be and how quickly life can be taken,” vice president for student affairs Cornel Morton said.
Luskin’s family and her friends on campus have not contacted Morton to set up a memorial, endowment or scholarship.
“Most of those are accidents and avoidable, but basically we just have to take better care to be vigilant about safety.”
Morton advises students visiting home to drive carefully and to wait until morning if they are tired.