Category: Public Policy

Reagan Fellowship recipient Sydney Ganon MPP ’17 Leadership, integrity, drive, and citizenship are qualities that leaders should have

October 22, 2015/0 Comments/in Public Policy, School of Public Affairs, Urban Planning /by Joe Luk

By Breanna Ramos
UCLA Luskin Student Writer

Leadership, integrity, drive, and citizenship are qualities that leaders should have — Sydney Ganon (MPP ’17) has them all.

Ganon is the second recipient of the Ronald Reagan Public Policy Fellowship, an annual award. Through the support of The Reagan Presidential Foundation and The Draine Family Charitable Foundation, UCLA Luskin students apply to receive up to $30,000 for the two-year Fellowship. Upon hearing the news, Ganon declined offers to other schools.

As a Fellow, there are a number of requirements the recipient must uphold, academic strength being one of them. Ganon, who graduated from the University of Vermont (cum laude with a B.A. in Anthropology and English is pursuing her MPP with a focus on educational policy and quantitative analysis.

“I’m interested in learning about the cross-sections between education and other policy, such as education and health, education and environment,” Ganon said. “I like that the broad program at UCLA lets me look at those other factors.”

Recipients also must have a keen interest in public policy and assisting in the local community. At the Knowledge is Power Program New York City (KIPP NYC), which is a national network of public charter schools, Ganon was heavily involved: from organizing volunteers to connecting students’ families with local officials through lobbying.

“I’m really happy that I worked before going to grad school,” Ganon said. “If I hadn’t worked at KIPP, I would have never known that education was what I wanted to have as my career. The experience totally shaped where I wanted to go.”

A key part of the Fellowship is access to Reagan’s Presidential Library. As a part of the Walter and Leonore Annenberg Presidential Learning Center’s internship program, Ganon must complete 100 internship hours at the library. Over the two-year Fellowship, the internship hours will give Ganon the time she wants to research Reagan’s educational policies.

“One of the incredible things about the Fellowship is that you get to see and learn about things from the politician’s side,” Ganon explained. “In order to create change, you have to understand what’s going on from both sides.”

Upon earning her MPP, Ganon plans on pursuing a career that provides opportunities to improve education for all.

“I would like to be working pretty specifically in education analytics, either with a school district or the state,” Ganon elaborated. “I want to be heavily involved in student data and test scores, using that information to make schools better.”

Inequality is Focus of New Issue of Blueprint Income and wealth inequality is the focus of the newly release issue of Blueprint

October 19, 2015/0 Comments/in Public Policy, School of Public Affairs, Social Welfare /by Joe Luk

By Stan Paul

Income and wealth inequality is the focus of the newly released issue of Blueprint, a UCLA partnership with the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs.

The second edition is once again led by editor-in-chief, Jim Newton, a 25-year veteran reporter and editor for the Los Angeles Times.

“American inequality decreased in the 1950s, only to explode in the 1970s and ’80s and to expand yet again during the recent recession,” writes Newton in the introduction.

Included in the Fall 2015 “Table Talk” section is an interview with economics Nobel Laureate and former presidential adviser, Joseph Stiglitz, author of the influential 2012 book, The Price of Inequality. Los Angeles Times editorial writer and deputy editorial page editor, Jon Healey, interviewed Stiglitz on subjects ranging from taxes and growth since the great recession to minimum wage and basic fairness.

“…we have become one of the nations among the advanced countries with the least opportunity. In the United States, the life chances of young people are more dependent on the income and education of their parents than in almost any other advanced country,” Stiglitz comments.

Research and profiles by noted journalists and scholars in this second edition include a look at leadership in Los Angeles, the physical suffering of the poor, unequal schools, wages and the middle class, and economic growth. Blueprint’s “Landscape” section includes writing on voter turnout (by Newton) as well as pieces on the working poor and same-sex marriage.

“We are more about conversations, writes Newton, adding, “I hope the pieces contained here will start some of those conversations, as policy makers and others who care about society consider inequality and how it shapes neighborhoods and destinies. Few questions more define our history; few are more important to consider and address.”

A public discussion led by Jim Newton is set for Oct. 21 at the California Endowment in Los Angeles. Scheduled discussants are: former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio R. Villaraigosa, Homeboy Industries’ Father Greg Boyle and the California Endowment’s Robert Ross.

For more information and registration, please go to: http://blueprint.ucla.edu/event/public-discussion-thoughtful-l-a-leaders-on-poverty-and-politics/

Read the newly released second edition online at: Blueprint.ucla.edu

Takahashi Named UCLA Luskin Interim Dean The Urban Planning and Asian American studies professor will lead the School during the search for Dean Gilliam’s permanent successor

August 5, 2015/0 Comments/in For Faculty, Public Policy, School of Public Affairs, Social Welfare, Urban Planning Lois Takahashi /by Joe Luk

Lois M. Takahashi, a professor of Urban Planning and Asian American studies and a noted scholar on service delivery to vulnerable populations, will serve as interim dean of the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Scott Waugh announced today.

Takahashi assumes the leadership role from Franklin D. Gilliam, Jr., who was named chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro in May.

A member of the UCLA faculty since 2001, Takahashi is professor of urban planning and of Asian American studies. In addition to her current service as associate dean of research at UCLA Luskin and as associate director of the University of California Asian American and Pacific Islander Policy Multicampus Research Program, she has also served as chair of the Department of Urban Planning (2011-13) and chair of the UCLA Asian American Studies Center’s Faculty Advisory Committee (2010-13).

Outside UCLA, Takahashi is the vice president/president-elect of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Planning, a board member of the Western Center on Law & Poverty and a member of the editorial boards of three journals: Journal of Planning Education and Research, Journal of the American Planning Association, and AIDS Education and Prevention. A National Institutes of Health-funded scholar, her research focuses on public and social service delivery to vulnerable populations in the U.S. and Southeast Asian cities, HIV/AIDS, homelessness and environmental governance. She has published more than 60 articles and chapters, and she is the author of Homelessness, AIDS, and Stigmatization: The NIMBY Syndrome in the United States at the End of the Twentieth Century and a co-author of Rethinking Environmental Management in the Pacific Rim: Exploring Local Participation in Bangkok, Thailand.

Takahashi received a Ph.D. in urban planning from the University of Southern California, an M.S. in public management and policy/architecture from Carnegie Mellon University and an A.B. in architecture from UC Berkeley.

In the coming months, Provost Waugh will form a committee to search for candidates to permanently serve as dean of UCLA Luskin.

Study: New P.E. Curriculum Triples Performance on Test Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris led a study that found positive results for the UCLA Health "Sound Body Sound Mind" physical education curriculum

July 15, 2015/0 Comments/in Public Policy, School of Public Affairs Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris /by Les Dunseith

By Amy Albin
UCLA Health

A physical education program that brings commercial-grade fitness equipment to under-resourced schools, along with a curriculum based on boosting confidence and making participation more enjoyable, dramatically increases students’ performance on California’s standardized physical fitness test, a UCLA study has found.

Publishing in the July issue of the Journal of Education and Training Studies, Urban Planning professor Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris reported that the UCLA Health Sound Body Sound Mind curriculum tripled the percentage of students who passed the state Fitnessgram test in schools where it was implemented — from an average passage rate of 20 percent prior to the curriculum’s initiation to an average passage rate of 60 percent after its completion. The study also found that students’ confidence levels, enjoyment of physical activity and knowledge about fitness increased following the program.

“I was not expecting that in such a short time one could see such a big difference in the kids’ fitness performance,” said Loukaitou-Sideris. “A curriculum such as this could go a long way toward motivating children to be more active and fighting obesity, particularly in low-income communities where such efforts are most needed.”

Loukaitou-Sideris, along with a team of UCLA graduate students, followed 640 students attending five inner-city Los Angeles schools during the academic year 2012-2013. The students, who ranged from seventh to 10th grade, spent eight weeks taking physical education classes that followed the Sound Body Sound Mind curriculum. Students, parents and physical education teachers were asked to respond to questionnaires before and after the students completed the curriculum. The researchers also interviewed teachers and analyzed students’ Fitnessgram scores.

“Further research is needed to evaluate the impact of the SBSM curriculum on students in more schools, and especially to look at the impact on students of various ages, ethnicities and socioeconomic backgrounds, as well the long-term impact of the program,” added Loukaitou-Sideris.

Sound Body Sound Mind has been implemented in nearly 100 middle and high schools in the Los Angeles Unified School District, the vast majority of them in low-income communities. More than 400 educators have been trained on the curriculum. The Sound Body Sound Mind Foundation was created by philanthropists Cindy and Bill Simon in 1999, and became part of UCLA Health earlier this year.

Approximately 23 percent of children and young people under the age of 18 in Los Angeles County are obese, and another 19 percent are overweight, as measured by body mass index. Low-income communities tend to offer limited access to free and safe spaces for physical activity outside of school, making it more difficult for children from those communities to get regular exercise.

Sound Body Sound Mind addresses this problem with state-of-the-art fitness programs and a unique curriculum that includes 30 lesson plans focused on mastering basic physical tasks. All of the activities are designed for small spaces, so they don’t require gyms or large multipurpose rooms, which many inner-city schools lack.

“At the core of the teaching strategy is creating a welcoming environment, removing intimidation and demonstrating to students that they can improve their fitness by focusing on their own achievement rather than comparing themselves to others,” said Nathan Nambiar, executive director of the Sound Body Sound Mind Foundation and community engagement manager at UCLA Health. Nambiar says that students are never asked to perform in front of others and, since everyone is moving at once, they don’t worry that others are watching.

At Alliance Alice M. Baxter College-Ready High School, a public charter school in San Pedro, the initiation of the Sound Body Sound Mind program last fall resulted in a dramatic increase in the percentage of students passing the FITNESSGRAM test — from 37 percent to 82 percent.

“It’s changed the entire outlook our students have on fitness,” said Brooklin Brumund, athletic director at the school, which was not part of the study. “A lot of these kids come from families where exercise and healthy lifestyles are not promoted. Many have never been involved in recreational sports. At the beginning some of them complained about hating anything physically strenuous, and now they are running miles, passing the physical fitness test, and showing confidence that they’ve never had before. It’s been an amazing transformation.”

The study was funded by a donation from the UCLA Dream Fund.

Study: New P.E. Curriculum Triples Performance on Test Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris led a study that found positive results for the UCLA Health "Sound Body Sound Mind" physical education curriculum

July 15, 2015/0 Comments/in Public Policy, School of Public Affairs Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris /by Joe Luk