Melissa Martinez, New State Department Diplomat in Residence at Luskin New diplomat in residence brings international experience from Mexico City to guide students on campus

By Stan Paul

Melissa Martinez

Melissa Martinez

Melissa Martinez is the new U.S. State Department Diplomat in Residence at UCLA this year. As with the last several years, the Luskin School of Public Affairs Department of Public Policy will continue to be the home department of the Diplomat in Residence while assigned to UCLA.

Diplomats in Residence (DIRs) are a select group of career Foreign Service Officers and Specialists located throughout the U.S. who provide guidance and advice on careers, internships and fellowships to students and professionals in the communities they serve, according to the U.S. State Department.

She replaces Michelle Los Banos (Diplomat in Residence in 2014-2015) who was recently recalled to a new assignment in Washington, D.C.

Martinez is a media and communications professional with 13 years of international and domestic experience in the U.S. diplomatic service. She most recently worked as Deputy Press Attaché at the U.S. Embassy Mexico City, one of the largest U.S. diplomatic missions in the world, and led her team in crafting messages for one of the United States’ most important bilateral partnerships.

Before coming to Mexico, Melissa served as the Director of the Media Hub of the Americas for Latin American and Caribbean media based in South Florida. She fostered new partnerships with the academic community, civil society, and private sector in Miami and throughout the Americas to advance policy outreach for senior U.S. officials.

Previous Foreign Service assignments include Press Attaché at U.S. Embassy San Jose; Policy Officer for Sub-Saharan Africa and Latin America with the Bureau of International Information Programs in Washington D.C.; Consular Officer at U.S. Embassy Mexico City and Deputy Public Affairs Officer at U.S. Embassy Montevideo.

In 2002, Melissa received a Master’s degree from Columbia University’s School of International Public Affairs where she was a Thomas R. Pickering Foreign Affairs Graduate Fellow and National Security Exchange Program International Graduate Fellow. She earned a Bachelor of Arts from New Mexico State University in 1999. Born and raised in New Mexico, Melissa is fluent in Spanish and has studied Portuguese and Italian.

For more information on U.S. State Department programs or to inquire about office hours, please contact Martinez at mmartinez@luskin.ucla.edu) or her UCLA campus phone number 310-206-2552.

 

Monkkonen Examines Airbnb’s Impact on Housing Prices In a study commissioned by Airbnb, Urban Planning professor Paavo Monkkonen documents a limited impact on home values in L.A.

Urban Planning professor Paavo Monkkonen is attracting attention in the media for his work on a new report commissioned by the home-sharing service Airbnb.

In interviews with the LA Times and with “AirTalk” on KPCC-FM, Monkkonen has spoken about his analysis of an Airbnb study that documents the scale of the company’s impact on housing prices in Southern California. The study finds that short-term rentals occurring through peer-to-peer sharing on Airbnb make up a small portion of the region’s housing inventory.

Airbnb conducted this study in response to report written by Roy Samaan MA UP ’11 for LAANE. Monkkonen argues that the focus on the housing supply impacts of Airbnb distracts us from the more important causes of the housing affordability crisis in the city.

When asked about the recent coverage of the topic, Monkkonen mentioned his pleasure at engaging with an alumnus from the school on this topic. “The discussion that LAANE and other groups initiated about Airbnb is important to have at this moment given that the City of LA is crafting an ordinance to regulate short-term rentals.”

 

More Than 100 Participants Attend UCLA Luskin Center Lower L.A. River Workshop Workshop hosted to provide feedback on projects surrounding the LA River

More than 100 people gathered for the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation and the Watershed Conservation Authority (WCA) co-hosted, in conjunction with North East Trees, the Lower Los Angeles River: From Gray to Green workshop on Tuesday, August 18th.

Participants had an opportunity to give their feedback about what improvements they would like to see and where on the river parkway and how a Los Angeles River Greenway Toolkit could best help these efforts. Using the feedback provided by workshop participants, the Luskin Center will work to make the Toolkit more user-friendly, and incorporate new ideas and information.

This news was adapted from a UCLA Luskin Center report.

Over 100 people gathered for the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation and the Watershed Conservation Authority (WCA) co-hosted, in conjunction with North East Trees, the Lower Los Angeles River: From Gray to Green workshop on Tuesday, August 18th.
Participants had an opportunity to give their feedback about what improvements they would like to see and where on the river parkway and how a Los Angeles River Greenway Toolkit could best help these efforts. Using the feedback provided by workshop participants, the Luskin Center will work to make the Toolkit more user-friendly, and incorporate new ideas and information.
Joseph Gonzalez, Watershed Conservation Authority, Associate Project Manager (right), discusses ways in which River stakeholders can give feedback about improvements to the river parkway, while Zed Mason, CSULB Assistant Vice Chancellor of Research, looks on.

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

feat_takadean

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

feat_peals

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

feat_peals

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.

Students Report on Assignments Around the Globe Students living and working abroad will be blogging about their professional and personal experiences on the UCLA Luskin Abroad blog

A sexual health study in the Dominican Republic. Federal water policy in Mexico City. A bus rapid transit line through Nairobi, Kenya.

These are just three of the projects that UCLA Luskin students will be tackling this summer as they live and work in countries around the world. Most of the students travel under the auspices of the International Practice Pathway program, the experiential component of the School’s Global Public Affairs initiative that’s intended to expose students to a broad range of policy and practice in communities around the world.

No matter what facilitates their travel, every student working abroad this summer is driven by their innate curiosity about the world and motivated to better understand their circumstances and themselves. This year’s students are:

  • Sandra Bernabe (Social Welfare), Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic
  • Humberto Castro (Urban Planning), Mexico City, Mexico
  • Carmen Chen (Urban Planning), Istanbul, Turkey
  • Shafaq Choudry (Urban Planning), Panama City, Panama
  • Cally Hardy (Urban Planning), India
  • Jason Karpman (Urban Planning), Chiang Mai, Thailand
  • Mohan Khidia (Urban Planning), India
  • Joseph Lawlor (Urban Planning), Hyderabad, India
  • Maritza Lee (Urban Planning), Hyderabad, India
  • David Leipziger (Urban Planning), Nairobi, Kenya
  • Katie Merill (Social Welfare), Geneva, Switzerland
  • Marissa Sanchez (Urban Planning), Panama City, Panama
  • Ryan Sclar (Urban Planning), Chengdu, China
  • Elsie Silva (Social Welfare), Santo Domingo, Dominican Republic

The students will be blogging about their experiences on the UCLA Luskin Abroad blog.

Luskin Forum Describes Career Development The magazine catalogues the various ways that students can build professional skills while earning their graduate degrees

The latest issue of Luskin Forum, UCLA Luskin’s twice-yearly publication highlighting School projects and personalities, has been released.

In this issue, readers learn about leadership development and career services programs, as well as a number of other ways students enhance their professional skills while studying at the School. Also included are news and event highglights, infographics and alumni updates.

The magazine is mailed to homes of alumni and friends of the school and is also available via the document service Issuu.

 

Alumni keep LA County Department of Mental Health Humming UCLA Luskin alumni have a growing influence on social welfare in Los Angeles

By Alejandra Reyes-Velarde
UCLA Luskin Student Writer

Over the years, Social Welfare alumni have stepped into managerial positions in various programs in the Los Angeles County Department of Mental Health. From overseeing supervisors and clinicians to working directly with children, adolescent and adult patients with mental health problems, alumni have elevated the practice of social work beyond what can be done on the street.

After graduating from UCLA, Silvia Rowe MSW ‘95 obtained a position with Didi Hersh working with clients in outpatient treatment. Rowe then transferred to the Department of Mental Health, where she has been working as program head of the San Antonio Mental Health Center for 15 years.

“I knew I wanted to go into mental health, but I didn’t know I wanted to go into administration,” she said. “I wasn’t a macro person. That evolved as I learned what the different roles within mental health were.”

Rowe said that when she received the position in the child adolescent program in Long Beach, she first began to consider herself in a managerial role because she was seen as a lead clinician by other staff.

Repeatedly, social welfare alumni, including Department of Mental Health director Marvin Southard DSW ‘83, have been recognized for their outstanding work and referred to higher administrative positions through networks with colleagues.

Much like Rowe, Southard graduated and took summer jobs and internships, working as a forensic specialist in a community agency after his first year in UCLA’s DSW program., Southard said he was able to obtain a position as a clinical director because of the research and writing experience he obtained at UCLA.

Southard said the relationships he formed, both with professors and classmates, have supported him through the years.

“(My education at UCLA) has helped me in several ways,” Southard said. “My clinical professor and two policy professors remain advisors to me through the years and in the various positions I have had. I consider both my classmates and professors an important part of my evolution as a leader through the years.”

For many alumni, obtaining managerial positions has been a serendipitous experience, allowing them to enjoy multiple elements of social work. Though Rowe decided that long term therapy was not what she wanted to do, she said she enjoys that she is still able to work with clients directly. For her, being program head allows all her interests to come together. She said enjoys the managerial side of social work because it’s a different side of mental health that is necessary to provide people with services and training clinicians to make sure clients are getting what they need.

“I actually enjoy (working with clients) very much. I enjoy seeing the changes and the direct contact. It gives me a bit of both worlds,” she said.

Rowe has fond memories as a program head as well as a clinician. She remembers in particular working with a young Salvadoran adolescent woman who suffered many hardships on her journey to the U.S., causing her to enter into depression.

“In the process of building a relationship with her, she was able to open up and tell me what happened. It was satisfying to see that this person left a more confident young woman who felt she could manage anything.”

In a similar position as Rowe, James Coomes MSW ‘96 serves people who experience chronic and severe mental health problems as the program manager of Olive View Community Mental Health Urgent Care Center.

Coomes believed he would pursue child welfare and did his masters thesis on adoptions, but started transitioning after trying different fields when he graduated from UCLA.

“I thought I was going to be an adoptions worker my entire career and I thought I’d be perfectly happy. But getting out of school and becoming exposed to the work force and the opportunities that were out there, I tried to invest myself wherever I was.”

Coomes said his role has been rewarding because he has been able to see changes in the department and people getting quicker access to the services they need. Coomes said that in a managerial position, he has been able to train and supervise staff, making sure they know how to best navigate the program.

“I’m having a lot of fun with working on everything from direct client services to administrative processes and certification. It’s a challenge, but it’s invigorating. It gets me going everyday and I feel like I’ve had a real opportunity to make an impact on people’s lives.”

Southard said he knows Coomes to be a strong Bruin, being actively involved in the athletics program.

“As a leader he’s a clear, articulate, charismatic guy that can represent both UCLA and the profession of social work very well,” Southard said.

Southard said he thinks UCLA alumni have been pivotal to the mental health department and have served as the backbone for their community-based workforce. He sees the benefit of his Bruin education over the course of his career.

“I’m grateful for my time at UCLA. It has been one of the pivotal things that have allowed me to achieve the things I’ve been able to achieve,” Southard said.

 

Vancouver Trip Demonstrates Lessons in Sustainability Insights for urban and regional planning from Vancouver

vancouver_bike

By Alejandra Reyes-Velarde
UCLA Luskin Student Writer

After a week-long trip to Vancouver for their spring break, 14 urban and regional planning students returned from the journey with a report of seven implementable lessons about sustainability that they learned from “the greenest city in North America.”

They presented their findings on May 19 to a group of more than 50 sustainable living students and professionals in an event hosted by the UCLA Ziman Center for Real Estate. The trip was inspired by Mayor Eric Garcetti’s recent Sustainable City pLAn, which aims to develop short and long-term strategies to address climate change and increase urban sustainability. The plan was modeled after Vancouver’s 2011 Greenest City Action Plan.

Entirely student led and organized, the trip included stops to meet with government agencies, researchers, non-profits and other stakeholders working in different areas of sustainability  to learn about their most successful practices that would be relevant for Los Angeles. Though the team analyzed several more Vancouver successes, they decided to hone in on seven that they believe Mayor Garcetti has already identified and are achievable today. The report outlines how the students encountered each lesson and how Los Angeles can successfully implement the ideas.

Some of the objectives they identified included generating and distributing energy at the neighborhood scale to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, using data to drive policies that increase access to green space, and creating a space in City Hall to collaborate on design-build projects using the expertise of higher education institutions and graduates.

Aaron Ordower, a second-year Urban Planning student involved in the project, said he enjoyed touring the LEED-ND Platinum Olympic Village, where the students were able to talk to urban planning students from the University of British Columbia and exchange ideas about how to improve sustainability in their urban communities. The visit taught them several conclusions about energy generation on the neighborhood scale.

“Los Angeles should consider brownfield sites and other large redevelopment projects as opportunities for district energy generation. A local utility was made feasible because it was built in a new neighborhood, the Olympic Village,” the students said in their report.

Ordower said he enjoyed experiencing the sustainable elements of Vancouver such as its seamlessly integrated bike planning and access to open space.

“The remarkable thing about Vancouver is how similar it was to L.A. 30 years ago, with respect to the number of people using public transit, biking, access to quality public space, and innovation in renewable energy,” Ordower said. “ We hope the report offers a glimpse into some of those successes that are well within L.A.’s reach.”

The trip was sponsored by the UCLA Luskin Hildebrand Award for Canadian Studies, the Fulbright Canada-RBC Eco-Leadership Grant, the UCLA Center for Canadian Studies and the Liberty Hill Foundation.