Luskin Lecture Spurs Conversation on Poverty in America Event featured screening of documentary "American Winter" followed by panel discussion.

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By Alejandra Reyes-Velarde
UCLA Luskin student writer

On Tuesday, the Luskin School of Public Affairs held its first Luskin Lecture featuring a film screening and panel discussion about middle class Americans falling into poverty after the recession of 2008.

The documentary, “American Winter” attempted to dispel perceptions and stereotypes about people who face poverty. The film follows the lives of eight families in their struggle to search for jobs and resources as their financial debts continued to grow, making homelessness a possibility for their futures.

After the screening, Film Director Joe Gantz, Housing Advocate with Volunteers of America Orlando Ward, and Social Welfare professor Laura Abrams sat down with moderator Val Zavala of KCET to discussed the themes of the film with the audience.

Ward, who was homeless and spent 15 years on Skid Row before going on to become the Vice President of Operations at Midnight Mission said he found the film emotionally satisfying and well informed in pointing to solutions.

“(Being homeless) is the most dehumanizing situation to be in. The film captured the fact that these are people that can be your friends, your neighbors or your family,” Ward said.

Having lived with these families while making the film, Gantz said he saw the stress they went through to maintain basic needs like paying electric bills and feeding their kids.

“I think what you see in this film is that these myths about it being the people’s fault are anything but true. These families are incredibly resourceful and hard working,” Gantz said.

Gantz is known for being able to bring to light very personal and intimate moments between the people in the films. In American Winter, some of the most emotional moments for the audience and the panel included those depicting the children’s emotional turmoil over their parents’ wellbeing or how they might support their own families in the future.

Professor Abrams felt deeply moved by the children and said it highlighted the important topic of childhood development.

“They were hopeful, compassionate and empathetic…Although they were the most endearing to me, I felt their having to worry about their parents well-being was very sad,” she said. “On the more intellectual side, we know that cumulative stresses add up, affecting their neurological development and coping strategies. We have to think about where these children are going to be 20 to 30 years from now.”

The film addressed topics on a political level as well, using shocking statistics throughout the documentary revealing how money in America is distributed.

“The money is going to the top 10% and the middle class is disappearing. On top of that, new laws make it possible to pour unlimited amounts of money into elections. You begin to wonder if this system is able to be called democracy,” Gantz said.

Although he thinks the federal response to this crisis did some good, Gantz said he was not struck by the U.S. reaching out empathically to those in need. Instead, services and programs that benefited those in need were cut and those families were left in the dark, he said.

Ward said he does not think the American government can solve these types of problems on their own. Instead, we have to look at the third side and understand the personal responsibility in the situation, he said.

“The film was about the fragility of hope. I think the film captured where we are as a country right now. I think a lot of us were seeing the pillars this country was built on was hope.”

Professor Abrams concluded the event by noting that this type of discussion and the issues presented are exactly the type that UCLA Luskin programs aim to address. This event was part of the School’s “Season of Service” that is highlighting underserved populations and the many ways students, faculty, staff and alumni are working to build a better world.

Additional upcoming Season of Service events:

Tuesday, Oct. 28:

Tuesday, Nov. 4:

  • A discussion on Coordinated Entry Systems will be held at 5:30pm in the Public Affairs Building.

A highlight of the Season of Service is on Saturday, Nov. 15 when the Luskin School participates in the 2014 United Way Homewalk at Exposition Park – walking and running to end homelessness.

Alumni Gather to Remember the Early Days of Social Welfare at UCLA Graduates from the 1950s and 1960s were honored at a luncheon celebration bridging then and now

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For some UCLA alumni that gathered at the Faculty Center on Tuesday, being on campus brought up memories of crossing the arroyo bridge to classes in Quonset huts, just part of life as graduate students at the “Southern Branch” of the University of California.

But for the 28 alumni that came for a reunion luncheon, all former students that graduated from UCLA’s School of Social Welfare between 1950 and 1969, the return to Westwood was a chance to see bigger changes that have happened since the early days of the program. Student enrollment of a few dozen has grown to more than 200 students this year. Faculty positions have doubled and then doubled again, from only two tenured professors in the early 1950s to 13 today, with an additional seven field faculty providing experiential training. A focus on clinical practice, or “micro” orientation, has widened to encompass consideration of “macro” issues such as community development and advocacy.

In the face of these changes, however, the department celebration made clear that some things have remained the same. As they sat with current students, staff and members of the faculty, the common threads in the field became evident.

“The school kept saying ‘Don’t focus, be open'” when she was a student, Ruth Sugerman MSW ’67 (above right) said. “Social workers can do so many interesting things. I was really inspired by the school of social work telling me that once I had my degree it was just a start.”

For Sugerman, her UCLA education “was just a wonderful opportunity for me to grow and develop as a social worker and a person.”

Sophia Poster MSW ’52 (below right) agreed. “Everything I learned at UCLA was wonderful to me,” she said. “I was so exhilarated.”

Poster believes that students following her are on a similarly exciting journey. “If you’re inspired to be a social worker it’s one of the greatest experiences you’ll have, dealing with people and their ‘inner self'” she said. “How many of us know the other person in ourselves? A social worker can do that.”

Social work has been taught at UCLA for 67 years, and includes more than 3,300 alumni in master’s and doctoral programs of Social Welfare. Luncheon attendees learned other key facts from Department Chair Todd Franke and UCLA Luskin Dean Franklin D. Gilliam Jr., Second-year student Dawnette Anderson also delivered remarks at the event, sharing her experience as a foster youth and describing her path to graduate study.

To Anderson and her fellow students, Arthur Nelson MSW ’57 offered some straightforward words of encouragement: “There’s a lot that needs to be done in our society. The UCLA Department of Social Welfare prepares you very well for what is ahead of you.”

More photos from the event

The Do’s and Don’ts of Professional Etiquette Urban Planning alumnus Jonathan P. Bell will lead a workshop for all UCLA Luskin students on October 20.

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By Alejandra Reyes-Velarde, UCLA Luskin student writer

Urban Planning alumnus Jonathan Pacheco Bell will be leading a professional etiquette workshop on Oct. 20 for UCLA Luskin students seeking to make themselves more competitive in the job market.

Bell, who earned his masters degree in urban planning in 2005, has worked in the field for seven years. He is currently working for the Advance Planning Division of the County of Los Angeles’ Department of Regional Planning. He will share his employment experiences and cover topics like communication, networking and nonverbal cues.

“Proper professional etiquette will make or break your chances with potential employers,” Bell said. “This should seem obvious, yet some students discount the importance of etiquette and end up being memorable for the wrong reasons.”

The workshop, which Bell said will cover the “do’s and don’ts of professional etiquette,” aims to give students an advantage in obtaining jobs, internships, scholarships and other work experiences that will help them be successful in the workforce.

Career Services director Michelle Anderson said it is extremely helpful for students to know the rules of etiquette when entering the professional world and even when encountering opportunities while they are in school.

“Students are interacting with high-level individuals and having professional exchanges everyday. Whether it is speaking with a professor and employers or attending events or speeches, it is important for students to know what to do and how to present themselves,” Anderson said.

The workshop will be held from 4-6 p.m. in room 2343 in the Luskin School of Public Affairs. Food will be provided for attendees. The workshop is mandatory for students in the Alumni Leader’s Academy, but students seeking summer jobs or internships are strongly encouraged to attend. RSVP to careers@luskin.ucla.edu.

Is Revival of Downtown L.A. Real? Urban Planning professor Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris and other panelists agree that balance of power is shifting.

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By Sarah Rothbard/Zocalo Public Square

This year, GQ called downtown Los Angeles “America’s next great city” and “the cool capital of America.”  The New York Times included downtown on its list of “52 Places to Go in 2014.” At a “Thinking L.A.” event copresented by UCLA and Zocalo Public Square at the Museum of Contemporary Art, Grand Avenue, a panel of people who have developed, designed, lived, worked and played downtown discussed whether downtown actually lives up to this (admittedly East Coast) hype.

Award-winning architect and UCLA professor Thom Mayne cautioned against the hype. The notion of “downtown,” he said “is already a misnomer” for Los Angeles, a county of many different cities and more than 10 million people. “‘Downtown,’ as a word, connotes a singular,” said Mayne, pointing to what the word means in cities like Kansas City, Cleveland and Chicago. But in L.A., downtown is just one of a number of downtowns.

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Two UCLA professors, architect Thom Mayne and urban planner Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris, took part in an Oct. 14 panel discussion hosted by UCLA and Zocalo Public Square.

Los Angeles Times arts and entertainment editor Laurie Ochoa disagreed. Yes, L.A. has a lot of neighborhoods and tribes; she recalled that when the L.A. Weekly’s offices moved from Hollywood to Culver City, her colleagues “were tearing their hair out” over the identity crisis of becoming Westsiders. “To me, it’s one city,” she said. L.A. is united by its theaters, restaurants, its people. And downtown has long been a cultural hub, she said. Before there was Disney Hall, there was the Music Center.

Mayne recalled that for a long time, he lived in Venice and never went downtown. Crossing the 405 was like getting through the DMZ in Korea.

Ochoa again disagreed: Downtown’s not “suddenly interesting,” she said. “It’s always been interesting.” For a long time, only a certain kind of person lived downtown. Now it’s a destination for all sorts of people.

New York Times national correspondent Jennifer Medina, the evening’s moderator, asked the panelists to define success for downtown.

UCLA urban planning professor Anastasia Loukaitou-Sideris said that success is having people live, work and play downtown — transforming it into a place with life on the weekends and after-work hours. Great cities have great downtowns, she said. Downtown is the symbolic heart of Los Angeles, which is why its success is so meaningful.

Downtown is just one of the hearts of L.A., Mayne added. “I think it can be absolutely successful without being dominant.”

Who exactly are the people living and playing downtown? Medina asked restaurateur Bill Chait, who owns businesses across the city, if he notices a difference between customers at his downtown restaurants versus his Westside restaurants.

His downtown clientele is “incredibly eclectic,” said Chait. They’re younger, more urban and mobile. Chait, who grew up on the Westside, recalled that he resisted opening restaurants downtown for years. It was strictly a daytime environment, he said. There wasn’t enough of a residential population to sustain a restaurant, he thought at the time. In 2009, however, he opened up Rivera near the new L.A. Live complex, and other restaurants followed.

Over the past five years, downtown has become a center for people across the eastern part of Los Angeles, said Chait. Yet for all its architectural glory, noted Mayne, there was not a soul on foot on Grand Avenue at 7 p.m.

Loukaitou-Sideris said that architecture remains a hurdle for downtown. There’s been an emphasis on creating architectural masterpieces, but not on what’s happening on the street. The buildings and streets “don’t talk to one another” or link to one another, said the urban planning professor.

One of Medina’s favorite places downtown is Grand Central Market, which also epitomizes downtown’s current transition. At Grand Central, she said, you can pay $6 for a latte or $6 for a dinner, including a beer. How can downtown deal with the tension between preservation and creation?

Chait said that a lot of downtown development is going in the right direction because more people and builders are reclaiming rather than knocking down and rebuilding.

The challenge also lies in preserving downtown’s social diversity, said Loukaitou-Sideris, making sure it doesn’t turn into another Westside.

However, Mayne said that changing the perception of downtown has to start on the upper end. If wealthy people come into the area, everyone else will follow. Building low-income housing is the last thing you do — not the starting point, he said.

Ochoa said a flow between high and low was needed, illustrated by the availability of expensive coffee and $2 gorditas at Grand Central Market, and the skateboarders at the Caltrans building Mayne designed on Main Street.

Chait said that downtown’s evolution is being driven by renters rather than by super-wealthy buyers. You’re never going to gentrify all of downtown, he said. The challenge is to create housing for the people who already live there instead of relocating them.

At what point, asked Medina, will downtown start attracting people over age 45?

It already is, said Chait — at least to eat. On a Saturday night at his restaurant Bestia in the arts district, there’s a moment when you’ll see people from the Westside: right before dark.

The balance of political power is shifting, said the panelists, pointing to Los Angeles City Councilman Jose Huizar, who represents downtown and has a great deal of clout, particularly when it comes to urban planning.

In the question-and-answer session, an audience member asked the panel what can be done to make downtown feel safer.

Loukaitou-Sideris said that vibrant, more populated streets mean fewer opportunities for crime. She did a study of bus stops around L.A. and found that the 10 most dangerous stops were downtown — and they were often just a few feet away from stops on the same line with no crime. An open storefront adjacent to the stop versus an empty lot made all the difference, she said.

Another audience member asked the panelists to weigh in on downtown’s Grand Park. It feels “kind of one-dimensional,” the individual said. Is it going to be a truly great, central public space?

It’s not finished yet, said Ochoa, who was echoed by Loukaitou-Sideris.

“Give it a few years,” said Loukaitou-Sideris. It’s still quite sterile, but people — rather than design and planning — may change it.

Thinking L.A. is a partnership of UCLA and Zócalo Public Square. This piece has been adapted from one running on the Zocalo Public Square website.

 

Why Blaming Health Care Workers Who Get Ebola Is Wrong Public policy professor John Villasenor argues that data and statistical methods can protect health workers.

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Since the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention confirmed on Oct. 12 that a Texas health care worker tested positive for Ebola, media outlets have reported that health officials are now “scrambling” to find out how she contracted the disease despite wearing protective gear. According to the head of the CDC, the infection was caused by a “breach in protocol” that officials are working to identify.

Public Policy professor John Villasenor argues in an article published on Forbes.com that while working to identify weak links in protocol is important, blaming the health worker for breaching protocol ignores the fact that, statistically, having multiple contacts with Ebola patients will lead to an inevitable “limited number of transmissions to health workers.”

He writes:

“This is because if you do something once that has a very low probability of a very negative consequence, your risks of harm are low. But if you repeat that activity many times, the laws of probability—or more specifically, a formula called the “binomial distribution”—will eventually catch up with you.

For example, consider an activity that, each time you do it, has a 1% chance of exposing you to a highly dangerous chemical. If you do it once, you have a 1% chance of exposure. If you do it twice, your chances of at least one exposure are slightly under 2%. After 20 times, you have an 18% chance of at least one exposure, and after 69 times the exposure probability crosses above 50%. After 250 times, the odds of exposure are about 92%. And the exposure odds top 99% after about 460 times.

In other words, even if the probabilities are strongly stacked in your favor if you do the activity only once, with repetition the probabilities flip against you.”

Villasenor ends his article by offering three recommendations for how to analyze this situation, including avoiding assumptions. You can read the full article here.

In another piece published in Slate on Oct. 15, Villasenor asserts that big data should be used as a “core component of the strategy” to protect health workers from Ebola exposure. Big data and statistical methods are vital in analyzing how Ebola can spread and shouldn’t be treated as an afterthought, he says.

Villasenor urges health officials to collect data about interactions between health workers and Ebola patients, and develop protocol for simulations so that health workers can practice using and removing protective gear.

He concludes:

“Big data and statistics alone aren’t going to keep health workers safe from Ebola. But they can certainly help. If we are going to ask health workers to repeatedly step into rooms with patients contagious with a virus that now appears to have a fatality rate of about 70 percent, we have the obligation to do everything possible to minimize the chances that they might be exposed. And today, we’re not doing nearly enough.”

UCLA Ranked in Top Five Urban Planning Programs The Department of Urban Planning was named the fourth best planning program in North America by Planetizen.

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UCLA Luskin’s Department of Urban Planning has been ranked No. 4 in North America, according to the latest survey of the nation’s top graduate programs in urban planning by Los Angeles-based planning and development network Planetizen.

Planetizen’s latest guidebook also ranks UCLA No. 4 on its list of best graduate planning programs according to educators and the No. 2 program on the West Coast. In addition, UCLA is in the top five schools for most diverse student body in an urban planning program.

In terms of specialty areas, Luskin’s urban planning department was named in nine of those areas, including: Community Development, Economic Development, Environmental/Sustainability Planning, Housing, International Development, Land Use/Physical Planning, Regional Planning, Transportation Planning, and Urban Design.

For more information on the rankings and Planetizen’s methodology, go here.

In other studies, UCLA has taken the top spot for faculty productivity and reputation. An analysis published late last year found that UCLA faculty members averaged the highest number of total citations, and the School ranked second for average citations per year for faculty. In that same study, Urban Planning Professor Michael Storper was also ranked the No. 2 most cited planning faculty member of any school. Confirming this finding, in July Professor Storper was named to Thomson Reuters’ list of the World’s Most Influential Scientific Minds of 2014.  Researchers who published numerous articles that ranked in the top one percent of the most cited in their respective fields in the given year of publication made the list.

Newton to Write on Region’s Civic Life for UCLA Luskin The Los Angeles Times journalist begins a new role designed to deepen UCLA's ties to the region's civic life

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newton_slideVeteran journalist and author Jim Newton will join the faculty and staff of UCLA in a new role designed to deepen UCLA’s ties to the civic life of Los Angeles and the region.

Newton, is best known for his 25-year career at the Los Angeles Times, where he spent time as a reporter, editor, bureau chief, editorial page editor and columnist.

In his enhanced role, Newton’s first project will be to develop and launch a new quarterly university journal highlighting UCLA research in fields that are particularly relevant to Southern California. The journal will also highlight our region’s leading institutions and influential figures. The journal will serve as the centerpiece of a series of public events. It will be housed in the Luskin School of Public Affairs and jointly published with External Affairs Public Outreach.

Newton will also serve as an advisor for other UCLA public outreach programs, for which he has appeared several times as a moderator or panelist in recent years. At the same time, he will take on an increased teaching load in the Communication Studies Department, where he has taught journalistic ethics since 2010. In addition to that course, Newton will begin teaching a special course in writing starting next year. He will continue to serve as a UCLA Luskin Senior Fellow, a distinction he has held since 2008, mentoring and engaging graduate students in Los Angeles’ civic life.

In addition to his career as a newspaperman and academic, Newton is also an author, well-known for his biographies of California governor and Chief Justice Earl Warren (“Justice for All: Earl Warren and the Nation He Made,” Riverhead, 2006) and President Dwight Eisenhower (“Eisenhower: The White House Years,” Doubleday, 2011), a national best-seller. His next book, which he co-authored with former CIA Chief and Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta, is being released this week.

American Women Less Likely to Bike Than Dutch Women, Here’s Why Domestic roles influence the cycling habits of women across the world.

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By Alejandra Reyes-Velarde
UCLA Luskin student writer

The UCLA Institute of Transportation Studies’ Herbie Huff and transportation policy and planning doctoral student Kelcie Ralph say that American women are less likely to bike than Dutch women, largely to differences in domestic roles rather than infrastructure.

In an op-ed that ran in The Guardian’s bike blog on Oct. 3, the researchers said that “Despite years of progress, American women’s lives are still disproportionately filled with driving children around, getting groceries and doing other household chores…that doesn’t lend itself easily to two wheeled transportation.”

Their claims that infrastructure does not account for the differences in male and female bikers are supported by Ralph’s research, which reveals disparities between Dutch culture and labor policies as well as the gender gap of bikers in the U.S.

To learn more about their solutions to these disparities, you can read the full article here.

 

There’s a Brand New Vocabulary on the Streets, Says NYC Planning Rock Star UCLA Regents’ Lecturer Janette Sadik-Khan Discusses Designing the 21st-Century City.

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By Stan Paul

New York has long been known for its colorful language, distinctive regional accents and even its own definition of time: the proverbial “New York minute.”

But, while New Yorkers are still in a hurry, “There’s a brand new vocabulary on the streets,” said UCLA Regents’ lecturer and former commissioner of New York City Department of Transportation, Janette Sadik-Khan, who spoke to a full house Wednesday evening at UCLA. The event was part of the UCLA Luskin Welcome Week.

Sadik-Khan, who was appointed in 2007 by Mayor Michael Bloomberg, ran the department until 2013 and is currently a principal with Bloomberg Associates.

“You will see that there is a sea-change in what the streets of New York look like. There’s a brand new vocabulary on the street that didn’t used to be there,” she said. Throughout the evening, Sadik-Khan provided case studies and data about the many innovations and improvements that have occurred in recent years. These included transforming Times Square – “a crossroads of the world” —  into a pedestrian friendly place, expansion of bus service routes, the creation of the largest bike share program in U.S. and the addition of 400 miles of bicycle lanes, to name just a few.

“New Yorkers now talk about traffic calming. New Yorkers now talk about bike sharing. New Yorkers now talk about way-finding, said Sadik-Khan, adding, “There is just a completely different set of transportation options and designs on the streets of New York. Once known as the ‘mean streets’ I think they’ve really changed.” She noted that younger people today are looking for choices that include not taking on the burden of car ownership. This is important because “The choices we make today about how we prioritize our streets…has worldwide implications for generations to come.”

Sadik-Khan is acclaimed for her work to transform the transportation system in New York City. The crowd that filled the hall was made up of students, alumni, faculty and city and community leaders who work in the field. At the start of the evening, Sadik-Khan was introduced to the podium by Evelyn Blumenberg, chair of the UCLA Department of Urban Planning at the Luskin School of Public Affairs, who acknowledged Sadik-Khan’s renown in the transportation world.

“So often we hear about the many urban problems facing large urban areas…bankruptcy, poverty, poor urban design, traffic congestion, pollution and on,” said Blumenberg. “It’s awesome when someone in my own line of work achieves rock star status and tremendous visibility for helping to address some of these problems.”

“I’m really honored to be here with you as the Regents’ Lecturer at the Luskin School. I think the work is extraordinary, what you are doing here,” said Sadik-Khan.

During her lecture, Sadik-Khan outlined how increasing the safety and sustainability of a city is not just a single strategy, but “a panoply” that includes creating plazas and walkways and even creating places for people to just sit, putting “new life into old spaces.”

“Streets are our most valuable asset in cities and yet our street designs haven’t taken into account the ways people want to use them,” she said. “This dysfunction has somehow become accepted. We’ve become used to our streets as being out of balance.”

Sadik-Khan concluded the lecture with a word of caution and advice. Recounting the ways the media reported negatively on the changes she implemented in New York City, she explained that, “when you push the status quo, it can push back.” She added: “We are simply not going to create healthier, safer, more sustainable cities with the strategies that we followed up till now, that ignore all the other ways that a street is used.”

Her recommendation to the diverse audience of planners, academics, citizens and those who work daily in city government on these problems was this: “All sorts of new options are taking hold and planners need to adapt to these new changes and understand the way people want to get around. And we’re really just starting to glimpse what this shared economy means for transportation and cities.”

Following her presentation, transportation planning expert and Urban Planning Professor Emeritus Martin Wachs led a lively and informative question and answer session.

In addition to her Regents’ Lecture, Sadik-Khan was a guest speaker at an Urban Planning graduate course at the Luskin School on Thursday.

 

In studying suicide, he shines a light on a secret shame Social welfare professor Mark Kaplan says raising awareness about suicide is a key to preventing it.

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When people think of public health, they do not often think of suicidology — the study of the causes and prevention of suicide. Historically, public health has beeneither associated with Hollywood-style images of government workers investigating disease outbreaks or mistakenly equated to local health departments responsible for restaurant inspections and bureaucracy.

But more recently, the ever-changing public health field now faces a growing list of problems, including, chronic diseases such as cancer, heart disease and diabetes. Mark Kaplan, professor of social welfare at the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs, is working to ensure that suicide, the tenth-leading cause of death in the United States, is on this list.

While the causes of suicide are complex, during his 20-plus years studying it, Kaplan has become a leading suicidologist working to understand the range of determinants that lead to suicide.

At the heart of Kaplan’s study is one motivating factor: “to do work that can save lives.” In many of his conversations, Kaplan mentions two statistics that tumble off his tongue with the speed and familiarity of someone who has spent years laboring under them. Nearly, 40,000 people die by suicide every year in the United States and more than half of all suicides involve firearms.

“In general, we underappreciate the impact that suicide has on our country and even globally,” Kaplan said. “Not only is the victim of concern, but scores of others are affected, such as family members. A colleague of mine at my former university took her life at the peak of her career and left behind a very young child. We have all been touched by suicide.”

As each September — National Suicide Prevention Month — comes to a close, Kaplan reflects on some of the most salient facts about suicide that he has learned — points that continue to spur him onward in further study.

First, male and female veterans face high risk of suicide. Second, two-thirds of gun deaths in the United States are suicides. Third, more than 80 percent of suicides among older men involve firearms. And lastly, about a third of all suicide victims consumed alcohol immediately before their death and many of them were acutely intoxicated, particularly those who died of self-inflicted gunshot wounds.

Kaplan’s research has focused on using population-wide data to understand suicide risk factors among veterans, seniors and other vulnerable populations. And his work has significantly influenced clinical practices and public policy. Many references to his suicide research have appeared in reports by the prestigious Institute of Medicine. He has contributed to state and federal suicide prevention initiatives.

He’s also testified before the Senate Special Committee on Aging at its hearings on veterans’ health and was appointed by the secretary of veteran affairs to the VA Blue Ribbon Work Group on Suicide Prevention in the Veteran Population.

A study Kaplan published in 2010 on the hidden epidemic of suicide among women with military experience was the first to estimate the suicide risk among women with U.S. military service. The results showed that young women veterans have nearly triple the suicide rate of young women who have never served in the military.

“The elevated rates of suicide among female veterans should be a call-to-action, especially for clinicians and caregivers to be more attentive to the warning signs of suicide among women with military service,” Kaplan said.

In recognition of his work on veteran suicide (Kaplan and his colleagues published a landmark study in 2007 on the risk of suicide among male veterans prior to his study that focused on female veterans), Kaplan received a Distinguished Investigator Award from the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention.

Kaplan’s foray into what is generally thought of as a somber topic was through one of his professors while he was a public health graduate student at UC Berkeley. Richard Seiden had just published his groundbreaking study in 1978 of people who had attempted suicide by jumping off the Golden Gate Bridge. Years later, Kaplan collaborated with a colleague at the University of Illinois on a study that was the first to point out that, as of the mid-1980s, firearms were the most common suicide method among elderly women. They also demonstrated that despite this risk, few primary care providers would ask their at-risk elderly patients about access to firearms.

“This discovery was troubling to me as a researcher and a family member with elderly relatives,” Kaplan recalled. “And sadly, suicide as a public health priority is often neglected in contemporary societies. Silence and shame still surrounds suicide victims and their survivors.”

As Kaplan and his colleagues in suicidology know, much more research is needed to understand how personal, environmental and social factors determine suicide risk across people of different ages and how preventive interventions should be designed to best address the national suicide crisis. Currently, he is lead investigator on two National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism funded projects: “Acute alcohol use and suicide” and “Economic contraction and alcohol-associated suicides: A multi-level analysis.” So far, this research shows a high prevalence of alcohol involvement among persons who died by suicide during the recent economic downturn.

“I continue to see some positive developments in the field, such as a push to advance awareness of suicide prevention,” Kaplan said. “But there is still a need for a spotlight on this issue. The investment in suicide research and prevention is vastly underfunded. There is far more funding for research of other epidemics than there is for suicide.”

Kaplan is committed to training and mentoring the next generation of suicide researchers. He’s included many graduate students and young scholars in producing these important studies. “It’s imperative we offer students opportunities to conduct prevention research on one of the most pressing public health issues facing us today.”