Gun Violence Creates Shockwaves, Kaplan Says

Social Welfare Professor Mark Kaplan was featured in an Alabama Media Group article about a shooting at St. Stephen’s Episcopal Church in Vestavia Hills, Alabama. The attack left three people dead, but it is not considered a “mass shooting” since that term technically refers to shootings with four or more victims. Experts have noted that gun violence is on the rise in Alabama and across the United States, and the entire community of Vestavia Hills was rocked by the shooting. “When we hear about shootings in schools, churches, grocery stores, that does send shockwaves across the citizens,” said Kaplan, an authority on gun violence.


Astor Cautions Against ‘Making Schools Into Little Prisons’

Social Welfare Professor Ron Avi Astor spoke about competing approaches to curbing gun violence in an extended interview on the Slate podcast “What Next.” Astor cautioned against plans that would “make schools into little prisons” with metal detectors, steel doors, armed teachers and other strategies to “harden” campuses, which can deepen students’ anxiety, according to research. He called for vigilance to detect a constellation of risk factors displayed by potential school shooters, including suicidal thoughts, a hunger for attention and an extreme obsession with firearms, prior shooters and conspiracy theories that focus on harming others. Several other media outlets have also called on Astor to share his expertise on the most effective strategies to create a safe campus environment; current legislation to curb gun violence; and an eight-point call to action put forth by a nationwide coalition of scholars. They include Time, ABC News, the New York Times, EdWeek and K-12 Dive.


 

Alumni Notes

NEW ACCOMPLISHMENTS FOR 2 ALUMNI IN TRANSPORTATION

Maddy Ruvolo MURP ’20 was appointed to serve on the board of a federal agency that promotes accessibility, especially in transportation, for disabled people. 

Ruvolo currently works at the San Francisco Municipal Transportation Agency. She has spent her career ensuring that disabled people can seamlessly navigate their neighborhood and surrounding areas. 

Ruvolo, 29, is younger than the Americans With Disabilities Act and told the San Francisco Examiner that fact illustrates “how long so many people in the disability community have been waiting for accessibility. We’ve made huge strides, but there’s so much work yet to do.”

In the same article, Ruvolo said she believes San Francisco has been exemplary at offering micromobility — transportation that uses lightweight vehicles, especially electric ones borrowed through self-service rental programs, as an inclusive option for disabled people. With this opportunity to work with the Biden administration, she wants to take that concept and apply it on a grander scale across the country.

woman poses with buses in background

Lupita Ibarra

Lupita Ibarra ’10 MURP ’12 was recently hired to lead the City of Montebello’s Department of Transportation. 

In her role, Ibarra oversees the day-to-day operations of seven local routes, one express route, a semi-fixed-route feeder service, and a dial-a-taxi service. 

Ibarra was previously the senior operations manager in the Transportation Management Center of San Francisco MTA, where she developed operator forecasts, carried superintendent responsibilities within the light rail operating division, and led the development of new initiatives that included route and systemwide studies of service levels, operations, demand and strategic planning. 

In a story posted by TransitTalent, an online site focusing on the transit industry, Ibarra says, “I am very excited to return to Southern California, where I grew up riding public transit … bringing with me a decade of experience managing major transportation systems in San Francisco. My goal is to improve the riding experience for our passengers, which we will achieve through improving the reliability and safety of the system, investing in a modern and sustainable fleet all while making [Montebello Bus Lines] a great place to work.”


headshot of individual in the story

Culver City Mayor Daniel Lee

SOCIAL WELFARE ALUMNUS IS NOW CULVER CITY’S MAYOR

Daniel Lee MSW ’15 is serving his first term as the mayor of Culver City following a previous term as vice mayor.

He became the first African American member of the Culver City Council upon election in 2018.

Lee has said that his inspiration to be of service comes from his grandmother, who participated with Martin Luther King Jr. in the Montgomery bus boycott.

Lee, who earned his doctorate at USC in 2021, is a veteran of the U.S. Air Force and California Air National Guard. He was formerly a filmmaker and actor, and, for 17 years, volunteered with El Rincon Elementary School students in an artist and communication program.

He has also been a social worker and a union-affiliated campaign worker. Lee’s current and past affiliations include the Board of Directors for Move to Amend, the Backbone Campaign, Mockingbird Incubator and the Clean Power Alliance.

In addition, Lee served on the Culver City Martin Luther King Jr. Celebration Committee for seven years. He developed a civil rights curriculum that was implemented at the city’s Teen Center to increase young people’s understanding of their country’s history.


 

portrait photo of Kergan

Sasha Wisotsky Kergan

URBAN PLANNING GRADUATES RECEIVE STATE APPOINTMENTS

California Gov. Gavin Newsom has appointed two alumnae of UCLA Luskin Urban Planning to new positions with statewide impact. 

Sacramento resident Sasha Wisotsky Kergan MA UP ’10 has been appointed as the deputy secretary of housing and consumer relations at the Business Consumer Services and Housing Agency. This is not Kergan’s first time working at the California Department of Housing and Community Development’s Division of Housing Policy Development. Since 2017, she has held the positions of housing policy specialist, housing policy manager, and data and research unit chief. In addition, she was asset manager at the Oakland Housing Authority from 2015 to 2017. While at UCLA, she emphasized real estate development and finance in her studies.

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Lande Ajose

Oakland resident Lande Ajose MA UP ’95 has been appointed to the California Cradle-to-Career Data System Governing Board. Ajose has been vice president and senior fellow at the Public Policy Institute of California since 2021. She was senior policy advisor for higher education in Newsom’s office from 2019 to 2021, where she chaired the Governor’s Council for Postsecondary Education. Throughout Ajose’s career, she has focused on improving the lives of Californians. She works in state government, private philanthropy and research institutions to do so. Her research interests include addressing issues of inequality through education and employment.


 

portrait photo of Jackson

Maria Rosario Jackson

URBAN PLANNING ALUMNA LEADS NATIONAL ENDOWMENT FOR THE ARTS

Urban Planning alumna Maria Rosario Jackson Ph.D. ’96 has been confirmed as chair of the National Endowment for the Arts, becoming the first African American and Mexican American woman to lead the federal agency. 

“The arts are critical to our well-being, to robust economies and to healthy communities where all people can thrive,” said Jackson, a professor at Arizona State University who has served on the National Council on the Arts since 2013. 

For more than 25 years, Jackson’s work has focused on understanding and elevating arts, culture and design as critical elements of strong communities. 

She has served as an advisor on philanthropic programs and investments at national, regional and local foundations, including the Los Angeles County Cultural Equity and Inclusion Initiative and the Smithsonian Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage. She serves on the board of directors of the Performing Arts Center of Los Angeles County, among other organizations, and her work appears in a wide range of professional and academic publications. 

She also taught a UCLA course on arts, culture and community revitalization. 

Jackson grew up in South Los Angeles and credits her parents with instilling a love of the arts in her family.


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Aurea Montes Rodriguez

MSW ALUMNA SPEAKS DURING UCLA CHANGEMAKERS SUMMIT 

UCLA Luskin alumna Aurea Montes-Rodriguez BA ’97 MSW ’99, participated in March 2022 in the UCLA Alumni Association’s three-day summit, known as Changemakers.

The summit is designed to empower attendees to gain the knowledge needed to champion diversity, equity and inclusion in the workplace. Montes-Rodriguez is executive vice president at Community Coalition. 

She spoke virtually along with other UCLA alumni: John Ho Song ’85, executive director, Koreatown Youth and Community Center, and Henry Perez ’00 MA ’03, associate director, InnerCity Struggle. 

Montes-Rodriguez has worked at Community Coalition for more than 20 years. In 2017, she was named Social Welfare Alumna of the Year, an award that honors Joseph A. Nunn, a UCLA alumnus and former vice chair and longtime former director of field education for UCLA Social Welfare.

Born in Mexico and raised in South Los Angeles, Montes-Rodriguez developed a passion for creating change at the local level. She has been a key leader responsible for building Community Coalition’s youth programs to fight for educational equity, leading efforts to keep children in family care and out of the foster care system, helping to build organizing capacity in South L.A., and leading a capital campaign to transform the organization’s headquarters into a state-of-the-art hub for community organizing.

Alumni Accolades Job changes and other updates from UCLA Luskin graduates

Jane Davis MSW ’16 accepted a new position at UCLA Counseling and Psychological Services as a staff social worker.

Joshua Baum BA ’15 MURP ’18 is the new research analyst for the Southwest Regional Council of Carpenters, performing a multitude of economic and planning research tasks to inform contract negotiations, legislative initiatives and other activities across the organization.

Kimberly (Clark) Macakiage MPP ’02 is the director of 1115 Medicaid Waiver and Accountable Care at Austin Travis County Integral Care. She also will be one of the panelists at the 2022 Texas State of Reform conference, serving on a session about financing models for addressing the social determinants in health and wellness.

Elisabeth (Furbush) Mitha MPP ’08 is now the recruitment consultant at Springpoint, a national nonprofit organization that partners with select school districts and networks to design and launch new secondary schools that bring all students to college and career readiness.

Cara Vallier MPP ’02 is in a new position as mayoral assistant for the city of Seattle. Vallier is one of many UCLA Luskin alums who work in municipal government. 

Triple Bruin Silvia R. González BA ’09 MURP ’13 UP Ph.D. ’21 is now the UCLA Latino Policy and Politics Initiative’s director of research. Previously, González was the founding assistant director at UCLA Center for Neighborhood Knowledge and has previously collaborated with UCLA LPPI before taking on the new position. She is a proud Latina first-generation Ph.D.

Jaime Nack ’98 MPP ’02, founder and president of three squares inc., created a program for the UCLA Alumni Association called Bruin Business 100. The program highlights the determination and entrepreneurial spirit of Bruins. In its inaugural year, Bruin Business 100 will recognize the outstanding achievements of Bruin entrepreneurs, expand and connect the Bruin network, and inspire further innovation.

Kimberly (Lewis) Mundhenk ’02 MPP ’07 now holds a new position as education research and evaluation administrator of the Accountability Development and Policy Analysis Unit at the California Department of Education. Mundhenk is one of the dozens of MPP alumni working in education policy at all academic levels and organizations, including local, state and federal government, plus school districts, nonprofits and even locations overseas.

Vidya Sundaram MPP/MBA ’06 is the co-founder and CEO of Family Engagement. In March, Sundaram joined fellow Asian American female education leaders at the SXSW EDU conference session “Asian American Women Leading in EdTech” to discuss how their voices are critical in creating the tools and services used in education today.

In Support Meyer Luskin sharing life lessons is among recent events, gifts and fellowship efforts

Meyer Luskin, benefactor and namesake of the Luskin School of Public Affairs, spoke to UCLA students about leadership skills and responsible entrepreneurship at a March 3 gathering held in person and via Zoom.

Luskin shared stories from a long and varied career in investment advising, oil and gas, rental cars, beauty schools and, ultimately, the recycling of food waste. Scope Industries, the company he has led for more than six decades, turns tons of bakery goods that would otherwise have gone to landfills into food for livestock.

“Meyer is a businessman who invented a business, and that’s not common,” UCLA Luskin Dean Gary Segura said at the event. “Meyer had an idea, and his idea was to take something most people threw away and make it into something useful.”

Luskin’s talk included stories from his own UCLA education, which was interrupted by a tour of duty during World War II, and his experiences facing anti-Semitism as a young businessman. Luskin advised students embarking on their careers to examine their motivations, acknowledge conflicts of interests and uphold the highest ethics.

“You have to be retrospective about yourself,” he said. “You have to take time to think about what you’ve done and where you’re going and who you are and what you want.”

He encouraged those blessed with success in business to act responsibly and generously.

“The first principle is get good people, pay them well, think about them,” he said. “When you do something that’s right, it comes back and helps you. … It just works that way in a long life.”

Meyer and Renee Luskin also visited with many of the student fellows currently receiving their financial support while pursuing UCLA degrees, an opportunity that is a meaningful highlight for the Luskins and students that had not been able to take place face-to-face for two years because of the pandemic.


Panelists were Jarrett Barrios, Nina Revoyr and Ruby Bolaria-Shifrin, all of whom work in the philanthropic sphere.

SPEAKERS DISCUSS EQUITY, DIVERSITY DURING FIRESIDE CHAT

“Foundations and Racial Justice — Creating the Pathway for More Equitable and Inclusive Communities” brought together philanthropic leaders on March 31 for a virtual discussion of the critical role that foundations play in funding and working together for a more equitable and inclusive society.

Dean Gary Segura served as moderator. Panelists were Jarrett Barrios, senior vice president of strategic community and programmatic initiatives for the California Community Foundation; Nina Revoyr, executive director of Ballmer Group’s philanthropic efforts in Los Angeles County and California; and Ruby Bolaria-Shifrin, director of housing affordability at the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative.

“If we always wait until we are sure,” said Revoyr about making decisions in unfamiliar circumstances, “we’re never going to do it.”

The event was organized by the Equity, Diversity & Inclusion (EDI) committee of the Luskin School advisory board and schoolwide departmental leadership in support of UCLA Luskin’s Equity, Diversity and Inclusion funds. 

The financial support provided to students from underrepresented backgrounds advances the goal of diversifying the fields of public policy, social work and urban planning, providing several types
of support: 

  • Funded internships with nonprofit community organizations that otherwise couldn’t afford to provide a paid internship. This is a double win: The student gets paid while gaining professional experience, and the community organization gets a funded temporary position.
  • Student fellowships, allowing students to devote more time to learning instead of having to hold down a job or being saddled with an unsustainable debt load.
  • Creation of these fireside chats to support opportunities for students to meet in small groups with professionals in the field. The goal is to discuss pressing social issues and the i mplication on their work within public affairs.

In addition, board members Laura Shell, Vivian Rescalvo, Lourdes Castro Ramirez and Jacqueline Waggoner hosted a salon focused on EDI fundraising on May 3 at Shell’s home. The salon is an extension of the EDI efforts by Ramirez and Waggoner highlighted in the previous issue of Luskin Forum.


Los Angeles city planner Ken Bernstein, right, gave remarks at a Senior Fellows event in the fall. Photos by Mary Braswell and Amy Tierney

MENTORS, MENTEES CELEBRATE 25TH ANNIVERSARY OF SENIOR FELLOWS 

The Luskin School celebrated 25 years of mentorship and meaningful engagement through the Senior Fellows program on May 24. 

The mission of the premier leadership career training program is to engage prominent leaders as role models for graduate students from UCLA Luskin Public Policy, Social Welfare and Urban Planning. The program features policy, public service and community leaders who serve as mentors to guide Luskin students toward careers in the public interest.

The special occasion also provided an opportunity to honor and reflect upon the work of VC Powe, who was the heart of the program for years prior to her death in 2020. Her leadership, dedication and finesse in matching Senior Fellows to students was integral to its success. 

In recognition of the 25th anniversary and in memory of VC, the school also launched a successful fundraising campaign that raised over $25,000 to help sustain and grow this valuable program. The funds are being used to support programming and supplemental internship stipends
for students.


New scholarships for undergraduate public affairs students were established thanks to gifts from UCLA alumna and former congresswoman Lynn Schenk, left, and H. Pike Oliver, a UCLA Luskin Urban Planning alumnus.

NEW SCHOLARSHIPS BENEFIT PUBLIC AFFAIRS MAJORS

Several well-deserving students were selected as the first recipients of two new undergraduate scholarships beginning in the spring quarter. 

Established by UCLA alumna and former congresswoman Lynn Schenk, the Congresswoman Lynn Schenk Capstone Scholarship in Public Affairs will support students completing the required experiential learning capstone opportunity during their senior year. UCLA Luskin undergraduate majors participate in a three-quarter experiential learning capstone program that integrates the classroom and community. This experience gives students the opportunity to build practical expertise while also deepening understanding of their coursework.

The second award was established by H. Pike Oliver MA UP ’73 as the H. Pike Oliver Scholarship in Public Affairs to support students from underrepresented communities with an interest in addressing complex interdisciplinary issues related to urban and regional development. Students pursuing the public affairs degree are deeply engaged in learning skills and gaining knowledge that will improve how people live and help communities thrive. 

Like Schenk and Oliver, donors can create scholarships through current-expenditure or endowed gifts, providing essential support
to students whose academic promise and career goals embody the mission of the Luskin School.


people seated in foreground listen to speaker at podium while a screen shows an image of Martin Wachs

Students, colleagues and friends gathered to honor the legacy of transportation scholar Martin Wachs. Photo by Mary Braswell

URBAN PLANNING CELEBRATES 50 (PLUS!) YEARS AT UCLA

Half a century after the study of urban planning got its start at UCLA, alumni, faculty and friends returned to campus to celebrate the program’s enduring focus on activism and equity. 

Throughout the spring quarter, several of the nation’s thought leaders on urban planning and environmental justice shared their scholarship in a series of lectures. The commemoration included reflections on the legacy of the late Professor Martin Wachs, a renowned educator, researcher and influencer of transportation policy and planning. 

The celebration culminated on May 14 with a keynote speech by Dolores Hayden, a scholar of the history of the American urban landscape, followed by a festive gathering in the UCLA Franklin D. Murphy Sculpture Garden outside the Public Affairs Building that houses the Luskin School.

Alumni and friends are encouraged to support the Urban Planning department’s current top priority: student fellowships. By contributing to this fund, you help allow students to devote more time to learning instead of having to hold down a job or being saddled with an unsustainable debt load.

Dean’s Message

As some of you know, the Luskin School is a bit unusual compared with other institutions. 

The juxtaposition of Social Welfare, Urban Planning and Public Policy sets us apart from most other universities where schools of Social Work and schools of Public Policy are often standalone units, while Urban Planning rests in Design, Architecture or Environmental colleges. Policy and planning can occasionally be found together, but to have the three disciplines together makes the Luskin School something of a unicorn.

This is to our benefit, I believe. When I share our vision with donors, scholars and prospective students, I talk about our unique capacity to examine human well-being from different levels and units of analysis. At UCLA Luskin, we are interested in individuals, families and organizations; municipalities, metros and regions; states, nations and the globe. This is a strength. But to make use of this variety of perspectives, we require places — real and virtual — for faculty with these perspectives to share, cooperate and collaborate. This is the key virtue of our centers and institutes — to serve as a locus of dialogue and collaboration across the entire School.

The Luskin School is blessed to have sizable clusters of faculty interested in housing and homelessness, transportation, the environment, health and mental health, youth and child development, criminal justice and policing, international policymaking and its impacts, race, class and inequality, and so much more. What these various foci have in common is that each has faculty and student researchers in more than one department and, in some instances, all three. In order for the School to have its greatest impact, as a locus for pathbreaking research and to provide the best possible training for our students at every level, breaking down the organizational silos is critical.

In addition, nearly all UCLA Luskin centers/institutes have active participation from faculty outside of the School, within which the research unit provides a mechanism of collaboration and interdisciplinary dialogue. Today, faculty from dozens of departments and programs across nearly every division/school on the campus participate in one or more UCLA Luskin research center.

In this issue of Luskin Forum, we highlight some of the excellent work being done by these centers and institutes, and the ways in which that work advances the mission of the Luskin School. 

And there is much, much more to come.

Forward!

Gary

New Online Mapping Tool Helps California Prepare for Extreme Heat

As summer kicks off and California braces for more record-breaking temperatures, a new tool co-developed by UCLA researchers will help government officials, school administrators and communities visualize the neighborhoods most in danger from extreme heat. Low-income residents and communities of color are impacted most by hot weather, which is the deadliest effect of climate change in California. “Heat is an equity issue. Neighborhood by neighborhood, we’re going to be experiencing heat differently,” said Colleen Callahan, co-executive director of the UCLA Luskin Center for Innovation. “That’s why it’s important to identify where protections are most needed, and where they’ll have the biggest impact.” The online mapping tool developed by UCLA and the Public Health Alliance of Southern California allows users to find information about temperature extremes, explore vulnerable populations, understand community health situations and seek out state resources such as air conditioners for low-income households. Researchers created the tool with a variety of audiences in mind. For instance, data at the school district level can help educators understand how their risk compares to nearby districts. They can also identify funding programs to weatherize classrooms and playgrounds. Other users, like state agencies, nonprofit organizations, and local and tribal governments, can use the tool to identify where to target investments. At the household level, residents can find programs to make their homes more energy efficient, help pay for energy costs or install rooftop solar panels to provide cheaper electricity. The California Strategic Growth Council’s Climate Change Research Program provided funding.


 

Faculty, Students United by Their International Interests  

A desire to bring about change in a world that sorely needs it drew three UCLA Luskin undergrads to the Global Lab for Research in Action.

Joey Lu, Karlinna Sanchez and Anjani Trivedi spent their senior year immersed in research aimed at improving the health of women and children around the world — the primary focus of the Global Lab, which was launched at UCLA Luskin in 2019. They translated scholarly texts into persuasive op-eds and policy briefs, and used their skills in digital media and design to increase the audience for the lab’s important work.

“I really like that the Global Lab focuses on under-researched, hard-to-reach populations and doesn’t treat them like people cast aside but like people we could learn from,” Sanchez said.

The Global Lab is one of several UCLA Luskin entities with a distinctly international focus. The Latin American Cities Initiative, established by Associate Professor Paavo Monkkonen in 2019, fosters cross-border collaboration among students, scholars and professionals in the planning and policy fields. Often referred to as Ciudades, the initiative puts an emphasis on discerning shared lessons from different urban cultures. 

Since 2014, Global Public Affairs has offered Luskin School graduate students a chance to study abroad, learn from top scholars from across the UCLA campus and earn certificates in any of several international concentrations. GPA is led by Professor Michael Storper, who was also instrumental in developing an Urban Planning dual-degree program that includes a year studying in Paris.

UCLA Luskin also broadened its geographic scope with two ventures helmed by Adjunct Professor of Social Welfare Helmut Anheier: the transdisciplinary social sciences journal Global Perspectives, published by University of California Press, and the Berggruen Governance Index, a data-rich evaluation of the effectiveness of governments worldwide.

At the Global Lab, research on the well-being of vulnerable people around the world is led by Public Policy Professor Manisha Shah, the center’s director and an expert in microeconomics, health policy and international development. 

That research portfolio resonated with the trio of interns. 

Lu said a trip to Ghana after her freshman year opened her eyes to the powerful forces that keep some countries mired in poverty, and led her to triple major in public affairs, sociology and international development. 

Childhood trips back to her birthplace, India, exposed Trivedi to different lifestyles, heightening her interest in comparative economics and helping her think about her own place in the world.

Sanchez grew up in American Samoa, a U.S. territory that “everyone forgets about,” where their public school lacked tables and chairs and their classmates fell into apathy.

“I just see so much potential in my peers, in my population, but no one invests in them,” said Sanchez, who uses they/them pronouns.

The three were attracted to the Global Lab’s research but also its call to action. They worked closely with founding Deputy Director Janine N’jie David MPP ’14, and credited her with shaping a shared public affairs capstone project that would steep them in the research that intrigued them while tapping into their own talents to advance the lab’s mission.

The interns’ aim was to communicate the Global Lab’s work in compelling ways while refining its brand and digital presence. Over the year, the team revamped the lab’s website, stepped up its social media presence, created monthly newsletters and supported its events, taking care to measure the impact of each step of the communications strategy. 

In the end, Trivedi said, “it’s the people that have made this experience the most rewarding. This is a company culture where everyone is so passionate about what they do and they have this intrinsic motivation to create change.”

A New Hub at the Intersection of ‘Multiple Vulnerabilities’  

UCLA Luskin’s newest research initiative is deeply rooted in the community, with the aim of improving the well-being of its most vulnerable members. 

Launched in late 2019, the Hub for Health Intervention, Policy and Practice (HHIPP) connects scholars, policymakers and advocates for those battling poverty, racism, homophobia and discrimination of all kinds.

“We really see HHIPP as in service to Los Angeles’ diverse communities, especially those at the intersection of multiple vulnerabilities,” said Social Welfare Professor Ian Holloway, director of the initiative.

In his long career in research, Holloway has focused on health policy through a social justice lens, working closely with Social Welfare faculty colleague Ayako Miyashita Ochoa.

“When we looked across all of our projects, one of the unifying themes was that we always started with our community partnerships,” Holloway said. “We centered the needs and priorities of the communities that we’re engaged with: lots of diverse LGBTQ+ communities, BIPOC communities, communities of people who use different substances or who are street-connected.”

This has led to innovative and collaborative projects including one using machine learning algorithms to provide personalized information about HIV prevention to gay and bisexual young men. A team led by Miyashita Ochoa is working with people involved in L.A. County’s sex trade to measure the impact of a new state law that prohibits law enforcement from using condoms as evidence of sex work.

HHIPP is also tracking the trajectory of cannabis use among LGBTQ young people in the state. This includes efforts to understand high rates of tobacco use among gender-non-conforming youth, including the role of targeted marketing campaigns.

“And so the idea for HHIPP was really to unify all of these streams of research under one hub,” Holloway said.

HHIPP is committed to making its research widely accessible to the public. To share early findings from the hub’s tobacco-related research, Holloway hosted a webinar tied to LGBTQ Health Week and Transgender Day of Visibility.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, when the School’s signature Luskin Summit went virtual, HHIPP used the platform to share information on the coronavirus’ impact on the opioid crisis and the role of telemedicine in protecting sexual health.

Even though the pandemic lockdown struck HHIPP just as it was getting off the ground, Holloway noted that the COVID era also brought new opportunities, including development of a proposal to create community-based tools for vaccine promotion and delivery.

“We certainly have seized the moment in terms of trying to understand the impact of COVID on the communities that we’re serving,” he said.

HHIPP’s work has been funded by a variety of organizations, including the National Institutes of Health, the California HIV/AIDS Research Program and the California Bureau of Cannabis Control. The initiative established a cross-cutting advisory board and continues to launch partnerships with community groups across Southern California.

Looking down the road, Holloway envisions a brick-and-mortar field site where HHIPP can truly serve the community. Local residents could come to the site for social services or health and mental health support. Scholars could co-create research alongside community members, and Social Welfare, Urban Planning and Public Policy students could develop their skills in real time and alongside policymakers.

“Bridging worlds together and locating power in community would be very aligned with our ethos at HHIPP,” Holloway said. “I think that that is one strategy that moves us closer to achieving our vision.”

An Institute Whose Name Is Also Its Mission

Upon receiving the naming gift from Meyer and Renee Luskin, the School embarked on a self-examination to codify a path forward. One goal identified a decade ago by the planning task force reads: “position UCLA Luskin as a national leader in analyzing and teaching about the root causes and consequences of inequality in America.” How? Create a research center — and that became the Luskin Institute on Inequality and Democracy, now in its sixth year. That name didn’t spring forth easily, however. Learn that history and more about the Institute, known for providing a voice for activists and advocates, from our former dean, the Institute’s founding director and a doctoral student who has been with the Institute almost since the beginning.

Frank Gilliam, whose tenure as dean at the Luskin School ended in 2015 when he became chancellor of the University of North Carolina at Greensboro

The Luskins are very interested in inequality and in a just society. It was the thing that they hammered home over and over. 

We started talking about creating a research action center to address that. And we fumbled in the weeds a bit for a couple of years, trying to figure out a name, trying to figure out what the institute would look like and the issues that it would work on.

It was called Institute X for a couple of years because we couldn’t figure out the name. And then, finally, we landed on two big concepts that, as it turns out now, often seem to be under attack. On the one hand, democracy, and on the other hand, equality. 

Ananya Roy, founding director of the Institute and professor of urban planning, social welfare and geography 

You didn’t want to call it the Institute for Social Justice?

Gilliam: We worried that social justice had such heavy quantitative meaning that people wouldn’t be able to give [the Institute] a chance to do the work, even settle on what it ought to be. So, we stayed away from that.

Roy: I think the name is a really interesting provocation. It prompted me to look at the ways in which democracies, inequality persist. How? Why? And what do we do
about that?

I had spent much of my academic career at UC Berkeley. And I was willing to make the move and serve as founding director of this institute because I found this to be such a wonderful and unusual opportunity.

I looked closely at other centers that are focused on inequality at other universities — Harvard, Stanford. And most of them focused on inequality but did not think about democracy simultaneously. None of them thought about space and cities. Almost none had serious relationships with communities and movements, and almost all of them were focused exclusively on the U.S.

Most of them were led by economists, so I said, “OK, we’re going to do something different here” and take very seriously this question of power, political power, or collective action of what a radical meaningful democracy would mean. What it means to actually think about issues such as housing in relation to rights.

We’re going to do this by paying close attention to the spaces in which people actually live their lives and struggle with these forms of inequality. And we are going to recognize the connections across different parts of the world.

What makes us different, even from other centers in the Luskin School and at UCLA, is that we realize that we can’t do this work without building deep relationships of trust with the communities that are actually most impacted by inequality. 

In Los Angeles, this is everything from unhoused communities to working-class communities of color
facing eviction to the communities that are subject to racialized policing.

In my early years as a director, I spent a lot of time getting to know movements in these communities, spending time at community events and with community organizations. I joked early on that L.A. is the sort of city — this was before COVID — that you showed love by showing up. You braved the traffic and you showed up consistently. … And sit in the back of the room and listen and learn.

Now we have research partnerships with movement organizations … the research we do is often “homework” assigned to us by communities in need and by movements that are doing the advocacy work.

I’m very proud … we’ve done our work with integrity. Powerful universities are often mistrusted by communities that are suffering. They’re worried about how academic research almost extracts their stories, puts it on display without giving anything back.

We try very much to do the opposite. I call this research justice. It is about being accountable to the communities most impacted and to those whose futures and whose reality we are writing about. 

Mostly importantly, we believe that they have the right to critique us, to call us out and to say, “You didn’t do this properly. Do it again.”

Hilary Malson, a June 2022 doctoral graduate in urban planning who is among the many students who have worked with Roy or received funding through the Institute

My first introduction to working with the Institute actually started before I set foot on campus. Professor Roy, she reached out to me once I was admitted as a Ph.D. student and asked me to consult on a grant that she was putting together.

I have previous work experience in public history … as a curatorial research assistant at the Smithsonian Institution. From the moment I arrived on campus, I was involved in stewarding that housing justice and unequal city research coordination.

My independent dissertation work … analyzes Black displacement from cities through a critical Black diaspora studies lens. So, instead of quantifying and mapping the losses of gentrification — how many people no longer live here, for instance — I ask, what does community building look like for a people that has faced ongoing, generational displacement and dispersal.

The work that we have undertaken on housing justice is community-based, first and foremost, which means it is fundamentally and primarily accountable to the communities with whom we study and from whom we learn so much.

Gilliam: The work that this center does is extraordinarily important. And I think the thing that separates it — its secret sauce — is that it also translates into action. And that’s the part I’d hoped for.

But it took Professor Roy to make that happen, and I’m so glad it did.