Author Archives: Jonathan Van Dyke

Assemblymember Sydney Kamlager-Dove introduces a special California State Boards and Commissions Appointments Workshop at the UCLA Faculty Center. (photos by Jonathan Van Dyke)

The California Governor is in charge of more than 3,000 appointments to more than 295 boards and commissions that span topics ranging from medicine, to water, and even the movie industry.

Civically engaged volunteer applicants are needed continually to fill these positions, and UCLA Government and Community Relations partnered with 54^th District Assemblymember Sydney Kamlager-Dove to offer a special workshop for the campus community to describe the process of applying.

More than 200 people attended the special California State Boards and Commissions Appointments Workshop on Sept. 27, which was hosted at the UCLA Faculty Center. Governor Jerry Brown’s Appointment Secretary Mona Pasquil moderated. She and a panel of four current and former board and commission members introduced instructions for how to apply while answering audience questions.

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UCLA Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs Monroe Gordon commits the university to the first annual College and University Voter Registration Ballot Bowl. (photos by Jonathan Van Dyke)

As California Secretary of State Alex Padilla stood before a group of enthusiastic UCLA students in front of the UCLA Athletics Hall of Fame, he couldn’t help but smile about his choice of campuses to kick off the inaugural College and University Voter Registration Ballot Bowl.

“I feel the energy, and we just need to keep building on it into the November election,” he said, adding that the UCLA students present represented the “true Bruin spirit, the spirit of teamwork, spirit of community service, and the spirit of friendly competition.”

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Amgen Scholar Christina Liu works in the bioengineering lab of Prof. Dan Kamei. Liu later earned her B.S. in bioengineering.

Fourth largest employer in L.A. County supports more than 72,000 full-time jobs

Article originally appeared in UCLA Newsroom by Katherine Alvarado.

UCLA is an economic powerhouse for Los Angeles, Southern California and California overall. A study by the Beacon Economics consultancy found that UCLA generated a total of $11.06 billion in economic activity and supported more than 72,700 full-time jobs throughout the state during the 2016–17 fiscal year.  

The report also found that UCLA is the fourth largest employer in Los Angeles County, behind the county itself, the Los Angeles Unified School District and the City of Los Angeles, and ahead such companies as Kaiser Permanente, Northrop Grumman and Target Corp. 

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Fifth District County Supervisor Kathryn Barger addresses the room flanked by UCLA Government and Community Relations Executive Director Richard Benbow and Executive Vice Chancellor and Provost Scott Waugh. (photos by Jonathan Van Dyke)

Fifth District Supervisor Kathryn Barger came to UCLA with a commitment to working with experts here to end homelessness and treat the county’s health and mental health issues that often go hand-in-hand with this countywide crisis.

“Mental health and health, in general, are my passions,” she said during a roundtable discussion on Sept. 6 at UCLA Center for Health Sciences.

At the start of her career, Barger worked as former Firth District Supervisor Mike Antonovich’s health deputy, and she has maintained her commitment to those issues ever since. “We have to look at the cause of what’s taking place in this population and what is growing it. I am committed to working with you all … This isn’t about any one district.”

Barger heard from an accomplished group representing three major facets of UCLA’s work with the homeless community:

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State Sen. Holly J. Mitchell hasn’t forgotten about the importance of higher education as she has ascended to chair of the Senate Budget and Fiscal Review Committee.

California State Senator Holly J. Mitchell has been working toward this moment for as long as she can remember.

“I’ve always been civically active, so I grimace when people confess that they aren’t,” she said from her office in Exposition Park, reflecting on a life dedicated to her community at large. “It’s our collective and individual responsibility.”

It wasn’t that Mitchell’s parents forced this mentality onto her, but both were social workers, and social consciousness and advocacy was just woven into the family persona. And sometimes that meant her mother needed to be out of the house at 5 a.m. to open a Riverside County clinic.

“Sometimes it’s circumstance. “My mother would say, ‘Come ride with me to Blythe on a Saturday morning.’” Mitchell playfully rolls her eyes recalling a 5 a.m. trip to a Riverside County methadone clinic. “It’s just what they did. And so it was an integral part of me.”

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U.S. Reps. Lou Correa and Jimmy Gomez visited with Chancellor Gene Block, students, staff and faculty during a special luncheon regarding the McNair Research Scholars Program.

Through her research, UCLA student Brenda Lara has coined the term epistemic unconfidence. The first generation philosophy and Chicano/Chicana studies student defines the term as such: that structures of power continuously deny Latinas intelligence, leading those women to believe they are incapable of producing “legitimate” knowledge.

It’s a topic she has observed in her family through her mother and across her community in Huntington Park. As she continues her education, Lara wants this research to make a difference back home and positively impact her hometown and beyond.

At a special roundtable luncheon on Aug. 7, members of U.S. Congress and a cohort of students, faculty, staff, and Chancellor Gene Block bonded over their work to give back to the community, and better help the state and country at-large understand their backgrounds and the people in their communities.

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