Literacy Campaign Trains Family and Friends to Teach Reading and Writing in Spanish

For Centro Latino’s students, among the approximately 202,000 people in Los Angeles County who are non-literate in Spanish and English, the inability to read and write can turn a 2-hour bus ride into a 6-hour ordeal,  Read the article

The Who’s Hungry? theater project aims to raise our awareness of the lives of people who, on a daily basis, must choose between food and rent, food and medicine, food and bus fare—the range of life’s basic necessities. But don’t expect a sobering play performed by live actors. Read the article

Tackling Employment Discrimination Against Former Prisoners

UCLA law students and the community organization A New Way of Life join forces on the Prisoner Re-entry Initiative, supporting former prisoners in restoring their lives and, in turn, stimulating economic development in South Los Angeles. Read the article

Public Markets as Engines for Urban Revitalization November 2, 2007 Thai Community Development Center and UCLA School of Public Affairs partner to study public markets as a tool for immigrant entrepreneurship and social integration in East Hollywood.  Read the article

Transcending AIDS in South Africa

A monumental artwork created by 130 women from South Africa's Eastern Cape province commemorates the lives of individuals who have died of the disease and celebrates the community's determination to prevail in the face of AIDS. download brochure and/or download sermon.

UCLA’s Virtual Pioneers: Remapping Los Angeles

A bold new experiment in community-based computing is currently underway in downtown Los Angeles.  Read the article

She Motivates Troubled Teens to Change

Psychologist Marguerita Lightfoot has a formidable task — she develops intervention programs designed to change the behavior of troubled young people who have committed crimes or live on the streets. Many have mental health problems; some are prostitutes and drug users.

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Exposing Locals to LA's Secret Cultural Enclaves

UCLA and the nonprofit organization LA Commons took Angelenos on a daylong exploration of some of the city’s best-kept secrets. The event, “Trekking Los Angeles: Local Adventures in a Global City,” was designed to promote Los Angeles’ cultural diversity by introducing people to neighborhoods they may have driven past but never gotten to know.  Read the article

The Other Side of LISTOS!

Spanish Professor Susan Plann tells how a partnership introducing Spanish to African-American second and third graders in Leimert Park is also providing UCLA students with a once-in-a-lifetime learning experience.

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Engaged Scholarship at Work at Centro Latino

Helping her students to sound out a word, write their name, or just convince them that they could still learn after so many years reminded UCLA student Michelle Smith Meza of a promise she had made to herself as a child. "I told myself that if I ever was in the position to help other people, I would," she said. Read the article

UCLA Dr. Timothy Fong Talks about Asian Gambling

"Very clearly, without the UCLA in LA award we would not have pursued this partnership further. We had been talking, but we didn’t have the time and the resources to donate to them."

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