Category: Research

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Ernesto Arciniega is pursuing his Ph.D. in Hispanic Literatures at UCLA and currently serves as Vice Chair of the University of California Graduate and Professional Council (UCGPC). Ernesto served as board member on the AS-UCLA Board of Directors, a student-run, non-profit with an $80 million budget that governs UCLA’s student publications and media, UCLA’s student services, facilities and restaurants, and UCLA’s trademark and licensing.

Ernesto graduated with a B.A. in Spanish Peninsular and Latin American Literatures (Summa cum laude, Phi Beta Kappa) from UC Berkeley in 2016 and earned his Master’s degree in Hispanic Literatures from UCLA in 2018. Ernesto’s primary research interests are Contemporary Mexican and Chicanx literatures and cultures, border studies, Mexican immigration to the United States, and protest art.

Ernesto was born and raised in Tepic, Mexico and moved to San Diego, California in 2007. Ernesto is a strong advocate for social justice and immigrants’ rights: He has worked with different Hispanic/Latinx organizations at UC Berkeley and UCLA. He worked as Student Researcher for UC Berkeley’s Restorative Justice Center (2014) and as President of UC Berkeley UARLL (2015). Ernesto is the founder and former President of UCLA Hispanic Latinx Graduate Students Association (2017-2019), was the inaugural GSA Director of Diversity, Inclusion and Community Engagement (2018-2019) and has contributed as Student Advocate (STAR) to the UC Board of Regents. Today, Ernesto is an elected Councilmember for the North Westwood Neighborhood Council in the 5th District of the City of Los Angeles, where he advocates for building student affordable housing, improving public transportation and fighting for Westwood’s disfranchised.

Banks received her Ph.D. in Cultural Foundations of Education and a Certificate of Advanced Studies in Women’s Studies, from Syracuse University. She specializes in sociology of education, cultural studies, and qualitative research. Committed to educational reform and inclusion, Banks draws from educational theory, feminist theory, and critical race theory in her work and in her teaching, research, and writing. Her book Black Women Undergraduates, Cultural Capital and College Success (Peter Lang, 2009) expands the concept of cultural capital and provides practical ways colleges and universities can recognize and utilize the cultural capital of all students. She is the co-author of the edited text, Teaching, Learning and Intersecting Identities in Higher Education (Peter Lang, 2012). This book utilizes voices of scholars and students from a range of academic disciplines to analyze the ways divergent identities and experiences infiltrate the classroom. Her newest project entitled, “No Justice! No Peace! College Student Activism, Race Relations and Media Cultures” examines the implications of changing tides of student activism for college campuses. Banks has produced scores of articles, book chapters, and presentations and has won a wide array of honors, awards, and scholarships. A graduate of Monroe Community College she was inducted into Monroe’s Hall of Fame.

My scholarship is centered on exploring those organizational contexts and characteristics of higher education institutions that encourage individuals (students, faculty, staff) and universities (as organizational actors) to confront our collective democratic challenges which typically arise in the form of: cultural contestations, competition over sustainability of actions, disparities in natural and economic resources, human rights concerns, and deficiencies in legal or political processes. This focus has prompted me to study the campus characteristics that contribute to campus-based activism, factors shaping individual students’ acquisition of civic commitments and skills, campus administrators’ roles in creating inclusive educational environments for undocumented immigrant college students, and senior campus administrators’ displays of public advocacy for diversity and inclusion, among others. I apply an interdisciplinary perspective to these topics, drawing from the study of organizations, social movements and collective action, as well as individual identity development. While my theoretical approach is coherent, the topics I have pursued are somewhat diffuse. I submit however, that this variety of topics is revealing of the philosophy that guides my work: I aim to help colleges, and the people that comprise them, navigate real-life dilemmas that manifest on account of coexisting in a pluralistic democracy. As I often remind my students, rigorous educational research requires that it also be relevant to practice and to the context in which the research findings are likely to be applied.

Ryan Coonerty is on the Santa Cruz County Board of Supervisors and the two-time former Mayor of Santa Cruz. He is also an entrepreneur, author, and educator. He is currently the host of "An Honorable Profession" podcast and a long-time lecturer in Legal Studies, Politics and Jewish Studies at UC Santa Cruz. He is a guest lecturer at the Panetta Institute at CSU Monterey Bay and Santa Clara University. Previously, he cofounded NextSpace Coworking, co-authored of The Rise of the Naked Economy – How to Benefit from the Changing Workplace and wrote Etched in Stone – Enduring Words from our National Monuments. Ryan was selected by the Aspen Institute to be a Rodel Fellow in Public Leadership as one of "the nation’s most promising young elected officials.”

Ryan is a contributor to Governing Magazine, the San Francisco Chronicle, Huffington Post and numerous publications. In addition, he is a frequent speaker at conferences on government, education, planning and business. He graduated from Santa Cruz’s public schools and the Honor’s College at the University of Oregon. He received a master’s degree from the London School of Economics and a law degree from the University of Virginia School of Law.

Jill Dunlap, PhD, is Director for Research and Practice at NASPA-Student Affairs Administrators in Higher Education. Prior to NASPA, Jill was the Director for the CARE Office at the University of California, Santa Barbara, during which time she served on the Presidential Task Force to End Sexual Violence. She completed her PhD in Political Science and Public Administration and her dissertation work focused on the students impacted by sexual violence on campus. Jill’s research can also be found in several publications, most recently in Contested Issues in Troubled Times: Student Affairs Dialogues on Equity, Civility, and Safety. Jill has consulted with many national organizations, including the National Organization for Victim Assistance, Victims’ Rights Law Center, and the Department of Defense.

Alice Yau, PhD, is an Asian-American police officer for the Chicago Police Department (CPD). As an instructor and mentor, Alice is committed to advocating for underrepresented and marginalized populations within CPD and the greater community. Alice is committed to evidence-based research, curriculum development, and contributing to education. Alice has developed evidence-based law enforcement curriculum and has taught less-than-lethal tactics, use of force, and 4th Amendment rights to city, county, and university police departments for 12 years. Alice teaches police curriculum to reinforce the importance of professionalism, integrity, courage, dedication, and respect while on and off duty. Alice maintains her commitment to service through volunteer roles with the Asian Law Enforcement Association, Lesbian Gay Police Association and Gay Officers Action League of Chicago, CPD Run to Remember and Misericordia.

Dr. Flores is proud to be a lifelong product of the California public education system, from K-12, to college, to her doctorate in Urban Planning from the UCLA Luskin School of Public Affairs. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor at California State University Long Beach. Dr. Flores teaches in the Social and Cultural Analysis of Education graduate program, where she trains students as emerging scholars and practitioners focused justice, power, and resistance. She draws on current and community events to anchor academic ideas in everyday life, and uses critical pedagogies in her courses to engage students in deep analyses of social and educational inequities at global and local levels.

In her research Dr. Flores examines issues related to gender-based harassment experienced online, in public spaces, and at academic conferences. She has written journal articles and given scholarly presentations about gendered public space, street harassment, and most recently the targeted harassment of faculty members. As someone committed to public scholarship and civic engagement, she is recognizes the ways in which targeted harassment may silence faculty, leading them to self-censorship. Dr. Flores is a past fellow with The OpEd Project, and her public writing has been featured in national outlets such as the The Washington Post, The Huffington Post, Ms. Magazine Blog, YES! Magazine and Progressive Planning Magazine. Before returning to academia, Dr. Flores worked as a political messaging strategist and jury consultant, conducting pre-trial focus group research for legal cases in more than thirty states.

Nick Havey is a PhD candidate in the Higher Education and Organizational Change program in the Department of Education at the University of California, Los Angeles. His research interests fall under three areas: the intersection of whiteness and queerness, queer romantic and sexual politics, and student political organizations and political engagement. He works with Mitchell J. Chang (Professor of Education and Asian American Studies) and is an Editorial Assistant for the Journal of Higher Education.
In addition to ongoing work investigating how queer college students respond to a lack of sexual education through community building and self-study and how queer white men on college campuses understand and describe race and racism, Nick is working on a larger group of projects focused on campus political actors.

His ongoing political work considers the key predictors that explain why students change their political orientation over the course of college and how students across the political spectrum engage in campus political discourse and understand themselves as political actors, particularly in reference to students identifying at the other end of the spectrum, and how they develop and implement rhetorical and political repertoires. This qualitative, in-depth work is paired with a big data project that looks at politically engaged students’ information networks on Twitter, what news sources are central to these networks, and how these sources are impacting media literacy and, subsequently, informed civic engagement for the contemporary student. Future work will similarly consider faculty and staff information networks and implications for campus political discourse.

Jennifer Lambe is an associate professor in the Communication Department at the University of Delaware, ​with a joint appointment in the Legal Studies minor. She is a ​founding faculty member of the UD Center for Political Communication and is directing the center’s Initiative on Free and Responsible Expression. Lambe received her Ph.D. from the University of Minnesota​ in 2000​.

Her research and teaching focus broadly on media and democracy. Her areas of interest include (a) freedom of expression, both domestically and internationally; (b) media policy/law/ethics; and (c) the effects of media. ​In 2017 she co-authored the second edition of Media Effects and Society with Elizabeth M. Perse. ​Other current and recent projects include a forthcoming book, tentatively titled Remedies for Hate Speech, improved measurement of public (and campus) willingness to censor, updating measurement of political tolerance, public opinion about celebrity and athlete free speech, net neutrality and campaign finance issues.

Lambe has been partnering with the Vice Provost for Diversity at the University of Delaware for four years to provide regular campus programming about the tensions between free speech and hate speech. Their largest collaboration was a two-day symposium entitled “Speech Limits in Public Life: At the Intersection of Free Speech and Hate.” The program involved 19 keynote speakers and panelists from a variety of academic disciplines, lawyers, non-profit advocates, a college student who developed an anti-bullying app, and a former hate group member who is now an anti-hate activist.

Dr. Elizabeth Niehaus is Associate Professor in the Department of Educational Administration at the University of Nebraska – Lincoln. Her current research focuses on how we can create and improve educational environments to facilitate student learning and development in higher education, with a particular emphasis on the intersections of issues of free speech, academic freedom, and campus climate. Dr. Niehaus’s other research interests include study abroad, international education, graduate student and faculty professional development, and service-learning programs. At the University of Nebraska – Lincoln, Dr. Niehaus teaches courses on diversity issues in higher education, college student development, research methods, and free speech and campus climate.

Dr. Niehaus earned her Bachelor’s degree in Linguistics from the University of Virginia, her Master’s degree in American Culture Studies from Washington University in St. Louis, and her PhD in College Student Personnel Administration from the University of Maryland, College Park. She has published her research in a wide variety of scholarly and practitioner-oriented outlets, including the Journal of College Student Development, The Journal of Higher Education, the Journal of Student Affairs Research and Practice, and Frontiers: The Interdisciplinary Journal of Study Abroad. She has received a number of grants to further her research on alternative breaks, short-term study abroad, and tertiary student engagement and development in Trinidad and Tobago, and was a recipient of the 2017 Excellence in International Research and Service to the International Community Awards from ACPA: College Student Educators International.

Brian Soucek is Professor of Law at the University of California, Davis. He is a graduate of Boston College (B.A., Philosophy and Economics); Columbia University (Ph.D., Philosophy), where he was awarded the Core Preceptor Prize for his teaching; and Yale Law School (J.D.), where he was Comments Editor for the Yale Law Journal and won the Munson Prize for his work in the school’s immigration clinic. Prior to law school, Soucek taught for three years at the University of Chicago, where he was Collegiate Assistant Professor and Co-Chair of the Society of Fellows in the Liberal Arts. After law school, he clerked for the late Mark R. Kravitz, United States District Judge for the District of Connecticut, and the Hon. Guido Calabresi of the Second Circuit Court of Appeals.

Professor Soucek’s research and teaching spans constitutional law, particularly Equal Protection and the First Amendment, LGBT rights, asylum/refugee law, civil procedure, and law and aesthetics. His writing has been cited by the Sixth and Seventh Circuits; referenced and excerpted in leading casebooks in Immigration Law, Sexual Orientation Law, and Civil Procedure; discussed by the Wall Street Journal; and honored with the Dukeminier Award from UCLA’s Williams Institute for the year’s best article on sexual orientation and gender identity law. Professor’s Soucek is an elected Trustee of the American Society for Aesthetics; he is the Chair-Elect of the American Association of Law Schools Section on Law and Humanities; and he is currently serving as the Vice Chair of the University of California’s systemwide Committee on Academic Freedom.

Melissa J. Barthelemy is a Doctoral Candidate in Public History with a designated emphasis in Feminist Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara. She has served as an intern and consultant for the Vice Chancellor of Student Affairs assisting with special projects pertaining to free speech, campus climate, mental health services, and crisis management.

Barthelemy has helped lead campus and community responses to the May 23, 2014 Isla Vista Tragedy in which six UCSB students were killed and 14 individuals were injured in a violent rampage. As such, she has served as a liaison between family and friends of the victims and the University administration, and has played a lead role in organizing memorial anniversary events. She is interested in relationships between intolerant and offensive speech, campus safety, and hate crimes committed in college environments. She has presented at national conferences on the topics of proactive responses to free speech community controversies, and campus responses to violence.

She holds a J.D. from Golden Gate University School of Law with an emphasis in Public Interest Law, an M.A. from San Francisco State University with an emphasis in United States Constitutional History, and a B.A. from University of California Santa Cruz in United States History. For more information visit http://www.melissabarthelemy.com.

Jonathan Friedman is the program director for campus free speech at PEN America where he oversees advocacy, analysis, and outreach in the national debate around free speech and inclusion in higher education. Prior to joining PEN America, Friedman was an adjunct professor at NYU and Columbia University, teaching courses in comparative and international education, higher education, and social theory. His research on American and international higher education looks at such topics as university administration, organizational cultures, nationalism, and cross-cultural understanding. Friedman holds a Ph.D. in International Education from NYU, and has received awards for his teaching, research, and leadership.

Nikita Gupta specializes in Transforming Trauma through Healing and Resiliency in educational as well as public and private settings. She is a recognized leader and educator and has worked nationally with at-risk communities, educational leaders and community service providers. Nikita is the founder of the innovative GRIT Coaching program at University of California, Los Angeles. The GRIT (Guidance, Resilience, Integrity, and Transformation) Program is nationally recognized as a model for excellence in mental health promotion, advocacy, and transformation for students, staff and faculty.

As a 2020 Fellow of the National Center for Free Speech and Civic Engagement, Nikita designed educational frameworks that are adaptable to various contexts for engaging communities in Trauma-Informed Practice and Embodied Leadership. Nikita’s methodology is interdisciplinary and includes Neurobiology, Positive Psychology and Somatic Education through prisms of Community Health and Social Justice.

Nikita’s work is rooted in practices of personal empowerment and social healing. Her ultimate goal is to recontextualize the untapped potential of healing, mindful awareness and resilience into institutional spaces toward achieving a greater capacity for holistic success, thriving and connection for all.

Nikita received her Master’s in Public Health from UCLA. She is also a long-time Yoga Teacher and Meditation Facilitator. Her efforts to integrate practices of healing and restoration are dedicated to both individuals and organizations. Through training, coaching and consultation, she aspires to uplift the collective in bravely moving through the unknown, while finding joy and satisfaction in each day.

Spoma Jovanovic, PhD, is a professor in the Department of Communication Studies at the University of North Carolina, Greensboro. Since 2001, she has been teaching students there how to collaborate with community members on programs and activist strategies designed to enhance ethical conversations and action related to civic literacy, cultural understanding, democratic participation, and social justice.

She is the author of the book, Democracy, Dialogue and Community Action: Truth and Reconciliation in Greensboro, and editor of Partnerships: A Journal of Service-Learning and Civic Engagement. Dr. Jovanovic’s scholarship has been featured in dozens of academic journal articles and book chapters, as well as in national magazines, daily newspapers, and a 2013 TEDx Greensboro talk.

Her communication activism has included launching, with the community, the first U.S. truth and reconciliation process, bringing participatory budgeting to her city, and advancing political engagement with an urban high school, as well as expanding spaces for free speech.

Rebecca MacKinnon directs the Ranking Digital Rights (RDR) project at New America, working to set global standards for corporate respect for freedom of expression and privacy online. The RDR Corporate Accountability Index ranks the world’s most powerful internet, mobile, and telecommunications companies on relevant commitments and policies, based on international human rights standards. (See: https://rankingdigitalrights.org) Author of Consent of the Networked: The Worldwide Struggle For Internet Freedom (2012), MacKinnon co-founded of the citizen media network Global Voices, serves on the Board of Directors of the Committee to Protect Journalists and was a founding board member of the Global Network Initiative. Fluent in Mandarin Chinese, she was CNN’s Bureau Chief and correspondent in China and Japan between 1998-2004. She has also taught at the University of Hong Kong and the University of Pennsylvania, and held fellowships at Harvard, Princeton, and the Open Society Foundations.

Saugher Nojan is a PhD Candidate in Sociology with a designated emphasis in Critical Race & Ethnic Studies at the University of California, Santa Cruz. Her research focuses on social inequality, immigrant/refugee integration, civic/political engagement and education. Saugher is trained in community-collaborative research methods and worked as a graduate researcher for the Center for Collaborative Research for an Equitable California and the Student Success Equity & Research Center. She is also a former fellow for the California Immigration Research Initiative. Saugher received her Masters in Education at UC Santa Cruz and was recently awarded the 2019 Chancellor’s Achievement Award for Diversity.

Contact Saugher on Twitter: @snojans.

Lara Schwartz teaches at American University School of Public Affairs, where she founded and directs the Project on Civil Discourse. She specializes in civil discourse and campus speech, constitutional law, civil rights, politics, communications, and policy. Drawing on her experience as a legislative lawyer, lobbyist, and communications strategist in leading civil rights organizations, Lara emphasizes collaborative learning and universal design in her teaching. She has served as a Faculty Fellow at AU’s Center for Teaching, Research, and Learning.

Andrea Malkin Brenner, PhD is a sociologist and college transitions educator who works with high school students and their parents on challenges related to college transitions. She also works with high school and college faculty and administration to design first-year experience programs. Andrea is the creator of the nationally-recognized American University Experience (AUx) Program, now a mandatory full-year course for first-year students at American University. Previous to that, Dr. Brenner served as a faculty member in the Department of Sociology at American University for 20 years, teaching classes on inequality, social problems, and the life course. She also directed AU's University College program, the university's oldest and largest living-learning community for first-year students.

They are co-authors of How to College: What to Know Before You Go (And When You’re There).

Emerson is a staff attorney with the ACLU Speech, Privacy, and Technology Project where he focuses on First Amendment free speech protections.

Prior to joining the ACLU in 2018, he was a legal advisor for Africa at the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law (ICNL). He provided technical legal assistance to African civil society leaders, government officials, law students, and other stakeholders to improve the legal framework protecting the freedom of association, assembly, and expression. Emerson previously served as assistant general counsel to the New York City Council, where he worked to increase transparency for council members’ discretionary spending, and contributed to the council’s friend-of-the-court brief against the NYPD’s “Stop and Frisk” program. In 2011, he was as senior policy fellow in the office of a Member of Parliament in Ghana. Earlier in his career, Emerson conducted research and wrote about U.S. foreign policy for The Century Foundation and worked for the National Democratic Institute’s Central and West Africa Team.

Emerson holds a J.D. from NYU Law, where he was a Root-Tilden-Kern scholar for public interest law, and a Master of Public Affairs from the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton. He earned a B.A. in political science at Stanford.

Shira Tarrant is Professor of Women’s, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at California State University, Long Beach where she engages students in her research on gender and sexual politics. Dr. Tarrant is the author or editor of several books including The Pornography Industry: What Everyone Needs to Know (Oxford University Press), Men and Feminism (Seal Press), and Gender, Sex, and Politics (Routledge). Her work has been featured in The New Yorker, Bitch magazine, and The Atlantic; her commentary has appeared in global and local media, including the Canadian Broadcast Corporation, NBC, New York Times, Forbes, Ms. magazine, Huffington Post, and others. Shira Tarrant received her Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of California, Los Angeles. Read more at http://shiratarrant.com or follow her on Twitter @shiratarrant.

John K. Wilson is the co-editor of the American Association of University Professors' AcademeBlog.org, and the editor of the Illinois AAUP's Illinois Academe. He has a Ph.D. in higher education from Illinois State University, and is the author of eight books, including The Myth of Political Correctness: The Conservative Attack on Higher Education (Duke University Press), Patriotic Correctness: Academic Freedom and Its Enemies (Paradigm Publishers), and President Trump Unveiled: Exposing the Bigoted Billionaire (OR Books).