What if computers could tell the difference between a smile and a smirk?

Computer scientist and facial expression recognition researcher Rana el Kaliouby hoped to answer this question at the eighth annual Technology Fair at California State University, Northridge on May 1. CSUN hosts the technology fair to help familiarize faculty and staff with new technology trends in higher education.

“These devices have very high IQs, but technology is still missing the emotional component,” el Kaliouby said. “Getting devices to have emotional intelligence could be particularly useful in education.”

Using artificial intelligence (AI) in education could benefit students because the software could be adapted to each student’s needs, el Kaliouby  said.

The event, organized by CSUN’s Division of Information Technology, featured el Kaliouby’s talk remotely — a first in Tech Fair history — using Zoom,  CSUN’s video conference platform.

During the presentation, el Kaliouby asked for an audience volunteer to use the emotion AI AffdexMe app that she developed at the MIT Media Lab and now uses in her Affectiva company to recognize human emotions based on facial cues or physiological responses. She initially developed this technology in her research on mental health and autism, and its uses have expanded over time to capture student engagement during class and emotional responses to events such as political debates, movies and other forms of media.

A volunteer walked to the front of the University Student Union’s Grand Salon and used an iPad whose screen was mirrored on the projector for the audience to see.

“Can you furrow your eyebrow?” el Kaliouby asked the volunteer.

An angry emoji popped up next to the volunteer’s face. Next, el Kaliouby asked the volunteer to pucker her lips, producing a kissing emoji on the screen. The software measures facial expressions to deduce the emotions an individual may be experiencing.

After the presentation, attendees met with representatives from vendors such as Zoom.

Shawntel Barreiro has known since she was in ninth grade that she wanted to be a linguist, and she has worked hard to fulfill that dream since. She will be graduating later this month from California State University, Northridge with bachelor’s degrees in linguistics and Chicana and Chicano studies, and full funding to complete her doctorate in linguistics at The Ohio State University.

But before all that Barreiro is one of nearly 2,500 graduates invited to take part in CSUN’s Honors Convocation at 6 p.m. on Saturday, May 12. The ceremony recognizes the graduating students for their academic and personal achievements.

Shawntel Barreiro, 2018 Woflson Scholar

Barreiro has been named this year’s Wolfson Scholar, the top honor given to a graduating senior. It is presented each year in memory of CSUN’s first vice president, Leo Wolfson. Not only must the student have an exceptional academic record, but he or she must also have made significant contributions to CSUN or to the community through co-curricular and extracurricular activities.

Barreiro, 22, a first-generation college student and the daughter of immigrants from El Salvador, said she was flattered to receive the honor and grateful for the opportunities CSUN has provided her, including setting her firmly on her career path.

“I was in my first introductory course in linguistics, and we started off with looking at the basics of linguistics and it was fun,” she said. “But then we started talking about sociolinguistics — the relationship between social issues and language, how language can affect society — and I was like ‘This is what I want to do. This is what I want to study.’”

Barreiro discovered the field of linguists while a freshman in high school while struggling in a French class.

“Then I realized that there were similarities between French and Spanish,” she said, adding that as a native Spanish speaker she was interested in exploring the relationship between the two languages. That curiosity led her to the field of linguistics, the science of language, and “I knew what I wanted to do with my life,” she said.

With an eye on getting a doctorate in sociolinguistics, Barreiro, who commuted to Northridge from her home in South Central Los Angeles, devoted the past five years at CSUN to studying and taking advantage of research opportunities. As a student in CSUN’s BUILD PODER program, a research training program supported by a $22-million, five-year grant from the National Institutes of Health, she helped child and adolescent development professor Emily Russell examine how language background affects child language acquisition.

After a year with BUILD PODER, she became part of the inaugural cohort of CSUN’s HSI Pathways to the Professoriate — which, in partnership with the University of Pennsylvania and supported by a $5.1 million grant from the Andrew W, Mellon Foundation — aims to prepare undergraduates in the humanities and related fields for admission to a Ph.D. program. Under the guidance of linguistics professor David Medeiros, a mentor in the HSI Pathways Program​, Barreiro conducted her own research about the use of Salvadoran-Spanish in Los Angeles and Washington D.C. Research she credits with helping her get into the doctoral program at Ohio State University.

She spent the summer of 2016 working on a linguistics research project at Yale University as part of a summer undergraduate research fellowship program.

Barreiro, who is graduating summa cum laude with a 3.97 GPA, is looking forward to studying at Ohio State, and a version of winter she has never experienced.

“I am looking forward to a real winter, with snow, blizzards or rain,” she said. “Whatever it is, I am ready for it.”

Barreiro would like to eventually teach at a university and serve as a role model and mentor to her students “in the way people here at CSUN did for me.”

“I don’t want to be defined by my degree,” she said. “I know that it is truly an honor to be able to get a Ph.D. What I hope to do is inspire people who come from my community, whether is South Central Los Angeles or the Salvadoran community. I don’t want to be a researcher who sits in an office who views the community from afar. I want to be able to work first-hand with communities so that their own narratives and sense of agency directly inform my research.”

Other students getting special recognition at the Honors Convocation include:

Jasmine Awad, 2018 Nathan O. Freedman Memorial Award for Outstanding Graduate Student

Jasmine Awad, 2018 Nathan O. Freedman Memorial Award for Outstanding Graduate Student

Jasmine Awad’s master’s thesis offers new research on a condition called synesthesia — the phenomenon of a person perceiving multiple reactions from their senses from a single stimulus. People with synesthesia may perceive colors when they hear a song on the radio. Or feel that chicken tastes square. Or experience navy blue when they read the number seven.

Awad has found new clues about how and why people with synesthesia see the world the way they do as part of her research in CSUN’s Visual Information Sciences at Northridge (VISN).

With a 3.9 GPA, frequent appearances on dean’s lists, numerous scholarships and multiple research accomplishments, Awad received the Nathan O. Freedman Award, given annually to the top graduate student during CSUN’s Honors Convocation.

Her next stop is the University of Washington’s Ph.D. psychology program, where she will join its Vision and Cognition group. Eventually, she would like to be a college professor, she said.

Awad was born to a mother who immigrated to America from El Salvador at age 11, and a father who moved from Lebanon in his 20s. Determined to see her children succeed, Awad’s mother vigorously searched for resources — interpreters, tests that would identify her daughters as gifted — to ensure their education would take them as far as they wanted to go.

She graduated from CSUN with a bachelor’s degree in psychology in 2014. Financial and medical emergencies in her family delayed plans to immediately get her master’s degree. To save money and help support her family, she worked full time at the nature-made vitamins company Pharmavite. She was tasked with ensuring the company followed the legal requirements of various countries.

“My parents just instilled a strong sense of just moving along,” Awad said. “The world keeps spinning and you can either spin with it, or sit and wait for it to move you. If you want to get anywhere, you have to move forward. And even if it takes longer, if you have to take a break, eventually you’re going to have to keep moving.”

Assisting her on her journey to her master’s degree were multiple scholarships and awards, including the Robert Dear Quantitative Research Award, Creative Endeavors Scholarship, Sally Cassanova Pre-Doctorate Scholarship and Academic Competitiveness Grants. Her classmates helped her study. As she waited to begin her master’s program, psychology professor Stefanie Drew invited her to continue her work as a lab manager in the VISN to make sure she stayed involved in research.

“All of my success has always been a product of the help and kindness of others,” Awad said, referring to her lab members, family and friends in her cohort. “I wouldn’t feel right taking anything without thanking my support system. They’ve been great.”

David Angeles, Karen, Leon and Rita Goldstein-Saulter Memorial Award

David Angeles, Karen, Leon and Rita Goldstein-Saulter Memorial Award

David Angeles, 23, knew that mathematics was his major from the moment he set foot on campus as a CSUN freshman. In high school, his grades were inconsistent and he earned a relatively low GPA, but math was different.

“I was pretty decent in math,” Angeles said. “I got straight Bs, which wasn’t bad compared to my other classes.”

Six years later, Angeles is graduating with a 3.81 GPA, a Harvard University summer biostatistics research program under his belt, another summer mathematics research program at UCLA about to begin and a spot waiting for him in the biostatistics doctorate program at The Ohio State University. On top of these accomplishments, Angeles also will receive the Karen, Leon and Rita Goldstein-Saulter Memorial Award at Honors Convocation.

Angeles credits CSUN’s Educational Opportunity Programs (EOP) and PUMP (Preparing Undergraduates through Mentoring toward Ph.D.) for providing the community and support he needed to be successful at CSUN and continue on to a doctoral program.

“EOP, PUMP and my mentors are my biggest highlights [from CSUN],” Angeles said. “I want programs like [PUMP and EOP] to keep growing because they gave me the opportunity [to succeed], and I think it is only fair for other students to get the same opportunity.”

After working with his mother at a fast food restaurant as a teenager, Angeles developed a new respect for the work she took on to support him and his brother. She worked two jobs, sometimes back-to-back without sleep, and he “didn’t want that for her,” Angeles said. He decided to pursue a career as a math teacher, since he saw it as the quickest way to make money right out of college. Though he saw his education as a way to build a career that could allow him to help his family, Angeles also worked two jobs, one at a restaurant and another tutoring in mathematics, so he could help pay the family’s bills while he attended CSUN.

The PUMP program was a game-changer for Angeles, sending him to a conference where he learned about biostatistics and pushing him outside of his comfort zone. Last year, Angeles applied to some of the most competitive summer research programs in the country, originally intending to show his PUMP mentor, CSUN mathematics professor Maria Helena Noronha, that he wouldn’t be accepted. Angeles was still planning on teaching and didn’t plan to go to grad school, so he didn’t feel like he needed to do a summer program. However, he was accepted and spent the summer of 2017 attending a mathematics research program at Harvard. Ultimately, the research program helped solidify his desire to get his Ph.D.

“It wasn’t that long ago that I was rejected from CSU Fullerton and Cal Poly Pomona for my undergraduate degree,” said Angeles. “Now, six years later, I will have done research at two of the top universities in the U.S. — all because CSUN gave me an opportunity and believed in me.”

Kenya Lopez, 2018 Outstanding Graduating Senior

Kenya Lopez, Outstanding Graduating Senior

Few people can say they got more out of their college experience at CSUN than Kenya Lopez. After her first year, she earned the President Dianne F. Harrison Leadership Award, given annually to a freshman who excels in the classroom and shows leadership qualities.

Her list of accomplishments and roles continued to grow: Camp Matador counselor, University Ambassador, New Student Orientation TAKE XXVIII cast member, board member for several campus organizations, Special Olympics volunteer, member of Delta Zeta sorority, mentor for high school and college students, summer intern for the Mexican Embassy in Washington, D.C., and Associated Students (AS) vice president. And she is graduating with a 3.6 GPA to earn her degree in criminology and justice studies.

“Coming into CSUN, I knew I wanted to be involved and give back to our university. After all, it gave me one of the greatest gifts someone can receive, an education,” Lopez said. “After attending my Freshman Convocation, I left inspired to make the most out of my time at CSUN.”

As AS Vice President, Lopez, 22, worked with other students and staff members to advocate for the DREAM Center, giving undocumented students a safe space to congregate. Her advocacy also helped create the CSUN Student Legal Support Clinic and increased donations for the CSUN Food Pantry. She also made 10 trips to Washington, D.C. and Sacramento to advocate for students, a fully funded CSU, DACA and year-round Pell Grants. An undocumented student herself, Lopez has been open about her status to help others like herself.

“The reason why I have always been open about my status is to show other DACA recipients that our legal status does not define our potential,” Lopez said. “Too many times, I have talked to fellow DACA students who live in fear, and I want to show them that we shouldn’t hold back. I want to bring awareness to such a political issue that desperately needs to be addressed. The country needs to realize all the positive contributions that DACA recipients bring to this country. We are as much contributing members of society as U.S. citizens.”

After graduation, Lopez will attend USC’s Marshall School of Business, where she will work to attain her Master of Science in social entrepreneurship. Her goal is to help social enterprises and nonprofit organizations without financially sustainable business models become more solvent and attract more people into the business of social change.

“If we can do that, it will increase the number of people who are working toward these social causes to make the big changes in society, especially at a time like this,” Lopez said.

She has fond memories of her time at CSUN, and is looking forward to making one more with her graduation.

“It’s a great way to say thank you to my mom for her extreme hard work as a single mother,” Lopez said. “I’m definitely excited that she’ll be able to come to commencement and show her that her sacrifices to move here were worth it, and that I’m living the American Dream that she brought me here for.”

Amber Partida, 2018 Outstanding Graduating Senior

Amber Partida, Outstanding Graduating Senior

As her family and personal life were rocked by tragedy during her final years at CSUN, education became Amber Partida’s port in the storm.

Partida lost her father to brain cancer before her junior year at CSUN, not long after her parents divorced. Her family was evicted from their home, and she had to work to support herself and her family. Then, during her senior year, Partida’s mother was diagnosed with cancer. Her mother passed away just one month later, leaving Amber, her sister and her two younger brothers as orphans.

Her siblings were her primary inspiration to stay in school, she said.

“I’m a first-generation college student, so completing all my years here was really important — to keep going, to prove that I could do it,” said Partida, 23. “The one place I felt I had control in my life was the power of my education.”

She persevered, graduating cum laude with her Bachelor of Arts in journalism and a minor in Spanish-language journalism in December 2017.  This month, she’ll be honored with one of the Class of 2018’s Outstanding Graduating Senior Awards.

Raised in South Pasadena, Partida caught the journalism “bug” early, participating in yearbook in middle school and on-air sports commentary at South Pasadena High School. She chose CSUN for its stellar Department of Journalism, dreaming of a career in sports broadcasting.

“Sports has given me confidence and role models, and guidance in my life when I didn’t have a lot of people older than me to give me advice,” said Partida, a lifelong basketball player who co-founded CSUN’s club women’s basketball team.

Partida said she’s particularly proud that she took advantage of the journalism department’s myriad resources, especially mentor relationships with professors and her extensive involvement in producing the department’s “On Point “talk show and “Matador News” and serving as lead anchor for its “Valley View News” TV program. She landed the inaugural Gwen Ifill Journalism Fellowship, a prestigious position with “PBS NewsHour” in Washington, D.C., in summer 2017. At her mother’s insistence, Partida finished the fellowship even as her mother’s health failed.

“Amber never lacked self-confidence, though I often thought she would fold up her tent and leave college at any moment,” journalism professor Benjamin Davis wrote in his recommendation for Partida’s award. “The death of her mother coming just two years after her father’s passing was a seemingly visible weight Amber lugged around. … With all of this, Amber persisted. Amber possesses the determination and optimism we want all of our students to display.”

After commencement, Partida said, she hopes to land her first full-time broadcast job back in D.C. or at a local TV station as a news assistant, reporter or producer.

Tyler Pugeda, Outstanding Graduating Senior

Tyler Pugeda, Outstanding Graduating Senior

Tyler Pugeda has certainly been busy during his time at California State University, Northridge: He’ll be graduating magna cum laude as a double major in mathematics and philosophy, been an active member of CSUN’s Deaf and hard-of-hearing community and participated in several CSUN clubs and organizations, including the Deaf CSUNians, the College Bowl and the philosophy club. He received the prestigious President’s Scholarship, and is due to walk in this year’s Honors Convocation as one of the Outstanding Graduating Senior Award recipients.

Even so, Pugeda isn’t sure what to feel as he prepares to leave CSUN. “It’s not what I expected,” he said. “The emotions haven’t hit me yet.”

One thing he does know is that his undergraduate education here helped him develop a strong sense of social responsibility and of self, preparing him to move to the next chapter of his life.

Pugeda, who received his bachelor’s degree in fall 2017, currently attends Johns Hopkins University’s Post-Baccalaureate Premedical Program. There, he applies the critical thinking skills he acquired in math and philosophy with the goal of earning an MD-Ph.D. degree and launching a medical career.

“I’m thinking clinical neuroscience,” he said. “I’m curious about how we could alleviate human suffering caused by neurological diseases.”

Pugeda initially believed that entering medicine would be a challenge due to discrimination against Deaf people needing access.

“Before attending CSUN, I was still trying to develop my Deaf identity; I wasn’t strong,” he said. “But when I first visited NCOD (CSUN’s National Center on Deafness), it was really empowering. They were warm, supportive and gave advice that helped me develop my own Deaf identity.  It’s helped me learn how to ask for the access I need at Johns Hopkins and the medical field.”

Although Pugeda misses his professors and friends at CSUN — as well as the warm sunshine of California — he believes the lessons he’s learned here will serve him well.

“In retrospect, I certainly matured at CSUN,” he said. “I’m empowered to overcome the future challenges of medical school. Challenges are there to make us excellent, and I’m eternally grateful to CSUN for providing me a well-rounded education.”

Academic scholarship applications are a rigorous test for students to compile their achievements and capabilities into a story that catches the eye of the benefactor making the selection. When applying to Stanford for your doctorate, this task is heightened tenfold.

Luckily for Brenda Velasco and Caroline Arellan-Gracia, they didn’t have to travel blind into this potential minefield.

California State University, Northridge’s Maximizing Access to Research Careers (MARC – undergraduates) and Research Initiative for Scientific Enhancement (RISE – undergrads and post-graduates) programs help increase the number and capabilities of underrepresented scientists engaged in basic biomedical research. These grants’ goals are to strengthen science curricula and research opportunities at CSUN while also strengthening the biomedical research capabilities of minority-serving institutions.

“As a first-generation college student, I didn’t know how to begin a path forward to my Ph.D.,” said Brenda Velasco ’17 (Biochemistry). “They gave me mentors and advisors throughout my time at CSUN. Without them, it would not have been possible.” Velasco is now currently working toward her doctorate at Stanford.

Velasco recently won the National Science Foundation (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship, which has given her the opportunity for a full ride to Stanford. The scholarship requires the applicant to provide letters of recommendation, a personal statement and a research proposal describing the specific aims of the applicant’s research project for the next three years.

“I worked on my application, research proposal and personal statement for four months,” said Velasco. “I met with my advisor every week to prepare my statement and proposal and even carried out experiments to collect preliminary data.”

When Velasco won, she was given $34,000 to carry out her research proposal that also includes $12,000 to cover tuition cost.

Velasco hopes to one day be a professor at a state university, where she can conduct research in her own lab.

The MARC/RISE programs help ensure that underrepresented communities have the opportunity to access educational options to the same degree as other communities. Caroline Arellano-Garcia is a sound example of these programs’ benefits.

“My experiences have shown me the immense value of mentorship,” said Arellano-Garcia ’15 (Biotechnology). “I would not be in this position if it had not been for the mentors that have paved the way.”

Arellano-Garcia won both the NSF and the Ford Foundation Pre-Doctoral Fellowship, which seeks to increase diversity in higher education with students of superior academic skill. She is currently pursuing her doctorate at Stanford, for biology with an emphasis on molecular and organismal cell biology.

The NSF and Ford Foundation have funded Arellano-Garcia for her entire doctorate degree at Stanford. To help her prepare, the MARC/RISE programs offered her thesis and research assistance.

“Preparation for these fellowships has been a process that has taken many years,” said Arellano-Garcia. “This included being a teaching assistant at CSUN and mentoring my peers.”

Arellano-Garcia said she wasn’t expecting to get the scholarship because she was up against many talented applicants, but was excited that they picked her.

“Three fellow MARC/RISE Matadors were admitted to Stanford last year and it was great reconnecting,” said Arellano-Garcia. “At CSUN, we were all involved in one way or another with the MARC/RISE program. I encourage my fellow Matadors to continue doing the best they can and take the shots needed to achieve your goals.”

Many are the first in their families to get a college education. Others have used their experiences in the foster-care system as inspiration to aim for the highest bar. Still others came to California State University, Northridge determined to get the tools they need to make a positive impact on the world.

The cheers may be deafening this week when more than 11,500 students are expected to take part in CSUN’s 2018 commencement ceremonies. Each student has a personal story of hard work, perseverance and success. Below are just some of these unique stories:

Justin, left, and Jordan Brooks

Justin Brooks, B.A. in Criminology and Justice Studies, and Jordan Brooks, B.A.s in History and Religious Studies

When Justin Brooks came to CSUN as a freshman four years ago, he flirted with the idea of being an English major. His twin brother, Jordan, who started CSUN the same year, was thinking about becoming a special education teacher.

As they explored the university and all it had to offer, they discovered how to turn their passions — for Jordan, history, and for Justin, trying to make the world a safer place — into careers.

“If I got an offer from Harvard right now, I’d turn it down,” said 22-year-old Justin. “There’s no other place I’d rather be than CSUN. The faculty here, they changed my life.”

Jordan, who has autism, agreed. He said support from the university’s faculty and staff stoked a fire in him to succeed — leading to a near-perfect GPA during his four years at CSUN, despite a double major and a part-time job — and a desire to teach history someday, perhaps at the college level.

He is taking a year off after graduation to study for the graduate admissions exam, and then has his eyes on the University of California, Santa Barbara doctoral program in history. He is particularly interested in the period between World War I and World War II and “how human beings manifest ideology for their own ends,” Jordan said.

Growing up in a relatively rough neighborhood in Van Nuys, Justin was frustrated by friends’ and neighbors’ fear for their safety and the lack of resources for crime victims or those struggling with homelessness.

“I felt helpless and decided to explore criminology to try to understand why things happened the way they did,” he said.

Justin, who also has maintained a near-perfect GPA while at CSUN, despite holding down two jobs for a while, is part of the first cohort to graduate from the university’s year-old Department of Criminology and Justice Studies. He has begun preparing for the rigorous tests he must pass before he’s considered as a candidate for the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD).

“People have a stereotype of what a police officer does,” he said. “It’s not just about rescuing people. There’s also a lot of outreach. I’d like to be part of something like Operation Progress (a program that pairs students in Watts with LAPD mentors and encourages them to pursue higher education). I want to be part of something that makes a positive impact in the community.”

That sense of inclusion and respect for the rich diversity that makes up the community was a factor in the brothers’ decision to attend CSUN.

“We grew up in an incredibly diverse neighborhood, and continuing to learn in a diverse, accepting community was important to us,” Justin said.

“I can’t imagine any other place than CSUN where that would happen,” Jordan added.

Both young men will take part in the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences commencement ceremony at 8 a.m. on Sunday, May 20, where Justin will receive his bachelor’s degree in criminology and justice studies and Jordan will receive his bachelor’s degree in history. Jordan also is eligible to take part in the College of Humanities commencement ceremony at 8 a.m. on May 21, where he will receive his bachelor’s degree in religious studies.

Gardenia Centanaro

Gardenia Centanaro, B.S. in Political Science

            Gardenia Centanaro, 23, of Northridge, is just 6 inches, a little less than the span of a hand, away from clearing one of her goals. She will be spending the next two years in pursuit of those 6 inches. If all goes right, she’ll be representing Mexico in women’s pole vault at the 2020 Olympics in Tokyo.

Her path to the Olympics will not be easy, with Centanaro dividing her time between the Chula Vista Olympic Training Center, coaching pole vault at Pitzer College in Claremont and working on her master’s in nonprofit-sector management through an online program at CSUN.

“It’s going to be a couple of busy years, but I’m up to it,” she said.

Centanaro, a first-generation college student, grew up in foster care. Her mother, an addict, was unable to care for her nine children. She died when Centanaro was 8 years old, and Centanaro and her siblings permanently became part of the foster care system.

Determined that she not become “another statistic,” her foster father, who was once a pole vaulter, volunteered to coach pole vault at Centanaro’s Corona high school so she could experience the joys and learn the work ethic associated with the sport.

“Pole vaulting is a demanding sport that demands a positive attitude,” she said. “It’s a sport where you have to clear a bar, and they keep raising it until you can’t make it any more. You always end on a miss, thinking about how you can get it next time. And that’s life, you’re always going to have a limit and you are going to have to figure out how to get past it.”

She attracted the attention of CSUN Athletics, which invited her for a visit in 2014.

“It had a totally different atmosphere than any other school I had visited,” Centanaro said. “It was so diverse and so warm. I felt I belonged here.”

Centanaro made the most of her time at CSUN. In 2016, she won the Big West Conference pole vault title with a school-record performance of 4.06 meters, or 13 feet 3.75 inches. In 2017, she placed second at the Big West Championships in the pole vault with a clearance of 3.92 meters, or 12 feet 10.25 inches, and had a career-best clearance of 4.12 meters, or 13 feet 6.25 inches, which earned her second place at the Mountain Pacific Sports Federation Championships.

Despite the demands of training and competing, Centanaro held down at least two jobs while maintaining a high GPA, a fete that earned her regular membership in Varsity N, a group of high academic-achieving student-athletes. She even served as the lead student on a research project with political science professor Kristy Michaud that examined water conservation among Los Angeles renters.

Centanaro said her fondest CSUN memories include the time she spent with her fellow student-athletes, not on the fields, but studying together. “We spend so much time together that they have become family,” she said.

“Most people have this misconception that student-athletes don’t work hard when it comes to academics when, really, we have this work ethic instilled in us from athletics that makes us want to excel in academics,” she added. “The whole definition of work is to physically and mentally push yourself to accomplish a result, and that’s what athletes do. When it comes to the classroom, we still have that idea of work.”

Centanaro was born in the United States, but her biological parents were from Mexico, thus giving her dual citizenship and an opportunity to compete at the 2020 Olympics representing Mexico — a goal she intends to work toward for the next two years. Once the Olympics are over, Centanaro plans to turn her focus to her ultimate goal — establishing a nonprofit that encourages foster children to get an education and to take advantage of educational opportunities.

She is expected to take part in the College of Social and Behavioral Sciences commencement ceremony at 8 a.m. on Sunday, May 20.

Fedrick De La Paz

Fedrick De La Paz, B.A. in Religious Studies

Fedrick De La Paz, 31, of Los Angeles, credits his wife, Dulce, with inspiring him to get his degree. For years, he would take one or two classes at local community colleges, while Dulce completed her bachelor’s degree at University of Nevada, Las Vegas before getting a master’s degree in architecture a little more than two years ago.

“That’s when I got the kick in the butt, and I thought I really needed to get on,” said De La Paz, who worked as a bartender while his wife concentrated on her studies. “I was in that work mode, working full time and being that figure, that head of household, while she was in school. Now the roles have changed. She has been amazing, supporting me all the way while I am in school.”

De La Paz took community college classes in a variety of subjects, including business, philosophy, architecture and interior design. It wasn’t until he took a class in world religions that he found his passion.

“Religious studies gives you a foundation of exposure to different perspectives,” he said. “When you think of researchers or scientists, they are very observant but disconnected from the people or things they are researching. With religious studies, you can research, but there is a certain amount of compassion that is instilled in you so that you are connected with the people you are researching.”

In the two years since he transferred to CSUN from East Los Angeles College, De La Paz has added minors in American Indian studies and civic and community engagement to his class load. He served as vice president of the American Indian Student Association, was a member of the College of Humanities Dean’s Student Council and worked at the campus’ Sustainability Garden, where he harvested produce for the CSUN Food Pantry. He also collaborated with the Departments of American Indian Studies, Central American Studies and Chicana and Chicano Studies to organize the Indigenous Community Garden Initiative, a space for students to apply sustainable practices in growing food.

De La Paz is the first in his family, besides his wife, to get a college degree. He has applied to graduate school, and he plans to study religion, spirituality and culture, and how dominant culture changes and/or affects them.

“Achieving a doctoral degree will allow me have that foundation of academia that no one can ever take away from me,” he said. “I can also serve as an example for others — that they can achieve their aspirations even if they have a different skin tone, ethnicity, religion, background or whatever it may be.”

More importantly, he wants to be a role model for what is possible. He tells the story of a friend who almost missed applying for graduate school because he was $15 shy of the application fee. When De La Paz heard the story, he reached into his pocket and pulled out $15, all the money he had that day, and told his friend to apply.

“He couldn’t pay me back for two months, but I didn’t care,” De La Paz said. “That $15 made all the difference. He got accepted and now he’s going to get a master’s degree. He is the first in his family to do anything in higher education. Fifteen dollars shouldn’t stop you from pursuing your dream.”

In 15 years, De La Paz said, he may consider running for mayor of Los Angeles.

“That’s one of my goals — to seek some sort of understanding of politics and bureaucracy and help people,” he said. “I want to be able to demonstrate that people should be more open to differences, and realize that those differences make us all the same because we are all different.”

He will take part in the College of Humanities commencement ceremony at 8 a.m. on May 21.

Stacey Leal

Stacey Leal, B.A. in Communication Studies

            Stacey Leal, 30, of Santa Clarita, was fully immersed in campus life in the fall of 2017. She had transferred to CSUN from the College of the Canyons only a year before and loved her classes, as well as her job at the university’s Pride Center, helping coordinate events and facilitating the center’s Queer and Trans People of Color Conversations. Then, Hurricane Maria slammed into Puerto Rico.

Leal — who was born in Miami, Fla., but spent much of her childhood in Puerto Rico — was worried about her father, who lives on the island.

“The hardest thing was the complete radio silence for four days,” she said. “I did not know if something had happened or if he was fine.”

It was a relief when he finally called, though the connection was spotty given the power outage that blanketed the U.S. territory. He was unharmed and his home was spared the worst of the damage, thanks to its higher elevation. Leal said the support she received from her colleagues at the Pride Center helped her get through the hard time.

It was that sense of community, Leal said, that drew her to CSUN.

“I was surprised by how many communities there were here,” she said about a CSUN campus she made while at community college. “What really stuck out to me was the LGBTQ community on campus and the Latinx community on campus. I felt that this was somewhere where I could be comfortable with my identity.”

Her parents divorced when Leal was in high school, and she moved to Santa Clarita with her mom. She attended community college a couple times — with a three-year break in New Mexico — before completing an associate degree in communication studies from College of the Canyons and transferring to CSUN.

“I have never felt more comfortable on a campus than I have at CSUN,” Leal said.

She recalled the adjustments she had to make moving from the heavily Latino neighborhoods of her childhood in Miami and Puerto Rico to largely white Santa Clarita. Though the area has a sizable Latino community, it is mostly Mexican-American, and Leal, whose mother is Nicaraguan, spoke Nicaraguan and Puerto Rican Spanish.

She laughed recalling her attempts to order a “torta” in a Mexican restaurant. In Mexican Spanish, a “torta” is a type of sandwich. In Nicaraguan, a “torta” is a cake, while in Puerto Rican Spanish it is often a fried pastry.

Her ability to adjust and help others become comfortable in their own skin drew the attention of Los Angeles City Councilwoman Nury Martinez, who honored Leal for her work advocating for the LGBTQ community.

Leal said her time at CSUN has given her insight into what she would like to do with her life. She has applied the university’s master’s program in communication studies, and whether she eventually owns her own business or works for somebody else, she said she is determined to find ways to give back to the community.

Leal will take part in the commencement ceremony for the Mike Curb College of Arts, Media, and Communication at 6 p.m. on Friday, May 18.

Paulina Silva

Paulina Silva, B.S. in Business Law

Paulina Silva, 22, a first-generation college student, has known since she was about 8 years old that she was interested in being a lawyer. Now, 14 years later and about to graduate from CSUN, she has applied to law school and hopes to someday have a corner office at a corporate law firm.

The path to that corner office has been filled with obstacles. Those experiences, she said, have only made her stronger and more determined to succeed.

“When a door closes, which has happened so many times for me, you see the other door and you realize you can get through,” Silva said. “I’ve learned how to be a problem solver and have developed new skills. I now see what I have been through as an asset.”

Silva said the minute she walked onto CSUN’s campus as a freshman four years ago, she knew it was where she belonged. “With the rich diversity on campus, instead of feeling isolated, I found a place where there were people like me,” she said.

Faculty and administrators such as Robert Sheridan, Hilary Goldberg, Melanie Williams, then-Interim Dean Deborah Cours, Kenneth Premo and many more “did everything they could to help me,” she said.

Silva threw herself into her classes and became active in a number of student organizations in the David Nazarian College of Business and Economics. She is the business college’s academic student senator; president of the pre-law student association; president of the student leadership council, Leaders in Alliance for the business college; and worked alongside Interim Dean Cours to promote student engagement and the university’s student success initiative, Matadors Rising.

As the political climate came more volatile for undocumented immigrants, including people with DACA status, Silva decided to advocate for students.

Silva said her final year at CSUN has been “crazy.” She had to juggle classwork demands, her student leadership obligations and studying for the law school entrance exam.

During the worst of it, she said, her mentor, business law professor Hilary Goldberg, took her aside to give her some advice.

“She said to look at it as if I were training for a marathon — make sure your body is rested and well fed,” Silva said. “She also gave me her lucky pencils, which commingled with the pencils she took the bar exam with.”

While she waits to hear the results of her law school applications, Silva envisions a career in corporate law in which she can also positively affect public policy. She is considering entering politics someday, or perhaps working on international business relations for the United Nations.

Silva will take part in the commencement ceremony for the David Nazarian College of Business and Economics at 8 a.m. on Saturday, May 19.

Teaching American Sign Language (ASL) can be very difficult on paper. Unlike an English paper, professors can’t simply mark up a student’s fingerspelling. Instead, a teacher of ASL has to physically show a student the correct way to sign.

In an effort to enhance ASL courses, California State University, Northridge has implemented an innovative software program into Canvas to create a fully immersive ASL environment. Since 2017, the Michael D. Eisner College of Education’s Department of Deaf Studies has been using the software, GoReact, as a learning resource for ASL.

GoReact is a cloud-based software, so students and professors can record themselves using a webcam or cellphone for online assignments and upload it directly to Canvas. Professors can also assign their students online assignments in ASL as a video. Once a student has uploaded an assignment, professors can input time-stamped feedback to help with ASL phonetics. 

CSUN Deaf Studies student Kelly Greer said her education wouldn’t be the same without GoReact.

“It would definitely be less involved,” Greer said. “I feel included, like there’s so many things I can do with it. It feels limitless.”

Prior to GoReact, many professors would have students record themselves on a DVD for graded assignments.

Deaf studies professor Christine Firkins explained the difficulty in helping students outside of the classroom prior to the integration of GoReact with Canvas, and she said her grading process was “cumbersome and time consuming.”

“There is no way to write down what you’re doing in ASL, because it’s done differently than a linear spoken language,” said Firkins. “So it was very difficult to provide any kind of feedback in ASL about [students’] particular errors. I couldn’t correct a sign — I would have to describe it or finish class early and approach each student individually and demonstrate that feedback.”

As a mainstream institution with one of the largest nationwide enrollment of students who are Deaf and hard of hearing, many CSUN students, faculty and staff may benefit from enhanced ASL training techniques.

“GoReact has empowered teachers and students,” said Firkins.

Originally designed to improve speaking skills by increasing awareness, GoReact is now used for an array of practicums, presentations, public speaking and training. Flavia Fleischer, professor and chair of CSUN’s Department of Deaf Studies, described ASL as a “visual and spatial language.” She said that GoReact is particularly useful to students because they can receive feedback through synced, time-coded video feedback.

“It’s really innovative and streamlined. The majority of the classes in the department have video-formatted assignments incorporated in the class,” Fleischer said. “GoReact is now vital to that process. Depending on the type of activity or assignment with GoReact, you can give live feedback or provide video and text feedback for submitted assignments that are auto-synced with video time codes.”

CSUN Deaf Studies student Michele Hirano, who is a junior in the program, described her passion for ASL. She said GoReact has positively impacted her ASL education to increase communication with fewer barriers.

“Having that language access is a wonderful thing in order to hold different communities and cultures,” Hirano said.

The sumo match was about to begin. But this wasn’t just any sumo match — the “wrestlers” were LEGO Mindstorm robots programmed by elementary school students. One team placed its entry, a gray robot with black wheels and a ramp attached to the front, in the middle of the ring. Then, the opposing team placed its robot, gray with black wheels and three LEGO walls surrounding the body, right next to it.

The judge counted down, “Three, two, one… sumo!” The robots spun around each other, trying to push each other out of the ring. The LEGOs collided with a loud clack. As one of them got leverage, the other robot tried to fight off being pushed out. The student teams watched intently, the winning team members cheering for their robot as it pushed out its opponent. Opposing team members held their heads in their hands as their robot was pushed out.

Spectators watched closely as the elementary school students pitted their robots against one another May 5 in the Matadome, at the fifth annual Rally in the Valley at California State University, Northridge. The competition for Los Angeles Unified School District (LAUSD) students had six different tracks, with first, second and third place awarded in each.

In teams of two and three, 400 students from 12 different elementary schools worked on their LEGO Mindstorm designs for months in preparation for the rally.

Spearheaded by CSUN professor of elementary education Susan Belgrad and professor of computer science and education Li Liu, Rally in the Valley is co-sponsored by the LAUSD and NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.

Belgrad said Rally in the Valley “inspires upper-elementary children and their families to see a future where they are STEM achievers and contributors in a global community.”

Belgrad also thanked the “incredible educators” who served on the Rally in the Valley board as well as the “girls and boys who worked hard to get” to the event.

Aside from the sumo matches, students also competed in the Follow the Line event, where students programmed their robots to stay as close as possible to a pre-drawn line. In the Obstacle Course challenge, students programmed their LEGO robots to navigate through a preset obstacle course made of PVC pipes.

Students also competed in the NASA Space Challenge, where the teams are asked to complete seven missions within ten minutes. Missions included Activate Communication, where teams had to raise their robots’ communication dish, and Initiate Launch, where teams launched the rocket and deployed the Mars Space Station. Belgrad said that NASA’s JPL Ota Lutz invested time in training teachers to lead it.

First through fifth grade STEM educator Sergio Millan said that he was happy to bring his students to the Rally because he wants his students to see that they have a place in STEM careers.

“The Rally in the Valley is one of many models of STEM education in our region that gives an opportunity to schools in and around the San Fernando Valley,” Millan said. ” I see [this] as an educational movement of STEM/STEAM education that is paving the paths for many of our youth to attain careers in these fields.” In education communities, STEAM stands for science, technology, engineering, art and math.

Nicholas Sikes, a fifth grader from Haskell STEAM Magnet, participated in all of the events and said he was most excited about the sumo match because of his robot’s design, which featured a ramp on its front to more easily push out opponent robots.

“We tried sumo with the ramp last year and it was pretty effective,” Sikes said, smiling.

Though Sikes’ robot did not place in the sumo competition, “The Destroyer,” as he called it, took home first place in the obstacle course track.

Sikes and his peers were under the guidance of lead educator Lauren Varon-Manning ’11 (Credential), ’15 (M.A., Elementary Curriculum and Instruction) and Rally newcomer Erica Lundy ’15 (M.A., Elementary Curriculum and Instruction), who teaches third grade at Haskell STEAM. Lundy won the 2016 Presidential Award for Excellence in Mathematics and Science Teaching, started teaching at Haskell STEAM in August 2017.

Plans are already underway to connect with sponsors, schools and volunteers whose contributions to the next Rally in the Valley make it possible for CSUN to lead achievement in STEM disciplines throughout the region, Belgrad said.

“‘Pregnancy could be a bad influence on other students.’”

It was 1998, but Cecilia Montes remembers her high school principal telling her that as if it were yesterday. She was kicked out of her high school for being pregnant during her senior year. Instead of dropping out, she decided to take three buses to get to her new school, during her second and third trimesters.

After having her baby, Montes did not drop out of school. Instead, she finished the spring semester, boarding each bus to school and back home with a backpack full of books, a diaper bag on her shoulder and a newborn baby in her arms. During school, she held the baby while she completed classwork.

She finished her senior year and graduated high school, becoming the first person in her family to do so in four generations. Montes next set her sights on a bachelor’s degree only to find that she couldn’t afford college because she’d have to pay international fees due to her immigration status as an undocumented student.

“I was so devastated that I couldn’t go to college. I couldn’t go right from high school into college like everyone else I knew,” Montes said (CSUN Today is using a pseudonym; citing privacy concerns, she requested her real name not be used). “I was already feeling excluded because I was a teenage mom. Then I couldn’t go to college with everyone else.”

Over the last 20 years, Montes has faced many obstacles — but she was determined not to let those challenges deter her from obtaining her bachelor’s degree. Montes has achieved her goal and will be crossing the stage on Monday, May 21 as a Public Health graduate at California State University, Northridge’s 2018 Commencement. She also has been accepted into CSUN’s Master’s of Public Health program and will begin working toward that degree in the fall.

“I do not easily give up,” she wrote in her statement of purpose for CSUN’s Master’s of Public Health program. “Most would think that hindrances like these leave a person with no hope, but I persisted, and nothing stood in the way of my desire to learn and enact change.”

As one of an estimated 1,700 undocumented students at CSUN, Montes wanted to share her story with fellow Dreamers because she wanted them to “know that they can still do things.”

“You can find avenues to continue being resilient and have hope that something is going to change,” she said. “And when that change happens, you’re prepared and have all the tools, skills and knowledge to continue moving forward.”

Never Give Up
Though she was devastated that she could not matriculate to college right after high school, she could not give up, she said. Montes knew she had to provide for herself and her daughter, so she pursued another avenue.

She enrolled at an occupational program in Orange County and completed her certification as a nurse’s assistant (CNA), but the certification was taken away once the program found out Montes was undocumented.

Montes took the training and knowledge she acquired and worked at an Alzheimer’s disease hospital in Anaheim, where she said she learned one of the most valuable lessons of her life.

During her time as a CNA, Montes learned that she had a passion for helping others and wanted to dedicate herself to that cause.

“My desire to help doesn’t end due to my barriers,” Montes said. “I hope to inspire and impact others in a positive way. I will continue to volunteer.  The more I learn, the better I can serve.”

Montes’ mom and two younger brothers moved in with her when she was 22, making Montes the head of household. She continued to work so that she could support herself, her daughter, her mother and her two younger brothers.

“I was very lucky that I always had jobs that paid enough so that we weren’t completely broke,” Montes said. “I wasn’t well off, and couldn’t afford luxuries, but I could support my family.”

Though she was content as a CNA, Montes said she still longed for a college education.

Then, in 2001, Governor Gray Davis signed California Assembly Bill 540, a bill allowing undocumented students meeting certain requirements to pay in-state tuition at state institutions. Though AB 540 was a huge weight off Montes’ shoulders, as a single mom working full time, she could still only afford one class at a time.

College Bound
It wasn’t until 10 years later that Montes could go to school full time, which was made possible by the Dream Act, a California law allowing California AB540-eligible students to apply for state financial aid.

With the help of her counselor at Moorpark College, Danita Redd, Montes began meeting the requirements to major in nursing.

“[Professor Redd] has been my pillar,“ Montes said. “This woman writes letters for me, no questions asked. She goes above and beyond. She knows my husband and my daughters. She’s just wonderful.”

Redd said she is in awe of Montes’ benevolence.

“I have to emphasize that she is one of the kindest people I have ever met,” Redd said. “The quality of kindness in her bubbles up from the very core of her being. I admire her. I always have.”

In pursuing nursing, Montes would find yet another closed door. Her immigration status meant she couldn’t enroll in the program, meaning she had to change her path again.

Refusing to quit, Montes changed her major to Nutrition, Dietetics and Food Science  — as that was still health related — and transferred to CSUN in fall 2016.

But when meeting with Mario Lopez, an Educational Opportunity Programs (EOP) counselor at CSUN, she discovered she would have to change her major again because of internship requirements. Lopez suggested Public Health because all of Montes’ classes fit. She hasn’t looked back since.

Support from CSUN
Montes is grateful for the endless support she has received from CSUN faculty.

“I have not met any professor here who has not opened their arms widely and supported me. That’s why I’m staying here,” she said, referring to starting her Master’s in Public Health program at CSUN in the fall.

“CSUN has been very good to me,” Montes said. “My professors have inspired me, and they have encouraged me every step of the way.”

Professor of Health Sciences Jeffrey Goodman has been particularly instrumental in her educational journey, Montes said, as he was her mentor when she applied to the master’s program at CSUN.

Montes has also used resources extensively on campus, such as the DREAM Center. Her work with Dario Fernandez, coordinator for the DREAM Center, helped provide an easy transition into CSUN.

Fernandez said that Montes’s story is inspirational and a great example for all students.

“[Cecilia’s] educational journey is inherently one of perseverance and inspiration,” he said. “This spring semester, [she] will culminate a 20-year pursuit of her bachelor’s degree.

“Her tenacity, will and perseverance is second to none. As an undocumented student, the prospective opportunity to seek employment post-graduation is always in question. Still, she persisted.”

Montes is proud of herself for achieving her goals, and said that she has no plans of stopping at her master’s.

“I want to stay [at CSUN] for my doctorate in education and hopefully I can work here and stay here forever,” she said, laughing.

The goal of California State University, Northridge’s HSI Pathways to the Professoriate is to make the journey to becoming a professor easier to navigate for students, including Latina/o students, in the humanities and related fields.

CSUN, a Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI), partners with the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education’s Center for Minority Serving Institutions to increase the presence and visibility of Latina/o faculty members. HSI Pathways is open to CSUN students in their junior year whose majors match a list of specified fields, and who want to get a Ph.D. and become a professor. The cohort provides research opportunities and the preparation needed to get a doctorate.

Eight of nine students in the inaugural cohort applied to Ph.D. programs this year, and all eight who applied have received multiple acceptances with offers of full funding to prestigious Ph.D. programs nationwide — an exemplary 100 percent rate. On April 20, HSI Pathways held an event at the Orange Grove Bistro to congratulate the graduating group and introduce the second cohort.

“I’m excited for them,” said HSI Pathways program coordinator Heidi Schumacher. “These are really brilliant scholars, and the fact that they’ll be a part of the professoriate is so exciting.  I’m proud to have this high of a success rate, which is a testament to how hard they worked and to how many people at CSUN participated and helped these students out.”

The students in the inaugural cohort receiving graduate funding to Ph.D. programs are:

Shawntel Barreiro
In the fall, Shawntel Barreiro will be attending The Ohio State University to obtain her Ph.D. in linguistics, with a specialization in Central American sociolinguistics. Barreiro thanked HSI Pathways for getting her to where she is today. 

“It gave me the resources to be able to get into a Ph.D. program, and it fostered this new sense of how I felt as a scholar and solidified everything that I wanted to do as a researcher, as a student,” she said. “It also goes beyond that, because there’s this sense of camaraderie that we have all created amongst ourselves: in the cohort, with the mentors, and with Heidi, who has been the heart and soul of this program.”

Through this intense program, Barreiro said her parents were her inspiration. She especially takes pride in being the daughter of immigrants from El Salvador, who left the country when the country’s civil war broke out in the 1980s. In 1985, her parents left everything that was familiar to them to start a new life.

“I think that the reason why I pushed myself to do all the things that I have done is because I’ve had my parents as motivators,” she said. “Looking back at it, they came here with little to no money, little to no English, and they were able to give me a life that I think any child would want to have. I grew up with parents who have really instilled in me what it means to be persistent, what it means to be hardworking, and the community that I grew up in, South Central, has also been really pivotal to my successes.”

Barreiro wants to make sure that she uses the privilege and honor of having a Ph.D. to give back to students who come from similar backgrounds.

As for being able to represent CSUN, “this program shows that its students are capable of being amazing scholars,” she said.

Elizabeth Calzada
For recipient Elizabeth Calzada, it was a big surprise to be able to receive such a prestigious award. The opportunity will allow her to attend the University of Minnesota’s history doctoral program.

“I didn’t think that I was going to get the graduate funding,” Calzada said. “I didn’t think that I would go from a bachelor’s to a doctorate, which is a huge leap in itself. This program turned my life upside down. I received so much support from my mentors, from Heidi and our cohort members. There are resources there that I never would’ve thought I’d have, and I do. That’s the biggest thing.”

She decided to pursue professoriate after noticing that not many of her professors looked like her.

“I want to be a professor to get more Latino representation in the professoriate,” Calzada said. “I mean you see it even here, in institutions like CSUN that is an HSI campus, there’s still a big gap [in Latina/o professors]. Imagine what the gap is like in schools that aren’t HSI, so that’s pretty huge.

“Being in HSI Pathways has brought me closer to my career goals. I’ve always known that I wanted to be a professor, but this program secured it and made it more realistic. It just made things more plausible and more likely to happen than if I was to just do it on my own.”

Receiving the full funding is even more special to Calzada, because she’s the first in her family to reach the doctorate level of higher education.

“I’m a first-generation American, so my parents never got much of an education,” she said. “My mother went up to first grade, my father went up to sixth grade, so we never really had much on how to apply to college or anything like that, any resources. That was really tough, because my parents wanted to help, but they didn’t know how. When they found out about the award, they were really proud.”

Jared Diaz
For recipient Jared Diaz, college wasn’t always an option. Growing up on the autism spectrum, he had a particularly difficult time in school.

“In my elementary years, I was diagnosed with Asperger’s, and there were many things that I’ve had to overcome,” Diaz said. “I struggled with social interaction, making friends, and having to navigate the complex nature of the school as an institution. I had teachers that would tell my parents not to expect much for me. ‘College may not be an option,’ they said. ‘He may not be able to take care of himself on his own,’ that kind of thing. Seeing how far I’ve come now to preparing to enter a Ph.D. program makes me feel good to know that they were wrong.”

Despite a difficult childhood, Diaz has now accepted an offer for a fully funded Ph.D. program at Arizona State University for religious studies. He thanks HSI Pathways for opening opportunities like these for him.

“HSI Pathways is basically the reason why I’m looking at the offers I have,” he said. “I never would’ve thought to try to apply for a Ph.D. program in any school. It gave me a lot of opportunities that I wouldn’t have at this point. I am where I am now because of this program.”

Diaz explained what inspired his goal to want to be a professor.

“I’ve always just enjoyed the process of learning and being inside and outside of the classroom, whether that is one-on-one work, or doing research and producing new knowledge to provide to your field that further knowledge,” he said. “Just the whole process of learning has always been a pleasure to me. Continuing that is something that I’ve wanted to do, and HSI Pathways has put me along the path of that goal.”

Yaquelin Morales
Inspired by family, a Los Angeles Latina-based poetry group and HSI Pathways colleagues, Yaquelin Morales successfully received an acceptance to the performance studies program at Northwestern University. The performance studies program analyzes performance to engage history, culture and human expression. She plans on doing ethnographic work on the performance of women’s activism.

As the first in her family to attend college, Morales feels grateful for the “continuously expanding opportunities” CSUN’s HSI Pathways program has provided. She hadn’t considered a Ph.D. program until CSUN professor Melissa Galvan explained the opportunity to her Gender and Women’s Studies class.

“I guess I never really thought about a Ph.D. until that moment,” she said. “It seemed like something very far away. It wasn’t until I started the program that everything was broken down for me. They demystified the whole process.”

After attending summer workshops with her cohort, traveling to universities nationwide and gaining a sense of morale from Schumacher, Morales gained lasting friendships and a “genuine love for people’s success.”

“Every time somebody got an acceptance into a program, we were genuinely happy for them,” Morales said. “In many academic spaces there is a sort of competitiveness. Ultimately, everyone succeeded.

“It has definitely brought a lot of attention from other universities to our institution,” Morales added. “It puts more light that CSUN students have the ability if given the right tools.”

Brian Mercado
Brian Mercado will be studying sociology with a concentration on education at the Graduate Center at the City University of New York next fall.

“I had the sense that [New York is where] I’m meant to be, this is what I’m supposed to be doing,” said Mercado.

Discussing both graduate school and the HSI Pathways program, Mercado said there was much he had learned, and he appreciated all members of his cohort, his coordinator, his mentor and everyone affiliated with the program for being his support system.

“The mission of the program is to diversify the professoriate,” he said. “[As a professor], I believe I can open doors for people that have had different experiences.”

As soon as he finished his first sociology course, Mercado said he knew he wanted to pursue a doctorate, because he fell in love with the subject matter. “I love theories, so I figured I could combine theory with teaching and become a professor, but also do my research on theory and people that are disenfranchised by the system of education.”

For his research project, Mercado interviewed high school administrators on their perception of low-income students of color. When reflecting on the future, Brian said that his thoughts on potential dissertation topics included: drug use among students, toxic masculinity of students within school settings and using Marxist theory to relate students to the laborer and draw parallels between the processes of alienation that both groups experience.

“When I was a high school senior, my mom was getting her GED while also studying for her citizenship test,” Mercado said. “That really inspired me. I love my mom. I look up to her. If she was in a different space, she could have gone so much farther. Seeing her in her 30s completing all of these things was very impactful for me.

Hermes Rocha
Hermes Rocha, a double major in philosophy and religious studies, wants to get involved with politics and “contribute to society with philosophical ideas.”

As a lover of philosophy and his Mexican culture, Rocha plans to bring non-European Western philosophies into the academic world as a future professor. Next fall, Rocha will be pursuing his goal of achieving a Ph.D. in philosophy at the University of California, Davis.

Being aware of the small percentage of Latinos involved in academia within the United States, Rocha said, “I couldn’t see myself doing anything else. My parents came from Mexico, so I could have opportunities not to do [physical labor] jobs.”

After learning that Latin American philosophy is still very much influenced by European decisions and learning he is half Native American, Rocha said, “[Mexico is] a country of people mixed with Spanish and Native-American. What really inspired me was trying to produce work that helps out the Native American side. Trying to enlighten the fact that there are indigenous people in Mexico, and not all of them are Aztec.”

One of Rocha’s mentors, Linda Alvarez, assistant professor in Central American studies at CSUN, helped him with writing and supported his application process. Rocha said he wanted to be a professor of philosophy since he was in community college. Additionally, the professors here at CSUN helped inspire him and refined his writing skills.

“Since I’ve been here, I’ve only gotten A’s except for one B,” said Rocha. He credits this to the help of his professors here at CSUN who have: “Gone above and beyond. They were really straightforward, but they were nice. And they were firm in their critique of our papers. Ultimately, I think they made me a better philosopher.”

Even though Rocha always knew he wanted to participate in a doctorate program, he was very nervous and felt underprepared. After going through a six-week-long academic bootcamp, learning important nuances of graduate school and creating the research papers which he used as his writing sample for the applications, Rocha wants other students to be aware of doctorate programs.

“I knew that a Ph.D. would give me more options,” he said. “I love philosophy for what it is and that’s what I want to do.

“Just as easy knowing that there’s the SRC on campus, that’s how I want students to feel about finding access to graduate programs,” he continued. “To the point where that information can find students. For me, I thought I was going to keep my head down, do my work. I didn’t know what it took to get into it.”

Eryn Talevich
What makes HSI Pathways an esteemed program is that it emphasizes diversity. Eryn Talevich, who was homeschooled for large portion of her life, was an untraditional candidate — but what made her unique was also what got her into HSI Pathways.

“I homeschooled from second grade until I was 18, so I hardly had any traditional schooling,” she said. “I entered community college at 18, but I wasn’t sure of my career path yet. [As a result,] I was in community college on and off for over 10 years, until I took anthropology and loved it. I transferred from Ventura College in 2016 to CSUN. I’m 33 now, so the majority of my full time college years were in my early 30s.”

This fall, Talevich will be attending the University of Michigan to work toward her Ph.D. in anthropology. HSI Pathways helped Talevich prepare by offering numerous resources at CSUN.

“It was an amazing time to bond with my fellow colleagues,” Talevich said. “Each day was new and exciting. You never knew what you were going to learn.”

Talevich said that her goal after attaining her Ph.D. is to go into full-time teaching as a professor. Through teaching, she says she can give back to the communities she was a part of as an undergraduate.

Kiara Padilla
For first-generation college students, being the first to attend college can be a difficult journey into the unknown. Kiara Padilla overcame this challenge.

“We completed a six-week seminar where we stayed in the dorms to learn different strategies that would be useful in our doctorate programs. We had workshops on topics such as theory, gutting books and how to deliver a proper elevator pitch” said Padilla. “This taught me the importance of time management and independence.”

Padilla has shown superior academic valor and will be graduating from CSUN with a double major in psychology and chicano/a studies. This fall, Padilla will also be attending the University of Minnesota for her Ph.D. in American Studies.

HSI Pathways offers students like Padilla the experience to build valuable relationships with their cohort and teach important habits to keep into their doctorate process. This program will help tremendously on her journey to her Ph.D.

“My mom and I attended CSUN at the same time. We learned how to navigate academia together and she graduated with her B.A. last year. But, I am the first out of my family to pursue a graduate school, most importantly a Ph.D.,” said Padilla. “I was speechless when I found out I was accepted to my first school. I thought it was a mistake.”

Padilla said she wants to be a university professor to encourage students to do research, because research is a form of social change.

“My mentors are the ones who continue to guide me when I have my doubts,” said Padilla. “Without them, my family and my partner, I wouldn’t be where I am today.”

California State University, Northridge estimates that there are 1,700 undocumented students on campus. Students, families, faculty and staff celebrated the achievements of undocumented student graduates at the 2018 Undocu-Graduation Celebration on May 11.

The event featured student speakers and presentation of sashes to commemorate the graduates’ accomplishments. Here are photos from the celebration.

In emergency rooms across the United States, nurses, doctors and hospital staff know never to say the “Q” word. The dreaded word isn’t “question,” “quarrel” or “quick” — it’s “quiet.”

It’s a rare time for an emergency room when the phones aren’t ringing and patients aren’t arriving, but that can all change in minutes, according to an ER superstition. As soon as someone remarks, “It’s going to be a quiet night, isn’t it?,” everything changes: Ambulances flood the ER with patients until it’s bursting.

As a doctor of emergency medicine and Co-Medical Director of Burbank Emergency Medical Group at Providence Saint Joseph Medical Center in Burbank, it’s a situation that Celina Barba-Simic ’92 (Cell and Molecular Biology) knows all too well.

Barba-Simic’s only access to medical care as a child was the busy county emergency department, which “normalized” long waits, chaos and language barriers for the alumna. When she decided to pursue a career in medicine, emergency medicine was the only specialty she considered.

“Attending to people at times of crisis represents the greatest privilege of medicine,” Barba-Simic said. “I am most grateful to be able to alleviate anxiety and have an impact on patients’ acute medical needs…”

Barba-Simic always knew she wanted to work in medicine, but she never imagined that learning not to say the “Q” word would be such a valuable lesson — nor did she know that she would be drawn to the fast-paced world of emergency medicine.

Her path became clearer when she took a human embryology course with — and later joined the Center for Cancer and Developmental Biology of — esteemed biology professor Steven Oppenheimer at California State University, Northridge.

His influence on her was so profound that Barba-Simic recently made a gift to the CSUN College of Science and Mathematics to create the Dr. Celina Barba-Simic Biology Scholarship in Honor of Dr. Steven Oppenheimer.

The annual scholarship will provide one award for an undergraduate student with demonstrated financial need who is also conducting laboratory research in the College of Science and Mathematics’ Department of Biology.

She decided to make the gift, she said, after her daughters asked her a tough question: “Mom, how did you become a doctor?”

“One day they just asked me how I did it,” Barba-Simic said. “And I really tried to unravel all of those layers of skills and education.”

In unraveling 20 years’ worth of layers, Barba-Simic remembered her inspiring professor of human embryology.

“Dr. Oppenheimer at CSUN gave me the comfortable, accessible starting point where I could really start building those skills and seeing that there are possibilities,” she said. “He was absolutely essential.”

Her Time at CSUN
Oppenheimer, who has mentored thousands of students during his 40-year tenure as a CSUN professor, said that Barba-Simic stood out when she was an undergraduate.

“Celina had sparkle, spark and enthusiasm seldom seen in students,” Oppenheimer said. “The combination of her enthusiasm and my enthusiasm made for great success. Celina’s spark was inspirational.”

After getting to know the professor — now emeritus — Barba-Simic joined the famed Oppenheimer lab. “Being in Dr. O’s lab was awesome. He made it approachable and hands-on,” she said. “Everything was accessible. He encouraged every person that walked in there to do everything they wanted to do and helped them find ways to do it.”

In the lab, Barba-Simic helped research cell surface carbohydrates in adhesion and migration, to explore how cells’ surface sugar-containing receptor sites change during development. The study aimed to determine the function of those carbohydrates in order to find causes of cancer-cell spread.

Barba-Simic said the professor’s encouragement made a profound impact on her life.

“You walk in and he’s saying, ‘You’re wonderful and you’re the best!’ It was life-changing, his teaching and his classes,” she said. “It prepared me for medical school. I knew I had the study skills, the research skills and the knowledge base [to succeed].”

Although she learned many things from him, the most important idea the professor instilled in Barba-Simic was this: You can be a doctor if you want to be.

“I reflected on the impact my time in Dr. Oppenheimer’s lab had on my career,” Barba-Simic said. “He gave me the confidence to apply to [medical school]. Dr. Oppenheimer changed the trajectory of my life.”

Overcoming Barriers
A first-generation college student born in Mexico and raised in Pacoima, Barba-Simic and her parents came to the U.S. when she was three months old. She started working at the age of 15 and had two jobs by the time she was 16. She used her wages to pay for essentials.

“When I was graduating high school, I brought the UC application to my mom and was like, ‘How many of these boxes can I check off?’ I think the applications were around $50 each,” Barba-Simic said. “And she said, ‘Oh, honey, we can’t afford that and you can’t move away from home.’”

Financial and cultural constraints led Barba-Simic to CSUN, where she initially enrolled as a physical therapy major. Once at CSUN, she encountered cultural barriers to her education from well-meaning family and friends.

“I knew I wanted to be a physician, but everybody told me, ‘Oh, don’t be a doctor. It takes too long and you’re going to get married anyway,’” Barba-Simic said.

Despite the financial and cultural barriers, Barba-Simic paved her way to medical school by volunteering at the Veterans Affairs Sepulveda Ambulatory Care Center, just a few miles east of campus, doing research and participating in on-campus organizations such as Chicanos for Community Medicine.

At the end of her undergraduate time at CSUN, Barba-Simic received multiple awards including Graduating Student of the Year Award from the Department of Biology and the Minority Achievers in Science Student of the Year Award. She also received multiple scholarships, fostering her appreciation of the financial needs of low-income students and later inspiring her to make a gift to aid those in need.

Barba-Simic made the gift to her alma mater in hopes of supporting “CSUN students that share similar challenges and career goals.”

As an involved undergraduate, Barba-Simic applied for — and later received — the National Institutes of Health Minorities Access to Energy Related Careers grant, with Oppenheimer’s encouragement, she said.

“The grant paid for two years [of undergrad], so I was able to stop working,” she said. “In the summer, the grant allowed me to conduct research in a Department of Energy lab and use the skills that Dr. O taught me.

“I was lucky to be at Lawrence-Berkeley National Laboratory working under Dr. Levy … where my job was to irradiate mice brain cell cultures, subjecting them to different levels of radiation and testing Bragg peaks using the linear accelerator. This was but a small part of the research that Dr. Levy used to perfect proton therapy for high-precision treatment of brain tumors and vascular malformations,” she added.

Perseverance
After graduating from Stanford Medical School, Barba-Simic completed a three-year emergency medicine residency at Harbor-UCLA Medical Center, where she started work as early as 4 a.m. and ended as late as 7 p.m. — the following day. This meant Barba-Simic often worked 38-hour shifts and 120-hour weeks.

On top of extremely long hours, in the first three months of her residency, Barba-Simic became pregnant with her first child. She went to her fellow residents and asked to switch schedules around so that her vacation was at the end of her first year.

“Once I switched it all, I went to my residency director and said, ‘I have a plan.’ I did not miss a day,” Barba-Simic said. “I actually went into labor my last day. I guess you’re so used to, as a minority, working harder and trying to prove yourself that it’s just part of you.”

At the start of her residency, she was one of two women in a class of 12, but she didn’t let that disparity discourage her from accomplishing her goals and realizing her full potential.

“You make it happen,” she said. “I’m kind of tough — I think that’s the Pacoima in me.”

The influence that Oppenheimer had on her was invaluable, as was the education and training he provided. “Dr. Oppenheimer changed my life by believing in me and providing the opportunity,” she said.

To her fellow Matadors considering making a gift, Barba-Simic said: “Please take a moment to remember those individuals that have made a difference in your life while at CSUN. Reflect on your ability to share the fruits of your education with the next generation, your community and those in need.”

Thomas Johnson III knows he’s been lucky to have great mentors — adult role models who taught him how to succeed. After graduating from California State University, Northridge and preparing to embark on a career in education, he’s eager to serve as a mentor for the next generations of students.

In May, Johnson ’13 (Music), ’18 (Teaching Credential) completed the Accelerated Collaborative Teacher (ACT) Preparation Program in CSUN’s Michael D. Eisner College of Education. This fall he will start teaching sixth-grade core math and science at the Los Angeles Unified School District’s first all-boys academy, the new Boys Academic Learning Academy of Los Angeles, on the campus of Washington Preparatory High School. An African-American male, Johnson said he’s excited to serve as a role model for a student body he estimates will be 75 percent African-American and 25 percent Latino.

“I think it’s a good fit because not only will I be able to teach the students, but the students will be able to look up to someone who’s made it through college,” Johnson said. “They’ll see that, yes, in the real world you may not be surrounded by people who look like you, but you can still do it. It’s a significant thing to accomplish and just say, ‘Hey, I did it.’”

Associate Professor Nancy O’Rode, who taught Johnson in the mathematics curriculum and methods ACT course, said he will be a great role model for his students, as he is smart, kind, considerate and funny. He already has experience in creating math problems that require problem-solving skills, using ideas based not on formulas but on challenges relative to his students’ neighborhoods and lives. She said he will be served well in the classroom with a booming baritone voice and a habit of getting everyone involved by asking “What do you think?”

“He’s just an exemplary human being,” O’Rode said. “He will be able to just naturally be a model for what it means to be a man in today’s society.”

Teaching wasn’t always Johnson’s goal, but he always appreciated the mentorship he received, he said.

He grew up in Culver City. His father works as a urologist in private practice and his mother is an educator — now the principal of Carthay School of Environmental Studies Magnet in Los Angeles. He also benefited from the guidance of other teachers and professors throughout his life, including Carey Christensen, a professor of music industry studies at CSUN.

After earning his bachelor’s degree, Johnson worked as a recording engineer at various studios, including part-time and freelance work. At his mother’s suggestion, he tried substitute teaching to earn a steadier income. It was his most challenging classroom in those days that inspired Johnson.

As a long-term sub, he inherited a class of fourth graders whose teacher had left a couple of months into the school year. The class included foster children, recent immigrants from El Salvador (including two who didn’t speak English), and other students whose personal lives provided barriers to learning.

Johnson worked to get to know each student as an individual and connect with them personally.

“That’s when I realized I can make a difference in another person’s life,” he said. “To enjoy school, students have to trust who’s teaching it. When we had a teacher we didn’t like, we didn’t buy in to what we were being taught.”

So Johnson returned to CSUN for his teaching credential in CSUN’s ACT program, a very selective, two-semester, full-time program designed for post-baccalaureate credential candidates interested in pursuing a Multiple Subject, Single Subject or Education Specialist Credential. Candidates progress through the program as a cohort, completing fieldwork during the day and coursework in the late afternoon and evenings. During the program, Johnson served as a student teacher in the Larchmont Charter School and Community Magnet Charter School in Los Angeles. He is considering returning to CSUN to complete a master’s in mathematics education.

Johnson will return to CSUN this summer for a summer bridge program funded by the W.K. Kellogg Foundation, which awarded the university a three-year grant for a teacher-preparation project aimed at increasing the number of men — particularly African-Americans, Asians and Latinos — who want to work in elementary education. In the summer program, Johnson will serve as a mentor for incoming minority, male high school juniors and seniors who are interested in teaching.

“I still see the need to help guide young males — doesn’t matter what background they come from — but males in general, just to help them make it through life, just be somebody they go to talk to,” Johnson said. “If they need help with school, need help with life in general, just have that older person to help guide them in the right way.”

CSUN alumni and the leadership group National Millennial Community (NMC) had the chance to present a paper on the state of the nation’s opioid epidemic to President Donald Trump’s administration. According to its executive summary, the paper discussed ways to provide a millennial perspective that coincides with the administration’s current and future health initiatives.

In March, distinguished alumnus and co-founder of NMC Bill Imada ’84 (Human Resource Management) made a visit to the White House with the help of Eljay Feuerman, NMC co-founder, and CSUN alumna Edith Gomez ’16 (Marketing). The visit’s purpose was to engage in a conversation about the country’s opioid crisis.

Initially, the NMC was scheduled to visit and tour the White House in August 2017. That visit was postponed to this spring, after White House staff asked the group to prepare a conversation about millennials’ perspectives on the opioid crisis. Feuerman said the conversation had shifted because an NMC member had seen people in his hometown deal with the effects of opioids. The group suggested they take the planned conversation one step further and send recommendations and exploratory research on the opioid crisis to the White House.

“Instead of walking into a room and having the conversation stop in that room, we wanted to do something that was a little bit more actionable to further the conversation,” Feuerman said. “It was about change in a way that could reach more than the people inside the room.”

According to Feuerman, the administration was open to hearing the students’ ideas, leading to the white paper “Millennials Take a Stand Against Opioids.”

Imada said he was proud to have so many CSUN alumni and representatives from another California State University present at the White House.

“It was a great feeling having representatives from 20 different states at our meetings with White House officials, and even better having CSUN students there to address some of the critical issues impacting our country,” Imada said. “CSUN was joined by another state university, Sonoma State, at our meeting. It was a cordial conversation about how millennials could play a greater role in addressing opioid abuse and addiction in our country.”

In May, the NMC received a positive response to the white paper from President Trump’s administration. Special Assistant to the Secretary at the White House Melissa Fwu told Imada that the White House was impressed by the well-thought-out essay and by the level of understanding that the NMC community demonstrated on the opioid challenges facing America, Imada said. She sent the document to Kellyanne Conway, counselor to the President and the White House’s point person on response to the opioid crisis, Imada said.

NMC member Brittany Gamble ’18 (Journalism) was one of five members pre-selected to speak with White House executives. She said she felt honored to have the opportunity to speak to the White House on such an important topic.

“Having an opportunity to visit the White House and the Eisenhower Executive Office Building was something I never expected to do in my lifetime,” she said. “It was truly an honor to serve as a student ambassador from California State University, Northridge, and be one of only three student delegates from our state. As lead members of our delegation, we were given a rare opportunity to receive a high-level briefing on the opioid crisis from four members of President Donald Trump’s team. We were also personally escorted from the White House to our briefing, passing the West Wing along the way.”

Gamble wasn’t the only CSUN student to participate. NMC member Nicole Delgado ’18 (Marketing) helped research and write the white paper. Although she was not able to attend the meeting at the White House, she felt compelled to contribute to the project.

“It felt really cool because I never thought I would be asked personally by the White House to talk about the opioid epidemic,” Delgado said. “It was a new experience and felt like a test, because I’ve never been asked about this before. I was more than willing to do it.”

Delgado said she appreciated having a chance to make change. Social movements can affect everyone, directly and indirectly, and she hopes that the white paper will help people understand the national crisis, she said.

“It was a lot of pressure because I wanted to do a good job,” she said. “As a CSUN student I wanted to prove to the White House that Cal State students have the skills and ability to provide quality knowledge, research and advice. I’m glad my advice and research was selected and hope It inspires the White House.”

The audience answered confidently: “Teach on.”

This question was posed by Darryl McKeller, a teacher with 20 years of experience in inner-city schools in LAUSD. His primary audience included a group of seven students of various ages, participating in Future Male Minority Teachers of Color (F2MTC). The program’s mission is to create a pipeline for male minorities to become elementary school teachers.

From June 25 to 29, California State University, Northridge hosted a group of high school students and one college student for F2MTC’s summer bridge program. The event featured several workshops, including McKeller’s, which focused on topics such as mentorship, defending a position and teaching methods. Another workshop combined hip-hop and social justice to show the importance of teaching and mentorship through creating various rhymes with positives messages.

“All of my life I have had female teachers,” said participant and Northridge Academy High School student Adrian Lopez. “I think having men of color in elementary schools would make a big impact on the students.”

In the social justice and hip-hop workshop, the students were told to create a rap song about teaching. This technique was used to encourage and educate on various teaching methods.

“It was really good to see just how hard it is for teachers,” said Brandon Angulo, a Simi Valley High School student. “I want to be able to help the next generation and inspire them.”

The workshops were full of students eager to learn and mentors eager to teach. Through bonding and mentorship, the experienced teachers are able to build a valuable relationship with the students to promote positive habits and lessons.

“There is a male teacher shortage is elementary schools nationwide,” said Shartriya Collier-Stewart, a mentor and co-director of the Kellogg Grant, a grant that supports the recruitment, retention and advancement of male teachers of color, which helped fund F2MTC. “Through mentorship and social justice, we are able to foster a generation of male minority teachers that can transform their communities.”

California State University, Northridge Deaf studies professor Lissa D. Stapleton has received a $20,000 grant to take Deaf students of color and Deaf studies majors to Cape Town, South Africa.

Students from CSUN will compare and contrast the history, language and culture of black, Deaf people in the United States with the history, language and culture of black, Deaf people in South Africa.

This past spring, Stapleton wrote a faculty-led international programming grant for the Council on International Educational Exchange (CIEE) that focused on supporting the Deaf community at CSUN. CIEE provides study abroad opportunities for students underrepresented in international education.

CSUN is one of two universities that received the grant. CSUN will be going to South Africa and Gallaudet University will be heading to Spain with the grants. The universities were chosen out of 200 submissions for their innovative focus on Deaf and Deaf studies students as well as minority groups, in both historical and regional contexts, according to CIEE.

CSUN’s trip will take place for 16 days during the summer of 2019. There will be about 10-12 students attending the trip. The students that are eligible to go are undergraduate and graduate students with a Deaf Studies background or who identify as Deaf or hard of hearing. All participants must be proficient in American Sign Language because of the grant criteria. Students who have never traveled out of the country will be strongly considered.

If you are interested in joining professor Stapleton on the trip to South Africa, she will be holding informational sessions regarding the trip this September. Please email lissa.stapleton@csun.edu for an application and any questions.

CSUN is launching a new, two-year, inclusive program this fall, CSUN Explorers, that offers people with intellectual or developmental disabilities to take classes at the university. Photo by Lee Choo.

Hoping to break down stereotypes and misconceptions, California State University, Northridge is launching a program this fall to increase the employability and independence of individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities.

CSUN Explorers is an inclusive, two-year, postsecondary program offered through the university’s Tseng College. It is designed to increase the independence, and work and life skills of students with intellectual and developmental disabilities by offering them an opportunity to experience university life in an age-appropriate setting.

“People have a lot of misconceptions about what people with intellectual disabilities can or cannot do,” said special education professor Beth Lasky, who created the CSUN Explorers program. “This gives people with intellectual or developmental disabilities an opportunity to break down stereotypes about what they are capable of and get a taste of university life, while also getting skills that will expand their employment opportunities.”

Lasky noted that CSUN Explorers will not be earning a CSUN degree.

“To do that, they must meet the CSU admissions requirements, apply and be accepted to CSUN,” she said. “Instead, they will receive a certificate of completion that signifies that the individual has increased their level of independence through significant progress in academic exploration, competitive employability, social competency and self-advocacy.

“Once they’ve completed the program, the certificate indicates not that they just have completed a program, but that they are more independent and have skills that make them employable, and that’s the real goal,” Lasky said.

CSUN is the second CSU campus to offer such a program. Fresno State launched a similar program, Wayfinders, in 2011.

To be eligible for the CSUN Explorers program, individuals must have a diagnosed intellectual or developmental disability, be between the ages of 18 and 28andhave a certificate of completion or equivalent from a high school program.

Explorers will take at least two classes each semester with CSUN undergraduate students, and will have a peer mentor in each class. They also are invited to join student clubs and take part in other activities on campus. Their second year in the program will include internships on campus or in the community. They also will have access to resources in CSUN’s Career Center, including resume writing, to help them find internships and jobs.

Lasky said she expected the program’s first cohort to consist of no more than five students.

“They will be part of a pilot program,” she said. “Their feedback will be important as we shape how the program grows in the future.”

Lasky said she was pleasantly surprised earlier this year when she sent out an email to department chairs across the campus, asking for the names of professors who would be willing to have CSUN Explorers in their classes.

“Basically, what I said is that I was starting this new program, that it would involve students with intellectual disabilities who would be taking two classes each semester, and that I wanted to have a variety of lower-division undergraduate courses that they could choose from,” she said.

Lasky, who teaches a course in disabilities studies, volunteered to meet with faculty who may have concerns about how they would meet the educational needs of a student with an intellectual or developmental disability.

“About 40 faculty responded from across campus,” she said. “It was more than I expected. Some of they said they weren’t sure an Explorer would want to take their class, but if they wanted to, then they were more than welcome.”

Lasky said the creation of the Explorers program seemed “natural” for CSUN, which has long championed inclusive education.

CSUN has one of the largest populations of Deaf and hard-of-hearing students at a mainstream university in the nation. Each year, it has hosted the CSUN Assistive Technology Conference — the world’s largest event dedicated to presenting and exploring new ways technology can assist people with disabilities. The CHIME Institute — a national leader in developing and implementing model educational programs and dynamic research and training environments to disseminate best practices in inclusive education, and which operates an inclusive K-8 public charter school — started at CSUN, and the institute’s research and training center is housed in the university’s Michael D. Eisner College of Education.

“Having a program like the CSUN Explorers is a perfect fit for the university, and the CSU as a whole,” Lasky said.

For more information about the CSUN Explorers program, visit its website.

José Luis Benavides

Professor José Luis Benavides has spent the past 15 years building California State University, Northridge’s Spanish-language journalism program into a nationally respected enterprise that sees its alumni landing jobs at news organizations around the country.

His efforts to train and mentor future journalists who have the skills to report on Spanish-language and Latino communities with sensitivity and appreciation for cultural differences and nuances has earned him the national Society for Professional Journalists’ Distinguished Teaching in Journalism Award, which honors an outstanding journalism educator who has made an exceptional contribution to the profession and/or journalism education.

Benavides said that while he is honored to receive the award, “to me, the most significant thing is that this recognition will give some visibility to the work of our students.”

“Despite the fact that many newspapers are downsizing, a good number of our students are landing jobs at television stations, online news media outlets and, yes, newspapers across the Southwest, on the East Coast and at news organizations across the country,” he said. “As this country becomes more and more diverse, a large number of this nation’s population will be Latino or Spanish-speaking. If news organizations want to do their jobs well in reporting news important to all Americans, then they are going to need journalists who have the skills to report on Latino and Spanish-language communities.”

In her nominating letter, Linda Bowen, chair of the CSUN journalism department, noted that many of the students Benavides has mentored are the first in their families to attend college and are often working 40 or more hours a week.

“His ability to connect with and inspire them to believe in themselves has literally changed hundreds of our students’ lives,” she wrote.

Benavides admitted he is a little overwhelmed at being named a “distinguished teacher” by the Society of Professional Journalists.

“It says that you have been recognized, but it also carries the responsibility to continue doing what I do and to do it better,” he said. “I’m not sure if I can do that — I still have doubts sometimes about whether I am a good teacher — but I am going to have to try.”

Benavides joined CSUN’s journalism faculty in 2002 and quickly began developing the department’s Spanish-language journalism program. He started by establishing El Nuevo Sol, a multimedia, bi-lingual student publication, and created two new courses. By 2007, the program — an interdisciplinary minor that includes courses in journalism, Chicana/o studies, Central American studies and Spanish — was formally launched.

Benavides will be honored at the Society for Professional Journalists’ Excellence in Journalism 2018 conference in Baltimore, Md., next month.

CSUN President Dianne F. Harrison and film professor Nate Thomas arrive at the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s annual grants banquet, where the university was awarded $60,000 to support film students. Photo courtesy of Nate Thomas.

The Hollywood Foreign Press Association (HFPA) has awarded California State University, Northridge $60,000 to support the university’s film students.

The gift was announced at the association’s annual star-studded grants banquet, held Aug. 9 at The Beverly Hilton in Beverly Hills. Among those in attendance were Alfonso Cuaron, Alfre Woodard, Amber Heard, Ben Hardy, Billy Porter, Charlize Theron, Cody Fern, Connie Britton, Dakota Fanning, John Cho, John David Washington, Rami Malek, Regina King and Steve Carell.  William H. Macy served as the evening’s host.

“The Hollywood Foreign Press Association has become a steadfast partner to CSUN’s film program,” said cinema and television arts professor Nate Thomas, head of CSUN’s film production option, who attended the event with CSUN President Dianne F. Harrison. “Over the years, they have been strong supporters of all aspects of what we do. The HFPA gets who our students are, and respects the diverse voices those students are bringing to tables all across the entertainment industry.  Their continual support helps to ensure the creative talents behind those voices have an opportunity to be heard.”

CSUN President Dianne F. Harrison with actor William H. Macy, who served as host of the Hollywood Foreign Press Association’s annual grants banquet. Photo courtesy of Dianne F. Harrison.

In 2015, HFPA gave CSUN’s Department of Cinema and Television Arts $2 million to support students, including the creation of a Hollywood Foreign Press Association scholars program, and to enhance technology.

HFPA, which is made up of international journalists who report on the entertainment industry and hosts the Golden Globe Awards each year, handed out a total of $3.25 million in grants at the Aug. 9 banquet to a variety of entertainment-related and charitable organizations. The donations were for a wide range of projects, including film preservation, higher education, training and mentoring, and the promotion of cultural exchange through film.

CSUN’s relationship with the association dates back to 1996. In addition to the $2 million gift, HFPA grants over the years have supported student film projects and helped keep CSUN’s film program current with the latest technology. Students edit in the Hollywood Foreign Press Association Senior Film Edit Suite on campus, and they work on sound design in a state-of-the-art sound mix facility made possible by a grant from the association.

CSUN’s Department of Cinema and Television Arts, housed in the Mike Curb College of Arts, Media, and Communications, has an international reputation for producing dedicated and talented entertainment industry professionals who recognize the value of hard work as they learn and continue to perfect their crafts. The department currently enrolls abut 1,550 undergraduate students and 30 students in its graduate screenwriting program. Its alumni work in all aspects of entertainment media, from writing, producing and directing to manning cameras and having the final say in what project is made. The entertainment trade magazines Variety and The Hollywood Reporter regularly list CSUN as one of the top film programs in the world.

CSUN ranks among the top universities in the country that award undergraduate degrees to minority students, according to Diverse Issues in Higher Education. Photo by Lee Choo.

California State University, Northridge ranks among the top 15 universities in the country that award undergraduate degrees to minority students, according to Diverse Issues in Higher Education.

The magazine’s annual ranking of the “Top 100 Producers of Bachelor’s Degrees” appears in its Aug. 23 edition.

“I am pleased to see the university maintain its high ranking on this list,” CSUN President Dianne F. Harrison said. “The recognition underscores our standing as one of the most diverse university campuses in the nation. The ranking illustrates our commitment to the success of all students by providing opportunity and access to students from traditionally underrepresented communities.”

CSUN ranked 11th in the nation among colleges and universities awarding undergraduate degrees to minority students.

The magazine also ranked CSUN second in the nation for bachelor’s degrees awarded to Hispanic students in liberal arts and sciences; second in bachelor’s degrees awarded in psychology; fourth in degrees awarded in the social sciences; and fifth in all disciplines combined. In addition, CSUN ranked second in awarding bachelor’s degrees in marketing to Asian-American students.

CSUN has nearly 40,000 students, 48 percent of whom are Hispanic, and offers 69 bachelor’s and 57 master’s degrees, 28 teaching credential programs and two doctoral degree programs. CollegeNET named CSUN a Social Mobility Innovator for its transformative effect on students and the region, and The Wall Street Journal ranked CSUN second in the nation for the university’s diverse learning environment.

California State University, Northridge academic and administrative leaders gathered Aug. 20 to prepare for the 2018-19 academic year — focused clearly on student success and continuing the push to improve graduation rates. More than 100 leaders, including department chairs, deans of CSUN’s nine colleges and library, and administrators, met in the Noski Auditorium and Bookstein Hall for their annual retreat.

“Believe in your hearts and in your actions that every student has the ability to succeed and needs our support,” CSUN President Dianne F. Harrison told faculty in her opening remarks. “I read recently, students respond much more positively when educators say, ‘let me collaborate with you’ — as opposed to ‘let me help you.’ Words matter. Think of our students as our partners, and we’re going to collaborate with them.”

In her address, the president shared updates and re-emphasized graduation goals for the year 2025 — set forth by the California State University (CSU) chancellor’s office and the CSU board of trustees (at CSUN, the initiative is called “Matadors Rising”).

“Our retention rate for freshmen from fall 2016 (the most recent data available) was 81 percent,” Harrison said. “That’s a three-point gain over fall 2015 — that’s tremendous progress. It’s the first time we’ve been in the 80s in many years, and the first time in the 80s with this large a student population.

“Our graduation rates look good. We’ve made particular gains with our transfer student population,” she said. “In the two-year transfer graduation rate, we have eliminated achievement gaps among that group. That’s huge for our students.”

As they prepared schedules, faculty staffing and classes for the fall semester (which began Aug. 25), department chairs were urged by the president to continue working with faculty to close achievement gaps for underrepresented minority students. “We cannot rest easy as long as there are any gaps among our students’ achievement,” Harrison said. “We need to really dissect what those differences are, address them, fix them — we know we can do it.”

The retreat’s sessions included breakout groups focusing on undergraduate and graduate policies, scheduling and budgeting in changing times, supporting student success and leadership training. Faculty members from across the university also had the opportunity to hear from new Interim Provost and Vice President for Academic Affairs Stella Theodoulou — a very familiar face, as the former dean of CSUN’s College of Social and Behavioral Sciences (SBS) — as well as new David Nazarian College of Business and Economics Dean Chandra Subramaniam, new SBS Dean Yan Searcy, and a number of new department chairs.

In the morning, Natalie Mason-Kinsey, the campus’ newly appointed chief diversity officer, spoke to the group about her role at CSUN and goals for the new academic year, including increased outreach for hiring, and diversity training for staff and faculty.

Later in the program, William Watkins, dean of students and vice president for student affairs, noted that this fall semester, CSUN is welcoming 4,500 first-time freshmen and 5,600 transfer students — all of whom are invited to celebrate the start of their Matador journey at the annual New Student Convocation on Sept. 13.

“We’re going to give our very best to our students,” Harrison said as she concluded her address. “It’s incredibly rewarding work. It’s not always the easiest work, but what we leave with makes it worthwhile. Our last gathering was at commencement. For those who attend, you know — that’s what makes it all worthwhile: those smiles, the pride, the families. That’s what we’re in our field to do.”

Naieer (above)  is featured in the documentary, “Intelligent Lives,” which challenges perceptions of intelligence as it follows three individuals with intellectual disabilities as they navigate high school, college and work.

Just what does it mean to be called “intelligent?” California State University, Northridge is screening a documentary on Wednesday, Sept. 12, that turns any preconceived notions about what it means to be intelligent on their head.

“Intelligent Lives,” by award-winning documentarian Dan Habib, features three people with intellectual disabilities who challenge perceptions of intelligence as they navigate high school, college and the workforce.

“It gives us great pleasure to be the first venue to screen ‘Intelligent Lives’ on the West Coast,” said special education professor Beth Lasky, who is organizing the event. “We’re lucky enough to have Dan Habib with us that night, who will answer questions about what inspired him to make the film.”

Filmmaker Dan Habib will be on hard to answer questions at the screening.

The screening of “Intelligent Lives” is scheduled to take place at 6 p.m. in the Northridge Center of the University Student Union, located on the east side of the CSUN campus off Zelzah Avenue.  The free screening is open to the public, but registration is required.

The evening also celebrates the recent launch of a new program at the university, CSUN Explorers, a two-year inclusive experience designed to increase the independence, and work and life skills of students with intellectual and developmental disabilities. The first cohort of students to take part in the program started this month.

“Intelligent Lives” aims to reshape how people define intelligence, and transform the label of intellectual disability from a life sentence of isolation into a life of possibility for some of the most systematically segregated people in America.

Academy Award-winning actor Chris Cooper serves as narrator of the film and contextualizes the lives of its central characters — Micah, Naieer and Naomie — through the emotional personal story of his son Jesse, as the film unpacks the shameful and ongoing track record of intelligence testing in the U.S.

For more information about the film screening or CSUN Explorers, contact Lasky at beth.lasky@csun.edu. To register to attend the screening, go to www.IntelligentLivesFilm.eventbrite.com. Parking on the CSUN campus is $8.