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Photo by Jonah Light CDTech’s Linda Wong, working with UCLA, is helping businesses survive in the Vernon-Central district. Dawn Smith (above) of J.U.i.C.E. reaches youths through hip-hop.

UCLA IN LA

Community engagement in action

Engaging with a community is no small task when that community is spread across 4,000 square miles, numbers nearly 10 million residents, is among the most culturally diverse in the nation and ranks as the 11th largest economy in the world. So when UCLA’s Center for Community Partnerships set out to develop a vehicle for community engagement, Associate Vice Chancellor Franklin D. Gilliam Jr., who heads the center, knew the Los Angeles area would be fertile ground for a model program of enrichment and solutions-oriented collaboration.

He was right. Two years after UCLA in LA, the center’s operational arm, was launched, the program has forged innovative and fruitful relationships between the university and nearly 100 community-based organizations. Through its Community Partnership Grants program, funded with a $2-million grant from the UCLA Foundation, the center annually awards $800,000 to $1 million in grants to campus and nonprofit organizations that focus on children, youth and families; economic development; or arts and culture. “Our goal is to avoid drive-by research and instead look for opportunities to provide long-term engagement,” said Gilliam, a professor of political science. “This is the only way to truly address the needs and issues facing our community today.”

Here are four partnership projects that illustrate Gilliam’s vision of community engagement in action.

CONCENTRATED J.U.i.C.E.
Three years ago, Marcus Napuri was lost in the rave scene. He pulled all-nighters spinning discs at dance parties, taking and selling drugs, and break-dancing in his free time. Then friends told him about J.U.i.C.E. — Justice by Uniting in Creative Energy — a community center that helps young people develop and expand their skills in the four elements of hip-hop: dancing, rapping, deejaying and mural art.

So Napuri visited the Pico/Union-Koreatown church where J.U.i.C.E. operates every Thursday evening. What he found was a place where he could practice his moves and upbeat people who helped him redirect his creative energy. Today, at 27, Napuri is drug-free, a full-time painting contractor and a J.U.i.C.E. regular, introducing others to the positive side of hip-hop. “J.U.i.C.E. is like my church; it makes me feel good,” Napuri said. “I know it’s a cliché to say, but hip-hop saved my life.”

To save more lives, J.U.i.C.E. plans to use its $18,700 grant to gather population, crime and other demographic data on various neighborhoods, as well as information on their cultural histories, to determine how these factors could influence the program’s success.

“It’s going to be more of a sociological study in order to assess which areas in greater Los Angeles could possibly benefit from something like J.U.i.C.E.,” said Cheryl L. Keyes, the UCLA partner in the project and an associate professor of ethnomusicology specializing in the hip-hop culture.

The ultimate goal of the project, called J.U.i.C.E. from Concentrate, is to create a manual on how to replicate the program, said Dawn Smith, executive director and founder of the community center. Many communities in California and elsewhere have sought tips on starting similar programs.

Smith founded J.U.i.C.E. in 2001 as an outgrowth of her work as a counselor to youths in juvenile halls. Today, her program has served more than 3,000 people, with about 100 attending weekly. Facilitators, partially funded by an earlier grant from UCLA, teach them the hip-hop arts.

“L.A. has tons of community centers that are run by adults but are not providing activities on the level that youth can identify with,” she said.

— Phil Hampton

COMMUNITY REVITALIZATION
The Vernon-Central district in South Los Angeles has a vibrant history. Once peppered with such famed establishments as Club Alabam and the Memo Club, the area pulsated with jazz in the 1920s and ’30s. Louis Armstrong, Duke Ellington, Billie Holiday and Count Basie performed in the area’s clubs and stayed at the Dunbar Hotel, a luxurious haven for black visitors in racially segregated Los Angeles. Vernon-Central’s economy was robust, and its merchants thrived.

After World War II, however, the area started to decline. Many residents left, mass transit into the district ended, unemployment and crime rose, and violence and a growing drug trade took hold. Over time, the neighborhood welcomed new residents, mostly from Latin America.

Past revitalization efforts did little to reverse the slide. But now, there is new hope being generated by a partnership between the Community Development Technologies Center (CDTech), a nonprofit training, applied-research and technical-assistance organization, and the School of Public Affairs’ North American Integration and Development Center, directed by Associate Professor Leo Estrada.

Funded by a $23,000 community-partnership grant, the project will provide the district’s business owners with much-needed training and will create two resource Web sites for manufacturers affiliated with the Toy Association of Southern California and the Food Industry Business Roundtable.

Linda Wong, CDTech’s business and workforce-development director, has already seen positive results when business owners take CDTech’s computer courses. “Most of the merchants are first-generation immigrants who have little education beyond eighth grade,” Wong said. “For many of them, the training was their first experience with computers. It was an enormous achievement to do what one recent CDTech student did — produce a marketing flyer to advertise her women’s clothing store.”

The partners hope to make a significant difference in the economic future of the Vernon-Central district, an important locale in the history of Los Angeles and one that has great potential to figure prominently in the city’s future.

— Susan Chapman

Photo by Jonah Light Dawn Smith of J.U.i.C.E. reaches youths through hip-hop.

A WISE CHOICE
When UCLA family-medicine physician Michael A. Rodriguez and his community partner wanted to learn how to best teach elderly Latinos about the benefits of healthy living, they went straight to the source.“We can’t solve problems that elderly Latinos face by staying in our offices at UCLA,” said Rodriguez, an associate professor specializing in vulnerable populations. “We have to ask those we want to help what their views are. They have to have a say in what’s going on.”

With funding from a $30,000 grant, Rodriguez and Santa Monica-based WISE Senior Services are developing the Healthy Abuelos (grandparents), Healthy Los Angeles project to identify what obstacles elderly Latinos encounter in choosing healthy lifestyles and accessing health and social services. By tapping into focus groups, the partners hope to learn what messages and methods will be most effective in reaching this population. The campaign will promote healthy lifestyles to seniors in five as-yet undetermined communities.

A language barrier is only one factor that may keep Spanish speakers from making healthy choices, said Nancy K. Hayes, president and CEO of WISE. Cultural values may intervene. For example, many dishes popular in Latino cultures are cooked with lard, and seniors may be reluctant to abandon this tradition. Other cultures may frown upon elderly women wearing sneakers and walking in the park or around the block for exercise.

“(Academicians) are good at pointing out what the problems are,” said Rodriguez, who chairs the Latino Coalition for Healthy California. “What we need to do more of is identify solutions in the real world, solutions you can pick up and apply in ethnically diverse communities. That takes trust, and trust takes time.”

— P.H.

BREAKING THE GANG CYCLE
Bobby Arias describes the young man with a mixture of fondness and pride: “He was wearing baggy pants, a bandana and an undershirt and shows up to work at a local assemblymember’s office. Three weeks later, he’s wearing a suit and tie, and handling telephone calls.”

It’s one of the many success stories that have emerged from the UCLA/CIS Gang Youth Tutor/Mentor Project, which received a $22,300 partnership grant this year. Arias is president of CIS/Communities in Schools for the Los Angeles/San Fernando Valley Region, UCLA’s partner.

The lure of gang life, a deprived upbringing and violence in the home or neighborhood leave many youths feeling trapped.

“The problem in Los Angeles is that many kids can’t find a way out from a life of violence and gangs,” said Jorja Leap, adjunct assistant professor in UCLA’s Department of Social Welfare. Leap’s work with violent youth and crisis has taken her around the world, from Bosnia and Kosovo to Ground Zero and South Los Angeles.

“On the other end, we as individuals tend to be fairly isolated. I worry about my students,” Leap said. “They’re brilliant and motivated, but have no real-world experience. This program builds capacity.”

Through the program, Leap’s UCLA students have a chance to redirect lives. While enrolled in the course at UCLA, they tutor and mentor youths at CIS. Youths are referred to CIS through probation departments, principals and sometimes school police. Students and youths are paired off and meet weekly. To ensure her students’ comfort level, Leap oversees their fieldwork and takes every precaution.

As relationships build, along with trust and credibility, the students become the positive role models that many of these troubled youths never had before. The participants also train for internship programs offered through CIS. In fact, many of the internships have resulted in permanent positions.

“Programs don’t change kids, relationships do,” Arias said. “The UCLA students come here and often wonder if they’ll be able to transform the kids because they come from such different backgrounds. But ultimately, the relationship transcends.”

— Pamela Corante