Informed & Inspired

As a young undergraduate student at the University of Texas-El Paso, Dr. Alberto Esquinca made a daily trek across a bridge spanning the concrete banks of the Rio Grande. The journey provided him safe passage beyond the imposing border fence — the physical representation of the century and a half of geopolitics that separated his family’s home in Ciudad Juarez from the opportunity he sought in the United States.

Dr. Vicki Park, associate professor in the Department of Education Leadership, and students from our Pomona/Alhambra Ed.D. cohort recently published a commentary on education amid the COVID-19 pandemic in Policy Analysis for California Education (PACE). The piece, entitled "Voices of Educators: Supporting Student Learning Amid the Pandemic Requires Prioritizing Social-Emotional Care," offers recommendations on how educators can support the welfare of their students in this time of increased stress.

Ghana seemed to offer everything Chasejamison Akilah Manar-Spears needed to clear her mind and break away from the San Diego State University campus for a while. And it did. As she connected with her roots, she developed a commitment to environmental and social justice that helped lead to her selection as SDSU’s Zahn Spirit of Innovation award recipient for 2020. Its effect on her life, however, is just beginning.

San Diego State University’s community has shown its true resilience during this unprecedented and difficult time in human history. Graduates from the Class of 2020, in particular, have risen to the challenge.

Television news coverage of the early spread of COVID-19 in the United States provided an eerie backdrop for Diana Pastora Carson and Rachel Schlesinger as they passed through airport terminals on their way back from New Orleans in early March. It was a strange time to travel, but for the pair of San Diego State University lecturers, the timing was also somewhat fortuitous.

An exploration of a virtual simulation tool that may revolutionize nursing education, authored by two San Diego State University leaders and alumni, has earned a Best Graduate Student Paper award from the nation’s top professional organization for educational researchers.

From a bedroom in her boyfriend’s parents’ house, Ashley Franklin teaches second grade. The student in San Diego State University’s multiple-subject teacher credential program hasn’t seen her guide teacher or students at Halecrest Elementary in Chula Vista in-person since March 13, when the district suspended in-person classes due to COVID-19. Yet from that small room, she’s found unique ways to connect with her pupils — and gain the classroom hours she needs to teach students of her own in the fall.

San Diego State University has received a $3 million National Science Foundation-funded grant to strengthen mathematics and science teaching in high-need, urban schools throughout San Diego County.

As she conducts research into dynamics between parents and their adolescent and young adult children in immigrant communities, Dr. Vanja Lazarevic, assistant professor in the Department of Child and Family Development, finds common threads — as well as echoes of her own experience as a teenage refugee from Bosnia.

Despite the COVID-19 pandemic and social distancing, the San Diego State University College of Education’s community clinics are meeting the mental health needs of hundreds of San Diegans. Faculty and student clinicians in the Community-Based Block (CBB), Center for Community Counseling and Engagement (CCCE) and Healthy Early Years (HEY) have continued to provide their important services virtually.