Informed & Inspired

Jermaine Rocacorba remembers a San Diego State University Leadership Minor project called “Create a Future Adventure.” The assignment was to create something that doesn’t already exist — something that would make the world a better place. Rocacorba, who graduated from SDSU in December of 2018 with a degree in communication, has been seemingly living that project ever since. 

As a lecturer in the San Diego State University Department of Child and Family Development, Carolyn Sanders teaches courses in multiple settings. But the course she calls her “passion project” typically meets in only one location: the natural canyon landscape of the SDSU Children’s Center’s backyard.

Dr. Jessica Suhrheinrich, associate professor in the San Diego State University Department of Special Education, is beginning work on a federally-funded project aimed at empowering educators who work with young students with autism.

A staff team from the Office of the Dean and Office of Student Success is set to offer insight and provide recommendations for improving student success in the College of Education’s two undergraduate majors.

Meet Angel Gonzalez, a doctoral student in the Ed.D. in Community College Leadership program. Learn about his passion for advancing equity and his dreams of a life in higher education in the first installment of the COE Stories video series.

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.