Luskin Center Research Fellows for 2024-25
The UCLA Luskin Center for History and Policy is pleased to announce its next class of Luskin Fellows for 2024-2025. The Luskin Center is one of the first institutions of its kind in the nation to bring together in-depth historical research and cutting-edge policy analysis.
The Luskin Research Fellowships for 2024-2025 have been awarded to research teams comprising UCLA faculty, undergraduate and graduate students. Four Research Fellowship teams were selected this year from a pool of very strong candidates. These research teams are awarded funds to conduct collaborative research that will bring historical analysis to bear on specific national and international issues of contemporary relevance. The teams are specifically asked to produce historical research and policy analysis that will aim to solve the contemporary issue they have identified.
The winning teams are:
Understanding How Teacher Unions and Educational Justice Coalitions Can Play Roles in Addressing Educational Equity, Civil Rights, and Democracy
This project addresses the problem of understanding how teacher unions can play a role in building power and fostering movements that advance educational equity, civil rights, and the expansion of democracy in schools and in surrounding communities. During the 2010s, the United Teachers Los Angeles (UTLA) transformed from a low-participation union with limited community support to a union powerful enough to lead the successful strike in 2019. This project presents ULTA’s efforts in relation to the broader historical context of teacher unionism in the country and examines the recent emergence of social justice teacher unionism and the intersection of teacher unionism and community relations.
Emily Szpiro
Alex Caputo-Pearl
John Rogers
The Effect of British Colonialism on Transphobia in India
This project examines the effect of British colonialism on transphobia in India. Using a combination of archival research and analysis of contemporary attitudes, the team will seek to identify how British cultural norms and anti-LGBTQ+ laws during the colonial era contributed to modern-day Indian views towards nonbinary individuals.
Ananya L. Hariharan
Josh Goetz
Emily Ortiz
Daniel N. Posner
Historical Border Instability and Democratic Backlash
This research addresses the contemporary “democratic backlash” problem by examining an often-overlooked historical factor: the impact of frequent historical border changes on localities. By exploring how these border changes have shaped local political attitudes over centuries, this project aims to provide a historical context for the modern anti-democratic phenomenon and to propose policy solutions to address this pressing issue.
Luwei Ying
David B. Carter
Sadaf Vafa
Changes to the Public Charge Rule Between 2019 and 2023 and Associations with Basic Needs Outcomes Among Low-Income Immigrant Adults in California
Dr. Wolstein and Dr. Babey will be studying changes in avoidance of public programs out of fear that it would impact immigration status between 2019 and 2023, a period covering the Trump administration’s proposed public charge rule change and the Biden administration’s rule change. They will also examine changes to the relationship between avoidance of public programs and basic needs outcomes (access to care and food security) among low-income immigrant adults.
Joelle Wolstein
