WASC Testimonials

Jonny Baker

CSUDH Student, MPA program
C.L.A.S.S. Tutor, Student Research Day Awardee
BS, Business Administration: Accounting, 2004

I am an International student from Jamaica and came in 2001 to pursue my bachelors in Business Administration in Accounting. "After I graduated though I still wanted to continue my education, but this time switching to Public Administration because it is more marketable". When I was getting my bachelors, I participated in different activities. Foremost was the coordinator for the Voluntary Income Tax Assistance (VITA) program. Where we help students prepare their tax returns as well as low-income, elderly as well as others within the community. I was also the Vice President for the Accounting Society.

WASC Questions:

What are your educational goals?

Before joining the MPA program, my focus was on public finance, however being in the program it has allowed me to shift focus a little to statistics and research. At this point in time I would like to be a researcher.

Describe you experiences as a tutor at C.L.A.S.S.

Working as a tutor in C.L.A.S.S. is two-fold. I’m teaching as well as learning at the same time. Learning in that I have to go back to my subconscious to help students with certain problems. Some of these problems I have done years ago. Therefore, tutoring a class helped me to reinforce prior knowledge and learning new things at the same time. It also helped me to enhance my art of teaching as well as I enjoy working with other tutors.

Describe your experiences as a winner of the campus Student Research Day competition.

As I winner for my college, Business Administration and Public Policy, I was most surprised, but happy. Surprised in that I was listening to some of the other presenters, they were top of their class. I was impressed with their presentation. The competition was quite fierce, so when I was announced as the winner, I was very, very excited.

What was your research project on?

The public support for the government redistribution of income, the socio-economic and demographic factors. The findings were very interesting too. It was found out that with all the variables or factors chosen that political ideology was the most significant as well as most influential factor with regards of the government redistribution of income. Also contrary to previous findings or studies for this is that average Americans were not interested in the government redistribution policy. The study I’ve given the author of findings are result where I’ve seen that the average Americans are of the opinion that they are more in favor of the governments redistribution policy than against it.

How does the opportunity to present at Student Research Day give undergraduates at Dominguez Hills an edge in preparing for this level of work in their graduate studies?

It is a stepping stone towards the graduate study. Especially in the MPA program, you have to do a lot of journal articles where you have too look up them and do a literary review of these articles. Therefore, doing that you are able to compare and contrast previous findings. And when you do the research now then you get to incorporate your findings, whether your findings agree with previous studies or it goes contrary to previous studies. It is a stepping stone toward the graduate program which is pretty intense, but this research is very helpful toward that.

So you feel that students, lets say an undergraduate student that has that opportunity to participate in Research Day, it is a good stepping stone to go on to further education as a master student?

They would be better prepared to handle the work that is in the master’s program. It is a win-win situation in both ways. Not only theoretically, but also practical knowledge is given or is derived from Research Day.

- Donna Cruz