WASC Testimonials

Ricky Bluthenthal, PhD.

Professor, Sociology Department
Director, Urban Community Research Center (UCRC), CSUDH

I have had my Ph.D for almost 10 years now. I do a lot of research mostly on community health. Specifically, in HIV prevention and alcohol and substance abuse. I am married and I have two kids.

WASC Questions:

How does the work of the Urban Community Research Center benefit the campus community?

I think it does so in 3 ways. The first is what we are trying to do is provide a infrastructure for faculty in faculty initiated research. Where they are taking there ideas through the Urban Community Research Center, getting assistance with getting funded, getting funding for that research, and then once they have funding, get the research done. We have been on exhibit for two years so in that time we have been able to put in a data entry system for doing telephone surveys, for doing computer assistance interviewing, we have software for doing quantitative and qualitative data now. So that’s one way. In time, I think there is evidence of this already, we are gonna see more productivity on the scholarly side with our faculty in terms of publications and books, and because students are obviously so much we are trying to do at Dominguez Hills. The second thing we are trying to do is get our students involved in our research in a comprehensive way. We do that a couple of different ways. We have three research assistants, two are undergrads, one that graduated in the psychology program here and then we have another psychology graduate student that works with us. So they get our B training and they participate in all the research that we have going on. We have about half a dozen different projects at once or another that are occurring. They are involved interviewing people, doing field observation in the community, they are involved in quantitative and qualitative data, and they are all involved in writing manuscripts that they will be first authors on and doing instruction, so when I teach research methods, all the students in my class and a couple of other instructors in my department also have those students do extra credit doing data entry just to get them familiar with that process and to get them familiar with us. So it’s a sort of a conduit for students who are interested in doing social scientific research or even multidisciplinary research to sort of come and get involved in the various activities. We have a lot of talented students who could do anything they want, but they just don’t know that yet or they don’t know what they want. So what we are trying to do is give them that opportunity to see that there are research careers. That there are careers as professors. That there are a lot of different things that they can do that they haven’t thought of. The third thing we do that helps the university in terms of the community is that there is a lot of love for Dominguez Hills. People are often looking for opportunities to partner with us and that includes a lot community based organizations. Now that we have the infrastructure to help them do their program evaluation or seek external funding program from the federal government and other sources. We are finding people are knocking down our door trying to partner with us around various different projects. This is great for me as a researcher, but also great opportunities for students and other faculty members. For me personally the research I do is because I want to make the world a greater place. So these community collaborations are a great opportunity to directly impact the kinds of services that people in our community receiving and to see and find out and discover if they are the best they can be and if they are not finding out how they can be better. So we have activities going on now with Shields for Families which is a substance abuse treatment program in Watts. We are working with the Los Angeles County Human Relations Commission. I am trying to get a couple of programs off the ground. We have work that is funded by the state to look at HIV prevention program. We are getting funding from the city and county of Los Angeles to help them with injection drug user related HIV prevention. So I think there are a lot of goods things happening.

A Communiversity has been defined as an institution that sees itself as an intricate piece of the surrounding community; assisting the community with its goals for growth and development and the community serving as a dynamic “laboratory” environment for student learning. How does Urban Community Research Center fit in with this model?

I think it fits in quite well. What we are trying to do is take the intellectual resources that the University has through its students and faculty and pair them with the communities' need and knowledge and produce something that would be to use to the community and to science.

So the pairing of the two how is that happening? How do you pair them together?

There is two things. First, a lot of the people who run the community based organizations, who work for city and county government and work in this area went to school there. So basically are just reintroducing the university and this capacity of the university which is newer to folks who are already aware of the university and are eager to work with them. As I said earlier it is easier to get community based groups to be interested in having a relationship with the university. Along the lines of doing research because of that there is a lot of trust already imbedded there as appose how they feel to other institutions whose graduates aren’t living in the community, aren’t providing service to the community, don’t have a on going relationship with the community. The Urban Community Research Center has stepped in to that opportunity to say, “Yeah, ok you came here, you got educated, you met your wife or husband here, maybe your kids go to school here or went to the high school, or maybe you just go here to go see the soccer games, or participate in some other activities that are going on in Extended Education”. But there is this other capacity now where if you are running a community based organization and you are going to apply to the federal government for money to support your services, we have the intellectual expertise and track record to partner up with you and do that and give back to the place that gave you so much. I think that its great. The research I do is on disadvantage groups and minority low income communities. A lot of our students are coming from those settings, they are already experts! They are comfortable in these community settings, they don’t have a problem driving around, they aren’t at any particular risk, they know the kind of things that are going on. They are real assets to the Urban Community Research Center in it of themselves. We give them some additional training and then hopefully some additional opportunities to see what else they can do in service of themselves and their community. So I think the Urban Community Research Center can play and is playing a crucial role in expanding the kinds of relationships the community can have with the University and the University can have with the community.

- Donna Cruz