UCLA Blueprint
​Led by editor-in-chief and 25-year Los Angeles Times legend Jim Newton, Blueprint is UCLA's biannual magazine focused on policy and societal issues impacting the LA region and beyond. It strives to foster informed discussions and offer in-depth analysis on significant challenges facing the community through explanations of academic work and ideas for change. Blueprint is largely led by elected officials and community leaders – including bylines of some of Southern California's most highly regarded journalists.
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As the manager, executive assistant and an author for Blueprint, I oversee the full range of the magazine’s journalism, from budget management to editorial processes and event coordination – including one with LA Mayor Karen Bass.
Issue 20:The Future of Mobility
Blueprint’s Issue 20 is centered around transportation and imagining its future. Every single piece in this magazine adheres to Blueprint’s core objectives: bridging the gap between cutting-edge research and real-world policymaking. Only this time around, the focus is on “The Future of Mobility,” exploring everything from electric vehicles and autonomous transportation to urban planning and sustainability.
Issue 21: Children and Fire
I had the privilege of featuring the work of UCLA’s Mobility Center of Excellence and its director, UCLA professor Jiaqi Ma. Ma leads innovative research to create sustainable, equitable and resilient transportation systems. His work spans autonomous vehicles and urban mobility – addressing challenges like climate change, aging infrastructure and technological adoption.
Issue 22:The Political Climate
For the first time, Blueprint takes on two pressing questions at the top of LA's regional agenda: foster care and recovery from this year's devastating wildfires. Through separate crises, they collide in the lives of the city's most vulnerable children — already displaced, then displaced again by disaster. We followed the scholars, physicians, advocates and public officials working to confront both the immediate emergency and the deeper institutional failures beneath it.
The Political Climate examines the widening gap between scientific reality and political response. As the planet warms and disasters intensify, Issue 21 looks at how research can guide policy or be distorted by expedience and denial. Blueprint follows scholars and public leaders working to turn evidence into action from renewable transitions and ocean-based climate solutions to equitable urban cooling, safer streets and post-fire recovery.
Dr. Shannon Thyne will be the first to say that childhood trauma doesn't stay in childhood. I had such an invigorating conversations with Dr. Thyne, learning about how she advanced trauma-informed pediatrics through ACEs Aware, pushing clinicians to treat adversity as a measurable health risk. Her work aims to identify trauma earlier and build care systems that prevent it from shaping a lifetime.
UCLA professor Alex Wang is tracking one of the most consequential shifts in climate policy: China’s rapid sprint toward renewable energy. From electric taxis in Beijing to industrial-scale clean energy growth, Wang’s work highlights how quickly the global balance is changing. He warns that U.S. political gridlock and slow policy response could leave America behind.
