- Author: Mike Hsu
Between 4th and 8th grade, Brent Hales had acquired from those years in 4-H a lifetime's worth of skills, a group of lifelong friends, an expanded perspective on the world – and the track suit of his dreams.
The middle child of seven kids, young Brent knew his family couldn't afford to buy a track suit off the rack. So he saved up money, bought the Navy blue fabric and pattern, and took on sewing as one of his many 4-H projects during the 1980s. Just one problem: he ended up making it inside-out, with the fuzzy side facing outward.
“And then, by the time I actually completed it, I had outgrown it, so I gave it to my younger brother,” Hales recalled with a laugh.
Hales still enjoys sewing, although he rarely finds time for it, given his many duties as UC Agriculture and Natural Resources' associate vice president for research and Cooperative Extension.
One of his responsibilities is helping to oversee the 4-H program in California, which, along with its counterparts across the country, is celebrating National 4-H Week Oct. 1–7. In a recent interview, Hales shared some of his favorite experiences as a 4-H club member growing up in Aurora, Utah, as well as some of the enduring impacts from his participation.
The mere mention of 4-H must bring back a torrent of memories, images and stories. Can you share one experience that stands out for you?
At the end of the summers, the leader of our horse club, Dan Thompson, would take us on a weeklong horse ride. In order to qualify, you had to demonstrate horsemanship, you had to be able to take care of your horse, and show a certain amount of leadership.
Dan had the kids take the lead; he planned the route but then he would ride in the back. Each day of the horse ride, we would take turns at various aspects of leadership within the week. We would get to a point and we would discuss where we were going; we would discuss points along the trail that we needed to be looking for. But, invariably, all with him in the back, allowing us to lead. He wanted us to lead the whole thing.
You could imagine sending a group of 11-, 12-, 13-year-old kids on a weeklong horse ride with a guy would be daunting enough. But the most important thing you need to understand is the amount of trust that we had in him, he had in us, and our parents had in him – because Dan was blind.
He had gone blind late in life. He knew the trails well enough that he could describe what we were going to see, and he could describe where we were going to stay, but he left it up to us to share information and lead.
You think about the types of skills that it taught us – I have cold chills thinking about that – and the confidence that it instilled in us was so powerful. In a community where less than half of the kids went on to a four-year degree program, all 11 of us in the horse club completed four-year degrees, and all of us are continuing to be very successful.
In addition to leadership skills, public-speaking skills, sewing skills and horsemanship…what else did 4-H teach you?
We actually got involved quite a bit in the arts – the visual arts, the performing arts. Because of that, I went to college on a vocal performance scholarship, which I tie right back to 4-H.
We put on an annual musical at the county fair, which translated to being involved in musicals at school and other performing groups. It paved the way for me to go to a much better school than probably was in my academic trajectory otherwise, so I went to BYU as an undergrad.
I realized very quickly how out-classed I was in terms of the vocal performance and ultimately changed majors – but I stayed involved and had the opportunity to do quite a bit of traveling and touring with various musical groups. In the last three years, I've sang at both Carnegie Hall and the Kennedy Center, as part of ensembles and groups. What a long tail my 4-H involvement has had, in encouraging my love of music and of performing!
In what other ways did 4-H shape who you are today, personally and in your career trajectory?
My hometown of Aurora was settled by my fourth great-grandfather, so I was actually related to about 85% of that small town. And so I had a very myopic view of what the world looked like.
What 4-H did was it showed me that there's a much larger world out there. Because of 4-H, I engaged with different kids from different backgrounds, different ideologies, different life expectations than that of my own. And it opened a world I never knew existed, number one, and that I had a place in that world.
So the thought of moving from my safe, rural community…when I was a little kid, that was the last thing that I wanted. But after engaging with kids from not just across Utah, not just across the country, but across the world, it created a hunger in me to learn and to know and to experience. And that has yet to be satisfied!
Every time I remember and relive my 4-H years, I'm reminded of why I do this job – to enable others, perhaps, to be that kid that I was, and see beyond what their worldview is, or the limitations of their culture, identity and hometown.
On top of your 4-H role as a part of the leadership team at UC ANR, you're also on the strategic planning board for the national 4-H organization. How has 4-H continued to evolve over the years?
With COVID, when I was at Penn State, we shifted online and we saw a whole new generation of kids who would not have ever joined 4-H as a result. We created statewide programs, instead of the traditional clubs, and that brought together kids who normally would not have been drawn to it. And instead of meeting face-to-face, we met virtually and we sent out activity boxes ahead of time. Then, post-COVID, what surprised us is that the online clubs – the clubs we kind of anticipated going away – those actually continued to grow.
So how we reach the kids has evolved as much as the type of kids that we are seeing come in. And it has had to – if we marketed 4-H to an ever-shrinking rural population of on-farm kids, it would quickly become irrelevant. And so the way we market to them, the way we bring them in, the way we encourage and facilitate discussion, the way topics and areas of interest are identified – those continue to evolve and I hope will drive the next iteration of what 4-H looks like. Because it doesn't look anything like what I grew up with – granted, that was a long time ago, over 40 years ago! And I would say in 10 years 4-H probably won't look like what it looks like now. And that's a good thing.
/h3>/h3>/h3>/h3>- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
Since joining UC ANR on July 3, Brent Hales, associate vice president for research and Cooperative Extension, has been traveling the state, meeting his new colleagues.
Hales has been meeting individuals to learn about their research and extension activities and learning what UC ANR programs do in different communities. Recently he has visited Hopland Research and Extension Center, Sierra Foothill REC and the UC Davis campus.
![Hales and UCCE specialists based at UC Davis. Hales and UCCE specialists based at UC Davis.](/blogs/blogcore/blogfiles/101682.png)
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
Hales begins as new AVP at UC ANR
Brent Hales joined UC ANR as the new associate vice president for research and Cooperative Extension on July 3.
Hales brings over 20 years of higher education research and leadership experience, including at land grant institutions and in Cooperative Extension. He most recently served as an associate dean of Pennsylvania State University's College of Agricultural Sciences and director of Penn State Extension.
Before joining Penn State in 2019, he served as the senior associate dean and chief financial officer of the University of Minnesota Extension, associate dean for the University of Minnesota Extension Center for Community Vitality, and the director of the Economic Development Authority Center at University of Minnesota, Crookston.
Hales earned a Ph.D. in rural sociology from Iowa State University, a master's degree in sociology from Middle Tennessee State University and a bachelor's degree in sociology from Brigham Young University in Utah.
While attending the UC ANR statewide conference in April, he was interviewed by Rodger Wasson for the “Farm To Table Talk” podcast. You can hear Hales explain that “Cooperative Extension is more than just kids, cows, sows and plows” at https://farmtotabletalk.com/beyond-kids-cows-sows-plows-brent-hales-uc-anr.
Hales is based at the Second Street building in Davis and can be reached at bdhales@ucanr.edu, (530) 786-0256 and on Twitter @BrentDHales. Vanya Woodward, who is providing his administrative support, can be reached at vwoodward@ucanr.edu.
Wayne joins UCCE as food systems advisor
Laurie Wayne joined UC Cooperative Extension on July 5 in Modoc County as a nutrition and food systems advisor for Modoc, Lassen and Siskiyou counties. Wayne will work with community members on healthy lifestyles, nutrition, food access and security, local food production, preservation and availability.
Wayne brings years of high-desert food systems experience to her role: she owned and operated Locavore Farms in Fort Bidwell, helped found the Surprise Valley Saturday Market and Modoc Harvest, and was on the team that started the Modoc Harvest Food Hub. She also has worked supporting healthy communities for Oregon State University Extension in Klamath Falls, and at the High Desert Food and Farm Alliance in Bend, Oregon.
She earned a master's degree in TESOL (to teach English as a second language) from Portland State University and worked in school and community gardens with immigrants and refugees as part of her research project. She earned a bachelor's degree in Italian literature from UC Santa Cruz.
This job feels like the culmination of the farming, studying, supporting farmers and working in food systems she has done in the past 15 years, Wayne said.
“I'm especially interested in working on expanding access to affordable, healthy, local food year-round, including extending and preserving the harvest,” Wayne said. Her goal is to help everyone feel empowered to make healthy food choices, and she's learning what resources producers need to improve processing, transportation and production strategies, and overcome barriers that are unique to the region.
To better understand both the food systems needs and the abundant food assets of northeastern California, she will be meeting with community members; state, local and regional nonprofits; schools and other organizations in the next few months. They will discuss ways to strengthen community food system resilience.
“It's all about healthy community members who can eat good local food without breaking the bank, and producers who can make a living feeding them,” Wayne said.
Based in Alturas, Wayne can be reached at lwayne@ucanr.edu and (530) 233-6400.
Hyland named UCCE environmental health sciences specialist
Carly Hyland joined UC ANR in July as a UC assistant Cooperative Extension environmental health sciences specialist/assistant professor in the UC Berkeley School of Public Health.
She recently finished a mixed-methods project at Boise State University examining pesticide exposure and perceptions of the risks of pesticides among Latino men and women farmworkers in Idaho. In California, she is pursuing projects examining interventions to protect farmworkers from pesticides, extreme heat and wildfire smoke in collaboration with community partners.
“There are so many reasons I wanted to come back to Berkeley, and I think one of the biggest motivating factors for me was the collaborative environment focused not just on conducting innovative research, but also translating those findings into solutions to improve community health,” Hyland said. “Farmworkers are increasingly experiencing the health impacts of climate change on a daily basis, and this position will provide me with the resources and collaborations necessary to identify strategies to address these urgent issues.”
Hyland earned her Ph.D. in environmental health sciences and master's degree in global health and the environment, both from UC Berkeley, and bachelor's degree in environmental science from Carthage College in Wisconsin.
Hyland is based at UC Berkeley and can be reached at chyland@berkeley.edu and on Twitter @c_hyland1.
Sam-Chen joins NPI as policy analyst
Samantha Sam-Chen joined the Nutrition Policy Institute on June 15 as a new project policy analyst.
She began her work at NPI as a graduate student and received her master's in public health with a concentration in public health nutrition from the UC Berkeley School of Public Health.
Her primary research interests include food and nutrition insecurity, evaluating food and nutrition programs, and early childhood nutrition interventions. Through her work, Sam-Chen hopes to contribute to research that will result in policies that eliminate nutrition-related health disparities. She brings over a decade of experience working with California school districts, primarily in rural and predominantly Latino communities. At NPI she works on several projects, such as evaluating the California Nutrition Incentive Program and California's Universal Meals Program.
Sam-Chen is based at UC Office of the President in Oakland and can be reached at ssamchen@ucanr.edu.
Murillo-Barrick named BIPOC advisor for Bay Area
Murillo-Barrick, who had worked as UCCE academic coordinator focused on planning grants for Fresno, Merced, Madera and Tulare counties since 2021, described her new role as “more holistic,” prioritizing historically marginalized communities. Murillo-Barrick will be identifying opportunities to leverage the strengths of BIPOC communities.
In addition to conducting a needs assessment, Murillo-Barrick is planning to form a language access group at ANR – something she is very passionate about. This group will focus on identifying language barriers and best practices by engaging programs like CalFresh Healthy Living, UC and the Expanded Food and Nutrition Education Program that have expertise conducting multilingual programs throughout California. For example, they may recommend increasing accessibility using infographics and/or video, both of which can be translated into different languages and/or dialects.
The realm of diversity, equity and inclusion is not new to Murillo-Barrick, who has worked in outdoor education spaces, serving historically underserved communities of color. “I worked in DEI before it was considered ‘cool,'” she said.
“I have a lot of influence over program development in this role,” said Murillo-Barrick, who is fluent in Spanish. “So, my goal as an advisor is really focused on the community engagement part,” she added.
Murillo-Barrick earned a master's degree in geography and community development and a bachelor's degree in Spanish and international relations at UC Davis. During graduate school, she studied conservation issues in Nicaragua, as well as in her homeland, Costa Rica.
Aside from her academic training and previous work, Murillo-Barrick believes that mentors – including Mary Blackburn, UC Cooperative Extension health and nutrition advisor for Alameda County – who were instrumental in creating the BIPOC community development advisor position, have prepared her well for this role.
“I'm the only one within UC ANR who has ‘BIPOC' in my title, but everyone has BIPOC among their clientele,” said Murillo-Barrick. “I'm tasked with leading our community development efforts, but we all play a part in this work.”
Murillo-Barrick is based out of the UCCE office in Hayward and can be reached at cmurillo@ucanr.edu.
Oberholster honored with American Dream Award
“Dr. Oberholster is an example of the promise of the American Dream and importance that immigrants play on education in our country,” said Thompson. “UC Davis is one of the premier research universities in the world, and it is thanks to people like Dr. Oberholster that a UC Davis education is highly sought after. I am proud to honor Dr. Oberholster with the American Dream Award and I look forward to seeing how her research and contributions at UC Davis continue to benefit our region and the world.”
Oberholster was born in South Africa, where she received a bachelor's degree in biochemistry and chemistry and an honors degree in chemistry from Stellenbosch University. She earned a Ph.D. in wine science from the University of Adelaide in South Australia in 2008. In 2011, she moved to the United States to work as UC Cooperative Extension specialist at UC Davis.
Oberholster has been a board member of the American Society of Viticulture and Enology for six years and is currently the 2nd vice-president of the society. She also has worked as the secretary of the American Society for Enology and Viticulture Foundation, which fundraises to give scholarships to viticulture and enology students. Furthermore, she is a member of the LLC Management Committee that organizes the Unified Grape and Wine Symposium. She is currently the chair of the Department of Viticulture and Enology's coordination and extension committee. Previously, she was the chair of the Viticulture and Enology graduate group and advised incoming students.
Oberholster is vice-chair of the Department of Viticulture and Enology and is doing important research to benefit the grape and wine communities. She focuses on grape and wine challenges, including grapevine red blotch disease and the impact of wildfire smoke on grape and wine quality. Oberholster helps the wine community become more sustainable, such as improving the quality of winery wastewater recycling methods.
The American Dream Award honors immigrants who have excelled professionally, through entrepreneurship and innovation, in the arts and culture, or through community service.
Diaz Rios wins Early Professional Achievement Award
Informed by the socioecological determinants of nutritional health, Diaz Rios studies methods of reaching groups at risk of malnutrition. She specializes in applying cross-cultural adaptation methodologies to develop nutrition education and to measure the value of tools. She has contributed to the production of culturally relevant educational resources to improve the food environment for people at critical stages of development, especially young children. Her approaches to adapt and validate evaluation tools for cultural relevance allow for accurate and reliable documentation of the impact of nutrition education programs in California and nationally. Recently, she has been exploring approaches to improve nutrition education in medically underserved communities.
Diaz Rios's published work informed the Journal of Nutrition Education and Behavior's guidelines for authors, reviewers and editors on publishing race and ethnicity data. One of her studies pointed out the scarcity of quality studies on interventions to improve diet-related health disparities. Her research also highlighted structural factors affecting food security among Latinas during the pandemic.
As a member and later chair of SNEB's journal committee, Diaz Rios led the creation of a mentorship program and recruitment of the first JNEB Mentored Editor; oversaw approval of three of the society's position papers; and participated in advancing the principles of diversity, equity and inclusion in the journal.
This award recognizes one SNEB member who has made notable contributions in the field of nutrition education and behavior and to SNEB as an organization during the early stages of their career, defined as less than 10 years as a nutrition educator.
Diaz Rios, who joined UC ANR in 2014, received the award at the SNEB International Conference in Washington D.C. on July 21.
UC IPM wins ACE gold award for online course
The UC Statewide Integrated Pest Management Program won a gold award from the Association for Communication Excellence for its online course “Urban Pyrethroid and Fipronil Use: Runoff and Surface Water Protection.”
Cheryl Reynolds, UC IPM interactive learning developer, led development of the self-paced course and served as lead instructional designer, audio/video editor, photographer and narrator. Petr Kosina, UC IPM content development supervisor, contributed instructional design, cartoon animations and photography. Karey Windbiel-Rojas, associate director for Urban and Community IPM, and Loren Oki, UC Cooperative Extension specialist, were principal investigators for the project. California Department of Pesticide Regulation's Robert Budd, Aniela Burant and Carlos Gutierrez served as subject matter experts.
Pesticides are the most common way structural and landscape pests are managed in urban environments. It has been estimated that more than 2 million pounds of urban pesticides are used for structural and landscape applications annually in California, resulting in the potential for pesticide residues to be washed into storm drains during rain or irrigation events. Water carrying this residue runs directly into creeks, lakes, and rivers, harming aquatic organisms and disrupting the entire food chain within sensitive water ecosystems.
The “Urban Pyrethroid and Fipronil Use: Runoff and Surface Water Protection” online course presents information on California's Surface Water Protection Regulations that were put into place in 2012 to reduce the amount of pyrethroids in surface water runoff. The course illustrates the types of applications allowed under the regulations, as well as those that are prohibited and those that are exempt.
This course was developed for licensed pest management professionals who work primarily in structural pest control or landscape maintenance and use pyrethroid pesticides and fipronil for their work.
Funded by the California Department of Pesticide Regulation, the interactive course has received positive comments from participants such as, “This was a good course to take. It was interesting and well done. It will make you think about what goes down the storm drains.”
The course was developed using the Adobe Captivate authoring software and is hosted on the eXtension platform, which uses the Moodle learning management system.
To learn more about the course, watch this video: https://youtu.be/5ogj2ZLk5XA.
Keatley Garvey wins ACE photo award
Headlined “Monarch Butterflies: Closer to Extinction,” the blog included photos of a monarch egg, caterpillar, chrysalis and male and female butterflies, all images she captured in her family's pollinator garden in Vacaville.
The blog noted that the International Union for Conservation of Nature announced on July 21, 2022, that the migratory monarch butterfly (Danaus plexippus) was now on its "Red List of Threatened Species as Endangered--threatened by habitat destruction and climate change."
Gosliner appointed to National Institute of Health working group
The ADVANTAGE project is an effort to better understand the intersection of food systems, diet, nutrition and health in a changing environment by addressing how the current realities of climate/environmental change are affecting dietary choices, patterns and relevant aspects of the food system, as well as implications for specific public health outcomes of interest. This effort seeks to determine how an ecological approach can be applied to assess the nature and impact of these relationships and how to best translate the evidence generated to promote health and prevent disease.
Gosliner is a member of the ADVANTAGE Working Group 5, tasked to focus on translation and implementation to support context-specific, equitable, safe and efficacious interventions, dietary guidance and standards of care in a changing environment.
Working Group 5 conducted a virtual workshop on June 12. Gosliner and collaborator Jenn Otten from the University of Washington hosted “A Conversation about Dissemination and Translation.” The recording from their presentation is available online and their talk begins at 1:46:30.
- Author: Pamela Kan-Rice
“After a nationwide search, Brent emerged as a proven and respected leader who will help us to strengthen partnerships, build trust, address challenges and define our 2040 strategic vision,” said Glenda Humiston, UC vice president for agriculture and natural resources.
Hales brings over 20 years of higher education research and leadership experience, including at land grant institutions and in Cooperative Extension. He currently serves as an associate dean of Pennsylvania State University's College of Agricultural Sciences and director of Penn State Extension.
“I am very excited to join the UC ANR family,” Hales said. “My grandfather was a 1939 graduate of the University of California, Berkeley and both of my parents grew up in California.”
Before joining Penn State in 2019, he served as the senior associate dean and chief financial officer of the University of Minnesota Extension, associate dean for the University of Minnesota Extension Center for Community Vitality, and the director of the Economic Development Authority Center at University of Minnesota, Crookston.
His research focuses on holistic community and economic development and entrepreneurship. He has spent his career working across the United States and the globe with underrepresented communities. Since 1998, Hales has worked with Native American Nations in asset development and capacity building.
“I am excited to collaborate with California's Native Nations, urban residents and underinvolved Californians as they seek to achieve their goals,” Hales said. “Some notable areas are tackling climate change, food security and workforce development.”
“What excites me most is to be part of the leadership team for the premier institution of Ag and Natural Resources research and extension in the United States,” Hales said. “The people, the facilities, the opportunities and the engagement with the communities and organizations of California is second to none.”
Hales earned a Ph.D. in rural sociology from Iowa State University, a master's degree in sociology from Middle Tennessee State University and a bachelor's degree in sociology from Brigham Young University in Utah.
He is the father of six children, is the grandfather of six grandchildren, and has been married to his best friend Candy for over 30 years.
Deanne Meyer, UC Cooperative Extension livestock specialist, has been serving UC ANR as interim associate vice president for research and Cooperative Extension over the past year and is assisting Hales with the transition.
Dear Colleagues,
I am very pleased to announce that Brent Hales will be joining UC ANR as the new associate vice president for research and cooperative extension beginning July 1. After a nationwide search, Brent emerged as a proven and respected leader who will help us to strengthen partnerships, build trust, address challenges, and define our 2040 strategic vision.
He brings over 20 years of higher education research and leadership experience, including at land grant institutions and in cooperative extension. Brent currently serves as an associate dean of Penn State University's College of Agricultural Sciences and director of Penn State Extension. Before joining Penn State in 2019, he served as the senior associate dean and chief financial officer of the University of Minnesota Extension, associate dean for the University of Minnesota Extension Center for Community Vitality, and the director of the Economic Development Authority Center at University of Minnesota, Crookston.
His research focuses on holistic community and economic development and entrepreneurship. Working with the University of Southern Mississippi, three community colleges, the Mississippi Department of Education and four public school districts, Brent founded the Southern Entrepreneurship Program, which teaches entrepreneurship skills to high school and community college students; it has expanded to serve displaced workers throughout the U.S. and across the globe. He is also a past president of the Community Development Society.
Brent earned a bachelor's degree in sociology from Brigham Young University, a master's degree in sociology from Middle Tennessee State University and a Ph.D. in rural sociology from Iowa State University.
“I am very excited to join the UC ANR family,” Brent said. “My grandfather was a 1939 graduate of the University of California, Berkeley and both of my parents grew up in California. What excites me most is to be part of the leadership team for the premier institution of Ag and Natural Resources research and extension in the United States. The people, the facilities, the opportunities, and the engagement with the communities and organizations of California is second to none. I look forward to meeting everyone.”
Brent will be joining us at the UC ANR Statewide Conference in Fresno so you will have an opportunity to meet him soon. He and his wife Candy will be relocating to the Davis area. Brent will be based at the UC ANR building in Davis. You can follow him on Twitter @BrentDHales.
I am deeply grateful to Deanne Meyer for her dedication to UC ANR and her strong and steady leadership as interim AVP over the past year. She will be assisting Brent with the transition. Many thanks also to the search committee members for their time and dedication to this important recruitment.
Please join me in welcoming Brent Hales to UC ANR.
Glenda Humiston
Vice President