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Posts Tagged: Fe Moncloa
New guides for engaging Latinx youth published
A series of ANR publications have been developed for people who wish to engage Latinx youth and families in their programs.
These briefs were inspired by a research project and the Journal of Youth Development article Guiding Principles for Reaching and Engaging Latinx Youth in Youth Development Programs, by Fe Moncloa, Nancy Erbstein, Aarti Subramaniam and Claudia Diaz Carrasco.
“We know that, in general, youth-serving practitioners do not read journal articles so we used the information to write easy-to-read briefs,” said Moncloa, UC Cooperative Extension 4-H youth development advisor in Santa Clara County.
The brief ANR publications are authored by Moncloa and Claudia Diaz Carrasco, UCCE 4-H youth development advisor in Riverside and San Bernardino counties.
The five-part series are
Engaging Latinx Youth: https://anrcatalog.ucanr.edu/pdf/8690.pdf
Conceptual Foundations: https://anrcatalog.ucanr.edu/pdf/8691.pdf
Organizational Infrastructure: https://anrcatalog.ucanr.edu/pdf/8692.pdf
Program Elements: https://anrcatalog.ucanr.edu/pdf/8693.pdf
Building Relationships in Latinx Communities: https://anrcatalog.ucanr.edu/pdf/8694.pdf
Names in the News
Mohamed joins Kearney to research alfalfa irrigation
Abdelmoneim “Moneim” Mohamed joined UC ANR as project scientist – alfalfa irrigation management Feb. 1.
Mohamed will be working with Khaled Bali conducting research to identify the best irrigation management practices on alfalfa to enhance water use productivity while minimizing environmental impacts. The project focuses on crop growth and agronomic performance as affected by irrigation management, salinity and other factors.
Prior to joining UC ANR, Mohamed was an agricultural scientist for the Tropical Research and Education Center at the University of Florida. His previous work focused on modeling and optimizing the performance of moving sprinkler irrigation. He has also studied precision and automated irrigation.
After receiving his Ph.D. at Washington State University, Mohamed was an irrigation engineer for WSU Skagit County Extension Center working with extension agents and growers on improved irrigation practices, irrigation systems efficiency evaluation, and crop water use efficiency.
Mohamed earned a bachelor's degree in agricultural engineering from Zagazig University, Egypt, a master's degree in land and water resources management: irrigated agriculture from IAMB, Italy, and a doctorate in biological and agricultural engineering from Washington State University.
Mohamed is based at Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center and can be reached at amohamed@ucanr.edu and (509) 781-4129 and on Twitter @moneim_z.
Brim-DeForest receives outstanding paper award
The Weed Science Society of America honored Whitney Brim-DeForest, UCCE rice and wild rice advisor for Sutter, Yuba, Placer and Sacramento counties, with its award for Outstanding Paper: Weed Science.
The award-winning paper, Phenotypic Diversity of Weedy Rice (Oryza sativa f. spontanea) Biotypes Found in California and Implications for Management is co-authored by Elizabeth Karn, biologist in U.S. EPA's Office of Pesticide Programs and former ANR staff research associate; Teresa De Leon, Short Grains Rice Plant Breeder for the California Rice Experiment Station and former UC Davis postdoc research scholar; Luis Espino, UCCE rice farming systems advisor for Butte and Glenn counties and UCCE director for Butte County; and Kassim Al-Khatib, UC Davis Melvin D. Androus Endowed Professor for Weed Science and Director of the UC Weed Information Center.
Over the past four years, Brim-DeForest, who holds the UC ANR Presidential Endowed Fellowship in California Rice, has focused her research on weedy rice, an emerging and important pest in California rice systems. In a relatively short amount of time, she and her team have conducted extensive research on California weedy rice including its genetics, identification, competition with cultivars, emergence, herbicide susceptibility, and even drone mapping.
The award was presented during the organization's virtual annual meeting Feb. 15.
DPR honors Spray Application Pest Management Alliance Team
In a ceremony on Feb. 18, the California Department of Pesticide Regulation presented a 2020 IPM Achievement Award to UC Spray Application Pest Management Alliance Team – El Dorado County for their achievements in reducing risk from pesticide use.
The Spray Application Pest Management Alliance Team, which includes industry and UC ANR members, is led by Lynn Wunderlich, UCCE farm advisor for the Central Sierra. The team aims to minimize the incidence of agricultural pesticide drift and reduce the risk of pesticide illness though training. The team developed an air blast sprayer calibration training program to increase pesticide applicators' adoption of best practices when using air blast sprayers. The training program is interactive and offers practical experience in key training topics.
“The highly effective training and the extensive outreach completed by the team make the Spray Application Pest Management Alliance Team an excellent recipient of an IPM Achievement Award,” wrote the person nominating the team.
The Spray Application Pest Management Alliance Team includes
- Wunderlich, UCCE farm advisor, Central Sierra
- Franz Niederholzer, co-principal investigator and farm advisor, UCCE Yuba, Sutter, Butte counties
- Maria Alfaro, community educator specialist, UC Statewide IPM Program
- Catherine Bilheimer, California Department of Pesticide Regulation grant manager
- Lisa Blecker, Pesticide Safety Education Program coordinator, UC Statewide IPM Program
- Stephanie Bolton, communications & sustainable winegrowing director, Lodi Winegrape Commission
- Matt Bozzo, chair, Yuba-Sutter Spray Safe; farm manager, Golden Gate Hop Ranch, Yuba City
- Luis Espino, UCCE rice farming systems advisor, Colusa, Glenn, Yolo counties
- Ken Giles, professor, UC Davis Biological and Agricultural Engineering Department
- Gwen-Alyn Hoheisel, Washington State University regional extension specialist
- Petr Kosina, Content Development Supervisor, UC Statewide IPM Program
- Peter Larbi, UCCE spray application specialist, Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center
- Ray Lucas, former videographer UC ANR Communication Services
- Tunyalee Martin, associate director for communication, UC Statewide IPM Program
- Louie Mendoza, Butte County agricultural commissioner
- Cheryl Reynolds, instructional designer, UC Statewide IPM Program.
- John Roncoroni, UCCE weed science farm advisor emeritus, North Coast
- Marcie Skelton, Glenn County agricultural commissioner
- Rhonda Smith, UCCE viticulture advisor emeritus, Sonoma County.
- Matt Strmiska, former Adaptiv CEO.
- Emily Symmes, former Area IPM advisor, Colusa, Glenn, Sutter-Yuba, Tehama counties
Cheryl Wilen, emeritus IPM advisor, was a technical advisor to All Kids Academy Head Start, Inc. in San Diego County, which received an IPM Achievement Award for its exemplary pest management program at 14 child care centers. This nonprofit organization's IPM program focuses on strong communication, careful monitoring, and active prevention to manage pests. AKA Head Start, Inc. partners with experts to find the most effective, lower-risk options to protect children in its care from pests and pesticide risk.
“One thing that they did that influenced me to nominate them is that they not only did a lot of IPM policy and implementation work in the school, they also provide information and resources to the parents/guardians to extend IPM information for their homes as well,” wrote the person who nominated the project.
Moncloa to guide Maine 4-H through intercultural competence program
Fe Moncloa, UCCE 4-H youth development advisor in Santa Clara County, has been named the 2021 Visiting Libra Diversity Professor at the University of Maine from January through June.
Through a virtual appointment, Moncloa will guide University of Maine Cooperative Extension 4-H Youth Development staff through the development and implementation of an intercultural competence professional development program. This project is part of a larger effort to increase the ability of University of Maine Cooperative Extension to foster inclusivity, diversity and access, particularly the statewide UMaine 4-H program. This project will serve as a template to expand diversity, equity, and inclusion efforts to other UMaine departments.
“In addition, my UMaine partners will lead four weekly Learning Circles to unpack intercultural communication,” Moncloa said. “I will teach an intercultural conflict styles workshop for all 4-H professionals in partnership with UMaine and will present a seminar to graduate students.”
Moncloa is on sabbatical through Sept. 30, 2021.
4-H Youth Development team wins national diversity award
4-H Youth Development advisors Dorina Espinoza, Russell Hill, Fe Moncloa and Keith Nathaniel and 4-H associate director Shannon Horrillo have won the National Extension Diversity Award for systematically enhancing the intercultural competency of 4-H personnel and others in California. Moncloa and Hill accepted the National Extension Diversity Award on behalf of the UC ANR team on Sunday, Nov. 13, at the 129th Association of Public and Land-grant Universities Annual Meeting in Austin, Texas.
The award, given by USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), Cooperative Extension System and the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU), honors the team for creating and using Intercultural Development Inventory© to shift organizational culture. This shift includes mutual respect, acceptance, teamwork and productivity among diverse people.
To meet the needs of a culturally and ethnically diverse youth population in California, they created a professional-development intervention for 4-H academics and staff. The Intercultural Development Inventory© is a cross-culturally generalizable, valid and reliable assessment of intercultural competence. Calling themselves the Intercultural Development Inventory Qualified Administrators, they applied the strategy over three years, providing 176 hours of intercultural communication feedback sessions, learning communities and regional conferences to enhance the intercultural competence of 65 4-H personnel.
Evaluations demonstrated that after the intervention UC 4-H Youth Development Program personnel had acquired skills and characteristics to become more culturally competent. The program has moved from focusing on similarities across diverse people that can mask deeper recognition of cultural differences to recognizing the complexity of dimensions of diversity.
The action plan and resulting positive change provides the potential to improve hiring and professional development nationwide by replication in other states. A summary of California's IDI professional development activities can be found in the National 4-H Latino Youth Outreach: Best Practices Toolkit, Professional Development.
Names in the News
Rebecca Ozeran joined UCCE on Sept. 12 as the area livestock and natural resources advisor in Fresno and Madera counties.
Raised in Yuba City with a passion for animals and the land that supports them, Ozeran plans to focus her research, outreach and extension education efforts on current issues impacting livestock producers and land managers in both counties.
Prior to joining UCCE, Ozeran was a range management intern for the Bureau of Land Management in the Salt Lake City field office. Her duties included collecting inventory, utilization and rangeland trend data, checking livestock compliance on BLM allotments and collaborating with local archaeologists to ensure compliance with archaeology requirements before grazing permit renewal. From July 2014 to May 2016, Ozeran was a graduate research and teaching assistant for the Department of Animal and Range Sciences at Montana State University.
She earned a B.S. in animal science with a minor in Spanish from Cal Poly, and an M.S. in animal and range sciences with a certificate in applied statistics from Montana State University. Her thesis studied patterns and risk factors of cheatgrass invasion in Montana foothills rangelands.
Ozeran is based in Fresno and be reached at (530) 415-2555 and rkozeran@ucanr.edu.
Axelson joins UCCE as forest health specialist
Jodi Axelson joined UCCE on June 1 as a UC Cooperative Extension specialist in forest health in the Department of Environmental Science, Policy and Management (ESPM) at UC Berkeley.
Axelson's broad research interests include forest resilience, adaptive management and forest disturbance; specifically, she is focused on forest dynamics and response to insect disturbances from outbreaks of bark beetles and conifer defoliators using a range of methods including dendrochronology. Learn more about her research at http://ourenvironment.berkeley.edu.
Prior to joining UCCE, Axelson was employed by the British Columbia government as a forest entomologist with Ministry of Forests, Lands and Natural Resource Operations. In this position, she was responsible for forest health issues in an area covering 42,000 square miles comprised of distinct wet- and dry-belt ecosystems. She gained considerable experience in taking into consideration timber, wildlife and land stewardship objectives when performing insect monitoring, treatment and risk-mitigation.
She earned her B.S. in geography from the University of Victoria (British Columbia, Canada), an M.S. in geography from the University of Regina (Saskatchewan, Canada) and a Ph.D. in geography from the University of Victoria.
Axelson is based at the UC Berkeley campus and can be reached at (510) 642-8459 and jodi.axelson@berkeley.edu. Follow her on Twitter @DisturbedDendro.
Haghverdi joins UCCE as urban water specialist
Amir Haghverdi joined UCCE on July 1 as a UC Cooperative Extension specialist in the Department of Environmental Sciences at UC Riverside. His research focuses on integrated urban water management.
Prior to joining UCCE, Haghverdi had been an assistant professor in the Department of Biological Systems Engineering at University of Nebraska-Lincoln, performing research and extension on irrigation and water management, since July 2015.
Haghverdi earned his B.S. in irrigation engineering from University of Tehran, Iran, an M.S. in agricultural engineering - irrigation and drainage from Bu-Ali Sina University, Iran, a Ph.D. in irrigation and drainage engineering from Ferdowsi University of Mashhad, Iran, and a Ph.D. in biosystems engineering from University of Tennessee-Knoxville.
Haghverdi can be reached at (951) 827-4774 and amir.haghverdi@ucr.edu.
Saitone named ag economics specialist
Prior to joining UCCE, Saitone had been a project scientist for ARE since July 2015. Before returning to UC Davis, she worked for OnPoint Analytics, an economic consulting firm in the Bay Area, where she conducted research on a wide variety of agricultural industries including meatpacking, dairy, eggs, broilers and sugar beets.
Saitone earned her B.A. in economics at Sonoma State University and her M.S. and Ph.D. in agricultural and resource economics at UC Davis.
Saitone can be reached at (530) 752-1870 and saitone@primal.ucdavis.edu.
Bautista named 4-H STEM coordinator
Jessica Bautista joined ANR on July 5 as the 4-H Science, Technology, Engineering & Mathematics (STEM) academic coordinator.
Prior to joining ANR, Bautista was a graduate research assistant in the Department of Botany and Plant Sciences at UC Riverside. Bautista's area of research interest focused on molecular biology and genetics in plant developmental biology.
As a native Californian and a first-generation student born to Mexican migrant parents, Bautista speaks Spanish and has fostered various methods to make her research accessible and advocate for STEM career paths for underrepresented communities. In 2012, Bautista co-founded UCR's Plant Discovery Day in the Department of Botany and Plant Sciences. This annual outreach event is filled with interactive science demonstrations for elementary school students in the community. She has also presented her research and discussed her career path annually since 2013 at workshops geared towards teaching and empowering young Latina women to pursue higher education and various career options.
Bautista completed a B.S. in biotechnology (chemistry minor) from California State University Northridge and a Ph.D. in plant biology from UC Riverside.
Bautista is based at the ANR building in Davis and can be reached at (530) 750-1341 and jbautista@ucanr.edu.
Pourreza wins international prize for HLB detection
Newly appointed UC Cooperative Extension agricultural engineering advisor Alireza Pourreza has been awarded the 2016 Giuseppe Pellizzi Prize by the Club of Bologna, an honor presented every other year to the best doctoral dissertations focused on agricultural machinery and mechanization. The Club of Bologna is a world taskforce on strategies for the development of agricultural mechanization.
Pourreza, who earned his Ph.D. at the University of Florida in 2014, worked on early detection of Huanglongbing disease of citrus. Huanglongbing, an incurable disease that is spread by Asian citrus psyllid, has seriously impacted citrus production in Florida. The disease has been found in commercial and residential sites in all counties with commercial citrus.
Early detection allows growers to remove infected trees before the disease can spread to healthy trees. Currently HLB infection is confirmed when leaves with yellowing blotches are submitted for PCR testing, which is expensive and time-consuming. However, the yellowing can be also symptomatic of other conditions, such as nutrient deficiency.
"We discovered we could see the symptoms of Huanglongbing using a camera, a set of cross-polarizers and narrowband lighting before it is visible to the human eye," said Pourreza, who is based at the UC Kearney Agricultural Research and Extension Center in Parlier.
He said the yellow blotches on HLB-infected leaves are caused by starch accumulation.
"If we could detect abnormal levels of starch in the leaf, we could tell it is affected with HLB," Pourreza said. "Starch showed the ability to rotate the polarization plane of light. We used this optical characteristic to develop the sensing methodology."
Pourreza said the team has patented the technique and is working on developing a commercial product. He is seeking funding to continue the research in California, where, to date, HLB has only been detected in isolated Los Angeles neighborhoods. Asian citrus psyllid is found in important California commercial citrus production regions from the Mexican border to as far north as Placer County.
4-H Youth Development team wins national diversity award
4-H Youth Development advisors Dorina Espinoza, Russell Hill, Fe Moncloa and Keith Nathaniel and 4-H associate director Shannon Horrillo have won the National Extension Diversity Award for systematically enhancing the intercultural competency of 4-H personnel and others in California.
The award, given by USDA National Institute of Food and Agriculture (NIFA), Cooperative Extension System and the Association of Public and Land-grant Universities (APLU), honors the team for creating and using Intercultural Development Inventory© to shift organizational culture. This shift includes mutual respect, acceptance, teamwork and productivity among diverse people.
To meet the needs of a culturally and ethnically diverse youth population in California, they created a professional-development intervention for 4-H academics and staff. The Intercultural Development Inventory© is a cross-culturally generalizable, valid and reliable assessment of intercultural competence. Calling themselves the Intercultural Development Inventory Qualified Administrators, they applied the strategy over three years, providing 176 hours of intercultural communication feedback sessions, learning communities and regional conferences to enhance the intercultural competence of 65 4-H personnel.
Evaluations demonstrated that after the intervention UC 4-H Youth Development Program personnel had acquired skills and characteristics to become more culturally competent. The program has moved from focusing on similarities across diverse people that can mask deeper recognition of cultural differences to recognizing the complexity of dimensions of diversity.
The action plan and resulting positive change provides the potential to improve hiring and professional development nationwide by replication in other states. A summary of California's IDI professional development activities can be found in the National 4-H Latino Youth Outreach: Best Practices Toolkit, Professional Development.
The National Extension Diversity Award will be presented on Nov. 13 at the 129th APLU Annual Meeting in Austin, Texas.
