Ursula Aldana

Ursula S. Aldana is a Graduate Student Researcher who facilitates project implementation and professional development for the project. Presently, she is a Doctoral Candidate in the Division of Urban Schooling at UCLA's Graduate School of Education and Information Studies. Her research interests include social networks and dominant and non-dominant cultural capital of Latino and African American youth and their relationship to academic achievement, urban Catholic schools and the sociology of education. She enjoys working with new teachers and has taught at USC, LMU and UCLA Extension teacher credential programs. She received a B.S. in International Politics from Georgetown University and M.A. in Education from Loyola Marymount University. Prior to her arrival at UCLA, she served as a middle and high school humanities teacher and an English Language Learner (ELL) Resource Teacher in the Compton Unified School District for seven years.