Portraits of Success The Impact of Graduate Education at UCSB An Annual Publication from the UC Santa Barbara Graduate Division THE ALUMNI ISSUE Visionaries, Changemakers, and Trailblazers graddiv.ucsb.edu Portraits of Success THE ALUMNI ISSUE CHANGEMAKERS, TRAILBLAZERS VISIONARIES Meet the visionaries, changemakers and trailblazers who earned their advanced degrees at UC Santa Barbara. Find out how these notable alumni discovered their potential to innovate, inspire, and lead in a dynamic environment. A Message from the Dean Dr. Carol Genetti CONTENTS Anne and Michael Towbes Graduate Dean UC Santa Barbara Graduate Division Portraits of Success Our Mission At UC Santa Barbara, we are committed to 7 The Changemakers providing our graduate students with a world- class education and with the opportunities, 25 The Trailblazers resources and support for career attainment in academia, industry, government, non-profits, 51 The Visionaries or the arts. Our goal is to cultivate the individual strengths and talents of each student and welcome them as 77 Building Opportunities at UC Santa Barbara partners in our research and teaching mission. We are a highly interdisciplinary campus and provide many opportunities for discussion, collaboration, and 91 Support the Future of Graduate Education at UCSB discovery across disciplines. We recognize the critical role of diversity in these conversations; it is only by bringing together scholars of varied backgrounds, experiences and perspectives that we will realize our potential for excellence and innovation. 5 Portraits of Success Portraits of Success 6 THE CHANGEMAKERS These UCSB graduate alumni made history by overcoming barriers and creating change to positively impact their communities, our state, our nation, and our world. NICOLASA SANDOVAL BETTY KOED LOIS CAPPS JEAN FULLER 7 Portraits of Success Nicolasa Sandoval NICOLASA SANDOVAL Ph.D. `07 // EDUCATION Education Director, Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians Education Department Member of the California State Board of Education Lecturer, Gervitz Graduate School of Education, UC Santa Barbara Past Board Member, UCSB Alumni Association Board of Directors When Nicolasa Sandoval received her Ph.D. in Education from UC Santa Barbara in 2007, she brought home an important milestone in educational attainment to her community. 9 Portraits of Success THE CHANGEMAKERS | Nicolasa Sandoval At the time, members of the Santa ever cheerleader from her tribe What brings me the greatest joy Ynez Band of Chumash Indians had at Santa Ynez High, before going is getting to know an individual, earned law and medical degrees, on to be the first in her family to finding out what lights their fire but no one had yet achieved a attend college. and then helping support them in doctorate in education. developing those pathways, so they Before she pursued her Ph.D. can nurture that love they have, for Sandoval was the first Chumash to at UCSB, Sandoval earned her the good of all.” earn a Ph.D., but due to community master’s degree in museum studies leaders and education advocates from George Washington University Sandoval also remains an integral like her, she would not be the and her bachelor’s degree in part of our UCSB community as a last. More and more members of public relations from Pepperdine lecturer at the Gervitz Graduate her tribe, many of whom she has University. She held several School of Education, and recently “I think diverse, multiple mentored over the past decade, positions at the Smithsonian’s completed her term as an elected have pursued advanced degrees National Museum of the American member of the UCSB Alumni perspectives are essential to our with great success. Indian, and worked as a public Association Board of Directors. relations professional for the intellectual and personal growth “It was a wonderful sense of Smithsonian’s National Museum ”I have had the wonderful accomplishment, to earn a Ph.D.,” of Natural History and the J. Paul honor of being able to support as human beings. One of the she said. “But I always knew that Getty Museum. and nurture emerging scholars, my research area and all of my work educational leaders, teachers, things I love about teaching on was never just for me. It was for the Sandoval currently serves as the school psychologists and guidance good of our tribal community and Education Director of the Santa counselors,” she said. “Being campus is the openness that our for society.” Ynez Band of Chumash Indians, part of this wonderful family and and has been appointed twice campus community, where we students have, to hear different Sandoval grew up with her four by Gov. Jerry Brown to the State are nurturing the next generation sisters on the Chumash reservation. Board of Education. of changemakers, keeps me voices and to listen to other views. Her mother worked hard to provide connected to UC Santa Barbara.” for her family, but always found “We help academic learning and They are open to the world. This time to encourage her daughters growth from birth to career in our to read and explore the local tribe,” she said. “We understand space enriches our own learning. libraries. Sandoval broke barriers that learning happens throughout early in her life, becoming the first the whole continuum of life. We may be surprised how we grow as a result.” 11 Portraits of Success Betty Koed Every Tuesday, Betty Koed delivers a history lesson for our nation’s lawmakers. BETTY K. KOED As head of the United States Senate Historical Office, Koed is able `83, MA `91, PhD `99 // HISTORY to educate our elected officials on any topic she chooses about our nation’s Senate history. “Often, I provide historical context to a current Historian of the United States Senate issue,” she said. “It’s a wonderful opportunity to share my love of Head of the United States Senate history with my principal audience – U.S. senators – and allows them Historical Office to gain a better understanding of this complex governing institution.” 2016 Distinguished Alumni Award, UCSB Alumni Association 13 Portraits of Success THE CHANGEMAKERS | Betty Koed Koed herself occupies a special records dating from 1790 to and considered applying to law bonds,” she said, citing teachers place in American history as the 1881. “Yes, that was an exciting school. A road trip from Maine and mentors like Bob Kelley, first female U.S. Senate Historian. event!” said Koed, who led her to South Carolina, with stops Otis Graham, Randy Bergstrom, “It’s a `plate-spinning’ kind of team in researching the volumes at Philadelphia’s Independence Mary Furner, and Pat Cohen. job, requiring me to keep many for insights into early Senate Hall and the U.S. Capitol in “When I was a history graduate I love helping people. Whether it projects balanced and going at administrative history. Washington, D.C., opened her student, I truly felt like I was part the same time,” she said. “I like eyes to the richness of U.S. history. of a large, supportive family—an be a Senate leader preparing for working with senators, who – A young Betty Koed would have intellectually challenging but despite the bad press – are mostly loved to dig through such a find. The many strengths of the UCSB comforting environment.” an important hearing or a fourth incredibly hard-working people Growing up in a working class history department, home to the trying to solve problems.” family in Iowa then Colorado, nation’s first Public History Ph.D. Koed cultivates that same type grade student preparing a History Koed loved to write stories and program, drew Koed to return of family environment for her Her many daily responsibilities as essays, and was fascinated by to her alma mater as a graduate staff at the Senate Historical Day project, helping them gives U.S. Senate Historian range from archaeology. Inspired by a book scholar. “Whether I studied early Office. “The camaraderie writing and research projects, to from the public library, she would national history or 20th century among the professors and me great satisfaction. `You’ve providing historical commentary bury her mother’s dishes in the history, however, I knew my focus graduate students at the History for C-SPAN to fielding questions backyard to “excavate” them the would be politics and public Department set me up for made my day,’ is a phrase we hear about the Senate’s 228-year next day. policy,” she said. She funded her a lifetime of friendships and history from the public, the press, dissertation research and living professional relationships,” she often in the Historical Office. That Senators, and staff members. Before Koed finished high school, expenses by working as a teaching said. “I love my job and the At our nation’s capital, history can her family moved to California. assistant and research assistant, life I have in Washington, D.C., never gets old. manifest in the most unexpected She attended Santa Barbara City and applying for awards. so I guess that experience and ways. In 2002, construction on College for two years before “I was lucky enough to come into training served me well! Thank the new Capitol Visitors Center transferring to UCSB in her junior the History Department with an you, UCSB!” unearthed a series of old leather- year. After earning her bachelor’s amazing cohort of grad students, bound volumes that held records degree in English in 1983, Koed and the `Americanists’ of that of Senate salary and compensation worked as a technical writer time period quickly formed strong 15 Portraits of Success Portraits of Success 16 Lois Capps LOIS CAPPS Last year, Congresswoman Lois Capps packed up MA `90 // EDUCATION her office at the Capitol and bid farewell to her fellow lawmakers in an emotional final address at the U.S.