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Veronica Terriquez


Issues Education, Immigrant Rights, Mobilization, Youth & Children

Professor, Director and Co-Founder, Chicana/o and Central American Studies and Urban Planning, Chicano Studies Research Center, Latina Futures Lab 2050

Dr. Veronica Terriquez directs UCLA’s Chicano Studies Research Center and is co-founder of the UCLA Latina Futures, 2050 Lab, an ambitious project funded through a $15 million California state budget investment and is an important step forward in investing and integrating Latinas in public policy.

She is a leading scholar of youth and leadership development in Latinx communities. She conducts innovative research that brings a civic engagement and social movement lens into conversation with sociological concerns about migration, education and youth development, and political participation. In addition to pursuing such cutting-edge research, Professor Terriquez has tirelessly dedicated her academic career and much of her adult life to supporting the civic organizing efforts to empower youth, particularly children of immigrants and youth of color.

Professor Terriquez’s research has been supported by major grants from the Irvine Foundation, the California Endowment, and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Her publications include awarding-winning work recognized by the American Sociological Association. Moreover, she has received prestigious fellowships from the Stanford University Center for the Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences and the Ford Foundation.

Dr. Terriquez comes to UCLA from UC Santa Cruz, where she was a faculty member in the Sociology Department. She received her Ph.D. in Sociology from UCLA, an M.A. in Education from the University of California, Berkeley, and her B.A. in Sociology from Harvard University.