| STAY CONNECTED WITH CURES!
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| CURes is now on LinkedIn! Connect with us to stay updated about the latest news, opportunities, events, blog posts, and more!
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| ORIENTATION EVENTS: NEW STUDENT RESOURCE FAIR
Loyola Marymount University will be hosting a resource fair orientation event for new students to offer a comprehensive approach to outreach. We invite all interested parties to join us at the CURes booth to learn more about all the opportunities within our global local initiatives!
Student & Parent Resource Fair: Thursday, August 25, 2022 | 2:00 pm - 4:30 pm
Student Involvement Fair: Friday, August 26, 2022 | 4:00 pm - 7:00 pm
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ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE PLANNING
On April 5, 2022, Carlos Moran from the Council for Watershed Health hosted a lecture on engaging community-based organizations in environmental justice. Click below to watch the full recording of this inspirational discussion!
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| WATER CONSERVATION: THE STRUGGLE IS NEVER OVER
On April 21, 2022, former Los Angeles City Councilperson Hon. Ruth Galanter hosted a lecture on Recovering the Ballona presented stories that highlight progress and challenges over 30 years of water conservation programs! Click below to view the full lecture!
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| RESTORATIVE JUSTICE PROJECT
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The vision of the CURes Restorative Justice Project (RJ Project) is to impact systemic education reform and transform social structures towards a more just society. The CURes’ RJ Project continues its work to implement restorative practices in partnership with K-12 schools, other universities, and nonprofit organizations, and through the ongoing facilitation and support of the Southern California Restorative Justice Consortium. For more information, please visit the CURes Restorative Justice Project Web Page.
SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA RESTORATIVE JUSTICE CONSORTIUM
Over the past two years, the RJ Project has hosted the Southern California Restorative Justice Consortium comprised of 80+ organizations bringing together practitioners, scholars, and advocates in the region. Held quarterly, the Consortium meetings offer a much-needed space for everyone to share best practices and to conduct research on implementation strategies used by stakeholders across sectors. The RJ Project serves in a leadership role to ensure the fidelity of RJ programming, promote collaboration, and conduct meaningful evaluation across the region.
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RJ Providers Map
The RJ Project developed a series of web pages to include an RJ providers map to offer practitioners tools to better understand the community and more strategically plan for community needs including under resourced communities. The map documents the locations, geographical hot spots, areas of focus, and desires for cross-engagement across the Southern California Restorative Justice Consortium. No such map has existed to document the locations and key leaders of organizations within the region. This map is a vital first step to recognizing on a regional level the emergence and growth of restorative practices by geographical area.
Community Wellness
In June, the So Cal RJ Consortium offered a series of online community wellness sessions that were attended by RJ advocates across the nation. These unique and innovative "drop-in" opportunities were offered free of charge with gratitude to the work and the care offered year-round by our colleagues and friends. Special thanks to the following hosts: Anthony Ceja, Marisol Rerucha: Returning to the Community-Building Circle as an Ancient and Spiritual Practice; Tanyna Hekymara: Restorative Practices and Alignment to Mind, Body, and Spiritual Wellness; Ariane White: Interrogating Whiteness – An Essential Practice for White RJ Practitioners; Julia Wade: Coaching Session – RJ Implementation with an Emphasis in Higher Education; Ashley McGuire: The Power of Play for Building Meaningful Connections.
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RESTORATIVE UNIVERSITY APPROACH
Across the nation, Restorative Practices (RP) implementation on college and university campuses has been gaining momentum as a vital contribution to improving social interaction among students, professors, campus staff, and administrators. The aim is to build and develop stronger relationships amongst all educational institution stakeholders which in turn, positively impacts the academic learning environment.
Loyola Marymount University (LMU)
The RJ Project is pleased to announce we will be offering a training for the LMU Seaver College of Science and Engineering at the end of July to a select group of faculty members on Restorative Practices Capacity Building. This two-day training will provide the cohort with a deeper understanding of Restorative principles and practices to develop key facilitation skills to begin implementation with the goal to create and sustain an inclusive and equitable academic environment. The RJ Project continues to partner with Dr. Julia Wade at the Office of Student Conduct and Community Responsibility (OSCCR) and Dr. Ariane White at the Truth, Racial Healing, and Transformation Center Alliance to provide restorative practices education and restorative conferencing facilitation services.
University of Southern California (USC)
We are entering our third year of partnership with the USC Chan Division of Occupational Therapy as part of their ongoing commitment to supporting the health of their collective community, and furthering their work supporting justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion. Also at USC, the RJ Project offers restorative conferencing facilitation services in partnership with Dr. Christopher Manning, Vice President and Chief Inclusion & Diversity Officer.
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WHOLE SCHOOL RESTORATIVE APPROACH (K-12)
As part of federal Education Innovation and Research grant, and with support from the Collins Foundation, we are working with Pasadena Unified School District (PUSD) to implement RP at four of their schools using the whole school restorative approach. We are providing RP implementation supports and training at Blair Middle and High School, McKinley Middle School, Pasadena High School, and Sierra Madre Middle School until May of 2023.
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JSN TOUR OF BALLONA
On June 21, 2022 CURes and Friends of Ballona Wetlands hosted a group of over 70 from the Jesuit Schools Network (JSN) through the Ballona Discovery Park as part of JSN’s experiential options during the week of the Colloquium. Members walked the Watershed Walk, learned about the history of Ballona and the indigenous people, and saw native plants and birds. We were thrilled to provide a rich experience folks from around the world!
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MIGRATION CELEBRATION
On May 21, 2022, Friends of Ballona Wetlands held their 6th annual Migration Celebration in the Park and Freshwater Marsh! Close to 700 people came through the Park to learn about native plants, look at critters, go bird watching, participate in face-painting, watch a marionette show, understand biodiversity and habitat loss while learning how to use Tongva rattles and razzes under the expert direction of Tongva Elder Robert Dorame and Family.
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KESTREL FLEDGLINGS
LMU’s Westchester Campus has a reputation for being very birdy, and it sure did live up to that reputation a few weeks ago when two American Kestrel fledglings were found on a grassy area outside of the Sacred Heart Chapel. With expert guidance from rescue operations, Lisa Fimiani from CURes helped
to secure the birds and place them back near their nest in a nearby bush, hidden from predators to make sure these birds were safe.
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WEEDING DAY: TONGVA MEMORIAL
On April 19, 2022, University Honors Program students and members of the HerbicideFree Club (HFC) at LMU descended upon the Tongva Memorial site on the LMU Bluff and made the area look fabulous! The goal is to
add more native plants, approved by our indigenous peoples, the Tongva Gabrielino,
and the students enthusiastically agreed to come back when planting will occur.
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BLUEBIRDS OF THE BLUFF
A pair of Western Bluebirds have been spotted at our nest boxes on campus. We will (hopefully) be expecting babies soon, so stay tuned! Remember, Bluebirds bring good luck, and we are lucky to have them dazzle us with their beauty and song. Sydney Stern Memorial Trust funded the project, and to Ian Kimbrey for made them and installing them on Campus last July!
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BALLONA DISCOVERY PARK
Friends of Ballona Wetlands has a long history of providing environmental education programs at the Park; their educational modules have engaged thousands of visitors over 36 years. LMU and Friends of Ballona Wetlands have workedon education and restoration projects
for over 30 years. For information and tours, please contact cures@lmu.edu or info@ballonfriends.org, or visit the website at
Friends of Ballona Wetlands.
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| RESEARCH & PARTNERSHIP UPDATES
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LOS ANGELES RIVER STEW-MAP
The Stewardship Mapping and Assessment Project (STEW-MAP) was conducted from 2019-2021 in the Los Angeles River Watershed to answer the questions: Who are the active environmental stewardship groups in my area and where, why, and how are they caring for the land? STEW-MAP defines a stewardship group as one that works to conserve, manage, monitor, transform, educate on and/or advocate for the environment. We developed an inventory of 535 stewardship groups working in the LA River Watershed; and collected survey responses from those organizations. The results are included in this report as well as in two online interactive tools: a geographic map of stewardship groups, and a network map showing connections between groups.
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CULVER CITY COYOTES
The Center of Urban Resilience collaborated with the Lisette Waits lab at Idaho State to use the DNA from more than 100 coyote scat samples to determine how many individual coyotes likely live in Culver City. The results revealed 10 different coyotes from two different packs. The pack that has been observed through multiple cameras at Marycrest Manor has eight has had eight coyotes during the past two years, six males and two females. One of the males matched with samples found at Culver City Park and one of the females matched with samples found at Linberg Park. Therefore, we know that the coyotes do occasionally visit local parks, even though the two radiocollared animals never do. There were male and female samples found on Ballona Creek that did not match with any other known coyotes in Culver City, reinforcing our hypothesis that there are coyotes that travel through the Creek and occasionally visit Culver City neighborhoods. This study is the first of its kind used in the area and has now solidified much of our understanding about coyote ecology in Culver City.
If you are interested in participating in this program or just want to learn more about it, please contact Dr. Melinda Weaver at melinda.weaver@lmu.edu.
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