Social Sciences Research Pathways (SSRP)

For Graduate Student Mentors:

• Graduate students interested in mentoring should submit an application describing their research project and research support needs by September 6, 2022. 
• Selected mentors will be notified in September 20, 2022.
• SSRP matches mentors and mentees into research teams based on research interest, background, and availability. 
• Research teams will attend a SSRP program orientation.
• Mentors are responsible for overseeing their mentees’ work output, but are encouraged to seek out support from the SSRP and IRLE staff, who are available to provide training and orientation as necessary. 
• As the departmental home for SSRP, the IRLE manages all logistics and administrative aspects of the program. 
• Groups are welcome to utilize IRLE meeting space. 

For Undergraduate Student Mentees:

• Interested undergraduate students should submit a mentee application by September 6, 2022.
• Selected mentees will be notified in September 20, 2022.
• SSRP matches mentors and mentees into research teams based on research interest, background, and availability. 
• Research teams will attend a SSRP program orientation.
• Mentees are expected to dedicate 3-5 hours of research time to the projects they support each week, in coordination with their mentor.

More detailed expectations are outlined below.

Graduate Student Mentors:

• Time commitment: 
  • 2-3 hours a week: mentorship, communication, consistent weekly/bi-weekly meetings, regular research training/check-ins
  • 25 weeks (whole academic year)
• Work commitment: 
  • Provide ongoing research training, including practical methodological training, research process from start to end, and everything in between  
  • Provide academic and professional mentorship 
• Value commitment:
  • Letters of Recommendation, or reference to faculty members
  • Graduate school applications support 
  • Guidance with independent research and/or senior theses

Undergraduate Student Mentees:

• Time commitment: 
  • 3-5 hours a week, 4 hours on average each week
  • On average 25 weeks of work throughout the academic year
• Work commitment: 
  • Tasks for the research team
  • Ongoing research support for their graduate student mentor, through tasks such as data cleaning, processing, collection, literature reviews, research report writing and revision
  • Completion of one mid-year report, and one end-of-year research report

All Program Participants:

• Research outputs: 
  • All research teams (graduate and undergraduate students) involved in this research program will contribute at least one student-led research output such as a policy brief, fact sheet, report, or chartbook to IRLE’s Student Publication Series throughout the academic year. 
• Check-ins
  • Teams will also participate in check-ins with SSRP program staff throughout the year to assess progress and identify additional areas of support.
• Program Evaluation
  • Research teams may be asked to complete a program evaluation survey.

Investigating Educational Leadership: Principal Support and Supervision of Special Education Teachers & Do or Die: How Special Education Administrators Problem Solve

Mentor: Corrine Aramburo (Education)
Mentees: Mayra Herrera, Aisvarja (Aisha) Eassey, and Tingyue Cui

Getting into the Club: The Social and Symbolic Dimensions of the Film Industry

Mentor: Jenae Carpenter (Sociology)
Mentees: Keziah Aurin, Keziah Aurin, and Vivian Ramirez Rodriguez

Geographic and Historical Variation in Labor Market Structures and Consequences for Inequality

Mentor: Joshua Choper (Sociology)
Mentee: Jaeyeon Bae

Antiblackness and Pro-Black Social Action at UC Berkeley

Mentor: Caleb Dawson (Education)
Mentees: Tya Valentine, Tatiana Butte, and Artemio A. Reyes Orta

New Teacher (Racial) Equity Learning

Mentor: Joy Esboldt (Education)
Mentees: Julyssa Palacios Pizano and Chloe Roesslein

Unruly Categories: Transnational Circulation of “Transgender”

Mentor: Tara Gonsalves (Sociology)
Mentees: Allie Giang and Ana Giulia Serra-Lazaro

Gut Knowing and Panza Awareness: Bridging the Mind and Body Divide Using Community Approaches to Knowledge Production about Cultural Concepts of Distress

Mentor: Sonia Cristina Hart Suarez (Ethnic Studies)
Mentees: Elle Henry and Julia Maloney

Corrupting the Conscience: The Congressional Black Caucus and Constraints of Black Politics

Mentor: Christian Hosam (Political Science)
Mentees: Giancarlo Fernandez and James Reyna

The Struggle to Define Justice: Community Organizing in the Criminal Courts

Mentor: Cathy Hu (Sociology)
Mentee: Tanya Decendario

High-Tech Environmental Fix: Economic Growth and Ecological Sustainability in the Taiwanese Semiconductor Industry

Mentor:: Janna Huang (Sociology)
Mentees:: Lucius Wu and Ahllain Santos

Making Race Count: Data Disaggregation and Racialization on the Ground

Mentor: Jessica Law (Sociology)
Mentee: Samantha Aguila

A Public Idea on TV: The 1619 Project Debate

Mentor: Tyler Leeds (Sociology)
Mentee: Jaime Mendoza

The Social and Cultural Tensions in Mexican Immigrant Families’ Acquisition, Use, and Understandings of Money and Wealth

Mentor: Nallely Mejia (Sociology)
Mentees: Citlalli Florez, Kassandra Ruiz, and Daniela (Dani) Plascencia

The Collateral Consequences of Childhood Trauma

Mentor: Michael Menefee (Sociology)
Mentees: Angel Garcia, Suchita Khanal, and Andrew Zepeda Monroy

Immaculate Re-Conception: Redefining Health and Reproductive Risk Using Prenatal Genetic Testing

Mentor: Meghna Mukherjee (Sociology)
Mentees: Natalie Rivas and Karen Tirado

Collective Action in Tech

Mentor: Nataliya Nedzhvetskaya (Sociology)
Mentee: Wynnie Chan

Blood, Honor and Family: Reconciliation of Blood Feuds & Nation Building in Kosovo

Mentor: Dhurata Osmani (Sociology)
Mentees: Leonardo Gonzalez and Satyam Sharma

College For All? College Non-Completion and the Reproduction of Inequity in U.S. Higher Education

Mentor: Sarah Payne (Sociology)
Mentees: Maya Hernandez Reza and Lizbeth Flores

Domestic Outsourcing in the United States: 1979-2019

Mentor: Kelly Quinn (Sociology)
Mentees: Jamie Ha and Emily Miles

New Agriculture Frontiers: Land, Labor, and Sovereignty in the Northwest Territories, Canada

Mentor: Mindy Price
Mentee: Angela Belulia

The Co-Construction of Gender and Autism in Medical Discourse

Mentor: Emily Ruppel (Sociology)
Mentees: Alexandra Ward and Zoe Anderson

Settler Colonialism and American Political Development: A Congressional Analysis

Mentor: Mary Shi (Sociology)
Mentees: Mark Yoo, Salvador Uribe, and Norma Garcia

The Rise of Smart Prisons: Understanding the Duality of Communication Technologies

Mentor: Maria Smith (Sociology)
Mentees: Ana Navidad Rayon and Graciela Serrato

The Changing Faces of Vietnamese Womanhood: From Warriors to Mothers

Mentor: Phung Su (Sociology)
Mentees: Vanessa Urrutia and Cristina Acosta Navarro

Investigating the role of family members in the demand for maternal care in rural India

Mentor: Pooja Suri (Public Health)
Mentees: Ashley Santos and Julio Ornelas

The Reparative Circuits of Second World War Confinement Camp Preservation: Hawai?i, British Columbia and Alaska in Context

Mentor: Desiree Valadares (Architecture)
Mentees: JP Pina, Rungsiri Upradit, and Laishaa Maciel

Ethnic Mobility in Mexico

Mentor: Enrique Valencia López (Education)
Mentees: Michael Garcia and Ariel Alba

Languaging “To Be” Neoliberal: Understanding the Ideological Practices of the Naturalization Process

Mentor: V de la Vega (Information)
Mentees: Jennifer Ramirez, Ananya Kapur, and Naz Shakur

Optimizing the Numbers Game: How Lovehackers Create and Moralize Dating Spreadsheets

Mentor: Skyler Wang (Sociology)
Mentee: Long Ly

How Exclusionary Conceptions of the Working Class Limit Support for the Left

Mentor: Alan Yan (Political Science)
Mentees: Isabel Cholbi and Alexander Davies-Morris