Official Blog | UCGPC

Meet Jocelyn Rodriguez — a September StAR! Jocelyn is a Ph.D. candidate in the Molecular Biology Department at UCLA, where she represents more than 13,000 graduate students. She currently serves as a Graduate Student Resident Assistant and HSI Fellow, and previously led the UCLA SACNAS chapter as President.

Jocelyn shared important insights highlighting student concerns with the UC Regents during her September meeting. Read her remarks below:

“Good morning President Milliken and UC Regents. My name is Jocelyn Rodriguez and I am a PhD candidate in the Molecular biology department at UCLA representing about 13,000 graduate students, I am a graduate student resident assistant, former SACNAS president and current HSI fellow. I’m here to ask for your continued support in preventing research funding cuts, student safety for all students on campus but especially for our undocumented students on campus and your continued support to the Hispanic Serving Institution mission. I want to thank you for being great advocates to research funding but want to emphasize to try and put students well being first when considering what the next steps will be. As a lung cancer researcher, myself and other colleagues fear what the implications will be for our research community today tomorrow and for years to come.

In these personal attacks on UCLA by the federal government I think it’s important to have adequate student protection on UC campuses given that in fear some undocumented students on campus have even withdrawn from the university or moved out of campus housing because they feel they are not protected by the UC. While standardized protection protocols are a great start, more resources need to be given to undocumented student programs offices for staffing and lawyers.  Lastly as you consider your agenda for the coming years to prioritize and emphasize the Hispanic Serving Institution mission in providing equity for ALL students. Thank you”

To hear more about what Jocelyn had to say, be sure to follow UCGPC’s Instagram page. Thank you, Jocelyn!