Oct. 5 - Latino healthcare research; cybersecurity month
Section 1
A student strolls toward a tunnel entrance beneath Ring Road on the edge of Aldrich Park. Photo by Ian Parker
UCI ANNOUNCEMENTS AND NEWS
UCI’s Stephen Schueller (left) and Adrian Aguilera of UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco co-designed a new study on how to better deliver mental health services via a digital platform to a Latino population with limited English proficiency. Photos by Han Parker/UCI and Keegan Houser/UCB
Latino mental healthcare subject of new NIH project by UCI, UC Berkeley and UC San Francisco researchers
The National Institutes of Health is awarding nearly $4.7 million over five years to support research teams from University of California campuses in Irvine, Berkeley and San Francisco. The teams will combine peer support with the use of a digital platform to better serve the mental health needs of Latino patients with limited English proficiency. The researchers hypothesize that complementing existing digital interventions with peer support will boost scalability and sustainability and help counterbalance mental health workforce shortages, a reality particularly prevalent in the Latino community.
October is Cybersecurity Awareness Month at UCI
UCI is hosting three presentations this month to mark Cybersecurity Month, a creation of the National Cyber Security Alliance and the Department of Homeland Security. The first event, on Oct. 14, features a talk by Yu Chao, a cyber threat warning Analyst with the California Cybersecurity Integration Center, covers the current cyber threat landscape for the education sector for both K-12 and higher education. On Oct. 19, FBI Supervisory Special Agent Bryan Willett, will discuss cyber activity and trends, the FBI’s role in fighting those threats and ways to protect yourself. And on Oct. 27, a pair of California-based deputy district attorneys, Deborah Kwon and Anthony Schlehner, will describe various types of cybercrime including those involving cryptocurrency and how to identify and protect yourself from becoming a victim of scammers and phishing attacks.
UC NEWS AND GENERAL NEWS
UC students volunteer for statewide voter outreach program
Inspired by the 1964 Freedom Summer Project to register Black voters in the South, UC Freedom Summer began in 2018 with 25 students from UC Santa Cruz and UC Merced doing voter outreach in the Central Valley. It now includes more than 100 students from all nine undergraduate campuses, as well as some California community colleges, fanning out to encourage civic participation in communities across California, from Visalia to Oakland and East San Jose. Participants plan events and set registration targets aimed at potential young voters in their communities as part of a summer-long internship focused on civic engagement.
Officials warn of a worse than usual flu season
Health officials are warning that this fall and winter could see a major increase in flu infections in a rebound of the virus since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic more than two years ago. Influenza has been largely dormant the last two years, a development likely attributable to the health protocols put in place to ward off the coronavirus.