Join CREA

Join the 2025-2026 CREA Undergraduate Team

What is the project? 

Students are knowledge holders and creators. Their language, culture, and familial and community histories are powerful assets that enrich and are necessary to transform different learning settings, including here at UC Santa Cruz. Historically, institutions of higher education have underacknowledged these cultural assets, categorizing marginalized students, including Latiné students, as deficient, lacking, or underprepared. Rejecting this perspective, we wholeheartedly recognize that centering the wisdom of Latiné and other marginalized students advances more equitable institutional practices and honors students as co-creators of their educational pathways.

Understanding the power of students' cultural ventajas y conocimientos, the Chicanx/Latinx (“El Centro”) Resource Center’s new Student Advisory Equipo and the Collaborative Research for Equity in Action (CREA) research group are partnering to build an undergraduate-student-led initiative that merges theory, research, teaching, and practice at UC Santa Cruz. The goal of this collaborative initiative is to build a community of student leaders that will chart new directions and understandings about how UC Santa Cruz can enhance practices of servingness as a research-intensive Hispanic-Serving Institution (HSI). Servingness, broadly defined, is a framework that considers how institutions can holistically serve racially and economically marginalized students on their campuses.

• Learn more about what an HSI is through this video created by the UCSC HSI Initiatives team. 

• Learn more about what servingness is through this helpful reading, website article, podcast episodes, or parts of this mini-lecture. Select what feels engaging to you!

Who are the teams, and what will they do? 

The effort will include two separate teams as part of the collaboration — the Equipo Student Advisory Team and the CREA HSI Servingness Research Team. The two teams will connect and collaborate on different aspects of the initiative in order to bridge research and practice. Specifically, the collaboration will translate your own research into meaningful practice that can better support and serve students at UC Santa Cruz. Throughout the year, you will connect via social and professional workshops and gatherings to build upon your projects. 

• The Student Advisory Equipo will consist of 6 undergraduate interns, guided and mentored by the El Centro Program Coordinator and Director. Grounded by your lived experience and experiential knowledge, Equipo members will serve as compensated collaborators who play a critical role in shaping culturally affirming programs, policies, and decisions that impact student life. Through shared governance and coalition building with campus departments, offices, resources, and student organizations, Equipo works to strengthen community engagement and cultivate a sense of belonging for Latiné and other marginalized students at UC Santa Cruz. Examples of skills you will develop and strengthen include reading relevant literature on servingness and HSIs, participate in  campus committees and working groups, co-developing initiatives and programs that reflect our communities, collaborating with faculty, staff, administrators, and students, mobilizing your ideas within institutional decision-making spaces, and engaging in participatory action research that centers student voice and social justice. 

• The CREA HSI Servingness Research Team will include 5 undergraduate researchers who will work alongside faculty mentor Dr. Rebecca Covarrubias, Professor of Psychology. The CREA team will conduct a participatory action research project on servingness, in which you and the rest of the research team will define the research question that matters to you and your communities and carry out all aspects of the research process together. Some example skills you will develop and strengthen include: reading relevant literature on servingness and HSIs, co-developing a research question and design, collecting and analyzing data, translating findings across various platforms (e.g., conference presentation, campus talks, infographics), and learning how to mobilize your findings into social change and improve practices at UC Santa Cruz. 

What are the logistics? 

This is a year-long commitment, including Fall 2025, Winter 2025, and Spring 2026 quarters. We will begin at the start of the Fall 2025 quarter, with 1-2 required readings before then to help build a strong foundation to start. 

These are paid positions at $18 per hour for 10 hours of work each week. By offering payment, we want to intentionally provide financial support to student leaders while also providing the opportunity for professional and career development.

Interested students should complete this application by Monday, August 4, 2025 at 5:00 pm PST. We will review applications shortly after this deadline; please allow a few weeks before you receive a response from us. Please answer all questions thoroughly and indicate whether you are primarily interested in joining the Student Advisory Equipo or the CREA Research team.

To enable us to get to know you better, please do spend time elaborating on your responses in the application. Giving concrete examples is helpful and encouraged so that we can learn more about your interests and what drives you to apply for either of these positions! 

To learn more about the initiative and the application process, join us for an informal Zoom conversation on June 23 from 11:00 am - 12:00 pm PST. You can access the Zoom link here.  

This project is funded by CULTURA Title V HSI Project.