Professor Stephanie Reich, UCI professor of education and expert on youth and social media

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to today's show featuring
UCI professor Stephanie Reich

Stephanie Reich, UCI professor of education and expert on youth and social media who served on the committee that produced “Assessment of the Impact of Social Media on the Health and Wellbeing of Adolescents and Children” for the National Academies joins host Janeane Bernstein on KUCI 88.9fm.

Over the past 15 years, mental health among youth has seen a decline, one that coincides with the rise of smartphone technology that has changed the relationship between teens and the internet.

According to “Assessment of the Impact of Social Media on the Health and Wellbeing of Adolescents and Children” from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine. Released last month, the report urges industry-wide standards for social media to minimize harm and maximize benefit to adolescent health.

“Currently, there is limited legislation and industry standards focused on protecting kids online, especially those 13 years and older. There is a need for more transparency, data sharing and accountability,” says Stephanie Reich, a UC Irvine professor of education who served on the committee that wrote the report.

You can read more about the committee’s findings and recommendations here. Reich, whose research focuses on understanding and improving the social context of children’s lives, is enthused to engage in conversations about what is currently known and what can be done in the future to learn more about how to better support youth in a socially and digitally connected world. Though the report focused on adolescents, Reich’s work spans diapers to college and considers school and family contributors to children’s and teens’ media use.

ABOUT
Reich is a fellow of the American Psychological Association and Society for Community Research and Action. Her research focuses on understanding and improving the social context of children’s lives, centering on direct, indirect, and reciprocal influences on children, specifically through the family, digital, and school environment. Reich is a recipient of the Distinguished Early Career Applied Contributions to Media Psychology and Technology Award from the American Psychological Association and serves on the advisory boards of Raising Good Gamers, Future of Childhood, Children and Screens, and Next Gen Public Media (By/With/For Tweens and Teens).

UCI's Richard Matthew, professor of urban planning and public policy and director of the UCI Blum Center for Poverty Alleviation, shares details about The Drake Gives nonprofit, contributing $1.5 million to UC Irvine’s Power of Music initiative - leveraging music for social good

Richard Matthew (left), UCI professor of urban planning and public policy,
will lead the Power of Music initiative, in close collaboration with
Alec Glasser (center), founder and CEO of The Drake Gives,
and Jon Gould (right), dean of UCI’s School of Social Ecology.

Han Parker / School of Social Ecology

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to today's show featuring
professor Richard Matthew

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

The Drake Gives contributes $1.5 million to UC Irvine’s Power of Music initiative

New School of Social Ecology effort will leverage music for social good

Irvine, Calif., March 7, 2024 – A donation of $1.5 million from The Drake Gives will support a novel initiative at the University of California, Irvine’s School of Social Ecology focused on leveraging the power of music to galvanize students, other individuals and communities for social progress and well-being.

The contribution will spearhead the new Power of Music initiative, which will be led by Richard Matthew, professor of urban planning and public policy and director of the UCI Blum Center for Poverty Alleviation, in close collaboration with Alec Glasser, founder and CEO of The Drake Gives.

“With this generous support, we can develop novel pathways for research and action,” Matthew said. “Whether integrating music into psychology, health or environmental advocacy, we are poised to advance groundbreaking initiatives here on campus.”

Echoing his appreciation for Glasser’s dedication and philanthropy, Jon Gould, dean of the School of Social Ecology, pointed to the prospective impact of the Power of Music.

“Mr. Glasser’s remarkable contribution will empower students locally and globally to harness music’s potential in addressing some of the world’s most pressing issues,” he said.

Glasser underscored the initiative’s significance, calling attention to its ability to pioneer a movement toward positive change: “The Power of Music will establish diverse platforms for students and individuals to engage and advocate using the compelling medium of music. This endeavor resonates deeply with our mission to drive meaningful progress.”

Matthew emphasized the initiative’s capacity to shape innovative curricula and opportunities catering to diverse interests and disciplines.

He said the Power of Music aims to establish a vibrant hub at UCI, fostering collaboration among scholars, students and practitioners dedicated to using music for social good across myriad contexts.

It will also enable the expansion of partnerships between the Blum Center and organizations in three African countries that promote social change through music.

“Our partners are Yole!Africa in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Collaborative Media Advocacy Platform in Nigeria and Kakuma Sound in a refugee camp in Kenya,” Matthew said. “They are building radio stations and recording studios, and through music, young people are mobilizing to bring people together. The technologies they’re using to build the stations and studios are helping kids acquire skills such as spatial analysis and geographic information system data science, which are really valuable for environmental sustainability, climate resilience and climate change adaptation.”

The Power of Music, Gould noted, “represents a significant step forward in harnessing music’s enduring power as a catalyst for positive change, reaffirming the UCI School of Social Ecology’s commitment to innovation and social impact.”

About the University of California, Irvine: Founded in 1965, UCI is a member of the prestigious Association of American Universities and is ranked among the nation's top 10 public universities by U.S. News & World Report. The campus has produced five Nobel laureates and is known for its academic achievement, premier research, innovation and anteater mascot. Led by Chancellor Howard Gillman, UCI has more than 36,000 students and offers 224 degree programs. It’s located in one of the world’s safest and most economically vibrant communities and is Orange County’s second-largest employer, contributing $7 billion annually to the local economy and $8 billion statewide. For more on UCI, visit www.uci.edu.

About The Drake Gives: The Drake Gives is a nonprofit organization whose mission is to connect and inspire underserved youth by providing them with the music education, materials and instruments they need and deserve to fuel their passions and experience the power of music. Founded in 2021 by Alec Glasser, The Drake Gives has raised more than half a million dollars to support the Save The Music Foundation,, which has funded public music education in underprivileged Orange County school districts.

Coming up 3/13 at 9:00am - Armita Jamshidi, Founder of Aunt Flo’s Kitchen, a company Run By Women, For Women. She is also a student at Cornell University, where she studies Women’s Health and Computer Science, as she builds Aunt Flo’s Kitchen.

Armita Jamshidi,
Founder of Aunt Flo’s Kitchen, 
a company Run By Women, For Women.

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Today's show featuring 
Armita Jamshidi

 Aunt Flo’s Kitchen’s first product, Cramp Bites, is designed to nutritionally help with menstrual cramps. These treats are based on clinical research and traditional Middle Eastern medicine. She is also a junior at Cornell University where she studies Women’s Health and Computer Science as she builds Aunt Flo’s Kitchen. They are currently selling online and are in 7 retailers in the Ithaca area.

Her backstory

From Armita, the Founder

"Cramp Bites began in 2022 after being transported to the emergency room: I had fallen out of consciousness, turned extremely pale, and couldn’t move or speak due to the extremity of my period cramps. I consistently had cramps leading up to and during my period, but I couldn’t bring myself to take medication every single month. I went searching for a better alternative, and I found that I wasn’t alone in this issue – a lot of people felt the same way.

Why wasn’t there a solution that worked with my body to sustainably rid the hormonal imbalances causing period cramps, not against it? Something more than medication or implants that would artificially add hormones to my body and have detrimental long-term effects. There had to be a better way.

And so Cramp Bites was born. A Middle Eastern delicacy my grandmother would make, and one made of real food only. Sweet-craving indulgences that worked with my body on my period.

Cramp Bites may have started the conversation, but there was much more work to be done. Periods won’t go away, but the stigma around how we discuss them and treat them can. So we set out to do just that.

Now we’re here as the first doctor-recommended snack for menstruation – born out of the hair-on-fire problem that got us started: taking agency over our own cycle. The start to a healthier and happier life – and one where you can change the world, regardless of your menstrual agenda."


Armita Jamshidi
Founder, Aunt Flo’s Kitchen

You can learn more about Armita, as well as the clinical results of her product by visiting the link below.

https://auntfloskitchen.com/

Coming up 3/6/24 - Caroline Paul , author of TOUGH BROAD: From Boogie Boarding to Wing Walking How Outdoor Adventure Improves Our Lives as We Age

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TOUGH BROAD

From Boogie Boarding to Wing Walking How Outdoor Adventure
Improves Our Lives as We Age

By Caroline Paul

From the New York Times-bestselling author of The Gutsy Girl, a funny, inspiring, deeply researched exploration into the science and psychology of the outdoors and our place in it as we age.

“This arc of a critical life blueprint comes from the toughest broad I know, Caroline Paul. You turn the last page of Tough Broad and promise yourself to spend every minute possible in the Great Outdoors. You are determined to test new horizons, to abandon your fears, to breathe your deepest breath. I’m 74. Caroline leads those of us of mature and wise ages to the very real hope that we all of us have much more to explore.” ―Diana Nyad, subject of the new Netflix movie and the first person to swim from Cuba to Florida without a shark cage, at age 64

“Oh, how I love--and need--this book! Paul's subjects don't deny or mask their years: they embrace who they are with gusto and vitality, seizing the opportunity to enjoy, to grow, to challenge themselves mentally and physically. And they remind us of a fundamental truth about women and aging: even as we become invisible to the culture, we become more visible--in the best of ways--to ourselves. I am here for you, tough broads!” ―Peggy Orenstein, New York Times bestselling author of Unravelling


“In Tough Broad, Caroline Paul takes the prevailing view of how women age—the ‘long slow rot theory’ of aging—and completely upends it. By masterfully pairing the latest research on aging along with stories of amazing, adventurous women who are taking risks and playing outdoors well into their 80s and beyond, she demonstrates that women can not only survive but thrive during this period of their lives. Prepare to be inspired!” ―Juliet Starrett, New York Times bestselling author of Built to Move, and 3x Whitewater World Champion

“Caroline Paul has long been my North Star for what it is to be an adventurer in the world. I'd follow her anywhere.” ―Bonnie Tsui, author of Why We Swim and Sarah and the Big Wave

“Caroline Paul and her fellow tough broads know how to live life to the fullest. Every story in this book reminds us that life is truly what we make it and that our curiosity, love of the outdoors, and appetites for adventure don't have to end in middle or even old age.” ―Natalie Baszile, bestselling author of Queen Sugar and We Are Each Other's Harvest

_______________________________________________________________

New York Times-Bestselling author Caroline Paul (The Gutsy Girl) has been an outdoor adventurer her whole life. From mountain biking in the Bolivian Andes to pitching a tent, mid blizzard on Denali to flying experimental planes, Paul has never been a stranger to the beauty and benefits of outdoor activity. But as she hit her mid-fifties and was often the only woman paddling a surfboard or riding a skateboard, she began to wonder why women, like men, aren’t encouraged to keep adventuring into old age. “Isn’t being outside a vital elixir?” she writes. “Isn’t adventure enlivening, and an important challenge? Why, then, aren’t older women out here with me?”

In her newest book, TOUGH BROAD: From Boogie Boarding to Wing Walking―How Outdoor Adventure Improves Our Lives as We Age (March 5, 2024; 9781635576498), Paul embarks on a quest to understand how not just to live a dynamic life in a changing body in defiance of societal expectations but why we must. Along the way, she uncovers the science and the psychology that shows how outdoor adventure may be the single best solution for a healthy brain, a vital body, a confident mindset, and a longer, happier life, and meets women whose outdoor activities have changed their outlook on growing older, bringing them fulfilment, community and endless joy.

Combining scientific research, cultural studies, medicine, psychology, and memoir, Paul travels the country sharing women’s narratives alongside her own incredible experiences, illustrating how outdoor activity positively affects a person’s spirit, body, brain, and heart. From BASE jumping with 54-year-old Shawn Brokemond in Yosemite National Park to scuba-diving with 80-year old Louise Wholey, riding BMX bikes with 74-year-old Miss Kittie, the oldest female racer competing in the United States today, to meeting the weekly group of septuagenarian wave catchers who boogie board together in the San Diego surf, these women’s stories offer important insights into our own physical and emotional health as we age, showing that growing older is no reason to sell yourself short.

TOUGH BROAD is a funny and fearless call for women to embrace the outdoors in our fifties, sixties, seventies, and beyond, casting our own futures in a new and dazzling light.

Main themes of the book include:

• The five pillars for fulfilling aging (community, health, novelty/challenge, purpose, and a strong positive mindset about aging itself)
  
  
• How going outside is the most complete way to bring all five pillars of fulfilling aging into your life as a man or a woman
  
  
• How going outside and adventuring is a direct rebuke to beliefs - society’s and our own - that women become less competent physically and less interesting overall as we age. When we upend that we begin to reimagine other parts of ourselves.
  
  
• Why adventuring outside as we age is especially important for women
  
  
• The importance of a positive mindset as we age
  
  
• How to combat the negative messaging around aging
  
  
• The different types of activity that lead to joy as we age - getting outside can mean walking in parks, or it can mean learning to swim, or it can mean mountain biking and scuba diving 
  
  
• The medicinal benefits of nature and of finding awe in our surroundings
  
  
• The biggest misconceptions about aging for women – especially, that it’s dangerous for women to engage at a later age in the uncertainty and physical risk of an adventure. Nothing could be further from the truth.

About the Author: 

Caroline Paul is the author of the New York Times bestseller The Gutsy Girl: Escapades for Your Life of Epic Adventure and Lost Cat: A True Story of Love, Desperation, and GPS Technology, which has been translated into fifteen languages. She is also the author of the memoir Fighting Fire, the middle-grade book

You Are Mighty: A Guide to Changing the World, and the novel East Wind, Rain. Her TED Talk, “To Raise Brave Girls, Encourage

Adventure,” has been viewed over 2 million times. A longtime member of the Writers Grotto, she lives in San Francisco.

Featured women and stories in the book:

Shawn Brokemond, a 54-year-old BASE  jumper who jumps from El Capitan in Yellowstone National Park;

Miss Kittie, aka Kittie Weston-Knauer, a 74-year old BMX racer who is the oldest
female racer competing in the US today, based in Des Moines, IA. Miss Kittie competes all through the season but since there’s no one her age she ends
up racing against men, and those younger than her, but she continues to do it. 

When she taught the author to BMX race, she ended up in a heat with her
and a 12 year old girl named “Lucy Tough Cookie” Cooke;

71-year old Cynthia Hicks, whose kids posted a video of her online wing-walking and facing her fear of heights after conquering breast cancer. Paul follows in her footsteps and takes a class on walking on the wing of an airplane at altitude;

80-year- old scuba diver Louise Wholey, who takes a trip with Paul to dive in Monterey, California, and teaches the author about the importance of
mindset and curiosity;

69-year-old Illona Aguayo, who had recently become a widow, and uses sea kayaking as a way to grieve;

93-year-old hiker Dot Fisher-Smith, who is a local celebrity in her town of Ashland, Oregon and known for her passion for walking; 

Boogie boarding with a group of sixty, seventy, and eighty year old women in San Diego who call themselves the Wave Chasers and who taught Paul the importance of play for our health and our confidence

Austin, Texas based Virginia Rose, age 64, who found birding in her 40s, and went on to found Birdability, a non-profit that aims to share the joys of birding with people who have disabilities, and to ensure birding is accessible for everyone;

Paul’s mother in Oregon who thought of herself as a big “scaredy cat” but skydived at age 52. Ten years later when she picked up cycling at 62, it was a time in her life when she was looking for distraction and recovery from heartbreak;

74-year-old Vijaya Svrivastava and 59-year-old Diane Espaldon, who decide to
learn how to swim later in life;

And the author, Caroline Paul, 61, who becomes a pilot of a gyrocopter after being inspired by the women she interviews for the book

Praise for The Gutsy Girl & Caroline Paul:

"Caroline Paul’s inspiring and sometimes astonishing stories of the adventures that she and other great women have undertaken, alongside Wendy MacNaughton’s beautiful illustrations, make The Gutsy Girl the book of the year for daredevils, doers, and dreamers of all ages." ―Cheryl Strayed, author of Wild

"The perfect book for young feminists, or really any woman who needs a dose of inspiration in her life . . . Viva la Gutsy Girl!" ―Buzzfeed

"A modern manifesto for bravery, perseverance, and breaking the tyranny of perfection." ―Maria Popova

"Part high-energy how-to guide, part hilarious memoir, and part interactive adventure journal designed to help girls of all ages build confidence, pluck, and bravery by venturing outside." ―Outside Magazine

"An incredible book for raising ‘gutsy’ girls and a must-read for adventurous women . . . Paul’s book will convince any woman that she, too, is destined for a life of epic adventure--whether it’s in the woods or in the boardroom." ―Quartz.com

"Paul's exuberant prose helps to place us in the adrenaline-fueled scenes . . . An adventure tome, field manual, journal, and self-help book all in one. The book aims to help young women widen their comfort zone, face fear, and manage insecurity." ―Sierra

2024 US TOUR FOR TOUGH BROAD By Caroline Paul

Sunday, March 3

Potero Hill Neighborhood House & Booksmith

In Conversation with Bonnie Tsui

San Francisco, CA

Tuesday, March 5

Mrs. Dalloway’s

In Conversation with Elaine Lee

Berkeley, CA

Wednesday, March 13

Wisconsin Book Festival & Madison Public Library

In Conversation with Jill Nadeau

Madison, WI

Monday, March 18

Ashland Public Library & Bloomsbury Books

In Conversation with Alexandra Paul & Dot Fisher-Smith Ashland, OR

Wednesday, March 20

*Virtual Event* - 6pm ET / 3pm PT

92NY / Spark Your Health

New York, NY

Wednesday, March 20

*In-Person Event* - 5:30pm PT

Commonwealth Club

In Conversation with Julia Flynn Siler

San Francisco, CA

TOUGH BROAD TOUR cont.

Tuesday, March 26

Austin Public Library and BookPeople

In Conversation with Virginia Rose

Austin, TX

Wednesday, April 3

Warwick’s

San Diego, CA

Tuesday, April 16

Beaverdale Books

In Conversation with Kittie Weston-Knauer

Des Moines, IA

Saturday, May 18

Cornwall Public Library

Cornwall, CT