Human Development

Fruit in boxes for sale at an outdoor market.

Hands-on Learning That Benefits Students and Local Neighborhoods

  • by Tiffany Dobbyn

From concept to completion – UC Davis student Mariah Padilla has taken what she’s learned in class to help create a tool that aims to enhance a local community’s social and economic health and well-being. Padilla, a community and regional development major going into her senior year, took a community economic development course (CRD 156) last spring which empowered students to provide an assessment of food security and community violence in two neighborhoods located in South Sacramento.

Before the sheep are released, assistant professor Haven Kiers of Human Ecology measures the grass.

Human Ecology

Human Ecology integrates themes of people, place, and power. "People" focuses attention on human development and individual relationships with others through family, institutions, and community. "Place" weaves together social processes and geographical space. "Power," defined as the capacity to shape processes and outcomes related to people and place, is an important focus for understanding contemporary issues such as health, equality, and sustainability, and how they might be addressed.

Three areas with the Department of Human Ecology include:

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