Rep. Sara Jacobs and USD President James T. Harris III Celebrate Federal Funds for USD’s VIP Lab Fellows Program
Congresswoman Sara Jacobs (CA-51) and the University of San Diego (USD) President James T. Harris III celebrated $580,000 in federal funding for the USD’s Violence, Inequality, and Power (VIP) Lab Fellows Program. The VIP Lab examines how different socio-political inequalities intersect, creating systemic issues that often facilitate violence and manipulate understandings of how to address it. The funding secured by Rep. Jacobs will help expand and extend the VIP Lab’s work by launching a new fellowship program.
“Understanding the role inequality plays in perpetuating the cycle of violence is key to building a more peaceful, just, and equal society,” said Congresswoman Sara Jacobs. “That’s why I was so proud to secure $580,000 in federal funding for USD’s Violence, Inequality, and Power Lab Fellowship program – to support their cutting-edge analysis, shape the broader field of study, and invest in the next generation of research. This funding will help add much-needed data to the conversation on inequality driving violence and conflict here at home and around the world.”
“Violence is in large part representative of power relationships that serve certain individuals or populations at the expense of others, often through systems of structural exclusion that create cycles of harm and disempowerment,” said Rachel Locke, Director of the VIP Lab. “Yet, while the centrality of power inequalities is increasingly known to drive violence, research on the topic is sparse.”
“The work being done through the VIP Lab allows us to move past the anecdotes and headlines,” USD President James Harris, DEd said, “to more fully and more accurately understand the scope and scale of urgent challenges, and to become a part of the change this world so desperately needs.”
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