In researching her story for this issue about archaeology professor Jo Anne Van Tilburg’s decades-long Easter Island Statue Project, POLLY BLITZER got to thinking about the amazing scope of some of UCLA’s research efforts. “UCLA’s work extends beyond campus and across generations,” says Blitzer, a Los Angeles–based journalist and editor. “The Easter Island Statue Project, in particular, reflects decades of scholarship, fieldwork and collaboration with the Rapa Nui community.” The effort it takes to sustain such work became a central theme of Blitzer’s piece. “I was struck by the dedication required to document and preserve both the statues and the cultural history surrounding them,” she explains. “What began as a story about monuments ultimately became a story about people, partnership and stewardship.” Blitzer has written for The New York Times, Allure, Vogue and Town & Country, among many other publications.

“Honestly, I never expected a thriving real estate attorney to care so deeply about writing,” says JEFF GILES, who authored our profile of Kwame Granderson, the lawyer and developer whose philanthropy will fund UCLA’s Undergraduate Writing Center for generations. “Of course, what really surprised me about Kwame was that there was actually someone who went to fewer parties in college than I did.” Researching Granderson’s life, Giles came to understand the way just a few influential people can alter our trajectories. “Learning about Angela Deaver Campbell’s career at UCLA, and about the Center for Scholarships and Scholar Enrichment she launched years ago, was an unexpected pleasure,” he says. A former executive Hollywood editor at Vanity Fair, Giles is the author of the forthcoming novel Someone Saved My Life Tonight, to be published in March by Penguin Random House. 

This issue’s story about the efforts UCLA scholars are making to shine a light on the Trump administration’s often shadowy deportation efforts hit especially close to home for illustrator LYNE LUCIEN, herself an immigrant from Haiti. “UCLA is doing the difficult work of gathering and analyzing data to reveal what is actually happening to immigrant communities,” says the award-winning artist, whose work has been published in The Atlantic, Columbia Journalism Review and other national publications. Lucien’s personal connection to the topic influenced the approach she took in creating the story’s powerful illustration, which depicts the Statue of Liberty as made of ice and melting from the heat of its own flame. “I wanted to reflect the contradiction between the ideals America has historically associated with immigration, freedom and opportunity and the reality that many immigrants experience today,” Lucien says.

The more MELANIE MANNARINO  worked on our story about the amazing things some UCLA faculty members do outside the classroom, the more she found herself both impressed and motivated. “I was reminded that any one of us can pursue an interest or make time for a passion any time the mood strikes,” she says. “They’ve inspired me to think creatively and fit more of the things I love into my everyday life.” Not that Mannarino’s life has ever been dull. A former editor at Seventeen, Marie Claire and Redbook, she has written four books, had a cameo on the soap opera As the World Turns (playing herself) and once served as a judge on Iron Chef America (her episode’s star ingredient: broccoli). Speaking of food, Mannarino says she’d gladly break bread with any of the professors she profiled. “If I had to arrange a dream dinner party,” she says, “I’d invite every one of them.”

The portraits that accompany “The Secret Lives of UCLA Professors” are not the first work readers have seen by photographer GREGG SEGAL in UCLA Magazine; his first assignment for us was all the way back in 1993. But Segal takes away something new every time he shoots. “Working on this story affirmed the value of thinking in other categories,” he says. “Pursuing multiple disciplines activates the mind and body and allows creativity to flourish.” Segal, whose work has appeared in Wired, Le Monde and The New York Times Magazine, knows plenty about creativity: Next year, photos he took for his latest book — about what kids around the world eat — will be shown at Cité Internationale de la Gastronomie et du Vin in Dijon, France. 

Photographer EMILY SHUR found a willing model in new Bruins head football coach Bob Chesney, who posed for the striking portraits that accompany our Q&A with him in this issue. It was a pleasant — and unexpected — surprise. “Coach Chesney had some great suggestions for a couple of the shots and was invested in the photography,” she says. “I always appreciate an engaged subject.”  Shur’s photographs have appeared in The New Yorker, Time, National Geographic and The New York Times Magazine, as well as in some of the world’s most prestigious museums, such as London’s National Portrait Gallery. Being on campus uncovered another surprise for Shur as well: “I learned that UCLA has a pretty awesome gym for its student-athletes.”

Read more from UCLA Magazine’s Fall 2026 issue.