Counseling group Adelante Mujeres promotes cultural understanding, facilitates meaningful conversations among Chicana and Latina students

Mental health counseling for specific communities acknowledges the unique experiences of students from marginalized racial groups on campus

BY MARIA MARTINEZ CASTRO features@theaggie.org

In an effort to address the diversity of experiences and identities among the student population and their complexities, UC Davis hosts group counseling services for students to have conversations about mental health in safe and supportive environments.

According to the UC Davis Student Health and Counseling Services (SHCS) website, group counseling services allow students to share feedback and personal experiences with peers while creating a sense of community.

Counseling groups focus on themes such as living with anxiety, the graduate student experience and sexual assault and grief, among others.

Within the multiple counseling groups that are offered, some solely focus on serving marginalized communities and their experiences. Due to their underrepresentation in higher education, students with marginalized identities often face a plethora of academic, financial and personal obstacles.

As marginalized populations attempt to overcome the struggles of higher education, the process often takes a toll on their mental health.

At UC Davis, counseling groups such as the BIPOC Support Circle, Wellness Wednesday Talking Circle and Adelante Mujeres are counseling groups that address the unique experiences of marginalized students on campus.

Adelante Mujeres is a group counseling service dedicated to providing a safe and supportive environment for students who identify as Chicana, Latina, gender fluid, gender nonconforming and two-spirit. Through the group, participating students can explore personal experiences on campus, create community and gain emotional

JOANNE SUN / AGGIE

support on topics such as navigating multiple identities, relationships and managing self-care.

Roxana Reyes, a licensed family therapist, has been working with UC Davis’s counseling services since 2010 and is the co-founder of Adelante Mujeres.

Prior to the establishment of Adelante Mujeres, there was only one therapy group for Chicana and Latina students led by a male, Chicano facilitator, according to Reyes. This led many Chicana- and Latina-identifying students wanting a safe space where their identities and experiences were highlighted and understood.

“We had a lot of female students [say] they wanted a group facilitated by women, for women,” Reyes said. “And so I think that the difference then was you needed to consent to therapy in order to be in the Latina group. And so we heard Latinas saying that they didn’t want to consent to therapy, but they wanted a space where they [could] remain anonymous if they wanted [...] so we decided, well, let’s start something different for Latinas, by Latinas. And let’s have it as an informal drop-in support space. And so Dr. Rene Lopez and I started it then. That was probably 2011, and it just took off. It has been running every year since.”

Reyes said that support groups for marginalized communities have not always been provided at UC Davis. However, in the past years, it has become a priority for UC Davis to serve communities that are often underrepresented in counseling services. One of the actions taken was establishing the Community Advising Network (CAN), a group of diverse

A Davis oasis: explore the sustainable designs and innovative lifestyle found in the Village Homes community

Learn about the ecologically engineered neighborhood that pioneered environmentally conscious living in Davis

BY REBEKA ZELJKO features@theaggie.org

Village Homes is a 70-acre subdivision in Davis, California, designed by Mike and Judy Corbett in the 1970s, according to the Village Homes website. The completed development includes 225 homes and 20 apartment units, as well as 23 acres of orchards, vineyards, parks, greenbelts, common areas and edible landscape.

The amenities and the environmentally conscious design are what distinguishes this community from others. Sue Colombano, the president of the Village Homes HOA Board and longtime resident, said the community was unique from its inception.

“My husband and I got interested very early on in 1979 when it was still being designed and developed,” Colombano said. “We would bike over in west Davis and see the area, and it really appealed to us. We saw all the vineyards, the orchards, the open space, and we decided to buy a lot so we could build a home. We wanted to build it in an energy-conscious, resource-conserving way, and so [the] Village Homes were perfect.”

Village Homes harbors many unique design elements intended to coexist with the environment. According to the Village Homes website, the design utilized a feature called “passive solar,” where “all the streets tend east-west and all lots are oriented north-south,” helping the homes store and effectively utilize the sun’s energy to regulate temperature. Other features, such as the street width, were also thoughtfully implemented in the residence. According to the Village Homes website, “their narrow widths minimize the amount of pavement to sun in the long, hot summers. The curving lines of the roads give them the look of village lanes, and the few cars that venture into the cul-de-sacs usually travel slowly.”

Key design aspects like these prioritize the quality of life of residents and the integration of the community’s natural surroundings, according to Colombano.

“It’s pretty innovative,” Colombano said. “It makes me reflect on how [Mike and Judy Corbett] were visionaries. You can see the conscious decision making in the design. Like the common areas, they’re consciously not fenced in because there is an understanding that you do have a community.”

These unique amenities quickly caught the attention of other Davis residents. Josephine Andrews, a UC Davis professor and resident of Village Homes, said the landscaping design is valuable to her.

“I think the landscaping is really, really appealing,” Andrews said. “The paths are designed to take you kind of everywhere you would want to go. And in the spring, it’s just so beautiful. It feels like you live in a huge garden.”

This garden-like feel is due to a feature residents call “edible landscaping.” According to the Village Homes website, there are more than 30 varieties of fruit and nut trees as well as vineyards planted all over the properties. As a result, there is always something that is ready to be harvested and enjoyed by the community nearly every month of the year.

“The community really enjoys and takes advantage of the abundance of fruit available to us,” Andrews said. “You would think this sort of thing would be more common.”

Andrews said that one of the distinct features in Village Homes is the shared plot design, where small groups of homes share and upkeep a common area their houses all face.

“Something I think I love the most is that there’s no fencing,” Andrews said. “We sit in our kitchen, and we can see through the windows all these people walking by, families, children, dogs; it’s so uplifting to see that; it just really warms you up. And in these common areas, you all have to agree if someone wants to make any changes to your yard, so you have a stake in that sort of beautiful area that everyone can enjoy.”

The emphasis on community and shared resources is important to the cohesion of Village Homes.

“It’s an amazing place to live,” Andrews said. “It’s very safe, nobody drives fast, there aren’t many roads, and the kids can really just wander in this large space very safely. You know your neighbors, even if you don’t really like them, you really know them, and that’s very important.”

Just as crucial as the community aspect, the incorporation of nature and urban development into a cohesive community is a signature component to Village Homes. Stephen Wheeler, Ph.D., a UC Davis professor in the Department of Human Ecology and longtime resident of Village Homes, said this hybrid design is valuable in a residential area.

VILLAGEHOMES on 4 counselors helping students take care of their mental health.

“We have definitely not had as many services focused on working with special populations, or marginalized populations as we do now,” Reyes said. “That is definitely unique and wonderful. And I think that it’s a result of the diversity of our staff now. So the establishment of the CAN program was actually […] out of a need to diversify staff on all the UC campuses and to reach out to students who don’t typically seek services.”

Group counseling tailored specifically for marginalized populations creates a space for cultural wealth and understanding, Reyes said.

“Specific feedback I’ve got about Adelante Mujeres is that it is so nice to have a space that talks about culture as much as we talk about problems, like unpacking the stigma of using limpias, sage, energy work, using a curandero or going to a sweat lodge,” Reyes said. “There could be a fear of being pathologized and working with a therapist that might not understand the power of energy in your culture or […] your belief in chakra work.”

Marlene Velazquez, a licensed clinical social worker and behavioral health counselor at SHCS, is the facilitator for Adelante Mujeres in Spanish. Velazquez said people from marginalized communities often feel discouraged from seeking mental health services because of fear of judgment, because they do not see themselves represented in conversations about mental health or because they struggle to identify with service providers. She said that in her own undergraduate experience at UC Davis and as a Mexican-American, she often hesitated to seek mental health services. Coming back now as a behavioral health counselor, she said she hopes to break that cycle.

“When I was a student, even though I knew I wanted to come into the field of mental health and be a counselor and whatnot, I never stepped foot into counseling services,” Velazquez said. “For the reason of feeling like no one’s going to understand my experience because the mental health field is, for the most part, seen as white therapists or for the white community. So when I saw my position, I was like, ‘Oh my god, this is my time to go back and at least be a face or a person or a name that students can at least see and be like, […] I think they, they may be [able] to understand.’”

POCMENTALHEALTH on 4

‘Get to the bargaining table’: North Davis Peet’s Coffee holds celebratory rally after historic vote to unionize

Local leaders, community members, employees gathered outside the North Davis location to express their workplace grievances and garner support

BY MADELEINE YOUNG city@theaggie.org

Peet’s employees and supporters gather outside the North Davis location to celebrate the unionization vote. (Sonora Slater / Courtesy)

On Jan. 28, Peet’s Coffee workers, former employees and supporters held a rally outside the North Davis Peet’s Coffee location to celebrate a successful vote to unionize and garner support from the community.

A week before the rally, the North Davis location voted 14-1 to join the Service Employees International Union (SEIU) Local 1021, making them the first Peet’s Coffee in the U.S. to unionize.

“The purpose of today’s protest is to first celebrate the victory of the first Peet’s Coffee in North America to unionize in a landslide election where they won 14 yes votes to one no vote,” rally organizer and Peet’s employee Jamaica Rettick said. “We’re also using this as a call to action for the community to support these workers to get to the bargaining table due to Peet’s creating conditions to the store that are really untenable for the workers.”

The rally featured both former and current employees who voiced their concerns regarding working conditions such as cut hours, a lack of significant raises, exhausting labor and more. Additionally, local leaders, including City Councilmember Gloria Partida, Deputy County Supervisor Sheila Allen and District 4 Supervisor Lucas Frerichs, came out to support the newly unionized coffeehouse. Frerichs spoke about the workers’ right to organize.

“The National Labor Relations Act was passed in 1935, which allows for an opportunity to organize, to collectively bargain and take collective action,” Frerichs said. “Even though that law has been in effect for almost 90 years, corporations are still trying to attack workers and stop workers from organizing. This may be the beginning, but this is not the end, not in the least.”

Alyx Land, shift lead, organizer of the rally and Peet’s employee since 2017, voiced his concern and disappointment regarding the conditions of the store.

“I love our coffee and I really believe in the values and what we bring to people,” Land said. “I’m passionate about our work and I’ve seen the quality of our products decline along with the treatment and pay of employees at our location and others. Five years later, after working through the pandemic, we’re more stressed out than ever. We’re underpaid and overworked. I don’t want to burn out every month. My rent rises every year and combined with inflation, I may be less and less able to live there. I’ve been in Davis for seven years and I don’t want to be forced to relocate or continue living paycheck to paycheck, wondering how long I can do this before I have no energy left.”

With the first steps being made in collective bargaining, County Supervisor Allen commended the employees’ push to unionize.

“I am pleased to know that this vote has gone through and that you are on the road now to one of the very important pieces of having a union, and that is collective bargaining,” Allen said. “It is hard for one person to make a difference, but collectively, you are so much stronger.”