Family, colleagues hope Agustin Roberto Salcedo will receive posthumous doctorate degree
By Brittany Wong
Jan. 5, 2010 9:45 p.m.
Two years ago, Professor Wellford “Buzz” Wilms met and became fast friends with Agustin Roberto “Bobby” Salcedo, a first-year doctoral student in the Educational Leadership Program. The two struck a chord with each other, forming a friendship based on mutual interests and shared beliefs about education.
In late October, Wilms agreed to co-chair Salcedo’s dissertation on school retention programs and later, gave his full support when the student decided to put his dissertation on hold to run for a school board position he would eventually go on to win.
“I said, “˜Absolutely.’ What I loved about him was that he really wanted to make sure organizations were more responsive to doing the right things ““ as a school administrator, he really caught onto that,” said Wilms, a professor in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies. Salcedo was gearing up to continue work on his dissertation this month, Wilms said.
But now, after the Dec. 31 killing of the 33-year-old El Monte school board member along with five other men in Gomez Palacio, Mexico, Wilm and those in the Graduate School of Education & Information Studies are looking for ways to honor a life cut short.
“I was expecting to get a draft from him. Instead, I got this horrible news,” Wilms said.
Salcedo, an innocent casualty of heightened drug violence in Mexico, served as the assistant principal of instruction at El Monte High School and was in his third year of the UCLA program oriented towards educators.
At the time of his death, he was developing the proposal for his dissertation, the final requirement for receiving an Ed.D., said Aimée Dorr, dean of the Graduate School of Education & Information Studies.
“(His death) is tragic and senseless,” she said. “A very fine person has been lost to this world, a world that very much needs people with the commitments, values, and talents Mr. Salcedo had.”
In recognition of Salcedo’s doctoral work, Dorr said he would be honored at the June 2010 commencement ceremony of the Graduate School of Education & Information Studies. The Educational Leadership Program and UCLA are looking into additional means of honoring Salcedo, she said.
Salcedo’s cousin, Priscilla Gonzalez, a fourth-year undergraduate at UCLA, said she remains hopeful that a posthumous doctorate degree will be granted to her cousin, giving a title and validation to the community work he had done and had hoped to do prior to his death.
She recalled the ardency and enthusiasm he had for his work at UCLA.
“On the days we both had classes, we’d meet and he’d talk about his program and how excited he was about his dissertation on progress that could be made in the educational system by Latinos,” she said.
Salcedo’s dissertation topic, dealing with the efficacy of programs designed to improve retention rates of Latinos in high school, was deeply informed by his work in his community, said Arman Davtyan, a student and friend in the Educational Leadership Program.
“Being part of the community, having worked at the same high school he attended, he was deeply aware of the issues that students, particularly young males, dealt with in school,” Davtyan said. “He was familiar with the problems of equity, access and knew of the support mechanics or lack thereof. This was something close to him.”
Dr. Eugene Tucker, Salcedo’s second chair who advised his dissertation work, said Salcedo endeavored to better retention programs that were too costly for schools to implement on a wide scale.
“The school Roberto was an assistant principal at had implemented four or five programs, but he wanted to see if a less costly program could be implemented at higher levels,” said Tucker, who said he believes Salcedo should be honored by the state for his work as a community leader.
Wilms said he was confident about the shape Salcedo’s dissertation would take after seeing the action research study he had done focusing on engaging parents in their children’s education.
“He was looking for a creative way to bring parents more actively into the picture. That research would have gone into his dissertation,” said Wilms. “I told him, “˜This is great stuff, go do it and I’ll help you however I can,’Tragically, the conversation ended.”
Both co-chairs and Davtyan said they held high expectations for his dissertation given his proposal and the research they had seen.
“His ambition with this piece of literature showed this wasn’t simple an intellectual endeavor ““ it was personally relevant,” Davtyan said, stressing that his friend’s ambition for his work was inherent and strong but never alienating.
Tucker mourned the loss of an influential community advocate for education.
“His research was very interesting, proving that, in addition to this being a tragedy for the family, another tragedy is the loss of a person with great leadership potential,” he said.
Wilms agreed.
“I have every confidence that he was going to come up with strong ideas and that his research would have made for a piece of work that would have had a real impact,” he said.
“He was going to make this happen in a big way and he was in wonderful position to implement it as a member of the El Monte School Board and with such wide influence around his community. He was a wonderful example of going to theory to the practice.”
