NEWS + NOTES alumni Dr. Michael Rodriguez (left) with Freddy Meynard, dean of health sciences, Universidad Nacional Autónoma de Nicaragua. Photo: Courtesy of Dr. Michael Rodriquez Promoting Exchange to Encourage Change Michael Rodriguez, MD ’88, MPH, is professor and vice chair for global health in the Department of Family Medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, co-director of the University of California Global Health Institute Center of Expertise on Migration and Health and founding director of the UCLA Blum Center on Poverty and Health in Latin America. His research activities focus on health inequities, including violence prevention, chronic diseases, such as diabetes and obesity, and efforts to strengthen the health system and develop partnerships with other institutions and stakeholders. He has authored articles and lectured internationally on a wide 40 U MAGAZINE range of health issues. He also collaborates with the World Health Organization, UNICEF, the Pan American Health Organization and the Inter-American Development Bank. Dr. Rodriguez mentors and teaches UCLA faculty and trainees from numerous schools while volunteering at a community health center serving uninsured patients in Los Angeles. Today, UCLA is improving global health by nurturing a new generation of leaders and by providing clinical, research and humanitarian training for medical students, residents, fellows and faculty. When I attended medical school at UCLA, in the