The UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center’s Office of Cancer Training and Education is committed to exceptional cancer research education, mentorship and training to support trainee career development and provide a foundation for ongoing progress against cancer. Our mission is to foster innovation and excellence in interdisciplinary cancer education and training through partnerships and to create innovative and complementary cancer-related education and training programs for all trainee levels. The Office embraces, coordinates, and helps organize rich and diverse cancer education and training programs across the UCLA campus and at affiliate and partner institutions. Serving as a coordination center for all educational activities in the Cancer Center, the Office provides an academic and administrative scaffold for supporting cancer-related training and education in basic, clinical, and population sciences.

To achieve our mission the Office has three primary objectives:

• To identify, integrate, and support existing cancer-relevant education and training activities
• To create and coordinate new cancer education, career development, and mentorship programs and activities
• To engage trainees from underrepresented groups and support their cancer career development

MEET THE TEAM

Maie St. John, M.D., Ph.D.

Associate Director for Cancer Education, Training and Mentoring

Dr. Maie St. John is a professor and the Thomas C. Calcaterra Chair in the Department of Head and Neck Surgery who runs a successful NCI/NIH funded laboratory program focused on identifying novel diagnostic and treatment modalities for head and neck squamous cell carcinoma. As Associate Director of Education, Training and Mentoring for the Cancer Center and Director of the Office of Cancer Training and Education, she provides direction and works closely with her staff to identify, develop, implement and run cancer-focused education and training programs across the training continuum. [Email]

Nishtha Agarwal, B.D.S., M.P.H.

Senior Program Administrator

Nishtha is an international Dentist with a Master’s degree in Public Health from California State University Long Beach. She has more than four years of experience in planning, designing and implementing educational programs at various levels. She is responsible for coordinating and supervising all Cancer Center education, training and mentoring activities and programs including developing, implementing, and modifying strategies to meet goals and objectives. [Email]

Ian Aust

Data Analyst

Ian provides support to the Office of Cancer Training and Education for monitoring and tracking progress of programs used for continual improvement on offerings. [Email]

Education and training programs across the Continuum

High School Programs

• STEM Classroom Cancer Education Video Series
• The UCLA School of Dentistry Pre-College Science Education Program for STEM Fields
• The Keck Foundation High School Student Cancer Internship Program

Undergraduate Programs

• The Undergraduate Research Scholars Program
• Biomedical Sciences Enrichment Programs (BISEP)

Graduate Students, Post-Doctoral and Clinical Fellow Programs

• The Graduate Programs in Bioscience
• The Broad Stem Cell Research Center
• The UCLA Clinical Translational Science Institute (CTSI)
• The Minority Training Program in Cancer Control Research (MTPCCR),

NIH T32 Training Programs

• Chemistry Biology Interface Training Program
• UCLA-Caltech Medical Scientists Training Program (MSTP)
• UCLA Tumor Immunology Institutional Training Grant
• Tumor Cell Biology Training Program
• Cancer Epidemiology Training Grant
• UCLA Intercampus Medical Genetics Training Program
• Biomedical Big Data Training Grant
• UCLA Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine Training Program
• Physics and Biology in Medicine Research Training
• Dermatology Scientists Training Program
• Interdisciplinary Training in Virology and Gene Therapy
• Patient-Centered Outcomes Research Training in Urologic and Gynecologic Cancers (PCORT UroGynCan)

To learn more about the broad spectrum of NIH T32 training programs at UCLA David Geffen School of Medicine click here.

Faculty and Healthcare Professionals Programs

• The UCLA Clinical Translational Science Institute (CTSI)
• The UCLA SPORE in Brain Cancer Career Enhancement Program

Other Training Programs

• Charles Drew University / UCLA Cancer Center Partnership
• UCLA Kaiser Permanente Center for Health Equity

Seminars, Events and Initiatives

Seminars and Other Educational Activities

For greater than 20 years, the Cancer Center has hosted a weekly seminar series as a  forum for interactions between UCLA faculty, researchers, physicians, students, and staff to learn about impactful research being performed at UCLA and elsewhere, and to host scientific leaders from other institutions. The Center also organizes journal clubs, tumor board meetings, symposia, retreats, shared resource workshops and other activities.

Click here for the Calendar of Cancer Center Activities.

Women in Oncology Initiative

Launched in fall 2018 the Women in Oncology Initiative is a program that seeks to bring together female oncology leaders from across Los Angeles and neighboring counties. Participants are from the UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center, City of Hope, USC Norris Comprehensive Cancer Center, Cedars-Sinai Samuel Oschin Comprehensive Cancer Center, and community oncology practices. Together they work to develop programs and provide opportunities to professionally advance women at all stages in their careers. For information on the Initiative, contact Allison Muff: MAllison@mednet.ucla.edu

Clinical Research Unit Training Programs

The Cancer Center’s Clinical Research Unit (CRU) provides training programs for faculty clinical researchers, allied health professionals, clinical research coordinators, regulatory coordinators, and others involved in the performance of cancer clinical research. Organized by the CRU’s Coordination Services & Education unit are programs including the New PI/Sub-I Training Program, Clinical Research Coordinator On-Boarding Program, Clinical Investigator On-Boarding Program, Clinical Research Coordinator Certification Program, Clinical Research Coordinator Council, Clinical Research Coordinator Forum, and Clinical Research Best Practices Program.

Other Resources

Funding Opportunities

The Cancer Center has several intramural funding mechanisms, including the Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center Fellowship Program that accepts applications annually for cancer-focused research projects from post-doctoral fellows, graduate students, and residents. The goal of the Fellowship Program is to provide research funding to pursue research projects and develop preliminary data needed to competitively apply for NIH F-type grants. The Center additionally maintains a webpage highlighting extramural cancer-focused funding opportunities.

1. T32 Pre and Post-Doctoral positions available: Click here
2. Seed grants for Professors, Assistant Researchers and Assistant Professors available. Click here to access the RFA page.
3. Fellowship awards for Postdoctoral, Residents and Graduate students available. Click here to access the RFA page.

CTSI Education and Training

• Click here to visit their website

Career Skills Development

• Graduate & Postdoc Career Development Seminars and Workshops
• UCLA Extension Continuing Education

• UC Learning Center - Online Learning for UCLA Staff

UCLA Postdoc Professional Development Resources

• Core Programming
• Biosciences-Specific Career Development
• General Professional Development Resources
• Groups to Join for Training, Networking, and Resources

Career Planning Resources

• BioCareers - Bioscience Career Center and Jobs Board (UCLA constituents join free)
• Individual Development Plans and Progress Assessments, UCLA Graduate Division
• FASEB Individual Development Plan
• National Postdoctoral Association Career Planning Resources - including career skills assessments
• NEW! Career Planning Preparation Toolki

National Resources

•  NCI Office of Training and Education Details on NCI education and training programs, funding opportunity, community groups, fellowships and other resources for trainee
• American Association for Cancer Research Various education and training workshops for early career investigators
• National Institute of Health Grants, funding, policy and compliance
• CABTRAC (Cancer Biology Training Consortium) Includes over 80 institutions within United States along with NIH NCI Cancer Training Branch. Includes information about Retreat, Membership, Fellowship Opportunity, Training Session, Mentorship Opportunity. Platform to exchange ideas between trainees, faculty and institutions dedicated to the mission of training the next generation of cancer researchers.

• GMaP (Geographic Management of Cancer Health Disparities Program) Funded by the National Cancer Institute’s Center to Reduce Cancer Health Disparities. Through a systematic and comprehensive approach, we collaborate, cooperate, share resources and information, and build capacity between researchers, trainees, outreach workers and organizations to advance research and training. Region 5 serves Washington, Oregon, California, Alaska, Hawaii, American Samoa and Guam.

Coming Soon

• An exciting web based application, which will help connect trainees with mentors based on areas of interest.
• "Career Kickstart" panel event for junior faculty
• Seminars and other Education activities. Click here to see the Calendar of our activities.
• Seed grant RFA opening in Fall 2019 for Professors, Assistant Researchers and Assistant Professors. Click here to access the RFA page.
• Postdoctoral, Residents and Graduate students Fellowship RFA opening in Spring 2020.

For additional information, suggestions or ideas, please contact us at nishthaagarwal@mednet.ucla.edu