Tala Oszkay Febres-Cordero

Tala Oszkay Febres-Cordero, PhD is a Senior Research Analyst at the UCLA Labor Center. She completed her doctorate in Sociology at UCLA, focusing on how changing forms of political mobilization among community organizations, workers, and corporations shape local policymaking and economic development. As a graduate student researcher, she supported the Worker Equity Initiative at the Labor Center, analyzing labor trends, conducting interviews and focus groups with workers and other workforce development stakeholders, and coordinating with a steering committee to develop recommendations to create more equity in the workforce development system. She also supported a Labor Center project on the cannabis industry, collecting and analyzing dispensary listing data.

Just prior to joining the Labor Center, Tala was an American Council of Learned Societies Leading Edge Fellow and Applied Research Specialist with ACT-LA, a coalition of 46 community-based organizations in Los Angeles. In this role, she regularly analyzed policies and programs and co-designed research with community organizers to advance equitable urban planning and transit justice.

As a mixed-methods sociologist who uses a community-based, participatory research approach, Tala is regularly inspired by the ways community-led ideas, expertise, and policy interventions can create systems change. Her work has been published in a range of publications, including the Los Angeles Times, Studies in American Political Development, Urban Affairs Review, and Social Currents.