Professor Michael J. Smith joined the Educational Policy, Foundations & Administrative Studies faculty in Fall of 2005. From 2002 to 2004 he taught as a lecturer for UCLA's undergraduate education program and conducted postdoctoral research sponsored by the University of California All Campus Consortium for Research on Diversity (UC/Accord). He served as a postdoctoral assistant to the chair of education while teaching classes to undergraduates at UCLA and Santa Monica Community College. A study from his combined postdoctoral years explored the interaction of African American single mothers and their college bound high school daughters using a tri-generational approach.