Ping Ho, MA, MPH – Founder & Director

Ping is Founder and Director of UCLArts & Healing, an organizational member of the UCLA Integrative Medicine Collaborative, of which Ping is a steering committee member. She was founding administrator for the UCLA Cousins Center for Psychoneuroimmunology, which led to the privilege of writing for Norman Cousins and co-writing the professional autobiography of George F. Solomon, M.D., founder of the field. She has a BA in psychology with honors from Stanford—where she was appointed to establish the still-thriving Health Improvement Program for faculty and staff, an MA in counseling psychology with specialization in exercise physiology from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and an MPH in community health sciences from UCLA School of Public Health.

Ping is associate editor for the Creative Arts Therapies section of the Journal of Integrative and Complementary Medicine and has been Co-Chair of the annual Expressive Therapies Summit: Los Angeles, which has offered 150+ workshops on creativity and the arts in healing. She developed the Certificate Program in Social Emotional Arts (SEA) and the SEA on a Shoestring program of supportive art, movement, music, and writing for individuals or groups in any setting. In addition, she co-developed and served as principal investigator for the evidence-based program, Beat the Odds®: Social and Emotional Skill Building Delivered in a Framework of Drumming.  She is co-author, with Erica Curtis, of the 2019 National Parenting Products Award-winning book, The Innovative Parent: Raising Connected, Happy, Successful Kids through Art (Ohio University/Swallow Press, March 2019).

Krista Beagin – Operations & Communications Director

Janelle Ketcher – Social Media Manager

Janelle is an interdisciplinary artist and arts worker originally from Des Moines, Iowa now living in Los Angeles. As the Social Media Manager, she creates our social media content to connect and share resources with our digital community. As an artist, she uses a range of mediums from graphic design, drawing, photography and beyond to explore how creative expression can support people to share their stories and heal. With a personal connection to dementia, Janelle explores the themes of memory making, caretaking, archiving and loss in her creative practice and community work. Janelle holds a BFA in Painting, Art History, and Social Practice from the Kansas City Art Institute, completed our Certificate Program in Social Emotional Arts in 2017, and is currently studying to be an End of Life Doula with Going with Grace.

Jennifer Kuo – Programs Manager

Jennifer brings an abundance of experience with her two decades of work in events management, community building, marketing, and education within the non-profit and corporate sectors. She has worked in development and fundraising with the Boys & Girls Club, event management and marketing at The Walt Disney Company, and grassroots community-building programs and e-commerce marketing at TOMS. Jennifer values education and lifelong learning and she obtained a BA in Music Industry Studies from San Francisco State University, is a certified 200-hour and kids’ yoga teacher, trained in sound healing work, and will be receiving a Masters of Public Health at Cal State Northridge in Fall 2022. Having been a Kindermusik music & movement educator, she has always been an advocate for the research-based impact that the arts have on people’s wellness. Jennifer holds a Social Emotional Arts Certificate and Beat the Odds® Training certificate from UCLArts & Healing and continues to study mindfulness at the UCLA Mindful Awareness Research Center.

Heidi Parker – Community Initiatives Manager

Heidi is a lifelong advocate for healthy places to live, work, and play; and is on a mission to build a more equitable and just world. Prior to joining UCLArts & Healing, she was Executive Director of Immunize Nevada, Associate Director at University Studies Abroad Consortium, and Art Therapist at The Center for Hope & Safety and The Violence Prevention Center of Southwestern Illinois. As Community Initiatives Manager, Heidi is passionate about connecting with individuals and groups at the intersection of public health, expressive arts, and community. She believes public health challenges are best solved through collective action, collaboration, and community partnerships. Originally from Chicago, Heidi’s deep appreciation of the arts grew through the abundance of museums, music, theatre, and dance she experienced throughout her childhood. She graduated from DePaul University with a B.A. in Studio Art, received a M.A. in Art Therapy from Southern Illinois University-Edwardsville, and completed an Executive Certificate in Nonprofit Leadership from Duke University.

Jazlynn Pastor – Programs Administrative Assistant

Jazlynn is a storyteller, educator, and coordinator dedicated to serving her community through art and programming. Since graduating from the University of San Francisco in 2018, she has had the opportunity to create SF Asian Art Museum’s first Open Mic “What About Us?”, American Center of Philippine Arts’ Online Youth Program ACPA Konnect, and Project Home Art’s first global movement film festival HOMESCREEN. Jazlynn has also shared Philippine arts and culture around the world like in Colombia, Hawai’i, and San Francisco Bay Area with Parangal Dance Company. Her love for using art as connection strengthened when she completed her Social Emotional Arts Certificate through UCLArts and Healing in the Fall of 2020. She has taken what she has learned into spaces like Girl Scouts of Northern California and pinaypages. Now as the Program Administrative Assistant, Jazlynn is excited to continue serving her community by supporting individuals in their learning journeys.