Dr. Arthur M. Cohen, professor emeritus of education, medical school benefactor and a pioneering scholar whose work focused on community colleges, died on December 25, 2020.
He was 93 years old. Dr. Cohen joined the UCLA faculty in 1964, and he remained with the university until he retired in 2014. He was a vanguard in the study of community colleges and is largely credited with helping to shape national scholarship and the understanding of this field.
Dr. Cohen and his wife Dr. Florence Brawer Cohen were generous donors to UCLA, as well as champions of medical education. The couple established the Arthur M. Cohen and Florence Brawer Cohen Scholarship in the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA to benefit fourth-year medical students with financial need and who were interested in pursuing careers in primary care.
Dr. Arthur M. Cohen. Photo: Courtesy of UCLA School of Education and Information Studies
Donation to Lung Health Fund Made in Memory of CF Advocate
Friends and family donated to the UCLA Lung Health Research Accelerator Fund in memory of Stacy Ann (Hawes) Melle, who died October 10, 2019, at the age of 50. Melle was diagnosed with cystic fibrosis (CF), a genetic disease that affects the lungs and digestive system, when she was 2 years old, but she never used her condition as an excuse to sit on the sidelines. Rather, she chose to fully live. After graduating college, she pursued her dream of a career in media and telecommunications.
Melle worked in a number of roles before joining Universal Studios, where she became vice president of marketing for NBCUniversal Media. In 1998, Melle received a double lung transplant. On the eve of her transplant surgery, she met the love of her life, Kelly Melle, who serves on the UCLA Lung Health Advisory Board.
Shortly before her death, Melle ended a speech during a cystic fibrosis fundraising event with a quote from Eleanor Roosevelt: “The purpose of life is to live it, to taste experience to the utmost, to reach out eagerly and without fear for newer and richer experience.”
Melle fulfilled that mission.
Stacy Ann (Hawes) Melle. Photo: Courtesy of Kelly Melle
