Kent Wong, the former director of the UCLA Labor Center and an advocate for workers’ rights, died Oct. 8. He was 69 years old.
Wong was the director of the UCLA Labor Center from 1991 to 2023, during which he oversaw the 2021 development of its new MacArthur Park headquarters, said Toby Higbie, a professor of history and labor studies. Wong also co-taught several UCLA classes centering on immigrant rights and social movements alongside civil rights leader Rev. James Lawson Jr. – a UCLA faculty member who mentored Wong and died June 9, 2024, at age 95.
Multiple campus departments and centers – including the UCLA Labor Center and UCLA Institute for Research on Labor & Employment – held a memorial Oct. 16 for Wong in Dickson Court South. Around a dozen of his colleagues and students spoke at the event, sharing their memories of Wong’s dedication to teaching and building community.
Ju Hong, director of the UCLA Dream Resource Center, said Wong helped launch the national Dream Summer fellowship program – a paid fellowship program for immigrants and young people who are undocumented – in 2011. The program has supported nearly 1,000 fellows and partnered with hundreds of social justice organizations nationwide, according to the center’s website.
“His contribution, in many ways, was to hold the university to its commitment to the people of California,” said Higbie, the director of UCLA Institute for Research on Labor and Employment.
Prior to Wong’s time as an educator, he worked as a staff attorney for the Service Employees International Union, which represents health care, public services and property services employees, Higbie said. Wong later served as the founding president of several labor advocacy organizations – including the Asian Pacific American Labor Alliance and the United Association for Labor Education – as well as the vice president of the California Federation of Teachers, a union which represents educators statewide.
Marshall Wong, Kent Wong’s younger brother, said Kent became politically active at a young age and devoted his life to advocating for social justice.
“He also, from a young age, understood the importance of how Asian Americans had benefited from the struggles of other ethnic minorities – and was always a bridge builder working to ensure that he showed up for other communities.”
California State Senator Maria Elena Durazo said Kent both advocated for workers in the United States and led many efforts to help workers in other countries organize. Kent travelled internationally to establish a partnership between the Los Angeles County Federation of Labor and the labor movement in China, she added.
Durazo said Kent made her realize that leaders in the LA labor movement had the power to break down walls between countries and unite international labor movements around shared struggles.
“When Kent talked to you about doing something, he had all the right reasons. You couldn’t argue with him because he was right – he was right about what he believed in.” Durazo said.
Karen Magana, a doctoral candidate in the department of education who previously did not have legal resident status, said Kent helped her secure her first paid position. Kent also offered her a teaching assistant position in his UC-wide class on empowering young immigrants – which provided her professional experience, she added.
“He was more than, like I said, a supervisor,” Magana said. “He was like a family member.”
Despite his busy work schedule, Ryan Wong, Kent’s son, said Kent often cooked meals for his family, made time to help with homework and gave his children rides to school. Kent approached parenting much like his teaching and organizing – with patience and care, he said.
“I think one of the things that stands out most in my memory is how positive he was for so much of his life,” Ryan said. “He faced some very difficult political moments … in the movement work he was doing, and almost every single day he was a bright, smiling, energetic person.”
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