UCLA Vice Chancellor Mary Osako. (L.A. Material photo illustration. Base photos by Stefanie Keenan/Getty Images for Hammer Museum and Myung J. Chun / Los Angeles Times via Getty Images)
SEVEN YEARS AGO, UCLA tapped a hard-charging corporate public relations executive to burnish the university’s public image.
It was a very big job, and Mary Osako seemed to succeed with flying colors, navigating COVID-19, a campus encampment crisis and numerous other scandals with the university’s reputation intact. During a period when college campuses were nothing short of a minefield, UCLA cemented its position as one of the nation’s top public universities. All with Osako at the helm of the school’s strategic communications department — a group of more than 100 employees who handle marketing, media relations and communications, and call themselves “UCLA’s Storytellers.”
But behind the scenes, the department was riven by bitter internal conflict. And Osako, the accomplished alumna hired at the exalted rank of vice chancellor, emerged as a deeply divisive figure who some staff members have called abusive and vindictive.
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