Welcome to VFWC

Get in touch!

How to find us

Click here to download the VA West Los Angeles Medical Center campus map

The Veteran Family Wellness Center is housed within the newly renovated Center for Holisitic Health (Building 220) at the VA West Los Angeles Medical Center.

You can also reach out to us:

Phone 310-478-3711, ext 42793

info@vfwc.ucla.edu

Contact us

We're here to serve you and your loved ones, please fill out this form so that we can reach you:

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Veteran

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Events and Tickets

Services, Groups and Workshops

Community-Wide Information

Family and Child Programming

Women Veterans Programming

Combat Veterans Programming

The Healing Art

Transition Resilience

General List

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WELCOME
The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children.

WELCOME
The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children.

WELCOME
The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children.

WELCOME
The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children.

ABOUT US

Our Center is part of a unique partnership between the University of California Los Angeles (UCLA) and the VA Greater Los Angeles Healthcare System (VAGLAHS).

The skilled providers who make up our dedicated team are experts in the unique needs of Veteran families. They are experienced in providing a range of wellness services, including individual, couple, and family resilience programming, events and workshops, and quality referrals to mental healthcare and other resources. We are also pleased to provide fun recreational activities designed to promote family and child well‐being in the adjacent garden. Services are available through our secure TeleWellness platform.

The VFWC is open to Veterans and their families for both drop-in and scheduled services during family- friendly hours. We hope to see you soon. Click here to meet our team.

Join our mailing list

Stay up to date on events, programs, and resources by joining the Veteran Family Wellness Center mailing list!

CALENDAR/EVENTS

May

May 10, Women Veteran Tea and Pamper Me Day

May

Veteran Mental Health Connections and Resource Fair

Apr

Power Up Your Parenting Workshop: The Path Forward

NEWS

Dec

Tickets for Hansel and Gretel at Dorothy Chandler Pavilion

Dec

Managing Holiday Stress Workshop

Nov

VFWC Director Tess Banko speaks at UCLA's Veteran Day event on November 9, 2018.

Oct

Saucy Saturday, VFWC Family BBQ

Aug

National Grief Awareness Day

OUR TEAM

Tess Banko, MSW/MPA, CPSS, serves as the executive director of the VFWC. A Marine Corps Veteran, she has held leadership roles in the military, Veteran, and wider civilian communities for over 15 years. Her background includes social work and public administration, as well as mental health and wellness, community development, organizational leadership, and management. Tess is a strong supporter of collaborative, consensus-based initiatives and believes in accessible, preventive, strength-based approaches that span the continuum of Veteran and family-member needs.

Tom Babayan, MS, LMFT, serves as a Director of Veteran and Family Services for the VFWC. He has delivered prevention services to active-duty military families and Veterans for over 9 years. He currently acts as Model Supervisor for staff delivering the FOCUS suite of services at military installations in the United States and abroad. Mr. Babayan pioneered the teledelivery model, an innovative platform that uses video teleconferencing technology to deliver psychoeducation and training to Veterans and their families

Melissa Lee, serves as the Family Resource Coordinator for the VFWC. She served as a ground supply officer in the USMC from 2000 to 2004. She was stationed at Marine Corps Base Quantico, Camp Lejeune, and Camp Hansen, Okinawa. She did Veteran outreach for Habitat for Humanity in the San Fernando/Santa Clarita valleys, and for the last 2 years has volunteered with 22 Until None, a nonprofit dedicated to ending Veteran suicide. She is married to a former Marine Corps infantry officer and was stationed with him at Marine Corps bases Camp Pendleton and Twentynine Palms.

Gabriela Alejos, MSW, serves as a resilience trainer at the VFWC. Gabriela earned her master's degree in social work at the University of Southern California, with a concentration on children, youth, and families. Gabriela has worked closely with military and Veteran families, including the UCLA FOCUS for Early Childhood research study. She is passionate about supporting this incredibly resilient population.

Jimmy Guevara, MSW, Jimmy Guevara, MSW, is a Resilience Trainer at the UCLA/VA Veteran Family Wellness Center. He served in the United States Marine Corps for four and a half years. He has been stationed in Okinawa, Japan, Camp Lejeune, NC, and deployed to Iraq for all of 2005. He attended Los Angeles City College and worked in the Veteran Resource Center. Soon after he transferred to Cal State Northridge, earning degrees in both Psychology and Central American Studies, while serving outreach lead for the Veteran Resource Center on campus. He went on to earn a Masters of Social Work from the University of Southern California (USC), deciding to help his fellow veterans and making it his new mission to provide resilience training to the veteran community.

Sarah Schaub, AMFT, Sarah Schaub, AMFT, serves as a Resilience Trainer at the UCLA/VA Veteran Family Wellness Center. She obtained her Bachelor’s degree in Psychology from University of California at Santa Cruz and her Master’s in Clinical Mental Health Counseling from Naropa University in Boulder, CO. Sarah is a strong supporter of diversity and inclusivity who is constantly striving not only to identify how each part of a system (familial or organizational) affects the whole, but also how each part can shift in order to facilitate desired change. Her current focus is to facilitate further resilience and posttraumatic growth with Veterans and their families.

Savannah Mercado, MSW, Savannah Mercado, MSW Intern, is a Resilience Trainer at the VFWC. She is currently obtaining her master's degree in social work at the University of Southern California (USC), with a concentration in Adult Mental Health and Wellness coupled with Military Social Work. While at school, she serves as the Alpha Company Commander overseeing two platoons in the Army Reserve Officer Training Corps (ROTC) at USC. In May of 2020, she will be commissioning as an Officer in the United States Army. Along with her participation in ROTC, she assists with research through the Center for Innovation and Research on Veteran Military Families.

Get in touch!

How to find us

WELCOME

The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children. MORE

WELCOME

The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children. MORE

WELCOME

The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children. MORE

WELCOME

The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children. MORE

ABOUT US

The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children.

The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children.

The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children.

The Veteran Family Wellness Center (VFWC) provides a warm and welcoming atmosphere for Veterans and their families, including parents, couples, and children.