2014 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient
Shelby Nacino graduated Summa Cum Laude with Highest Honors from the Political Science Department in May, 2014. After graduation she worked as a staffer for a local school board campaign and as a researcher for faculty in the Political Science department. Shelby started Berkeley Law in August and currently volunteers with the Tenants Rights Workshop. She is also involved in the Berkeley Technology Law Journal. While she was a student, Shelby served in several campus leadership positions: Vice President of the Resident Hall Assembly, a campus tour guide...
2015 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient
Brandon M. Wong graduated Summa Cum Laude from the Political Science Department in May, 2015. At Cal Brandon spent the spring 2015 semester at the UC Washington Center, where he interned at the American Enterprise Institute (AEI) as a 2015 Matsui Center Washington Fellow. After graduation he interned in State Senator John Moorlach's office doing everything from meeting with interest group representatives and constituents to writing position letters to concerned voters. Says Brandon, "It was interesting to witness a politician and his staff gain their footing and...
2015 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient
Sandra Farzam graduated Summa Cum Laude with Highest Honors from the Political Science department in May, 2015. She is currently in law school at the USC Gould School of Law. While at Cal, Sandra served in campus leadership positions with the Berkeley chapter of the Model United Nations and founded a new campus club, called Peace Talks, which serves as a debating society for students to find common ground on national and international affairs. She worked for several professors in the Berkeley Law School as a research assistant investigating employment...
2016 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient
Madison Chapman is a fourth year Political Science major and Public Policy minor at the University of California, Berkeley, with a concentration in International Relations. Originally from a small suburb just outside of San Diego, California, Madison was inspired to work on immigrant rights and get involved in public service after witnessing injustices in her hometown. At Berkeley, Madison has pursued her academic and public service passions in order to make a difference for immigrants, women, victims of abuse, and public health.
2016 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient
Alex Mabanta is a double major in Political Science and Rhetoric and minor in Human Rights from Saratoga, California. With a huge passion for Berkeley, both the university and the city, he splits his time between class and City Hall on a mission to "bring human rights home."
At age nineteen Alex was appointed to the Peace and Justice Commission, a legislative body charged with crafting human rights ordinances for the city of Berkeley. As the youngest commissioner in the city’s history, together with law professors and disability stakeholders he crafted a law to enable Berkeley to...
2017 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient
Eric Yang ('17) is a senior at UC Berkeley studying Political Science. He is originally from Vancouver, Canada and is attending law school next year. He is passionate about using legal means to make a positive impact in his community. Eric believes it is very important for the legal system to be fair to everyone and wants to ensure the underprivileged have an equal voice within the system.
On campus, he was a caseworker for the Associated Students of the University of California Student Legal Clinic. As a caseworker, Eric did legal research for clients that needed help on a range of...
2017 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient
Grayson Dimick ('17) is a double major in Political Science and History, with a minor in Public Policy, from Sebastopol, California. Grayson is passionate about fostering dialogue, increasing access to affordable health care, and expanding opportunities for women and children, and has immersed herself in academic and public service opportunities surrounding these issues during her time at Berkeley.
On campus, Grayson serves as the president of UC Berkeley Model United Nations. In this role, she trains 110 students from 24 nationalities and 38 majors in public speaking and...
2018 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient
Youstina is a Political Science Major, and a Global Poverty and Practice Minor from Cairo, Egypt, graduating from Cal in May 2018. She has extensive service experience working on projects related to international human rights, refugee protection, and accountability for atrocities.
During her time at UC Berkeley, she worked closely with ICC investigators and prosecutors, open-source intelligence experts, and international human rights lawyers to verify and utilize open-source intelligence for legal accountability. At the Open-Source Investigations Lab of Human Rights Center, she was...
2018 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient
Ryen is a Bay Area native graduating from Cal in May 2018. On campus, Ryen has worked for the ASUC as both a videographer and as the Local Affairs Director. He has also worked for the Daily Californian as a writer for the Weekender blog, and for CalSERVE as a student mobilizer following the announcement of tuition hikes in late-2014.
Outside of campus, Ryen worked centrally at the Berkeley Student Cooperative housing system as a consent education educator and he currently teaches health education to high school students across the Bay Area as part of Peer Health Exchange....