Alexii Sigona
Ph.D., Department of Environmental Science, UC Berkeley
Amah Mutsun Tribal Band in San Francisco and Monterey Bay
Alexii Sigona and Ghaleb Attrache will partner with the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band to research and advocate for recognition of the rights of Indigenous Peoples within municipalities and natural resource agencies based in the San Francisco and Monterey Bay areas. They will promote commitments to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples to increase the acknowledgement of non-federally recognized tribes’ rights over their land and cultural resources.
Astha Agarwal
Ph.D., School Psychology Program, Graduate School of Education, UC Berkeley
Youth Law Center
Astha will be working with the Youth Law Center, which advocates to transform foster care and juvenile justice systems nationwide to provide all children and youth in these systems the opportunity to thrive. Although access to higher education is universally considered a human right, children and youth in the foster care and juvenile justice systems in the U.S. face significant systemic and institutionalized barriers to education, such that only 3% of youth in foster care and only 1% of youth in the juvenile justice system earn a college degree. With her background in creating culture and practice change in education, Astha will work to build commitment in the secondary and postsecondary education community to provide educational access to vulnerable students in these systems.
Brett Simpson
MJ, Graduate School of Journalism, UC Berkeley
Saami Council in Norway
Brett Simpson will be working in Alta, Norway, with the Saami Council, a non-governmental body advocating for the rights of the indigenous Saami people. Brett, an audio and print reporter studying at the UC Berkeley Graduate School of Journalism, will document the systemic fragmentation of traditional Saami land in pursuit of renewable energy and resource extraction projects in the Norwegian Arctic. She will follow Saami communities facing the dual threats of global climate change and development projects, examining the immediate impacts of Norway's pursuit of a future "green economy."
Ceren Fitoz
Undergraduate, Global Studies, Letters and Science, UC Berkeley
Organization for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons in The Hague, Netherlands
Ceren will partner with the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), an intergovernmental organisation based in The Hague, to monitor and aid the implementation of the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention. Through their Technical Secretariat, she will assist in their activities through online discovery and verification using Open Source Intelligence (OSINT).
Mir Fatimah Kanth
Ph.D., Anthropology, UC San Diego
Fatimah will work with a grassroots civil liberties organization in Indian administered Kashmir to research the effects of militarized humanitarian programming undertaken within the spheres of culture and education, on the Kashmiri youth. She will use mixed methods to participate in various aspects of the project, including research, advocacy, and documentation.
Forogh Bashizada
JD, School of Law, UC Berkeley
International Refugee Assistance Project
Forogh will partner with the International Refugee Assistance Project to serve the world’s most persecuted individuals through the mobilization of direct legal aid, litigation, and systemic advocacy. She will assist vulnerable clients in navigating various pathways to safety, including refugee resettlement, family-based immigration and reunification, and humanitarian parole. Forogh will also work with the Litigation Department to bring legal challenges to refugee rights violations in the courts, creating solutions to overcoming the legal and bureaucratic impediments in the resettlement process and developing an enforceable system of legal and procedural rights for refugees and displaced persons worldwide.
Ghaleb Attrache
Ph.D., Sociology, UC Berkeley
Amah Mutsun Tribal Band in San Francisco and Monterey Bay
Ghaleb Attrache and Alexii Sigona will support the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band’s ongoing efforts to preserve, steward, and return to their ancestral lands. They will research and advocate for recognition of the rights of Indigenous Peoples within municipalities and natural resource agencies based in the San Francisco and Monterey Bay areas. Specifically, their work will consider how commitments to the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples (UNDRIP) can promote the acknowledgement of non-federally recognized tribes’ rights over their land and cultural resources.
Gustavo Capela
Ph.D., Anthropology, UC Berkeley
Collaborative Media Advocacy Platform in Nigeria
Gustavo will work with the Collaborative Media Advocacy Platform (CMAP) to map the living conditions and spatial configuration in the waterfront community of Port Harcourt, Nigeria. CMAP's Human City Project seeks to elucidate realities that have been made invisible by the local government and media. Gustavo will help document the structural injustices and human rights violations that occur within these precarious communities, with a focus on the intersection of the infringements of social rights (especially housing and service provision) and discrimination based on gender.
Harjot Singh Dhindsa
Undergraduate, Political Economy and South Asian Studies, UC Berkeley
Punjab Documentation and Advocacy Project (PDAP)
Using multiple methods, Harjot will work on cases of extrajudicial executions in Punjab to analyze broader patterns of human rights violations and genocidal violence against minorities in India. Under the guidance of PDAP’s lawyers, his work will help examine how the impacts of the counter-insurgency measures that Indian security forces had undertaken (to curb the Sikh self-determination movement in the eighties) continue to subsist, as impunity upheld by several administrations has prevented the architects of state violence from being held accountable for more than three decades.
Idris Muktar Ibrahim
MJ, Graduate School of Journalism, UC Berkeley
FilmAid Kenya
Idris will be amplifying refugee voices in the Dadaab refugee camp. He will be mentoring students in storytelling and human rights advocacy through media and film production. Idris will partner with FilmAid Kenya to train residents of the camp in media and film production from ideation to completion. Through their documentaries and feature programs, they will portray their lived experiences and hopes in a creative and direct way. Idris will conduct writing, filming, and networking workshops. This will be screened to the refugees and broadcasted on different media platforms.
Helena von Nagy
JD, School of Law, UC Berkeley
Office of the Legal Advisor in Washington, DC
Helena will be a summer clerk for the Office of the Legal Adviser (OLA), advising the State Department about international law, working to bolster U.S. support for human rights and develop the centrality of human rights concerns within international law broadly. This administration has explicitly stated that the State Department will focus on supporting human rights globally, and OLA will be central to that effort. As a clerk, Helena will be given the same work as a junior attorney, and will center human rights in all the work that she does, advocate for human rights initiatives, and, if necessary, provide a voice of dissent to demand human rights considerations.
Lucy Meyer
Berkeley International Student Program, UC Berkeley
Croakey Health Media & Mibbinbah Spirit Healing
The over incarceration of Aborginal and Torres Strait Islander people is an urgent human rights issue in Lucy’s home country of Australia. Lucy will investigate palliative care in prisons for First Nations people in Australia. She will be hosted by Croakey Health Media, a public interest journalism organization, in partnership with Mibbinbah Spirit Healing, a grassroots Aboriginal health nonprofit. Lucy will work directly with the Co-Chair of Croakey, Professor Megan Williams. Wiradjuri through her father’s family, Professor Williams is an academic at the intersection of justice and health. Lucy will work collaboratively on a multidisciplinary project that incorporates academic research and journalism. Through her fellowship, Lucy will examine the treatment of critically ill Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people in custody.
Mayra Lopez
JD, School of Law, UC Irvine
San Diego Federal Defenders, Inc.
Mayra will be working as a legal intern at the San Diego Federal Defenders, Inc., and addressing some of the most concerning civil rights issues at the U.S.-Mexico border. Mayra will be helping fight against the targeted prosecution of migrants under Title 8 U.S.C. §1326. Mayra will also assist our attorneys in representing indigent clients charged with other federal crimes in our district who are disproportionally people of color.
Meher Wadhawan
Undergraduate, College of Letters and Science, UC Berkeley
Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons
Meher will partner with the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), an intergovernmental organisation based in The Hague, to monitor and aid the implementation of the 1997 Chemical Weapons Convention. Through their Technical Secretariat, she will assist in their activities through online discovery and verification using Open Source Intelligence (OSINT).
Michael Bakal
Ph.D., Graduate School of Education, UC Berkeley
Voces y Manos and Fundación Nueva Esperanza in Guatemala
The dry corridor of Guatemala is one of the world's most vulnerable regions to climate change. And yet, Maya communities have an array of resilience practices which can be leveraged to withstand the climate crisis. Michael will work with the NGOs Voces y Manos and Fundación Nueva Esperanza to co-design a climate change resilience project in the dry corridor, rooted in the Indigenous philosophy of Buen Vivir (living well). Integrating the rights of nature with human rights, this philosophy offers an important corrective to the Euro-western tendency to treat nature as disposable, and may help point the way toward a more sustainable, equitable future.
Naomi Spoelman
JD, School of Law, UC Berkeley
EarthRights International
Naomi will work at EarthRights International, a non-profit law firm based in Washington D.C. whose work lies at the intersection of human and environmental rights. She will be conducting legal research and writing and developing litigation strategies in support of ongoing cases. Her work will strengthen legal arguments on behalf of communities and human rights defenders impacted by climate change and corporate abuse of power.
Samanta Anriquez
DrPH, Public Health, UC Berkeley
Amnesty International Chile
Samanta will be working with Amnesty International Chile, researching and advocating for the reparation process for victims of human rights violations by the Chilean police during the social outbreak that began in October 2019.
Sara Osman
JD, School of Law, UC Berkeley
Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota
Sara will be working with the Immigrant Law Center of Minnesota to help provide critical legal support and representation to Somali individuals in ICE custody. As part of her legal internship, Sara will also conduct research and circulate surveys regarding detention conditions for Somali detainees in ICE detention centers in Minnesota. The objective of the project is to examine what issues currently exist, potential avenues for redress for any human rights violations and to eventually share the data with lawmakers in order to push for policy changes.
Sarah Abdelrahman
MPH, School of Public Health, UC Berkeley
Assistance Coordination Unit, northern Syria
Sarah will work with Assistance Coordination Unit (ACU) in determining the effect of current WASH services on waterborne diseases during conflict in northern Syria. The goal for this project is to analyze data collected by ACU on surveillance findings of waterborne diseases such as acute diarrheal disease and data on WASH activities such as chlorination. She will also have the opportunity to interview ACU WASH officers who are in charge of monitoring the WASH services in the field to determine potential gaps that cannot be addressed using the data.
Tiana Cherbosque
JD, School of Law, UCLA
Los Angeles Center for Law and Justice
Tiana will work at the Los Angeles Center for Law and Justice at the intersection of migration, gender-based violence, and human trafficking. Her work will support the diverse legal needs of immigrant survivors of human trafficking in Los Angeles and will include conducting legal research, drafting client declarations, preparing USCIS applications, as well as assisting with crime victims' rights, lost wages, and vacatur relief.
Tiffany Taylor
Ph.D., Anthropology, UC Berkeley
Visual Anthropology and Educational Inequity in Mississippi
Tiffany will work with the U.S. Department of Education to create a visual ethnography on educational inequality in Mississippi. She will also conduct ethnographic fieldwork and explore the social and cultural dynamics of relevant social justice initiatives. This project includes a mixed-methods analysis on youth with learning disabilities within the school-prison nexus, in addition to interviews with public policy officials.