Summer Fellowship

Minahil Khan received her Bachelor of Arts degree in Advocacy and Argumentation at the State University of New York at Buffalo. Minahil served as a William J. Clinton Fellow for Service in India where she worked on a women’s livelihood initiative at the Aga Khan Foundation’s Delhi office. She is currently earning her JD at the Georgetown University Law Center.

EJ Toppin is a Master of Public Policy Candidate at the University of California, Berkeley's Goldman School of Public Policy. As a Summer Fellow at the Haas Institute, he is engaged in efforts to address housing affordability and the issue of displacement in Richmond, California as well as Greater Detroit, Michigan's water contamination and infrastructure crisis. Prior to returning to school for graduate studies, EJ worked as a legislative aide on environment, agriculture, and energy issues in the United States Senate.

Derrick Duren is a senior transfer student at UC Berkeley completing a double major in Media and American Studies. Derrick has dedicated much of their extracurricular time to social justice education and advocacy through their experiences as Multi-Cultural Awareness Chair and as a curator for Multi, their inaugural art showcase for students of color at the University of California, Santa Barbara. Derrick currently serves as a Development Assistant & Honorary Student Committee member at the Berkeley Art Museum & Pacific Film Archive.

Daniel Russel Cheung is an incoming senior at UC Berkeley majoring in History. Outside of the fellowship, Daniel works to mitigate the effects of Proposition 209 on communities of color by serving as the External Director of the Bridges Multicultural Resource Center. Daniel also works with Asian and Pacific Islander students. He served as a Community Advocate in the Asian Pacific American Student Development Office and created and instructed a seminar on multiracial history in Berkeley's Asian American Studies Department.

Taliah Mirmalek is a community researcher-organizer from Oakland. She will conduct research and analysis supporting a multi-stakeholder collaborative aimed at increasing civic participation among those who have been excluded or disaffected, rather than simplistically focusing on the consistently politically active. For the past three years, she has been organizing as a researcher in the labor movement, most recently with UNITE HERE Local 2850.

Teofanny Saragi (they/them) is a recent graduate of Pomona College, where they studied Asian American Studies and Public Policy/Sociology. Teo’s commitment to social justice work is rooted in their experiences as a first-generation college student, being raised in a low-income, single-parent household, and coming from a lineage of indigenous Batak Indonesian people. This summer, Teo hopes to continue uplifting community voices as part of the Strategic Communications team. In their spare time, Teo loves to sing, read poetry, and search for yummy vegetarian foods.

Michael Xu is a J.D. candidate at the University of Michigan Law School. His research interests lie in the dynamics of othering and neoliberalism in the “post-civil rights” era, with a focus on the incomplete nature of democracy in our social order as well as environmental justice. Having received common law and civil law training in three languages, Michael most recently earned his LL.M.

Miranda Simes is an incoming junior at Columbia University studying sustainable development and sociology. In her studies, she continually questions the dynamics between natural, physical and social spaces and the different layers of geography when it comes to access and inclusion. Previously, Miranda has contributed to research analyzing how climate action plans in New York City and Los Angeles have addressed social equity. Miranda will be working this summer with the Equity Metrics Project to investigate spatial inequities and barriers to inclusivity.

Onisha Etkins is a Ph.D. student studying Population Health Sciences at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health. Broadly, Onisha is interested in exploring public health inequities as it relates to race and ethnicity. She is studying mental health in U.S. Caribbean immigrant communities and Black immigrant communities generally. Onisha's work is influenced by her own upbringing as a first generation Guyanese-American and growing up in a predominantly Caribbean immigrant community.

Evan Yoshimoto is a recent graduate from UC Berkeley with degrees in Environmental Economics & Policy, and Conservation & Resource Studies. Evan’s research interests include sustainable economics, political ecology, and environmental justice. As a member of the Students of Color Environmental Collective, Evan spent his undergraduate career organizing for a more equitable and justice-centered environmental movement. He currently serves as the Civil Rights Chair of the Japanese American Citizens League Berkeley Chapter.

Adiba Hasan is an international student and recent graduate of Augustana College where she earned a Bachelors of Arts in Political Science and Religion. During her time as an undergraduate student, she was the president of Augie International and co-founder of Búhos (English as Second Language program for the local community) on campus. As part of the organizations, Adiba contributed to increasing intercultural competency by organizing cultural events and raising awareness about the immigrant population that lack educational resources around campus.

Anetra Brown received her Bachelors of Science degree in Sociology with a concentration in race, ethnicity, and social change at the University of Oregon. For the last several years she’s worked in the nonprofit sector helping organizations develop and execute diversity, equity and inclusion initiatives and goals. Outside of her professional life, she has served as Education Chair for the NAACP Eugene/Springfield chapter and is currently on the board for the University of Oregon Black Alumni Network.