Muir Award Recipients

Mayra Lua Reyes

Class of 2024
2024 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award
2024 Democracy Camp in DC

Mayra Lua Reyes (she/her)

Mayra Lua Reyes ('24) is a first-generation student earning a double major in Political Science and Legal Studies and a minor in Public Policy. She was born and raised in the Central Valley (Merced, CA) and is the daughter of Mexican immigrant parents.

Mayra’s lived experiences and the knowledge she has gained at UC Berkeley have shaped her career aspirations and her interests in public service. For Mayra, public service means creating opportunities and pathways to break generational barriers and increase access to economic mobility. This includes...

Nicole Mendoza

Class of 2020
2020 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient

Nicole Mendoza is a Los Angeles native graduating in May 2020 with a major in Political Science and a minor in Public Policy. She is passionate about advocating for progressive policies to advance gender and racial equity. In her free time, she enjoys biking, baking, and listening to music.

During her time at Cal, she led a new advocacy program at the YWCA Berkeley/Oakland, teaching students about grassroots organizing and lobbying. The team conducted original research on Berkeley housing and presented new data to city legislators to promote more affordable housing and protections...

Mahshad Badii

Class of 2020
2020 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient

Mahshad Badii (’20) is a Bay Area native pursuing a double major in Political Science and Near Eastern Studies. She is a two-year Phi Beta Kappa member, a Cal-in-Sacramento alumna, and a 2020 FLAS Scholar in Arabic. She is passionate about U.S. foreign policy in the Middle East and North Africa, atrocity prevention, and international human rights law.

On campus, Mahshad has served as President, External Vice President, and Financial Vice President of Delta Phi Epsilon, Berkeley’s premier professional foreign service fraternity. During her tenure, she led a chapter of 80...

Madhumitha (Madhu) Krishnan

Class of 2021
2021 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient

Madhumitha (Madhu) Krishnan, a native of the East Bay, studied Political Science and History at UC Berkeley with a focus on comparative politics and the history of law and government. Madhu wrote her History senior honors thesis on the Madras Torture Commissioner’s Report and the origins of colonial policing in South Asia.

Madhu has extensive research experience, working with professors in the Political Science Department, the Center for Politics and Development, the Center for Gender and Refugee Studies at the UC Hastings School of Law, and most recently with the Indian Police...

Megan Cistulli

Class of 2022
2022 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient

Megan Cistulli graduated with highest distinction and earned a B.A. in Political Science with a specialization in international relations and American politics while minoring in human rights.

Working as a Civil Rights Research Fellow at the Berkeley Center on Comparative Equality and Anti-Discrimination Law (BCCE), Megan has led and participated in numerous research and fellowship projects including:

Amicus brief for the Harvard/UNC affirmative action case; Maintained BCCE global membership and partnership network of over 825 activists, advocates, and academics; Islamophobia...

Yasmin Ebrat

Class of 2022
2022 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient

Yasmine Ebrat is a native of the East Bay, pursuing a degree in Political Science, with a focus in International Relations. She is a recipient of the Cal Leadership Award, the Afghan American Community Award, and is a Cal in the Capital alumna. Yasmine is passionate about immigration rights and reform as well as providing marginalized communities with the necessary resources for success and provision of fair representation at the state and national levels.

Yasmine has extensive research experience, working with professors in the UC Berkeley Department of History...

Hunayn Anwar

Class of 2023
2023 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award

Hunayn Anwar was born and raised in Southeastern Minnesota. She is double majoring in Political Science, with an emphasis in Comparative Politics, and Arabic.

At Cal, she has been heavily involved in leading faith-based and cultural organizations. She served as president of the Association for Muslim Professional Development (AMPD). In this role, she organized workshops to help Muslim students learn skills such as resume writing, interview performance, and personal finance management. She also created mentorship and cohort programs that...

Mansour Taleb-Ahmed

Class of 2024
2024 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award
2024 Democracy Camp in DC

Mansour Taleb-Ahmed (he/him)

Mansour’s journey began in a high school where whispers of "far-fetched" threatened his Berkeley dream. Extraordinary challenges marked his undergraduate journey. Arriving in the US in January 2020, he faced the pandemic in absolute isolation, knowing no one in the country and having no access to see his family back home. In community college, he also questioned his place in academia as he didn’t see many people who looked like him in his classes. Yet, fueled by a desire for representation, he turned his ambition into action; as a Campus Ambassador and...

Sammy Raucher

Class of 2023
2023 John Gardner Fellowship
2023 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award

Sammy Raucher, a Los Angeles native, is passionate about LGBTQ+ rights law and policy, as well as the intersections between social issues and data technologies. At UC Berkeley, she majored in political science and minored in data science. She hopes to devote her leadership and sociotechnical skills to a career defending and expanding civil rights for marginalized communities, especially the LGBTQ+ community, in her home state of California and the greater United States. She is also a member of Phi Beta Kappa ...

Daniel A. Tuchler

2014 William K. (Sandy) Muir, Jr. Leadership Award Recipient

Daniel Tuchler graduated Magna Cum Laude with High Honors in May, 2014, with plans on pursuing work as a political consultant. At Cal he served in several campus leadership positions including President of the Cal Berkeley Democrats. He was also on the Strategic Planning Committee of the Public Service Center. Daniel worked for several Bay Area political consulting firms and on various candidate and issue political races, including leading a voter contact effort in Nevada during the 2012 presidential election cycle. He spent one summer working for the US...