This month’s guest on Face to Face With Chancellor May is a student who came to UC Davis to help refugees preserve their access to higher education — all while completing her own studies.
Dheera Dusanapudi is a junior studying international relations and religious studies, and works as the student lead for the Article 26 Backpack, a program that offers refugees face-to-face counseling and a cloud storage platform to preserve important records like transcripts and diplomas.
During the interview, Dheera shared her favorite class at UC Davis: RST 130, Islamic law (Sharia), Gender, and Religious Authority, giving a special shoutout to Professor Mairaj Syed. She loved that the small class size allowed her to hear her classmates’ opinions and feel connected to them over the course of the quarter.
She also pulled from her experiences in religious studies classes to ask Chancellor May what advice he would give to students who want to have discussions about important and weighty topics. Chancellor May’s response? Be empathetic and stay open-minded, and allow other perspectives to build what you think.
Watch the whole episode of Face to Face With Chancellor May, featuring Dheera Dusanapudi, below.