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  1. UC San Diego Labor Center
  2. Our Work
  3. Labor Summer
  4. Meet the 2023 Labor Summer Fellows

Meet the Fellows

Our outstanding 2023 fellows came from all walks of life and many academic backgrounds. Through the Labor Summer Fellowship, they immersed themselves in the field of labor advocacy, gaining valuable hands-on experience helping workers to organize their workplaces.

In their own words:

  • Alice Koga

    Alice Koga

    I am a doctoral student in philosophy here at UCSD, with strong interests in issues of social justice, ethics, agency, feminist philosophy, and philosophy of race. After organizing for UC-wide strike in Fall of 2022, I became more keenly interested in issues of labor, especially in the academy. I am excited to be working this summer with Teamsters 2010 and to think through the ways organizing praxis and philosophical theory can interact and improve each other. My hope is that this experience with serve me well as both an academic and an activist, while also making a direct contribution to the labor movement in higher education. Solidarity forever.
  • Anita Sun

    Anita Sun

    Anita Sun is a sociology major and computational social science minor from Fremont, California and currently studying at UC San Diego. She is passionate about labor inequality and focuses her research on social platforms and media. She is excited to learn more about labor unions in practice and hopes to apply her experience with Labor Summer to future research.
  • Jessica Hernandez

    Jessica Hernandez

    I am very excited to be in the Labor Summer fellowship as I have become very passionate in working with my community over my several years in UC San Diego. I hope to learn organizing skills that help bring people of the community and workers together to build solitary and empower each other. I have been fortunate enough to have worked with my San Diego community through programs like Earthlab and conduct migrant research in MMFRP, in which I hope my skills of building rapport and empowering people can transition to this new exciting position. As a descendant of migrant parents, I have seen first hand how marginalized groups of people become underrepresented and hope to be one of the voices that can uphold their rights in our society.
  • Jonathan Chavez

    Jonathan Chavez

    I am a history and ethnic studies major at UCSD and I have been doing organizing and activist work or many years now. I have been a long time organizer for DSA-SD, an AFT labor intern, and currently an organizer with the Party For Socialism and Liberation and Students For Socialism at UCSD. I've done organizing work around tenant’s rights/tenant union organizing, anti-war/anti-imperialism, against police brutality, women's rights, and other related progressive causes. I signed up for Labor Summer because I believe in building power within the multi-racial, multi-ethnic working class and want to help grow my skills and expertise in organizing work. I want to broaden my horizons and professionally develop my organizing skills so I can better facilitate the work I already do in the community and in my future organizing work I plan to do.
  • Michael Kennedy

    Michael Kennedy

    I'm a 1st year Master of Public Policy student in the School of Global Policy and Strategy at UCSD, and I'll be working with AFGE this summer. I'm undergoing a bit of a career shift, to say the least. For the last 13 years, I've been a Registered Nurse. In fact, I've worked in the ICU at UCSD Medical Center since 2014.

    I first got involved with labor in my role as an RN at UCSD Health. I volunteered as a shop steward for our union CNA/NNU and eventually worked my way up to UCSD's chief nurse representative. In 2020, I was elected to represent San Diego and Imperial Counties in CNA/NNU's Nursing Practice Commission, working with our Government Relations team developing our legislative agenda. Last year I was selected by my peers to represent UCSD nurses at bargaining. I applied to the Labor Summer fellowship to branch out beyond the on-the-ground operations in the healthcare sector. I am excited for this opportunity to gain valuable policy experience in government relations with AFGE.
  • Oscar Guzman

    Oscar Guzman

    I am a history major and a local "Sandiegan" who really sees this community as a whole. My attention was brought towards this program seeing that I as an undergrad had the opportunity to help my local community. I hope to learn what the daily struggles are for service workers and what our community can do to support. I personally have worked several food service jobs and understand the struggle of long shifts with little pay and I strive to put my education to work so one day I can help those who are struggling. I believe this is an opportunity of a lifetime as an undergrad which I can take into experience after I leave UCSD.