Sage Mentorship Project
UC Berkeley's Largest One-on-One Elementary School Mentoring Program
Executive Board
President
Alysha Jamieson
Hometown: Capitola, CA
Major: Molecular and Cell Biology
Sage Experience: 6 semesters!
Plans After College: Attend medical school
Favorite Sage Memory: Playing tag at John Muir with my mentee and all of her friends.
Fun Fact About You: I've spent my last three summers teaching and volunteering at an orphanage in Kenya, and my goal is to go back every year!
VP Membership
Isabelle Marsh
Hometown: Manhattan Beach, CA
Major: Psychology Major, Global Poverty Minor
Sage Experience:6 semesters!
Plans After College: To become a UI / UX designer building websites and apps to optimize user experience.
Favorite Sage Memory: First time I got to Sage, these 4 girls ran up to me, grabbed my hand, and told me they were going to make me look beautiful. I sat down as they all started braiding my hair until I had a mohawk of braids going every which way. I looked ridiculous the next hour, and couldn't be happier.
Outreach VP
Mounika Gopi
Hometown: Fresno, CA
Major: Molecular & Cell Biology
Sage Experience: 4 semesters!
Plans After College: Medical school!
Favorite Sage Memory: Reading comic books with my mentee and listening to him talk about his favorite superheroes!
Fun Fact About You: I broke my ankle tripping over a tennis ball!
VP Finance
Jesus Gonzalez
Hometown: South Gate, CA
Major: Intended Business Administration
Sage Experience: 4 semesters!
Favorite Sage Memory: A couple of months into my mentoring experience, I was forced to miss one week of mentoring due to my midterms conflicting with my schedule. Once I went back, I was surrounded by my students asking me about why I did not show up, and how excited they were that I returned. It made me happy to see how greatly I had impacted their lives in a positive way in such a short amount of time.
Fun Fact About You: I am currently learning Japanese and plan to learn another language while at Berkeley!
VP
Ilaria Stewart
Hometown: Pacific Palisades, CA
Major: MCB: Neurobiology Minor: Political Economy
Sage Experience: 6 semesters!
Favorite Sage Memory: When my mentee told me she wanted to be a chemist!
Fun Fact About You: I look at mouse brains in my free time (it's for research I promise!)
Internal VP
Veronica Nguyen
Hometown: Dallas, TX
Major: Integrative Biology
Interests: Urban dance
Sage Experience: 2 years!
Plans After College: Gap year and medical school.
Favorite Sage Memory: When my mentee accidentally called me "mom" on multiple occasions.
Fun Fact About You: I can do a great duck impression.
VP Communications
Karina Gadkari
Hometown: Fremont, CA
Major: Environmental Science, Toxicology Minor
Sage Experience: 2 semesters
Plans After College: Medical School!
Favorite Sage Memory: During my first Zoom call with my mentee, she was so excited to see me and we spent three hours talking while she gave me a tour of her entire toy room.
Fun Fact About You: I'm a twin!
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DeCal Coordinator
Bryce Lennan
Hometown: San Diego
Major: History, Minor in Education
Sage Experience: 7 semesters!
Plans After College: I plan to attend graduate school to obtain a master's degree in education and a teaching credential in social sciences. After that, I want to be a high school teacher!
Favorite Sage Memory: Playing "catch" in the gym on a rainy day, even though the only ball my mentees and I had was in our imaginations. Surprisingly fun once you get into it!
Fun Fact About You: I can juggle!
School Directors
Schantell Williams
Acorn Woodland
Hometown: Stockton, CA
Major: Gender and Women's Studies and Disability Studies minor
Sage Experience: For 4 semesters
Interests: Running track and field at Cal
Plans After College: Attending medical school
Favorite Sage Memory: When my mentee came and hugged me for the first time in excitement, she was happy that I came back to be her mentor and had a heart to heart with me
Fun Fact About You: I love learning ASL
Nicole Ru
Jefferson
Hometown: Pittsburgh, PA
Major: Psychology, French minor
Sage Experience: 2 semesters!
Plans After College: Attend medical school (maybe take a gap year beforehand and work with Teach for America!)
Favorite Sage Memory:Listening to my mentees talk about their story ideas for a writing assignment; I love their creativity!
Fun Fact About You: Every year, I attempt to write a 50,000 word novel during November, also known as National Novel Writing Month (NaNoWriMo). I've done this for the past eight years, and I've been successful four times!
Sweta Parija
Emerson
Hometown: Sacramento, CA
Major: Public Health
Sage Experience: 3 semesters
Interests: cooking and baking!
Plans After College: Hopefully, med school
Favorite Sage Memory: Introducing my mentees to Harry Potter and seeing their growing excitement and love for it!
Fun Fact About You: I don't like ice cream
Caroline Kim
New Highland
Hometown: Weston, MA
Major: Legal Studies
Sage Experience: 4 semesters!
Plans After College: Law School or Medical School
Favorite Sage Memory: The first time I played soccer with my mentees and his friends. They kept saying they wanted a grown up to play, so I jumped in. All the kids were really quick and had footwork skills like Messi’s hahah. But even though they showed me up, I could not have been prouder to see them work together like that.
Fun Fact About You: I love open water swimming!
Ala Mahmoud
Sankofa
Hometown: Malibu, CA
Major: MCB emphasis in Developmental Genetics
Sage Experience: 3 Semesters
Plans After College: I hope to go to medical school and become a physician.
Favorite Sage Memory: Playing a big game of football during recess with a bunch of the students. I was the quarterback for both teams and towards the end of the game I threw a pass to my mentee and he caught it for the final touchdown and we celebrated together. After that he really opened up to me and mentoring him became even more enjoyable.
Fun Fact About You: I love the outdoors.
Darby Shore
Washington
Hometown: San Rafael, CA
Major: Cognitive Science
Sage Experience: Since Jan 2018
Plans After College: Work in the Bay Area for a bit and then go to grad school!
Favorite Sage Memory: For a while, my mentee was very closed-off to me and shy, but I remember the exact day when that changed. Zoe walked around that day with a huge grin telling every single one of her classmates that my name was Darby and that I was HER mentor.
Fun Fact About You: I have a desert tortoise named Bubbles who will likely outlive me!
Berkeley Arts Magnet
Melissa Gonzalez
Hometown: Calexico, CA
Major: Economics
Sage Experience: Since Fall 2019
Plans After College: I want to work in the business sector but my dream job is to work at a nonprofit.
Favorite Sage Memory:
I went to BAM with my three mentees, Indigo, Sara, and Maya, and they noticed I didn't have my hair done that day. They decided it would be fun to play beauty salon and they made me a flower crown out of the school's plants and grass. They were super excited that I was letting them play with my hair and their laughs were contagious. I was expecting a whole mess in my hair but they actually did a decent job. We had so much fun that day and I left my flower crown in my hair all day.
Fun Fact About You: I regressed to my One Direction phase during quarentine
John Muir
Henry Diamond-Pott
Hometown: San Diego, CA
Major: Molecular and Cellular Biology
Sage Experience:4 semesters!
Fun fact: I love visiting national parks!
Plans after college: I hope to attend medical school.
Favorite Sage memory: During my first semester mentoring I came back to the school after spring break and my mentee was so excited to see me. Even the other kids knew my name and wanted to play!
Oxford
Carolyn Hong
Hometown: Los Angeles, CA
Major: Chemistry
Sage Experience: 2 semesters!
Plans After College: Dedicated to sustainable energy.
Favorite Sage Memory: Watching my mentee, Alyssia perform in her school dance performance and seeing how proud and confident.
Fun Fact About You: I have an 8 year old brother!
Rosa Parks
Sean O'Neil
Hometown: Richmond, VA
Major: Environmental Science, Class of 2019
Sage Experience: Since Fall 2015
Plans After College: I will be a secondary school biology teacher in Richmond, CA, through Teach for America.
Favorite Sage Memory: My mentee's dad telling me he called me his best friend
Fun Fact About You: I can make balloon animals!
Sylvia Mendez
Winnie Cheng
Hometown: Apple Valley, CA
Major: Psychology, Legal Studies
Sage Experience: 1 semester!
Plans After College: Moving back to LA and going to grad school or teaching math
Favorite Sage Memory:
One time a girl asked me over Zoom if I wanted to see her blanket fort, and when she gave me the tour, her puppy was inside.
Fun Fact About You: I'm obsessed with bees!
Finance & Marketing Team
Jillian Hutchison
Finance Chair
Hometown: Dana Point, CA
Major: Political Economy
Sage Experience:5 semesters!
Favorite Sage Memory: Helping my mentee learn how to multiply and seeing the sincere joy on his face when he could finally do it!
Fun Fact About You: I am obsessed with coffee and drink it 3x day.
Sabrina Marvin
Hometown: Kauai, Hawaii
Major: Political Economy, Behavioral Economics, and Psychology
Sage Experience: 3 semesters!
Interests: Research, Running, and Cooking
Plans After College: Working in corporate finance or human resources in the US or abroad.
Favorite Sage Memory: Playing UNO with my mentees.
Fun Fact About You: I went to boarding school on the island of Hawaii.
Stephanie Ross
Hometown: Toronto, Canada
Major: Economics
Sage Experience: 4 semesters!
Interests: Traveling, watching food/cooking documentaries, and going to concerts
Plans After College: Travel and live abroad for a while
Favorite Sage Memory: My favorite sage memory was participating in a cooking class with my mentee at John Muir Elementary School.
Fun Fact About You: My first language was French.
Lauren Coffey
Hometown: Villanova, PA
Major: Economics
Sage Experience: 4 semesters!
Plans After College: Hopefully either law school or business school
Favorite Sage Memory: Hanging out with my first graders last semester!
Fun Fact About You: I love yoga but I still can’t touch my toes.
Founder
Alejandro Velez
With the realization that there was a great need for a mentorship program that grounded itself in forging powerful, long-lasting relationships with the youth in the greater Berkeley and Oakland community, Alejandro founded Sage in 2008. Alejandro began Sage with a vision of creating a program in which UC Berkeley mentors could be paired up with an elementary student and serve not only as teachers but also as friends and role models. To this day Alejandro is very close to his mentee, Cleveland.
Since his graduation, he has gone on to have a very successful career driven by the same entrepreneurial spirit to find ways to better the world around him. Alejandro now serves as the co-founder of Back to the Roots, an Oakland-based business that sells mushroom kits and AquaFarm fish tanks to retailers nationwide. Since co-founding BTTR, Alejandro has even been named as one of Inc.’s 30 Under 30, Poder's 2010 Influential Hispanics Under 40, Forbes’ 30 Under 30, CNN’s 10 Next Entrepreneur’s to Watch, and been recognized by President Obama!