Lauryn Wang

She is the change

Third-year student Lauryn Wang earns 2023 Newman Civic Fellowship

Lauryn Wang

Courtesy of Lauryn Wang


Jonathan Riggs | April 28, 2023

It can be challenging to stand out as an individual at such a large school as UCLA, but third-year student Lauryn Wang — who is majoring in history with a double minor in Asian American studies and community engagement and social change — found a way.

College campuses can nominate only one outstanding student for Campus Compact’s Newman Civic Fellowship. Not only did Chancellor Gene Block nominate Wang, but she captured the honor.

“Lauryn has continuously linked her passion for social justice to her academic studies to seek real solutions to major issues,” said Chancellor Block. “She is a true embodiment of the public service aspect of our university’s mission.”

“I feel very honored to have even been nominated, and fortunate to have discovered the UCLA Center for Community Engagement, which has given me such support,” said Wang. “I believe more strongly than ever how important it is to translate what we learn in the classroom to the community.”

Recognizing students with exemplary commitment to creating positive local and global change, the Newman Civic Fellowship offers this year’s 154 student leaders from across the U.S. and Mexico a year-long training and networking program. Emphasizing personal, professional and civic growth, it will also provide pathways to apply for exclusive scholarship and postgrad opportunities.

In her campus work, Wang, a Helen S. and Alexander W. Astin Community Engaged Scholar, has focused deeply on issues of labor and decarceration. During a research project through the CCE, she studied the phenomenon of “double punishment,” when formerly incarcerated people, upon release, are transferred to U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement, held in detention centers and/or deported.

During her Newman Civic Fellowship, Wang hopes to become more involved in the VISION Act campaign that is lobbying for the passage of AB 937 in the California legislatures, which would address the complexities of double punishment. She is also planning to attend law school after graduation.

“Taking a class called ‘Asian Americans and Law’ last quarter was incredibly inspiring and

thought-provoking,” she said. “I have many overlapping interests that I am excited to explore in the field, such as providing legal services within the Asian American community at the intersection of the criminal justice and immigration systems.”

Although she entered UCLA thinking she had her entire academic career planned out as a strict history major, Wang was happy to broaden her horizons through her work with the CCE, as a sports reporter turned editor for the Daily Bruin and in her Asian American studies coursework.

“While I may not have changed my major, I changed my mind. Community engagement and social change and Asian American studies became my minors but shaped my aspirations in a major way,” she said. “Ultimately, these collective experiences in the past few years have challenged me to reimagine the future I want to be a part of.”

As she looks ahead to graduation, Wang is also proud to carry on a family tradition. Both of her parents are also Bruin alumni — she even attended her first UCLA basketball game at the age of six months.

“Growing up, I saw UCLA as a beacon and as an end goal. Once I came to campus as a student myself and joined the Center for Community Engagement, I began to reframe my perspective,” Wang said. “My coursework and involvements in the community engagement and social change minor have equipped me with a different lens to view academia, research and scholarship: one of reciprocity, relationship-building, accountability and community-based practices.

“Ultimately, UCLA has taught me the importance of the saying, ‘lift as we climb,’” she concludes. “Being a member of such a vibrant and enriching community has been such a privilege, and I am so grateful.”


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