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Evelyn Valdez Ward

Evelyn Valdez Ward

Evelyn is an undocumented, Latina, scientist and PhD student at the University of California, Irvine. As a Ford Fellow, she studies the impact of California’s drought on the interactions between plants and their soil microbes. In addition to research, she’s extremely passionate about advocating for undocumented students in STEM. She published her story “”I’m an undocumented scientist fighting for my Dream”” in Science, and was invited to speak at the March for Science rally in DC to advocate for Dreamers in STEM. She has been awarded UCI’s Dynamic Womxn’s Award for Outstanding Social Justice Activist, and the Svetlana Bersahdsky Graduate Student Award for her lobbying and advocacy efforts. Currently, she serves as UCI’s Associated Graduate Student Campus Climate Director, a Dreamer Scholar in Residence, and UCI’s SACNAS founding President. She plans to continue lobbying and fighting for her undocumented community after graduating, and continue advocating for both womxn and minorities in STEM.”