A University of California Board of Regents’ special committee has nominated Devon Graves, a doctoral student at UCLA, to be the 2018-19 student regent and in a separate process, UCLA undergraduate Rafael “Rafi” Sands has been appointed to the new position of student advisor to the regents for 2017-18, it was announced today (July 3).
Credit: Courtesy photo
The full Board of Regents will vote on the recommendation to appoint Graves as student regent at its July meeting. If approved, Graves will become the 44th student regent since the position was established in 1975. He will then serve as the student regent-designate for the coming year, able to participate in all deliberations. He will have voting privileges when his one-year term begins in July 2018.
Graves is a doctoral student in the Graduate School of Education and Information Studies at UCLA. He serves on the California Student Aid Commission and has served as chair of the board of directors for the California State Student Association.
“As a first-generation college student and a higher education researcher, my passion for wanting to serve comes from my belief in the transformative power that higher education can have for Californians in an increasingly dynamic and competitive world,” Graves said. “I look forward to being an advocate on behalf of the 265,000 students of the University of California."
The student regent for 2017-18 is Paul Monge, a law student at UC Berkeley.
Credit: Courtesy photo
To supplement the perspective provided by the student regent, Sands was selected to serve as the first-ever regents’ student advisor, a non-voting position that the board approved last year to provide more comprehensive input from students on university issues. Like the UC staff advisor position, the student advisor may attend open sessions of the board and its committees, and may also serve in an advisory capacity on committees.
Sands is a third-year undergraduate studying business economics and political science at UCLA. He previously served as external vice president of the UCLA Undergraduate Students Association and worked for the Office of the UC Student Regent and the Daily Bruin, UCLA’s student-run newspaper.
“My mission as a member of the Board of Regents will be to unite students with faculty, staff, alumni and other members of the UC community in pursuit of shared advocacy,” Sands said. “Only together can we take on some of the most important issues facing UC today.”
This year, 42 students from all 10 UC campuses applied for the student regent or student advisor positions. In accordance with Regents policy, the committee interviewed three finalists for student regent after the UC Student Association interviewed 10 semifinalists.