‘Real Heart Work'

Sandra Campero recalls the first time she was invited to speak to participants in UC Irvine’s SAGE program. A first-generation college graduate who grew up in South L.A., she overcame barriers – juggling multiple jobs with classes, failing some courses – to become a seasoned university advancement professional.

In 2014, UC Irvine recruited Campero to become its assistant vice chancellor for advancement operations. Soon after that, she was asked to address members of the Student Achievement Guided by Experience program. SAGE provides leadership training, career exploration, scholarship opportunities and help getting into graduate school to third- and fourth-year undergraduates who have significant financial needs.

“I told the students, ‘You see me now as an assistant vice chancellor, but years ago, I was right where you are. My path wasn’t linear, it was messy,’” she recalls. Campero’s connection to SAGE didn’t end when she left UC Irvine in 2022. Inspired by the program’s transformative impact, she has remained a dedicated supporter – contributing her time and resources to help future scholars thrive.

The only program of its kind in the University of California system, SAGE has flourished due to strong support from donors and corporate partners such as Nihon Kohden, BMO, Parker Aerospace and Edwards Lifesciences. (UC Berkeley also had a program but it ended in 2018.) UC Irvine’s SAGE program is going  strong, wrapping up its 25th year. Roughly two-thirds of SAGE’s funding comes from corporate and foundation partners, with the remaining third from individual donors – all helping to underwrite the leadership training, scholarships and career bridges that drive SAGE’s results.

Alums of SAGE credit the program with altering their educational and career trajectories. SAGE Scholar Jacqueline Rodriguez shared the stage with President Barack Obama as a speaker at UC Irvine’s special commencement at Angel Stadium in 2014 and is now director of strategic communications at FGS Global, a business consulting firm, working out of its Washington, D.C., office. Terica Kindred, among the original cohort of nine, runs a successful real estate investment and development company in Los Angeles. Joe Bui, a member of the second cohort, was a White House fellow during the George W. Bush administration and now is a managing director at Bank of America. (See profiles of four other SAGE alums on the following pages.)

Ninety percent of the program’s participants are first-generation college students and nearly 700 students have graduated. Of the 80 in the most recent class, 23 percent are going to graduate school and the rest are entering the workforce. Eight SAGE Scholars have received coveted Fulbright scholarships.

“I’m thrilled the program has continued to thrive,” says Karina Hamilton, a former corporate attorney and co-founder of Sage Hill (no relation to SAGE) High School in Newport Coast who was tasked by Juan Francisco Lara, then director of the UC Irvine Center for Educational Partnerships (and a board member of Sage Hill), to design and build SAGE. She joined UC Irvine to launch the program and left the university in 2019.

“This program is a point of pride for all of us at UCI,” says Neda Moayedi, who has directed the program for the last seven years. Sitting in on a SAGE workshop while an undergraduate at UC Irvine inspired her to go to graduate school, where she earned a master’s degree in leadership studies with an emphasis on higher education leadership.

SAGE is open to students from all majors who go through a competitive process to be accepted. They need to have a GPA of at least 3.0 and qualify for a significant level of financial aid. They submit a résumé and an essay and undergo a group interview before final selection.

Campero says her volunteer mentoring often comes down to listening to SAGE participants, being present when students need to cry, vent or simply be heard. “College is a heavy lift when you’re figuring it out alone,” she says. “Parents can care deeply, but if they haven’t been through it, they can only do so much.”

Ninety percent of the program’s participants are first-generation college students and nearly 700 students have graduated. Of the 80 in the most recent class, 23 percent are going to graduate school and the rest are entering the workforce. Eight SAGE Scholars have received coveted Fulbright scholarships.

“The students I mentored were often afraid to admit how overwhelmed they felt,” Campero adds. “There was so much pressure, and they carried it silently. My job was to connect with them through vulnerability to say, ‘I’ve failed, I’ve felt shame, and it’s OK to restart.’ That’s the real heart work”

Moayedi, Hamilton and Campero note that the SAGE program has continued to evolve and grow over the years to meet the changing needs of students. For example, a winter boot camp series was added three years ago and a workshop on leveraging AI in job searches was added just last year.

SAGE alum David Tong-Nguyen says the program benefits all involved. “The experience is fully immersive for both students and teachers,” he says.

Hamilton notes that Chancellor Howard Gillman, a first-generation university student himself, has been an ardent supporter of the program and the students.

“He often talks about the success of this public-private partnership with local corporations that strengthens our entire community,” she says. “I know the program will continue to thrive long into the future.”

Kristal Bastedo is a former foster youth from Los Angeles County who spent two stints in the system between the ages of 8 and 18 and who, along the way, had some brushes with the law.

Now she’s lead care coordinator at the Orangewood Foundation’s Young Adult Court, which offers support to young men who are charged with a felony in Orange County. On the weekends, Bastedo works with children at a mental health crisis shelter.

“One mistake or impulsive decision doesn’t have to define your future,” she says. “With the right support, young people can turn those moments into opportunities for growth and resilience.”

After graduating from high school, Bastedo made a critical decision: “I would say I have a good sense of self-awareness. I looked at my peers and thought, ‘I can continue this lifestyle or get out of the cycle.’’’

While Bastedo was working two jobs, her landlord offered her cheap rent if she went to college. She enrolled at Fullerton College and graduated in 2020 with associate degrees in administration of justice and interdisciplinary studies, with an emphasis in social behavior and self-development. Her landlord encouraged her to enroll at UC Irvine.

That fall, she started at UC Irvine on a full scholarship. The COVID-19 pandemic made things difficult with remote learning, but she still found a community through SAGE after hearing about it while working as a mentor in the Foster Youth Resilience in Education program.

“Growing up,” Bastedo says, “I was always just surviving and not thriving. When I joined SAGE, it was a real community that embraced me.”

SAGE, she says, prepared her for the workforce through professional development courses, résumé building workshops, and sessions on interpersonal and social skills and financial literacy.

“One mistake or impulsive decision doesn’t have to define your future. With the right support, young people can turn those moments into opportunities for growth and resilience.” 

“SAGE helped me to be OK feeling uncomfortable,” Bastedo recalls. “I applied for many internships that were out of my skill set but didn’t get any. I learned to handle these failures. SAGE helped me see that is part of moving forward.”

Bastedo landed a job at the Orangewood Foundation while still in SAGE and hasn’t looked back. She keeps in touch with SAGE leaders such as director Neda Moayedi and her assistant, Cecilia Leyva, and attended the program’s 25th anniversary party last November.

“When I think of SAGE,” Bastedo says, “I also think of the motivation it provides to students like me who don’t have a lot of it. And I learned to challenge myself and know that I had a community of people on campus to support me.”

O.C. native David Tong-Nguyen, a graduate of Cypress High School, says his immigrant parents preached the value of a college education, but SAGE taught him the ropes. He says the program’s founding executive director, Karina Hamilton, was instrumental in inspiring him to follow his true passion: teaching.

Urged by his parents to pursue a career in math or sciences, Tong-Nguyen thought he would become a

software engineer. But an internship at a tech company during his undergraduate years just didn’t click with him.

“It wasn’t something that made me wake up and get excited to do,” Tong-Nguyen recalls. Hamilton told him: “Try one summer doing what you want to do.” So he did – and he loved it.

Tong-Nguyen received a campus Community Teaching Fellowship in math and science and worked closely with local high school teachers. He spent his undergraduate summers with different education programs, including the California State Summer School for Mathematics and Science and the UC Irvine Gifted Students Academy. He also was employed at UC Irvine’s Center for Educational Partnerships.

“One of the biggest things I learned was that it doesn’t matter if the experience was hard, easy, challenging – every single experience allowed me and other SAGE alums to become who we are today.” 

After Tong-Nguyen earned his teaching credential from UC Irvine in 2008, he spent a year as an instructor at a public high school before joining the Tiger Woods Foundation (renamed the TGR Foundation in 2018), where he taught kids in the TGR Learning Lab. For the last five years, he’s been a math teacher at Valencia High School in Placentia. Two years ago, Tong-Nguyen obtained a master’s degree in educational technology from Cal State Fullerton.

He wasn’t the first SAGE alum in his family. Tong- Nguyen’s brother, Jason Tong ’02 (informatics and computer science), is a dentist practicing in Nevada. He had been a SAGE Scholar and urged his younger brother to follow in his footsteps.

Tong-Nguyen says that in addition to inspiring him to pursue teaching, SAGE taught him how to conduct himself in business meetings and about professionalism and other skills necessary to be successful.

“One of the biggest things I learned was that it doesn’t matter if the experience was hard, easy, challenging – every single experience allowed me and other SAGE alums to become who we are today,” he says.

The married father of two tries to attend yearly SAGE alumni gatherings, saying: “It’s an amazing network of talented individuals who continue to work hard to reach their goals and grow the companies they work with.”

For James Edward Grant Jr., it was the small things that stood out for him as a SAGE Scholar.

The late Juan Francisco Lara, who as founding director of UC Irvine’s Center for Educational Partnerships oversaw the launch of SAGE in 1999, always reminded Grant to put his name tag on the right side of his chest at networking events. “That way,” he explains, “when I leaned in for a handshake, the other person could easily see and read my name.”

A small thing, maybe, but SAGE turned out to be a big deal for Grant.

“I would have dropped out of UCI and left early had it not been for this program,” he declares. Founding Executive Director Karina Hamilton provided Grant the academic and moral support to push through, he says: “She was a major piece of my SAGE Scholar journey.”

Growing up in Compton and Long Beach, Grant attended the California Academy of Mathematics and Science in Carson. He was accepted into Cal State Long Beach and UC Irvine but decided to become an Anteater because of a financial aid package – making him the first in his family to attend college.

Starting out at UC Irvine as a mechanical engineering student, Grant switched his major to anthropology. He and his best friend were encouraged by another friend to apply to SAGE. Grant also interned for three years with nonprofits all over California.

“I would have dropped out of UCI and left early had it not been for this program.” 

Today he’s an electrician, writer, speaker and creative producer. As a 10-year union electrician, Grant spends a lot of time these days working underground on the L.A. Metro. Above ground, he tackles themes of identity, culture and community through storytelling on his podcast “OK, Bet!,” hosting conversations that challenge norms and uplift marginalized voices.

Earlier this year, Grant self-published a book, Bad Soil: So How Do You Show Up?, which explores “how the system around us shapes our lives,” he says, and details how there’s a better way to live beyond the status quo. “It’s basically a blend of self-help and entry-level business lessons,” Grant explains.

As for lessons from SAGE, it’s simple, he says: “I wouldn’t be where I am today without it.”

Laura Beck was 27 and the single mother of a 9-year-old girl when she decided to go back to school. Ownership changes at her job as a towboat dispatcher and member service representative halved her solid salary. That and her daughter finally being old enough to need less supervision sealed her decision.

“I chose UCI because it has a really good engineering program, and it was still close to home so I wouldn’t have to change my daughter’s school,” she says.

Growing up in Downey, Beck always wanted to become a commercial pilot. She studied aviation at Cypress College and planned to join the U.S. Air Force. However, having her daughter changed that dream and, as she says, “I had to figure out a new one.”

Beck chose chemical engineering as her major after her research showed that job applicants only needed to have a bachelor’s degree and that new graduates earned good money. “I ended up really liking it,” says Beck, who minored in materials science engineering.

She was accepted into SAGE in 2013. “It was the best thing I did while at UCI other than get a degree,” she says. “Since I was older and a student-parent, it was the first place where I felt like I fit in. SAGE was full of other non­traditional students.”

Beck quickly made friends, joined the board for the SAGE Club and became close with the advisors. “They all helped me in so many ways,” she says. “SAGE gave me confidence, helped me be better prepared for job hunting and interviewing, and ultimately helped me land my first job after I graduated.”

“SAGE gave me confidence, helped me be better prepared for job hunting and interviewing, and ultimately helped me land my first job after I graduated.” 

Now a launch systems integration engineer at Northrop Grumman, Beck previously served as a principal systems engineer in contamination control.

She gives back to SAGE by making donations, attending networking events and mentoring current SAGE students.

Her daughter recently returned from a UC Global Summer Internship in South Africa and will be starting her senior year at UC Santa Cruz, focusing on psychology and legal studies. While UC Santa Cruz doesn’t have a SAGE program, Beck notes, SAGE still played a role in her daughter’s future: “All the time she spent with me at UCI definitely helped her make the decision to go to a UC after high school.”