Who We Are

Our Team

David N. Myers

Director of BKI; Faculty Director, Dialogue Across Difference Initiative

David N. Myers is the director of the Bedari Kindness Institute, the Initiative to Study Hate, and the Dialogue Across Difference Initiative. He is a Distinguished Professor of History and holds the Sady and Ludwig Kahn Chair in Jewish History in the UCLA History Department. He is also the founding director of the UCLA Luskin Center for History and Policy.

Maia Ferdman

Staff Director, Dialogue Across Difference Initiative and Deputy Director, Bedari Kindness Institute

Maia Ferdman is the deputy director of the Bedari Kindness Institute. Maia is a dedicated bridge builder and educator. She is the founder and principal of Bridges Intergroup Relations Consulting, which supports organizations and communities to build vibrant spaces of belonging. Throughout her career Maia has developed numerous interfaith programs, trained government and nonprofit groups in cultural competency, and facilitated conversations across differences about policing, homelessness, racial equity, and more. She holds a B.A. in Global Studies and an M.A. in Latin American Studies from UCLA.

Amalia Mora

Research Manager, Initiative to Study Hate

Amalia C. Mora is the Research Manager for the Initiative to Study Hate, which is housed in the UCLA Bedari Kindness Institute. She is an ethnomusicologist, writer, and performing artist whose doctoral research examined the relationship between sexual violence and narratives about lower-caste dancers in India. In addition to her position at UCLA, she is a lecturer in the online Human Rights Practice Program and an affiliated faculty member for the Applied Intercultural Arts Research Program at the University of Arizona, where she helped to establish a new master’s certificate program as well as the UA Consortium on Gender-Based Violence. Amalia received her PhD from the UCLA Herb Albert School of Music, department of Ethnomusicology.

Felicia Graham

Graduate Fellow, Dialogue Across Difference Initiative

Felicia is a sixth year PhD candidate in UCLA’s Graduate School of Education in the division of Social Science and Comparative Education. Her research and teaching focus on youth civic engagement, Global Studies, and Indigenous/Decolonizing pedagogies and epistemologies of the Americas. Guided by chicana feminist theory, her current research engages youth in a political and economic critique of contemporary digital media to become advocates for culturally, historically, and politically responsive education based on human dignity, earthly respect, and rooted in the practice of love. She is a Graduate Fellow for the Dialogue across Difference Initiative at the UCLA Bedari Kindness Institute. Felicia received her Master’s in Global and International Studies, Political Economy and Sustainable Development from UCSB, and her BA in Political Science and History from UCSD.

Maria Patlan

BKI Fund & Payroll Manager

Maria Patlan is the fund and payroll manager at the Bedari Kindness Institute. She comes to the institute from the UCLA College Division of Social Sciences, where she spent a year working as the Divisional Payroll Intern. She received a B.S. in Anthropology with a minor in French from UCLA.

Our Interns

Alyssa Carmona

Alyssa Carmona is a fourth year Political Science major and pre law student. She also serves as a Bruin Guardian Scholars Academy Youth Coach and was an inaugural student fellow in the Dialogue across Difference Student Leadership Program.

Stephany Cartney

Stephany Cartney is a fourth year Political Science Major, and History Minor, Stephany currently serves students as a Resident Assistant and an intern on UCLA Residential Life First Year Experience Team. She was an inaugural student fellow in the Dialogue across Difference Student Leadership Program.

Celie Fischer

Cecelia (Celie) Fischer is a fourth year double major in history and Arabic and the current co-president of J Street U at UCLA. She studies Jewish history with a special interest in the philosophy of religious pluralism.

Regina Lee

Regina Lee is a fourth year Public Affairs and Economics student at UCLA. Originally from New York City, Regina began her advocacy career as a community organizer in environmental justice organizations, such as TREEage and Sunrise Movement NYC, and mutual aid organizer for community fridges across the city.

Angel Flores Martinez

Angel Flores Martinez is majoring in Education and Social Transformation with a minor in Community Engagement and Social Change. He is passionate about educational equity and has supported students across K-12, undergraduate, and graduate levels. Angel has guided middle school students in their social-emotional development, advised high school students through the college access process, and mentored undergraduates through both peer mentorship and his work as a New Student Advisor. He has also supported graduate students in navigating campus resources and academic success. Across each role, Angel leads with care, patience, and cultural humility, and he believes that dialogue is essential to building trust and supportive learning environments. He is committed to uplifting community stories, expanding access to education, and ensuring that students feel seen and valued. Angel plans to pursue a career in high school counseling, where he hopes to continue creating pathways that allow students to grow, pursue their goals, and thrive.

Hannah Park

Hannah Park is a second-year English major on the pre-med track, minoring in Creative Writing. She aspires to specialize in child and adolescent psychiatry after her undergraduate studies. Her research interests currently include increasing access to mental health care and promoting kindness in medical practice, as well as exploring the role of AI in therapy and other healthcare settings. As a UCLA Learning Assistant for biological mathematics and a volunteer in an international music program that provides musical therapy for seniors with neurodegenerative diseases, Hannah actively hones her skills of dialogue, active listening, and empathy in the community. At the Bedari Kindness Institute, Hannah is dedicated to fostering interfaith dialogue as well as covering events and telling stories as a trained journalist, photographer, and illustrator.

Martin Pierro

Martin is a fourth year Education and Anthropology student interested in applying qualitative research methods

Aaden Poyuzina

Aaden Poyuzina is a third-year undergraduate at UCLA double majoring in Political Science and Public Affairs. He is dedicated to fostering understanding and connection through open, honest dialogue. As Founder and President of the Common Ground Collective, Aaden leads a student-run organization that promotes dialogue facilitation across campus.

He has completed over 10 weeks of dialogue training and has since led an 8-week Israel-Palestine dialogue program, co-instructed a 4-unit dialogue course at UCLA, and organized a student-faculty dinner with university leadership, including the Chancellor. Aaden also expanded Anderson’s ECHO dialogue program to undergraduates to strengthen inclusive communication skills across disciplines. He is currently developing an Interfaith Dialogue program that unites students through common purpose, community service, and thoughtful conversation.

Shreya Sundar

Shreya Sundar is a fourth-year undergraduate student studying public health at UCLA with strong interests in health policy and management. Her passions lie in exploring substance use and behavioral health across the life course and examining preadolescence and adolescence as critical transition periods and formative for behavioral patterns and life outcomes. She developed an interest in dialogue facilitation through personal experiences struggling to effectively communicate with others and after seeing how campus climate transformed after October 7th, 2023 and recognizing the power of health communication to fuel progress. As a certified dialogue facilitator, she is keen on utilizing her training to create dialogue spaces that support overall wellbeing and community healing at UCLA and beyond. In the future, she hopes to pursue a masters in public health and attend medical school.

Cylin Wang

Immigrant, conversationalist, and 5th year undergraduate student at UCLA, Cylin enjoys studying both Materials Engineering and Art History. She became interested in Dialogue across Difference not only as a place to bridge political divides and learn soft skills not taught elsewhere on campus, but most importantly to bring together students from across disciplines and studies. Despite the academic rigor of a dual-degree, she finds that the most important lessons she’s learned at UCLA comes from speaking and connecting with other people.