Viridiana Fernández a first-generation undergraduate student double majoring in Political Science & Chicanx/e/a Studies, and minoring in Poverty, Inequality, & Social Justice, at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where she is set to graduate in June 2022. As an Iranian Chicana from Los Angeles, Viridiana is passionate about advocacy and community organizing to call for the expansion and protection of immigrant and refugee rights. Growing up in El Sereno, a predominantly mixed status, Latine/x, working-class community in Northeast Los Angeles, her family experienced various hardships due to the various intersections of their identity. Seeing how political and societal discrimination affected her community, and adjacent communities made her passionate to work in the field of effecting change for our communities.

During her time at UC Santa Barbara, she has been a research assistant to Doctoral Candidate Roselia Mendez Murillo for her research on separated Latinx immigrant families who have undergone stepwise migration. Currently, she is conducting her own research, “The Dissection of the Myth of the American Dream: How Latinx Mixed Status Families are Deprived of Upward Mobility in Los Angeles” under the mentorship of Profesora San Juanita García in the Chicanx Studies Department Honors Program.

Viridiana has been involved with the Immigrant Legal Defense Center (ILDC) since her second year at UCSB, participating mostly as a “Know Your Rights” or “Conozca Sus Derechos” Program Promotorx, and also as a former youth committee member. Recently she worked under Cristina Awadalla’s guidance to help present “Know Your Rights” workshops through a collaboration with Comunidades Justas, for their “Equity and Access Without Borders” program. She is ecstatic to join the Global Latinidades Project and continue her involvement with ILDC in the upcoming summer to continue her work with local Latinx communities and is looking forward to getting involved in any way she can with upcoming projects. As a current UCLA Law Fellow, she hopes to attend law school in the future and pursue the advancement of immigrant and refugee rights post-graduation.