LLM Alumni Profile

Passing the bar exam and achieving personal bests, UC Davis LL.M. alumna Olga Krzyszton exemplifies that success is all about raising the bar. Originally from Nowy Sacz (near Krakow) Poland, Olga completed her first Master of Laws in Legal Practice at Birmingham City University in the United Kingdom, where she earned a sports scholarship for Olympic weightlifting.

LL.M class of 2018 Alumnus Faisal Alotaibi, now a lecturer in law at the University of Hafr Albatin in Saudi Arabia, gained a valuable global perspective during his time here at UC Davis School of Law that has proven useful in many aspects of both his career and life. He now uses and shares this perspective to help students connect legal principles to real-world practice.

My name is Andrew Timothy. I was born and raised in Jakarta, Indonesia.

What are your plans after graduation?

I’m planning to go back to Indonesia and work as a corporate lawyer. Especially in the field of business or maybe construction law.

Why did you choose to come to UC Davis School of Law?

Well, UC Davis School of Law is one of the best law schools here in the U.S. And it's part of the UC system.

What is it like attending school in Davis, California?

14 years after completing her LL.M. at UC Davis School of Law in 2011, we checked in with Shamay Zurayeva, an Azerbaijani attorney who currently sits as in-house Counsel at BP’s Baku office.

BP is a multinational energy company and the largest foreign investor in Azerbaijan, with most of the country's economy and GDP related to the oil and gas industry.

Rowena Evangeline, a 2025 LL.M. graduate from Malaysia, is already helping shape the future of legal technology as Legal Annotator for a San Francisco-based AI startup.

It was a colleague from Petrobras, one of Brazil’s major companies, who first introduced João Mateus Borges da Silveira (LL.M. ’14) to the UC Davis LL.M. program. João soon found himself traveling from Maranhão, Brazil, to Davis, California a decision that he still fondly looks back on, “When I see back in the past, I have a feeling of being such a lucky guy for being in a nice place, with so many nice and polite people.” 

Ilker Dogan’s career in banking and finance law has taken him from Istanbul to UC Davis School of Law and back, where he now plays a pivotal role in shaping Turkey’s digital banking landscape. As Deputy General Manager of Lydians Electronic Money Institution and a board member of FUPS Bank, Turkey’s first digital deposit bank, Dogan credits the UC Davis LL.M. program with giving him the knowledge and confidence to pursue his career at the highest levels.

Meet Jaime Lopez (LL.M. ICL ’18) from Puebla, Mexico!

Jaime is a partner at DeForest Abogados®, a firm of 90 attorneys with offices in several locations across Mexico, and several international desks, including a German, Chinese, and French desk, as well as a New York and a Texas one.

So my name is Lia Gurchiani. I'm from Georgia, the country, not the state.

Tell us about your internship over the summer.
Okay, so I had an internship at the United Nations. I was interning at the Georgian Mission. So basically, what I would do is, I would attend high-level high level conferences. I would take talking points. And, at the end of the day, I would go back to the mission, and I would have to present it to the mission. My notes would be used for future negotiations between the countries.

With a bachelor’s degree in law from Saint Joseph University of Beirut, Alexandra Kibinian, a 2022 LL.M. alum from Beirut, Lebanon, set her sights on the United States, aiming to build a successful legal career. Her journey took her to UC Davis, where she enrolled in the LL.M. program and found the support and resources she needed to thrive.