King Hall Welcomes KHOP Students for Winter 2018 Session

UC Davis School of Law welcomed 21 students to the 2018 winter session of the King Hall Outreach Program (KHOP) program on January 27. The session, which will continue on February 3, February 10, and March 3, includes opportunities for students to meet with Dean Kevin R. Johnson and Professor Raquel Aldana, UC Davis Associate Chancellor for Academic Diversity.

Also on the agenda for the winter session are presentations by Professor Lisa Ikemoto ’87 and Lance Martin ’13 of Kennaday Leavitt Owensby PC. There will also be a panel discussion with former KHOP students who are now attending King Hall, including Paolo Hermoso ‘18, Kristina Munoz ‘19, Karen Pedraza ‘20, and Princepreet Singh ’20.

Established in 2001, KHOP is a unique program that helps first-generation and economically disadvantaged college students prepare for the law school admissions process. The program has won honors including the American Bar Association’s 2016 Raymond Pace and Sadie Tanner Mossell Alexander Award for Excellence in Pipeline Diversity. King Hall currently hosts 10 students who went through the program.

The current KHOP class includes students from UC Berkeley, UC Merced, UC Riverside, Sacramento State, San Francisco State, University of La Verne, and UC Davis. It is a diverse group that includes students born in the Philippines, Mexico, and Singapore, and 90 percent are first-generation college students.

Members of this year’s KHOP class include:

• Karen Avila is a first-generation college student in Political Science at UC Berkeley, where she works with first-generation, low-income, and underrepresented students as part of the Student Intake Staff at the Educational Opportunity Program (EOP). She is a JusticeCorps member serving at a Contra Costa courthouse, where she assists with Domestic Violence Restraining Orders and housing law questions. She also volunteers with Bay Area Legal Aid in Richmond.
• Gervilyn (“Gervi”) Cadimas was born and raised in the Philippines and now attends Sacramento State University as a Business Administration major. She is Vice President of Administration for the Women In Business club at Sacramento State and has volunteered for nonprofit organizations including My Sister’s House and the Filipino American Youth Leadership Conference. She hopes to become an immigration law attorney.
• Tristen Thalhuber is UC Davis Student pursuing degrees in Political Science and Chinese. Born in Singapore, he is a first-generation college student. He works as an Assistant Mechanic for Unitrans, the UC Davis bus company, and serves as an International Relations Research Assistant for UC Davis Political Science Assistant Professor Heather McKibben. He hopes to practice in the areas of immigration and international law.
• Diego Garcia Zamora recently graduated from UC Berkeley with degrees in Sociology and American Studies. Born in Mexico, he is a first-generation college student. As an undergraduate, he wrote a thesis on hydraulic fracturing and the risks it poses to minority communities in California. He was an active member of a Latino-oriented fraternity called Gamma Zeta Alpha and an Intern Aide at the District Office of Congresswoman Barbara Lee.