SAPAS Speakers and Panelists

Keynote Speakers

Goodwin Liu

Justice Goodwin Liu is an Associate Justice of the California Supreme Court.  He joined the state’s highest court from his position as Professor of Law and Associate Dean at the UC Berkeley School of Law.

The son of Taiwanese immigrants, Justice Liu grew up in Sacramento and earned a bachelor’s degree in biology in 1991 from Stanford. After obtaining a master’s degree in philosophy and physiology at Oxford University on a Rhodes Scholarship, he worked as a senior program officer at the Corporation for National Service and helped launch the AmeriCorps national service program. After graduating from Yale Law School in 1998, he clerked for Judge David Tatel on the U.S. Court of Appeals, D.C. Circuit; served as Special Assistant to the Deputy Secretary of the U.S. Department of Education; and clerked for U.S. Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg before joining the practice of O’Melveny & Myers.

Justice Liu is a recipient of the Steven S. Goldberg Award for Distinguished Scholarship in Education Law and serves on the American Law Institute Council.  He has served on the Board of Trustees of Stanford University, the Board of Directors of the Alliance for Excellent Education, the American Constitution Society, the National Women’s Law Center, and the Public Welfare Foundation. 

Juju Chang

Juju Chang is a co-anchor of ABC News’ “Nightline,” and reports regularly for “Good Morning America” and “20/20.”

Chang earned one of two Emmy awards covering California wildfires and one of two Gracies for a report on gender equity in the sciences; a Peabody award covering Superstorm Sandy; and a Murrow for the “Nightline” series “Face to Face” with a story about children visiting their fathers in prison. She earned a DuPont as a producer on a “Women’s Health” series and a Front Page award for chronicling a transgendered teen’s transition.  Chang is a former news anchor for “Good Morning America,” “World News Now” and “World News This Morning”. She began her on-air career as a reporter for KGO-TV in San Francisco and for NewsOne, ABC’s affiliate service White House, covering Capitol Hill and the presidential election in Washington, D.C. in 1996-97.

Born in Seoul, South Korea, raised in Northern California, Chang graduated with honors from Stanford University with a BA in political science and communication and was a recipient of the Edwin Cotrell Political Science Prize.  She is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and a founding board member of the Korean American Community Foundation.

Moderator

Harry Elam, Jr.

Harry J. Elam, Jr. is the Olive H. Palmer Professor in the Humanities, Senior Vice Provost for Education, Vice President for the Arts, and the Freeman-Thornton Vice Provost for Undergraduate Education at Stanford University. Elam is the author of numerous books and in addition to his scholarship, he has been an award-winning professional director for over twenty years. As a decorated scholar and teacher, he has received more than six of Stanford University’s highest awards for teaching as well as national distinctions as: the Betty Jean Jones award for Outstanding Teaching from the American Theatre and Drama Society, the Excellence in Editing Award from the Association of Theatre in Higher Education and the Distinguished Scholar Award from the American Society of Theatre Research. An inductee into the prestigious College of Fellows of the American Theatre, in 2014 Elam also received the Association of Theater in Higher Education’s Career Achievement Award, the highest distinction given to either a practitioner or scholar in the field of theater studies.

Harry J. Elam, Jr. received his AB from Harvard College in 1978 and his Ph.D. in Dramatic Arts from the University of California Berkeley in 1984.

Panels & Panelists

APIs at Stanford

Bamboo Ceiling

Asian American Studies' Place in Global Environment

Asian American Entrepreneurs

Women in Tech

Philanthropy

Government & NGOs

Popular Culture

Healthcare

Friday Evening

Performer: The Complements - Greg Yee 'o6 & Alicia Muller

Saturday Evening

Master of Ceremony: Rick Yuen

Rick Yuen is Assistant Dean and Judicial Officer, Emeritus - Stanford University.  Rick’s Stanford career started in 1989 as the University’s first full time position as  Director and Assistant Dean to the Asian American Activities Center. For fifteen years, Rick created mentoring resources for undergraduate and graduate students, and served as the Dean overseeing freshman class council activities.  In 2005, Rick was appointed Judicial Officer to provide outreach and to investigate alleged violations of the University Honor Code and Fundamental Standard. 

He continues to be actively involved with Stanford University serving as a board member of the Stanford Historical Society and as a panel interviewer for Medical School   applicants.   Recognizing our ability to make a positive impact one student at a time, he has been assigned his first SF unified school district reading buddy.

Rick was born at Stanford Hospital.  Proud grandfather of one with a second to arrive April! 

Performer: Takeo Rivera

Takeo Rivera (Comparative Studies in Race & Ethnicity 2008, Modern Thought & Literature MA 2009) is a Japanese Filipino American and Bay Area native. A former President of the Stanford Spoken Word Collective and RA at Okada House, Takeo is also a playwright and scholar whose award-winning work has been staged in New York City, Los Angeles, and the SF Bay Area. He is completing his PhD in Performance Studies at UC Berkeley, finalizing a dissertation on Asian American masochism and techno-orientalism in cultural politics. This July, he will be joining the faculty of Boston University's Department of English as a tenure-track assistant professor in modern & contemporary drama, with a joint appointment in Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies.

Student Performer: Stanford Asian American Theater Project

Student Performer: Stanford O-Tone - East Asian A Capella