Senior Feature: Anna Li
By Ria Rao
Anna Li (she/her) is one of our Office Operations Student Workers and a 4th year Materials Engineering major at UCLA! She has supported CSW|Stresiand Center’s office for the last 3 years. In her time here, she has made significant contributions to the center by revamping our Tiki-Toki Timeline: History of the UCLA Center for the Study of Women | Barbra Steriand Center, working on events like Beyond Representation: Practicing Feminist Engineering and Faculty Writing Retreats, and helping with daily office tasks. We sat down for a conversation on her experiences at CSW|Streisand Center, UCLA, and beyond.
How has your time here prepared you for your career?
My time here at CSW has taught me a lot about the importance of having a fundamental level of trust in any environment. This sounds really weird, but I was in a lot of highly competitive and high stress environments throughout college. This caused me to expect that sometimes, respect will not always be reciprocated. However, at CSW, the emphasis that there is an expectation of mutual respect has really stuck with me and I hope I continue to have that at the front of my mind. The praise, love, and support by this community has pushed me to evaluate my priorities in a work environment and has been so empowering.
What is one goal you achieved that felt really far away your first year in college?
A more invisible goal that I didn’t really think about when I came into college but something that has become so obvious, is having an intentional separation of the academic self and the personal self. I think that’s something I didn’t have when I first came into college and I wasn’t even aware of it being an issue. But having more diverse experiences, being in different spaces, and having people that treat me so separately from my academic self has really helped a lot with my confidence and understanding of my personal priorities.
What is your favorite memory working at CSW?
Most of my experiences at UCLA overall have been quite mixed. For example, classes and internships have been some positive, some negative. It’s so strange because my experience here at CSW | Streisand Center has been 100% positive. Every time I come into the office, whether it’s a gathering or a general work day, I just feel so recharged and leave this place feeling better than when I ended.
To be specific, I really enjoyed the Faculty Writing Retreats that our center holds. Being a young person, I’m used to understanding the perspective of people who are my age and are fellow college students. However, these spaces have allowed me to hear the perspectives of professors and fau\culty working on meaningful projects. It’s a small example of how this job has exposed me to so many more perspectives than just the student perspective, and I’ve found that so valuable.
What advice do you have for other UCLA students on how to make the most of their four years?
I’ve found that no one situation or experience can define you, but it’s more about how you react to that situation or experience that defines who you are. When experiencing setbacks, it’s easy to ignore other people’s setbacks, compare yourself, and lose sight of the fact . So, being kinder to yourself, remembering your own priorities in life, and understanding that as long as you meet your basic needs, no one life path or experience is superior to another. It’s all about the journey and being able to persevere through those experiences.
What are you most looking forward to in your next chapter?
In post-grad, I’ll be in a completely new environment and I really want to follow through more with my own personal goals and interests. It’s funny because I think people usually do that more in undergrad, but for a while, I was still in the headspace that I needed to prove myself to people in the end and I didn’t always listen to what I wanted to do. Overall, I’m excited to have more free time to pursue my own hobbies and passions.
We’d like to thank Anna for her time and energy that she contributed to CSW | Streisand and congratulate her on her upcoming journey. After graduating, Anna will attend the Cambridge Judge Business School to study Strategy, Marketing, Operations, and Organisational Behaviour and work as a strategy consultant for L.E.K. Consulting in Melbourne, Australia! Thank you Anna!
Ria Rao is a junior at UCLA studying Cognitive Science and Statistics & Data Science. She has been involved with UCLA student media organizations UCLA Radio and FEM News Magazine, and now serves the CSW|Streisand Center as a Student Worker.
