Baccalaureate Class of 2022 Keynote Speaker, Speech Contest Winner & Finalists
Simran Jeet Singh
Simran Jeet Singh was included on TIME magazine’s Fighting for a More Equal America list because of his commitment to “fairness for all faiths.” He is executive director of the Aspen Institute’s Religion & Society Program, a visiting professor of history and religion at Union Theological Seminary, and a Soros Equality Fellow with the Open Society Foundations.
Temiloluwa Bolodeoku
Temi, a Nigerian educated in the United Kingdom, is a senior majoring in Electrical Engineering with a Coterminal Masters in Management Science and Engineering. With experience in corporate finance and venture capital in Nigeria, Temi is committed to playing a major role in the interaction between finance, technology and development. Temi’s experiences in Nigeria have made him passionate about digital infrastructure systems in emerging sectors and he is looking forward to joining a team that is building value-creating platforms. In his free time, Temi is an avid Chelsea fan and content creator; he holds a growing online presence on several social media platforms.
Manar Barsi
Manar Barsi (she/her) is a senior from San Antonio, Texas, majoring in Economics. During her time at Stanford, she has deeply enjoyed being an RA in both Otero and Storey Houses, being a student staff member at the Markaz Resource Center and engaging in multiple public service internships through the Haas Center for Public Service. Manar is passionate about educational equity, development economics, policy, and politics, and hopes to one day attend graduate school to further her studies in these interests. Upon graduation, she will be moving to New York City to work as a Business Analyst. She will deeply miss her dorm communities, Meyer Green, the Caramel Latte at CoHo, and lounging on the gray couch at the Markaz.
Johnathan Bridges
My name is Johnathan Bridges, and I am a member of the graduating class of 2022. My time at Stanford has been incredibly fulfilling, from serving as the President of the Class of 2021, to forging deeper friendships and connections than I ever thought possible. I am an International Relations major from Huntsville, TN, and I look forward to carrying my Stanford memories, communities, and experiences forward with my fellow classmates.
Mina Mahmood
Mina is graduating with a B.S. in Computer Science and an M.A. in Public Policy. Her focus has been on urban studies, environmental & racial justice, and police & prison abolition. She is particularly excited by collective liberation for marginalized communities, community-building, and the role of emotional work in resistance movements. In addition to her studies, Mina organized with Abolish Stanford, researched at the Bejerano Lab, worked with Code the Change, volunteered with several organizations that provide support to homeless folks, and developed websites for many student organizations. Mina did data science work for the World Bank in her senior year and did software engineering work over her summers. Art-making is immensely important to Mina. Mina mixed music and danced for Common Origins. She has starred in two Stanford plays, DJ’ed, held singing workshops for incarcerated people in her time abroad at Oxford, produced her own EP, and sang everything from hymns to Bollywood hits at Stanford events.
Sameep Mangat
Sameep is a senior at Stanford majoring in Computer Science (HCI) and minoring in Communications. After graduation, she plans to pursue venture capital at Animal Capital, a fund backed by Josh Richards, Griffin Johnson, and Noah Beck. She is incredibly passionate about the intersection of beauty and fashion with computer science, and hopes to one day spearhead a startup within the fashion and beauty space or become the first Indian woman on the board of Glossier. Sam cares deeply about mental health and published a self help book in high school. During her time on campus, Sam was also part of many mental health organizations such as The Bridge and the ASSU Mental Health Executive Board. She loved to sing with her R&B and Soul acapella group Everyday People, and she served as Director of Diversity and Inclusion for Pi Phi.
Shreyas Parab
Shreyas Parab is a member of the Class of 2022 hailing from Delaware County, Pennsylvania. He is majoring in biomedical computation. During his time at Stanford, he has juggled a lot. No, literally, he was in the juggling club. He has passionately served the Senior Class as one of the Class Presidents and previously on the Junior Cabinet. He was the Student Representative on the Board of Trustees’ Committee on Development, the University Land and Buildings Committee, and on the Vice Provost Student Advisory Group. He was a proud RA of Mirrielees and Castaño where he would often be chastised by his residents for listening to too much Taylor Swift. He helped organize TreeHacks and was an Investment Partner at Dorm Room Fund. He hopes to continue a life of service towards others, solving exciting problems with technology, and juggling more…and maybe picking up unicycling to round himself out.
Vinh Ton
Vinh Ton is a coterminal student graduating with a bachelor’s degree in Symbolic Systems and a master’s degree in computer science at Stanford University, originally matriculating as class of 2020 but now graduating as class of 2022. With both majors, he specializes in human computer interaction which sits at the intersection of design psychology, agile development, and design thinking process to research, ideate, and prototype human centered digital tools. He identifies as a queer, first-gen, low-income, neuro-divergent immigrant from a family of war refugees from Viet Nam, and these experiences inform how he positions technology in his life as a specific and actionable toolkit to help others, especially those not typically included in the room in the Silicon Valley. In particular, he is interested in the role technology can play in bridging mental health accessibility gaps in historically marginalized populations such as: low-income, incarcerated, queer, refugee, disabled, and/or BIPOC communities.