UC Davis Celebrates Global Leadership at the 11th Annual International Connections Reception
Four faculty and staff members from UC Davis are being recognized for outstanding global engagement through two campus awards: the Chancellor’s Award for International Engagement and the Excellence in Teaching for Global Learning Award. The awards honor UC Davis faculty and staff whose work advances global education, research and service.
“Through innovative research, teaching and service, these awardees are strengthening UC Davis’s global impact. They are advancing knowledge, building meaningful international partnerships and contributing to solutions that benefit communities locally and globally. Their leadership reinforces our commitment to inclusive excellence and to a more connected and resilient future,” said Chancellor Gary S. May.
The Chancellor’s Award for International Engagement was created in 2017, and the Excellence in Teaching for Global Learning Award followed in 2019. This year’s awardees bring the total number of recipients to 43.
2025-26 Chancellor’s Award for International Engagement Recipients
The Chancellor’s Award for International Engagement recognizes faculty and staff members for outstanding global engagement that advances the university’s teaching, research and service missions. This year’s recipients are faculty member Luis Carvajal-Carmona and staff member Sarah Meredith.
Luis G. Carvajal-Carmona
Luis G. Carvajal-Carmona is an associate vice chancellor for Advancing Mentoring and the Professoriate in Inclusive Excellence and a professor in the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Medicine in the School of Medicine. Through his leadership of the UC Davis Multi-Disciplinary Cancer Research Training Program to Advance Precision Cancer Prevention and Care in Latin America, he has helped position UC Davis as a global leader in equitable cancer research and training partnerships, in close collaboration with Laura Fejerman, Professor in the Department of Public Health Sciences.
Carvajal-Carmona’s long-standing collaborations in Colombia and across Latin America have strengthened institutional capacity, supporting more than 50 research projects and helping establish doctoral programs and sustainable research infrastructure.
His work has had a tangible impact on patient care and public health, including contributing to the establishment of Colombia’s national hereditary cancer program, helping save lives through early detection and prevention strategies.
Through initiatives such as Latinos United for Cancer Health Advancement (LUCHA) and his mentorship of Latin American trainees and UC Davis students, many of whom are from historically underrepresented backgrounds, he has advanced cancer prevention, precision medicine, and global learning in ways that strengthen both our campus and communities abroad.
His nominators said that his success as a global collaborator reflects “not only his intellectual rigor but also his integrity, generosity and deep sense of responsibility as a scholar.”
Sarah Meredith
Sarah Meredith is the director of the Center for Advocacy, Resources & Education (CARE) in the Office of the Provost. She has been an unwavering partner to UC Davis’s globally engaged campus community, ensuring that students studying abroad, international students and faculty leading programs overseas have access to trauma-informed guidance and crisis support whenever and wherever needed.
Meredith has worked in the field of sexual assault and domestic violence advocacy for 23 years, including 16 years at UC Davis, consistently advancing culturally responsive care for a diverse and international community.
A trusted collaborator across campus, she partners with the Global Learning Hub to prepare faculty to respond to disclosures abroad, provide confidential support across time zones and strengthen emergency response capacity so students can pursue international learning with confidence. One nominator reflected that the ability to call her “at 3:00 AM on a weekend” and reach “a sensitive and caring person” ready to step in exemplifies an extraordinary level of commitment to our globally engaged community.
Her advocacy for interpretation services, along with data-informed prevention efforts, has also strengthened structural supports that help ensure students are heard, respected and treated with dignity, whether on campus or abroad.
Her nominators emphasized her leadership in fostering cultural humility and global awareness, writing that she is “keenly aware of cross-cultural and intercultural communication dynamics” and a “champion for the international students and community in the SCRT [Students of Concern Response Team] meetings and every space that she enters.”
2025-26 Excellence in Teaching for Global Learning Award
The Excellence in Teaching for Global Learning Award recognizes UC Davis instructors of the Academic Senate or Academic Federation who go above and beyond in designing and teaching UC Davis global learning programs. This year’s recipients are Ozcan Gulacar (Academic Senate), and Marc Ishisaka-Nolfi (Academic Federation).
Ozcan Gulacar
Ozcan Gulacar is a professor of teaching in the Department of Chemistry in the College of Letters and Science. He exemplifies UC Davis’s commitment to preparing students to engage meaningfully with global challenges through responsible action, intercultural understanding and systems thinking.
Through his First-Year Seminar, Find Your Passion: Learning About Sustainability in a Global Context, Gulacar guides students through the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals, connecting chemistry and scientific inquiry to issues such as food security, clean water, climate action and planetary health.
A hallmark of his teaching is the Green Fund Initiative proposal project, in which students design evidence-based sustainability initiatives for the UC Davis campus. This experiential work challenges students to analyze global problems while developing feasible, ethical solutions grounded in scientific understanding and stakeholder awareness.
In his large-enrollment General Chemistry courses, which collectively reach nearly 2,500 students each year, Gulacar embeds global case studies into core scientific concepts, helping students see chemistry as integral to environmental justice, resource sustainability and human well-being.
His nominators said that his courses are often “the first time [students] understood chemistry as a field directly connected to global justice and sustainability.”
Marc Ishisaka-Nolfi
Marc Ishisaka-Nolfi is a continuing lecturer in the Department of Design in the College of Letters and Science. For nearly two decades, he has distinguished himself as a deeply student-centered educator whose courses integrate rigorous studio practice with cultural inquiry and reflective design processes.
Whether teaching foundational graphic design or advanced motion typography, he emphasizes research, critique and the ethical dimensions of visual communication. Colleagues describe him as intellectually generous and meticulous in course design, and students consistently note his respect, availability and high standards.
This commitment to globally informed design finds powerful expression in his creation and leadership of Design Japan, a four-week immersive study abroad program in Tokyo and Kyoto. Since its launch in 2023, the program has reached full enrollment and draws students from across UC campuses and beyond.
In Japan, Ishisaka-Nolfi uses place as pedagogy. Students engage the built environment, material culture and everyday design practices as primary texts, translating lived experience into research-driven studio projects. Through structured critiques, reflective writing and sustained observation, he challenges students to recognize that design is never culturally neutral, but is embedded in history, labor, identity and meaning.
Ishisaka-Nolfi's nominators shared that his work “integrates cultural inquiry, academic rigor, reflective practice and community-building in ways that have a lasting impact on students’ intellectual, creative and personal growth.”
International Connections Reception
Chancellor May will recognize the awardees on Thursday, April 9, 2026, at the 11th annual UC Davis International Connections Reception, hosted by Global Affairs. This event brings together the UC Davis community for an evening of networking and celebration of globally engaged faculty, staff and scholars. Global Affairs will also acknowledge the 2025-26 recipients of Seed Grants for International Activities and Grants for Advancing Sustainable Development Goals.
“Global engagement at UC Davis is made possible by faculty, staff and students who bring vision, care and commitment to their work every day. The International Connections Reception brings our community together to recognize faculty and staff who are creating transformative opportunities that connect students, research and communities across borders,” said Joanna Regulska, vice provost and dean of Global Affairs.
The International Connections Reception is open to the UC Davis community.
Register to attend the International Connections Reception on April 9, 2026.