CITRIS Tech Policy Initiative Fall Launch & Reception
September 10, 2025 · Banatao Auditorium, Sutardja Dai Hall, UC Berkeley
On Wednesday, September 10, 2025, the CITRIS Tech Policy Initiative hosted its fall launch and reception at Banatao Auditorium in Sutardja Dai Hall. The event brought together students, researchers, community members, and policymakers working at the intersection of technology, policy, and society. We received 208 RSVPs to the event. 168 of these were students (71 undergraduates, 97 graduates); of the graduate students, 84 were Master’s students and 13 were PhD students.
The program opened with a welcome from Camille Crittenden, Executive Director of CITRIS and the Banatao Institute, who introduced the newly relaunched Tech Policy Initiative and its mission to catalyze solutions to pressing technology policy challenges.
Stella Grysler, Field Representative for California State Assemblymember Buffy Wicks, presented a Certificate of Recognition from the California State Assembly celebrating the launch of the CITRIS Tech Policy Initiative.
Researchers and leaders from around campus then shared brief overviews of tech policy opportunities and ways to get involved in the tech policy community at UC Berkeley:
- Leah Walker, Executive Director of the Berkeley Risk and Security Lab (GSPP Tech Policy Week and security policy)
- Iaina Lipara, Administrative Director of the Berkeley Criminal Law & Justice Center (technology and policy in the criminal legal system)
- Wes Holliday, Professor of Philosophy and Co-Organizer of Berkeley AI Risk (AI and risk speaker series)
- David Evan Harris, Chancellor’s Public Scholar at UC Berkeley (interdisciplinary research, public engagement, and an upcoming graduate course on tech policy)
- Deb Raji, UC Berkeley EECS, and Irene Chen, UC Berkeley EECS & UCSF CPH (AI & Society)
The presentations concluded with a keynote address by Janet Napolitano, former U.S. Secretary of Homeland Security and Director of the Berkeley Institute for Security and Governance.
I closed out the program by introducing CITRIS opportunities for students, thanking the speakers, and transitioning attendees to the atrium for a reception with food, networking, and interactive brainstorming boards.
Background
As an underclassman, I found it hard to access the “tech policy community” on campus. Opportunities were often siloed, and people/groups working on research in the broad classification of tech policy rarely got together! I quickly realized that a reception-type event at the beginning of the semester could be a great way for students looking for new opportunities at the start of the academic year to learn more about the work being done on campus, and that such an event could be a way to initiate cross-campus communities before semester routines fell into place. I ultimately spent a month and the better part of the start of my senior year designing the program, inviting speakers, and coordinating logistics, with invaluable support from the CITRIS Events Team and the invited speakers. The reception was designed as an open forum for the Berkeley community to explore how technology and policy intersect, connect with others passionate about tech for the public good, and help shape the future direction of the CITRIS Tech Policy Initiative, goals that were well-achieved by the event.