2017 Venu and Ana Kotamraju Endowed Scholarship Award Recipient

Biography: Yu Na Lee is a senior Economics Major and Digital Humanities Minor at UCLA. Since coming to UCLA, she has worked as an Instructional Consultant at UCLA Library, along with volunteering at VITA for income tax returns of low-income populations in Los Angeles. With having diverse work and internship experiences, she learned accounting, marketing, finance, and data analysis skills. During her free time, she educates herself coding language and statistical tools.

Future Plans: Yu Na Lee is searching for a work that will sponsor her visa in the U.S. upon her graduation, so that she can stay with her family and build professional experience in Finance and Data Analysis. She also plans to study in graduate school further in Statistics or MBA in her future, and meanwhile, hopes to be involved in Business Development department of tech or entertainment field.

What does the scholarship mean to me?: I am very grateful and honored to be a recipient of the Venu and Ana Kotamraju Scholarship award. As an international student from South Korea, paying for all costs for living and education has never been easy due to limited access for aids and employment for foreigners. This award will not only relieve the financial burden on my family but also encourage and support my achievements in academics and career. It also reminds that I am member of the UCLA community and the Economics department, which is such a strong motivation for me to be determined to stay connected to the school even after I graduate. The scholarship drives me to keep working hard and searching for any opportunities available. I hope I would be able to give back to the community in my future as Venu and Ana Kotamraju did. I want to express my gratitude for their generosity again.