Daniel Mayeda '79, J.D. '82

Last May, the Asian Pacific Alumni of UCLA (APA UCLA) hosted their 2025 Gala, an event vital to funding APA's scholarship support of current students and fostering a strong alumni community. This year, they extended their support to the University's disaster relief efforts, while reaffirming the values that APA UCLA stands for and its impact on the University since its founding.

The event honored Daniel Mayeda ’79, J.D. ’82, as the 2024 APA UCLA Alumnus of the Year. Mayeda was among a group of students, faculty, alumni and community members who were part of the grassroots movement to build APA. For him, the speech was an opportunity to celebrate APA’s history and revisit their legacy. He said, “I wanted to share things that the newer folks may not fully be aware of and tell them that they have a lot of power and potential influence.”

Mayeda is a double Bruin, attorney, educator, community builder and long-time UCLA basketball season ticket holder. He entered UCLA in the late 1970s, a few years after the founding of the UCLA Asian American Studies Center (AASC), the result of community organizing for a place at the University to study Asian American history and heritage.

A communication studies major, Mayeda graduated magna cum laude. He was director of the Asian Pacific Coalition at UCLA, bringing together the Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) campus communities to build collective power. As a student at the UCLA School of Law, he served as co-chair of the Asian Pacific Islander Law Students Association, a network that supports students’ academic, social, political and professional success.

APA UCLA became an official chapter of the UCLA Alumni Association in 1987. Mayeda says, “We wanted to be a voice for the growing number of UCLA alumni of Asian descent. And we wanted to use that voice to weigh in and effect policy.” The group was led by founding president L.A. County Superior Court Judge Ernest Hiroshige ’67, recipient of the 2017 UCLA Public Service Award, and civil rights leader, attorney, educator and second president of APA Stewart Kwoh ’70, J.D. ’74.

In his speech, Mayeda shared some of APA’s early accomplishments. One of their first campaigns was to rally alumni to join students in fighting for tenure for the director of the UCLA Asian American Studies Center, late Prof. Don Nakanishi. He shared, “As you know, Don won that battle and then led the Asian American Studies Center to become the largest such program in the nation.”

APA UCLA then joined their voices successfully to urge then-Chancellor Charles Young to reverse his decision to shutter the Chicano Studies Program, a decision which inspired a 14-day hunger strike by MEChA (Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano de Aztlán). They also urged Chancellor Young to preserve the independence of the ethnic studies centers, including AASC.

APA UCLA also worked to strengthen connections between alumni and students, bringing dozens of alumni back to campus for an annual careers conference. He says, “We had a hidden agenda. We wanted to instill in students the idea that no matter what career they chose, they could still engage in public service.”

After graduating from law school, Mayeda headed to Washington, D.C., where he practiced communications law. He returned to Los Angeles and joined Leopold, Petrich & Smith, becoming a partner in the firm practicing entertainment and media industry litigation, representing studios, networks, publishers, Broadway producers and record companies. He also taught journalism as an adjunct professor at USC’s Annenberg School, and taught media courses at California State University, Los Angeles, and California State University, Northridge.

Mayeda served as president of APA UCLA in the mid-1990s, shortly after the Rodney King verdict and the civil unrest, known as “Sa I Gu” in the Korean American community. He says, “Racial tensions were high, and I felt a strong need to create more opportunities for Asian American alumni to meet and interact with alumni of different backgrounds.”

During his tenure, he helped organize the first Diversity Tailgate Party at the Rose Bowl, co-sponsored by other diversity alumni groups, including Lambda alumni. He also organized an event at a local comedy club, ensuring that the night’s comics would be representative of the audience, calling the event, “Stand-Up for Diversity Comedy Night.”

The founding board member and former board chair says, “For me, it's about connecting people and helping my community. I feel privileged to have been able to go to a university like UCLA. You got something good; why not reach back and help some folks?”

Mayeda served on the board of East West Players for 27 years, the country’s premier Asian Pacific American theatre organization. He says, “I found a way to tell everybody I met about a play, or a musical or the youth theater program. When I was president of APA UCLA, we had theater nights that connected the two groups. It's a matter of trying to help my community in whatever way I can.”

When his daughter graduated from UC Berkeley as he was approaching his 60th birthday, Mayeda decided to pursue a new challenge. In 2018, he and Dale Cohen co-founded the UCLA Documentary Film Legal Clinic, one of the first of its kind to provide pro bono legal services to 100-plus independent documentary filmmakers, many from BIPOC, LGBTQ+, disabled or other underrepresented communities. As associate director, he worked with dozens of law students who received hands-on legal training. He retired in 2023 and continues to do limited work as an entertainment lawyer, including providing pro bono services and advice for select clients.

In his closing words to the APA gala audience, he said, “This all-too-brief history illustrates the potential and opportunities for APA. By representing UCLA’s largest non-white group of alumni, and by maintaining solid relationships with UCLA leadership, APA UCLA has had and can continue to play an important role in University policy.”

Looking back at the history of APA UCLA, he concluded, “Diversity is one of America’s super-powers; no other country can boast of having a population as diverse as ours, all working to create an economy that is the envy of the world. It is obvious that this country is deeply divided. Our only hope for unity is to provide opportunities for all people to be included and to participate fully in building American society.”