SAHARA DANIELA HUAZANO

Director of Programs

Sahara has interned for various organizations where she obtained skills to return to her home community of Mecca and partner with people to improve living conditions. She interned for the Sierra Club in Washington D.C., U.S. Representative Raul Ruiz, Pueblo Unido CDC, and she created a group called Gente de la Tierra.

Sahara completed her undergraduate studies in Environmental Studies at the University of California Santa Cruz in 2014. She focused her studies on the systemic challenges of rural communities through an environmental justice lens and completed a one-year research thesis, “Resort Development and Environmental Injustice: A Historical Analysis of Land Use, Race, and Class in the Coachella Valley, CA (1940s-1990s).” Her mission is to continue building bridges between people in her community and outside her community so they can work together to make the Coachella Valley a place for people to thrive. Before moving into her current role, Sahara led Alianza’s environmental justice work.

Moazzum Bajwa MD MPH MSc

Moazzum Bajwa is an assistant professor of family medicine at the University of California Riverside and core faculty at RUHS/UCR Family Medicine Residency, leading the program’s Community Health & Social Medicine initiative. He is the Medical Director of the Longitudinal Ambulatory Care Experience (LACE) at UCR School of Medicine. Dr. Bajwa practices comprehensive family medicine in Moreno Valley, CA.

Esmeralda Trejo is the Assistant Director of UCR School of Medicine Pipeline Programs. She completed her undergraduate degree at Claremont McKenna College in Biochemistry and her Master’s in Higher Education from California State University, Fullerton. Upon graduating with her BA, Esmeralda began supporting high school students to further their education as a College Adviser with UC Berkeley’s Destination College Advising Corps in the High Desert. In 2014, she started working at UC Riverside’s TRIO Upward Bound Programs and then later with the Early Academic Outreach Program before joining the School of Medicine in 2019. Esmeralda coordinates the following Pipeline Programs: Community College Outreach, Health Sciences Partnership, and Future Physician Leaders. Her passion includes supporting first-generation college students and increasing underrepresented minority students in the STEM fields, including the health professions. A native of Riverside County, she understands the importance of higher education and supporting future healthcare professionals from the Inland Empire.