The Common Experience at UCLA
The Common Experience Program creates community and inspires activism at UCLA.
Each year, our Selection Committee made up of students, staff, faculty, and alumni select a title for the Bruin community to read, listen or watch together centered around a common theme. Our mission is to ignite campus-wide discussions on compelling social issues and inspire action within the Bruin community. Explore this page to learn about this year's selection, and to take a deeper dive to spark your curiosity and to get involved.
The 2024-2025 Selection: The War for Kindness by Dr. Jamil Zaki
The War for Kindness explores the concept of empathy in depth, weaving together academic insights, pop culture references, scientific research, and personal anecdotes, including those from the author's own life. The book presents a compelling argument against the notion that empathy is an innate, unchangeable trait; instead, Dr. Zaki argues that empathy is a skill that can be developed and strengthened with deliberate effort and practice, akin to academic study.
Through a variety of engaging examples, from the transformation of a former neo-Nazi to the resilience of NICU nurses, this selection demonstrates the vital role of empathy and kindness across different contexts. The narrative is both clear and passionate, aimed to motivate readers to cultivate these qualities in their own lives.
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Diving Into the War for Kindness
The 2024-2025 Common Experience embraces the War for Kindness by Dr. Jamil Zaki, fueling conversations and cultivating community for a better, kinder tomorrow.
Thematic Discussion Guide
This guide lays out all the learnings found in each chapter of the book, pairing them with discussion questions to get conversation flowing.
Co-curricular Opportunities
The Undergraduate Research Scholars Program (URSP) is an undergraduate course tied to the Sustainable LA Grand Challenge initiative. It empowers its cohorts to leverage interdisciplinary research to tackle the complex issues tied to urban sustainability.
Fiat Lux When you are enrolling in classes, look for Fiat Lux (1 unit courses) that are connected to the Common Experience to dive deeper into the topics of Intersectional Environmentalism with renown UCLA Faculty.
The Dialogue across Difference (DaD) Initiative aims to model and promote the values of intellectual engagement, curiosity, empathy, active listening, and critical thinking, through. series of campus events, classes, informal learning opportunities and social programming.
The Bedari Kindness Institute was established to provide an interdisciplinary platform dedicated to the research, education, and practice of kindness, with the goal of transforming the individual and society as informed by the understanding and practice of kindness.
The UCLA Prison Education Program provides post-secondary education to incarcerated women and youth, engaging UCLA faculty and students in collaborative learning to challenge bias and injustice, thereby fulfilling UCLA's mission to advance knowledge for societal betterment.
Find out more about these programs at the links below:
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Contact Us
Reach out! We are excited to hear from you...
Email: FirstYearExperience@orl.ucla.edu
Phone: (310) 794-4866
Instagram: @UCLAFirstYearExperience