USC LAA Scholarship Gala

2023 Legacy Award Honoree

Carmen L. Herrera ’89

Carmen is an entrepreneur and Certified Public Accountant. Her latest venture is “Vida For Vitality,” a juice enterprise focused on brain health with a particular interest in underserved communities. Carmen’s corporate experience includes finance and operational roles with Fortune 500, international, start-up and Big Four public accounting firms in Energy, Manufacturing, Satellite Communications, and Entertainment.

For nearly 20 years, Carmen has worked with the Sempra Energy family of companies, holding various director roles. In 2007, Carmen became the first Latina director at this Fortune 500 company. Areas of responsibilities included Real Estate, Fleet Services, Facility Operations & Capital Programs, Land Management and Supplier Diversity, including sustainable programs implementation.

Carmen started her career with Ernst & Young LLP as an auditor and worked in various industries in financial and accounting roles from financial analyst to controller with organizations such as Paramount Pictures, Univisa, Inc., Hughes Communications and StarGuide Digital Networks before joining Sempra in 2001.

She holds a Bachelor of Science in Business Administration from the University of Southern California. Carmen serves on the USC Alumni Association Board of Governors, is the Co-Chair of the 2023 USC Women’s Conference, past chair of the Corporate Advisory Council of the USC Latino Alumni Association and the current president of the board of trustees for Camp Ronald McDonald For Good Times. Carmen has held leadership positions with various non-profit organizations, and she is an alumna of the Southern California Leadership Network, Leadership California, and LEAD San Diego.

In her spare time, Carmen enjoys sailing, traveling, cycling, college football and other sports.

2023 Corporate Leadership Award Honoree

For their longstanding partnership, employee volunteerism, and fundraising advocacy for the USC LAA.

Presenting Sponsor $50,000 (one available) 

• VIP seating for twenty (20) guests
• Recognition from podium
• Full-page advertisement on inside front cover of the printed Gala Program
• Logo recognition on event collateral, LAA website and social media
• Linked logo recognition on LAA Gala webpage for one year
• Product placement opportunity

Signature Sponsor $30,000

• VIP seating for ten (10) guests
• Full-page advertisement in printed Gala Program
• Multimedia Recognition at the Gala
• Logo recognition on event collateral, LAA website, and social media
• Linked Logo recognition on LAA Gala webpage for one year

 Benefactor Sponsor $18,000

• Premier seating for ten (10) guests
• Full-page advertisement in digital Gala Program
• Multimedia Recognition at the Gala
• Logo recognition on event collateral, LAA website, and social media

Trustee Sponsor $12,000

• Premier seating for ten (10) guests
• Full-page advertisement in digital Gala Program

 Trojan Sponsor $6,000

• Preferred seating for ten (10) guests
• Half-page advertisement in digital Gala Program

Friend of the LAA $4200

• Premier seating for (4) guests
• Half-page advertisement in digital Gala Program

Individual Tickets 

• Single Ticket $500
• A Pair of (2) tickets $900
• Young Alumni Ticket (35 and under) $400 * 2 maximum per young alumni
• Sponsor a Scholar $150  I would like to sponsor a LAA Scholar – 100% tax deductible

**ALL TICKET SALES ARE FINAL

For sponsorship and ticket opportunities, please click here. If you have any questions, contact Dolores Sotelo via email at dsotelo@usc.edu or Mercy Willard at mercywil@usc.edu. You can also call the LAA Office at 213 740-4735.

DIGITAL ADVERTISEMENT

Full-Page Color $1,000 (Format: PDF file, JPEG, or TIF  26″ wide x 11″ high – full color 144 dpi)

Half-Page Color $500 (Format: PDF file, JPEG, or TIF – 13″ wide x 11″ high – full color – 144 dpi)

Please email ADs to Dolores Sotelo at dsotelo@usc.edu by Friday, February 10, 2023

Gala contributions are tax-deductible with the exception of $150 per ticket

USC Tax ID: 95-1642394

2023 Gala Sponsors

Presenting Sponsors

Text-to-Donate Campaign Sponsor

Benefactor Sponsors

Trustee Sponsors

Trojan Sponsors

Friend of LAA Sponsors

Zurich

Our annual Scholarship Gala is our premier fundraising event. It provides an opportunity to network with the who’s who of the Latino business community, alumni and friends.

Every year, we present two awards at our gala. Commemorating the legacy of USC’s eighth president, the Dr. John R. Hubbard Award is presented to an outstanding graduating Latino student for academic achievement, leadership and community service. The Legacy Award is presented to an alumnus/a for his or her contributions to USC and the LAA, professional achievements and philanthropy.

Check out our past event photos:

2022 | 2019 | 2018 | 2017 | 2016 

2015 | 2014 | 2013 

Please view past program and tribute books:

2021 Program Book

2021 Tribute Book

2021 Photos

Thank you to Our 2022 Gala Sponsors

Presenting Sponsors

Text-to-Donate Campaign Sponsor

Signature Sponsors

Benefactor Sponsors

Trustee Sponsors

Trojan Sponsors

Friend of LAA Sponsors

California Credit Union
Lacovelli Family
Maribeth Annaguey
Rancho Santiago Community College District
USC Viterbi School of Engineering
Wells Fargo Bank
Zurich

2022 Legacy Award Honoree

Laura Peralta MPA ’10

Vice President, Community and Business Development
JPMorgan Chase & Co.

Laura joined JP Morgan Chase as Vice President of Community and Business Development in 2021. Prior to joining the Chase family, Laura worked as Vice President of Community Development at Citibank, where she managed public-private partnerships and funded nonprofit organizations that serve low-income communities in an effort to help close the racial wealth gap. She has an extensive background in government relations through her work as Policy Deputy at the Los Angeles City Council, Program Manager for Diversity Initiatives at the U.S. Department of Labor in Washington, D.C. where she served as a political appointee for President Barack Obama, and as Director of Local Government Relations at California Grocers Association.

Laura holds a Master of Public Administration degree from the USC Sol Price School of Public Policy and a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and Sociology from the University of California, Irvine. Laura is the immediate past Board Chair of the USC Price Alumni Association, currently serves on the USC Alumni Association – Los Angeles Regional Advisory Group, and she enjoys mentoring Price students and alumni. Laura is from Argentina so she naturally loves steak, red wine and futbol.

2022 Dr. John R. Hubbard Award Honoree

Alejandra Barreto

Bachelor of Science in Health Promotion and Disease Prevention
Minor in Spanish
Master of Public Health
Class of 2022

Alejandra Barreto is a first-generation, pre-medical student from Lynwood, California. She is a USC Mork Scholar (10 selected), Gates Scholar (300 selected nationwide), LeaderShape participant which is a national institute to transform the leadership capacity, and head student researcher for USC’s Office for Health Promotion. Through her research, she strives to improve USC students’ well-being by investigating and developing strategies to promote a sense of belonging, equity in and out of the classroom, decrease substance abuse, and promote healthy relationships.

As a daughter of Mexican immigrants and witnessing firsthand the challenges faced due to lack of insurance and language/cultural barriers to healthcare, she cares deeply about underserved communities. She is the co-president of Flying Samaritans and director of outreach of Mobile Clinic, where she focuses on bringing access to health care to the community of Tijuana, Mexico, and LA’s homeless community through organizing free clinics.
One of her motivations is to improve the navigation of resources among high school students. As co-president of Scholars Leading Scholars, she has created partnerships with neighboring high schools to provide mentorship for 80+ high-school students yearly and help them apply to jobs, internships, and college.

In addition to her involvement at USC, Ms. Barreto is a student researcher for the University of Pennsylvania’s Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics where she investigates how immigration status and policy affects Hispanic women’s perinatal and infant health outcomes.

Alejandra will be applying to medical school this summer in pursuit of her aspirations of becoming a physician who advocates for accessible and equitable health care for underserved communities.

2022 Corporate Leadership Award Honoree