\u201cI felt overwhelmed and kind of lost, literally and figuratively,\u201d Tanioka said. \u201cI kind of felt like I was missing something, like I was a step behind everyone else.\u201d<\/p>\n
Underlying all of it were creeping doubts about his own professional path. Until then, he\u2019d held onto the idea of pursuing a career in medicine, a notion his family had instilled in him for as long as he could remember. He\u2019d be the first doctor in the family, they told him. They\u2019d called him \u201cDr. Dean\u201d for as long as he could remember.\u00a0<\/p>\n
But Tanioka was drowning in the science-heavy coursework on the pre-med path. Much as he wanted to make it all work, he felt like he didn\u2019t deserve his seat at a prestigious place like Berkeley.\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt was like the path was disappearing,\u201d he said.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He didn\u2019t know it, but those struggles would soon reveal a new course \u2014 one he was particularly well-equipped to navigate.\u00a0<\/p>\n
![\"Dean](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/DeanTanioka-8-1024x683.jpg\")
Tanioka now walks with confidence through campus, a place he\u2019s build a community over the past decade. He said it\u2019s a long ways from where he started nearly a decade ago. <\/p>\n
Brandon S\u00e1nchez Mejia\/UC Berkeley<\/p>\n
A necessary reset<\/p>\n
As a boy growing up in Los Angeles, Tanioka wanted to become a firefighter, drawn to the profession\u2019s camaraderie and teamwork. Medicine, his family reasoned, was a logical place to put teamwork and knowledge into action. Hence, \u201cDr. Dean.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
He enrolled at Emory University but quickly felt out of place. It seemed he was the only person with a work-study position at the private research university. When finances got tight, he turned to a side hustle doing landscaping work \u2014 a job he was too embarrassed to tell anyone about.<\/p>\n
He was overwhelmed and unfocused, and his interest in classes was waning. By the end of his first year, he felt like he was just wasting time and racking up debt.\u00a0<\/p>\n
\u201cIt simultaneously felt like a predefined path to be the only doctor in the family,\u201d Tanioka said. \u201cAnd undefined, meaning I didn\u2019t know if it was in my heart.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n
Seeking a return west and a fresh start, he did a stint at Santa Monica College before arriving at Berkeley as an incoming junior in 2016. But the imposter syndrome returned, as did struggles in a science-heavy curriculum. At the end of his first year at Berkeley, Tanioka accepted a six-month job at an education technology firm in Boston. It was a far cry from medicine and a long way from California.\u00a0<\/p>\n
He didn\u2019t tell many people, but he felt like he might never return.\u00a0<\/p>\n
Yet with some distance from his academics, he met people who reframed what Berkeley could mean if he approached it differently, with a focus on community and curiosity instead of trying to live up to the expectations of others. He also reflected on how his background \u2014 growing up in a working, middle-class family still impacted by the legacy of Japanese internment camps \u2014 and mental health struggles might have affected his ability to move forward.<\/p>\n
For the first time, he realized that he could not just try to ignore those realities but instead use them for good.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt felt like a fresh start. It gave me perspective,\u201d Tanioka said. \u201cThese are some of the things that I felt were part of my story, my journey, part of myself.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u2018Berkeley needed this\u2019<\/p>\n
When he returned to campus in spring 2018, Tanioka began working with Berkeley Underground Scholars<\/a>, which helps people impacted by the criminal justice system to succeed in higher education. He also worked with the Teach in Prison<\/a> program, tutoring incarcerated people at San Quentin.<\/p>\n Courtesy of Dean Tanioka<\/p>\n It was as if being away from Berkeley taught him to embrace the things he\u2019d valued all along \u2014 community and camaraderie. It also freed him to shift his focus from a pre-med route to a sociology major. The study of educational systems and social structures for underrepresented groups fascinated him and also helped illuminate the systems that had shaped much of his own journey.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cIt felt like I had this expansion of my brainpower and motivation because I felt I was able to relieve myself of the external pressure, the academic pressure,\u201d Tanioka said. \u201cIt felt more true to my heart, wanting to do something that felt more like me.\u201d\u00a0<\/p>\n He met Mac Hoang around that time, a colleague from Underground Scholars who had an idea to build a student-led course that would help incoming first-generation, nontraditional students navigate Berkeley\u2019s \u201chidden curriculum.\u201d Tanioka was a senior at the time with a full course load and mentoring roles, but he was drawn to Hoang\u2019s idea.<\/p>\n \u201cBerkeley needed this,\u201d Tanioka said. He thought of the students who transferred, became overwhelmed, dropped out and returned home to the same service jobs they worked before college. He thought of those who held onto the expectations of others as they tried to make their way. He thought of students like him.\u00a0<\/p>\n Navigating Berkeley\u2019s unwritten rules<\/p>\n NAVCAL, short for Navigating the University of California, Berkeley<\/a>, gained early support from faculty sponsors and the Public Service Center<\/a>. Hoang and Tanioka structured the curriculum<\/a> around helping systemically marginalized students level the playing field with more privileged students.\u00a0<\/p>\n Meeting twice a week, students discuss assigned readings and also their own experiences around things like engaging professors during office hours or seeking research fellowships. They explore deep topics, like the role of power dynamics in education, the way one\u2019s upbringing and surroundings influence their beliefs, and tools to gain confidence. And they demystify the unspoken rules of higher education, developing both the critical awareness and practical skills needed to thrive at Berkeley and beyond.<\/p>\n The class had 14 students the first semester. Additional funding allowed it to grow to 43. The following year it grew to 90, with a constantly growing waitlist.\u00a0<\/p>\n His influence shows up in how students move: more confident, more connected, and committed to building ladders of opportunity.<\/p>\n Fabrizio Mejia, interim vice chancellor for the Division of Equity and Inclusion<\/p>\n Approximately 1,000 students have taken the course since it launched in 2018. Tanioka said participants have received more than $16 million in scholarships and fellowships, and approximately two-thirds of students have secured paid opportunities, including research roles and employment, through networks and mentorship cultivated in the program.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWhat makes Dean uniquely situated to lead NAVCAL is that he understands the \u2018hidden curriculum\u2019 not as an abstract concept but as something he has lived and then re-engineered for others to benefit from,\u201d said Fabrizio Mejia, Berkeley\u2019s interim vice chancellor for the Division of Equity and Inclusion, where Tanioka works. \u201cHis influence shows up in how students move: more confident, more connected, and committed to building ladders of opportunity for those who come after them.\u201d<\/p>\n This semester, there are 55 students enrolled and approximately 35 part-time peer mentors who work weekly with them. That\u2019s in addition to roughly 100 students on campus who have taken the course and often give back in other ways, like informal conversations with their peers or sharing connections and resources.<\/p>\n \u201cI felt there was this younger version of myself that needed this program. This was my calling to be of service to that prior version of me,\u201d Tanioka said. \u201cIn many ways, it helped because that shared history fostered the trust that our students needed.\u201d<\/p>\n Brandon S\u00e1nchez Mejia\/UC Berkeley<\/p>\n Fueling social mobility on campus \u2014 and nationwide<\/p>\n Tanioka sees his role as reminding enrolled students that they have the right to occupy space on campus \u2014\u00a0one of the program\u2019s four tenets, along with \u201ccommunity not competition,\u201d \u201ceach one teach one,\u201d and \u201ca togetherness approach.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cNAVCAL students are the underdogs of Berkeley, and they\u2019re the ones who are going to help promote change in society,\u201d said Tatiana Butte, a former participant and mentor. Since graduating in 2024, Butte has worked for the California governor\u2019s office and local government in San Diego County; she recently accepted a full ride to Georgetown University\u2019s master of public policy program. \u201cI cannot thank Dean enough. Obviously, grit and hard work will carry you far, but the right allies make all the difference.\u201d<\/p>\n Esme Nuno Mora, who experienced bouts of housing instability as a child, long saw community college as her dream school. But while attending Norco College in Riverside County, she decided to apply to Berkeley. Much to her surprise, she got in.\u00a0<\/p>\n NAVCAL students are the underdogs of Berkeley.<\/p>\n Tatiana Butte, NAVCAL alum<\/p>\n![\"A](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/teachinprison5-778x1024.jpeg\")
Tanioka (left) was part of the 2018 Teach In Prison facilitation team<\/p>\n![\"Dean](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/DeanTanioka-1-1024x683.jpg\")
When he was a student, Tanioka spent hours along Strawberry Creek \u2014\u00a0a place on campus that remains an important area for reflection for him today.<\/p>\n
![\"Esme](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Esme_award-1024x577.jpeg\")
Esme Nuno Mora received an advocacy award for her work in the HOPE Scholars program. <\/p>\n![\"Dean](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/Smith_Tanioka_NAVCAL-768x1024.jpeg\")
Outside of his graduation ceremony, Johnny Smith held a NAVCAL shirt. In the corner, it says \u201cCommunity > Competition,\u201d one of the program\u2019s core teachings.<\/p>\n![\"Tanioka,](\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ca\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/04\/NAVCAL_ChancellorGroup-1024x576.jpg\")
Tanioka and Chancellor Rich Lyons (middle) joined NAVCAL students for a group photo last semester.<\/p>\n