Growing up in Iran, Bita Daryabari immersed herself in Persian poetry and prose, memorizing the words of Rumi, the great 13th-century poet and scholar. She moved to the United States as a teenager to pursue her education, but her love for the history and culture of her homeland continues to guide her philanthropy. “It’s a part of your life, your culture,” she explains.
In 2016, Daryabari made a major gift to the University of California, Berkeley, to bolster the study of Iranian languages, literature, arts and culture, and history at the university. The Bita Daryabari Presidential Chair in Iranian Studies supports a faculty member in the Department of Near Eastern Studies whose research focuses on ancient Iran. Daryabari’s efforts to broaden the understanding of Persian language and literature at institutions of higher education extends well beyond Berkeley. At the University of California, Davis, she endowed the Bita Daryabari Presidential Chair in Persian Language and Literature; at Stanford University, she created the Bita Daryabari Endowment in Persian Letters; and at the University of Cambridge, she is a major backer of the Shahnama Project, based in the Shahnameh Centre for Persian Studies at Pembroke College. The Tehran native is also the founder and executive director of the Pars Equality Center, a community-based social and legal services organization “dedicated to helping the Iranian-American and other immigrant communities realize their full potential as informed, self-reliant, and responsible members of the American society.” Daryabari’s additional philanthropic endeavors include founding the Unique Zan Foundation, which empowers women through health and education initiatives to promote peace and positive change (zan means woman in Persian).
Daryabari majored in computer science at California State University, Hayward, and earned a master’s in telecommunications management at Golden Gate University in San Francisco. She began her career as a software engineer at the Silicon Valley start-up GammaLink, moving on to MCI Communications, where she worked until 1996. Her honors include the Ellis Island Medal of Honor (2012), the PAAIA Philanthropist of the Year Award (2010), and Golden Gate University’s Alumni of the Year Award (2008). In 2018, Golden Gate University awarded Daryabari an honorary doctorate.
“A better future simply cannot be built on an imaginary past, and must include all the cultures and hues that make our country unique,” she said. “E Pluribus Unum — the guiding motto of American citizenship which is printed on dollar bills — cannot be limited to a certain race or gender, and must be seen in inclusive terms.”
