Michele Rudy
Esperanza Project for National Ministries - summer program for unaccompanied migrant youth
Phoenix, Arizona
Michele Rudy is a doctoral candidate in Education Leadership (Ed.L.D) at Harvard Graduate School of Educaton. She has organized for education equity with undocumented and migrant students for over 16 years. She worked with United We Dream, the largest network of undocumented students in the country, on the 2010 national campaign for the Dream Act, which narrowly passed the House and failed in the Senate, and on the campaign for DACA that won protection from deportation for 1.7 million undocumented students. Working with Professor Marshall Ganz at the Kennedy School of Government, Michele led a national training program introducing immigrant youth leaders to Ganz’s leadership and organizing model.
Most recently, Michele worked at Arizona State University Entrepreneurship + Innovation, where she focused on entrepreneurship as a vehicle for economic empowerment with the immigrant community. She founded Cultivate, an education non-profit, to address the barriers that unaccompanied migrant high school aged youth face in accessing education in Phoenix. Michele is dedicated to addressing issues of equity in education for immigrant students through empowerment, education, social entrepreneurship and movement building.