Our Fellows
The Opportunity Agenda’s Communications Institute Fellows are media-ready experts on some of the country’s most urgent challenges, coming largely from communities most affected by those challenges. For journalists seeking voices with a grassroots perspective that links economic opportunity, criminal justice, immigrant opportunity, and racial justice issues to the lived experiences of Americans, Communications Fellows are ideal spokespeople.
Gabriela Villareal
Policy Analyst, California Immigrant Policy CenterGabriela Villareal is a Policy Analyst with the California Immigrant Policy Center. She provides policy advocacy towards ending the unjust detention and deportation of immigrants. Previously, she was the Immigration Advocacy Policy Coordinator for the New York Immigration Coalition and also worked for Safe Horizon’s Anti-Trafficking Program as the Training...
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Preeti Vissa
Chief Operating Officer, Greenlining InstitutePreeti Vissa is the Director of Greenlining’s Community Reinvestment Program, which focuses on building wealth and economic sustainability in communities of color. Vissa works on a holistic set of wealth-building issues including homeownership, small business development, supplier diversity, financial services, and job creation. She also leads Greenlining’s efforts to ensure...
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Manar Waheed
Legislative and Advocacy Counsel, ACLUAs Legislative and Advocacy Counsel at the ACLU, Manar works on the intersection of issues impacting Muslims, Arabs, Middle Easterners, and South Asians, including immigration, national security and counterterrorism, and hate violence. Manar was previously the Deputy Policy Director for Immigration at the Obama White House Domestic Policy Council in...
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Jo-Ann Wallace
President and CEO, National Legal Aid & Defender AssociationJo-Ann Wallace is the President and CEO of the National Legal Aid & Defender Association (NLADA). She was previously NLADA’s Senior Vice President for Programs, responsible for oversight of both the Civil Legal Aid and Indigent Defense Program agendas. From 1994–2000, Ms. Wallace served as Director of the Public Defender...
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Roy Waterman
Criminal Justice Project Manager, Jewish Council for Public AffairsRoy Waterman is the Jewish Council for Public Affairs (JCPA) Criminal Justice Project Manager. This project is focused on educating and empowering the Jewish community relations field to advocate on criminal justice reform at the national and local level. He will assist to mobilize these communities against the modern day Civil...
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Aisha Wells
Paid Family Leave Organizer, Mothering JusticeAisha Wells organizes with mamas of color in the community to understand the paid leave issues in the workplace to help pass legislation.
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Jheanelle Wilkins
Director of State and Local Government Affairs, The Leadership ConferenceJheanelle Wilkins is an advocate for underserved communities and dedicated to creating greater opportunity for all people to live their best lives. She has pursued this passion through advocacy for a decade at The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights, the nation’s premier civil rights coalition, where she is...
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Cheryl Wilkins
Associate Director, The Center for JusticeCheryl Wilkins is committed to ending the nation’s reliance on incarceration, developing new approaches to safety and justice, and participating in the national and global conversation around developing effective criminal justice policy.
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Alisha Williams
Senior Staff Attorney, Peter Cicchino Youth ProjectAlisha Williams works with homeless or street-involved queer and trans youth, providing free civil legal services at the Peter Cicchino Youth Project. Prior to working at PCYP, Alisha was at the Sylvia Rivera Law Project, where they served as the Director of the Prisoner Justice Project from 2012 to 2014....
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Pamela Winn
Founding Director, RestoreHER US.AmericaKnown as "The Face of Dignity For Incarcerated Women", Pamela Winn is an activist from Atlanta, GA who studied Biology at Spelman College, received three degrees in Nursing, and worked over 10 years as a Registered Women’s Health Nurse prior to serving a 78-month federal sentence for a white-collar crime...
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