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.
Laura A. Hughes
Director of Narrative Strategies, PolicyLinkLaura A. Hughes, Director of Narrative Strategies at PolicyLink, is a curious learner, change-maker, and persuasive leader with high emotional intelligence. In this role, Laura is responsible for harnessing the power of narrative to advance racial equity and justice specific to housing for the more than one million individuals who...
Get To know Laura A.April Ignacio
Founder, Indivisible TohonoApril is Tohono O’odham and a mother to five (5). She studied religious studies and history at the University of Arizona but is especially proud of her Associates Degree from the Tohono O’odham Community College. April is a community organizer through the arts, is in the beginning stages of her...
Get To know AprilCaroline Isaacs
Program Director, American Friends Service CommitteeCaroline holds a Bachelor’s degree in Political Science from the College of Wooster and a Masters in Social Work from Arizona State University. She has authored several reports on the poor performance of for-profit incarceration in Arizona, including Private Prisons: The Public’s Problem (2011), which has been cited nationally as...
Get To know CarolineOmar Jadwat
Senior Staff Attorney, American Civil Liberties UnionOmar Jadwat is a Senior Staff Attorney with the Immigrants’ Rights Project of the American Civil Liberties Union. He focuses on combating anti-immigrant state and local laws, and other abusive immigration enforcement tactics; he was the co-lead counsel in the civil rights challenges to Arizona’s SB 1070 and numerous other...
Get To know OmarSharada Jambulapati
Senior Staff Attorney, Immigrant Justice Practice, Southern Poverty Law CenterSharada Jambulapati is the daughter of Indian immigrants and was raised in the Deep South as her father worked as the only immigrant farmer in the region and her mother shuffled between jobs as a factory seamstress, janitor, and nanny. Growing up on a farm in rural Georgia, Sharada experienced...
Get To know SharadaElon James White
CEO, This Week in Blackness Media LLCElon James White is a writer, performer, radio host, and CEO of This Week in Blackness Media, LLC, which is the home of the award-winning web series This Week in Blackness and TWiB! Radio. Elon has been featured on MSNBC's Melissa Harris-Perry, Up With Chris (Now All In With Chris...
Get To know ElonJonathan Jayes-Green
Director, UndocuBlack NetworkJonathan Jayes-Green is an organizer, speaker, strategist, and believer. He’s a queer undocumented Afro-Panamanian and one of the co-founders of the UndocuBlack Network. Jonathan received his Associate’s degree from Montgomery College and his bachelor’s degree from Goucher College. He comes into this work having served as liaison and advocate of...
Get To know JonathanCristina Jiménez
Managing Director, United We Dream NetworkCristina Jiménez is the Managing Director of the United We Dream Network. She is a co-founder of the Network and served as chair of the Board of Directors. Cristina has organized immigrant youth and workers for the passage of the DREAM Act, comprehensive immigration reform, and pro-immigrant legislation at the...
Get To know CristinaSol Jiménez
Social Media & Narrative Creator, Familia: Trans Queer Liberation MovementSol is a trans immigrant from Mexico City, a first-generation DACA recipient, and a renowned makeup artist. They have coordinated local and national racial justice work, prioritizing transgender communities and Black trans women.
Get To know SolErica Johnson
Founding Executive Director, Iowa Migrant Movement for JusticeErica Johnson has been working for positive changes in immigration policy at the local, state and federal levels since 2006. Originally from Iowa, Erica is the Founding Executive Director of the Iowa Migrant Movement for Justice.
Get To know Erica