Paloma Garcia-Lopez
Preferred pronouns:
she/her
Areas of expertise:
Strategic planning
Social justice
Latino studies
Role: Board Member
Bio:
Paloma Garcia-Lopez is the associate director of the Institute for Latino Studies at the University of Notre Dame. In her role, Garcia-Lopez manages and oversees all of the activities and staff of the institute. Garcia-Lopez focuses on enhancing annual programming, special events, communications, fundraising, and budgeting. She is a central figure in the development of a strategic plan to support scholarly initiatives in Latino studies as a key component of Notre Dame’s academic mission. At the College of Arts and Letters level, she serves as a Diversity Catalyst. Additionally, she serves as the president of AdelanteND: Latinx Staff and Faculty Association, an employee resource group sponsored by the human resources department.
Prior to her position at the university, Paloma served as the inaugural executive director of the Maker Education Initiative where she launched a national organization at the Clinton Global Initiative-America conference, established the board of directors, secured multi-year corporate and foundation support, and executed four national programs impacting 100,000 educators annually. She worked closely with the founder of MakerMedia to realize his vision as part of President Obama's Educate to Innovate Campaign. Preceding her work at MakerEd, Garcia-Lopez served as director of the Posse Foundation site in Washington, D.C., a national college access and leadership development organization recognized by President Obama and the Catalogue for Philanthropy. She became engrossed in nonprofit management as the development director of Future Leaders of America, Inc., the country's premier Latino youth leadership organization. Since 2007, she has extensive experience consulting and training nonprofit boards and executive directors in best practices for sustainability.
Paloma started her career stuffing envelopes and filing news clippings as a student assistant at the United Farm Workers union in La Paz, California at 9 years old, where her parents worked for Cesar E. Chavez. Her family relocated to the pacific northwest for the third great Grape Boycott before settling in Ventura County, California, serving the Mexican immigrant population in various capacities (doing "papeles," teatro Chicano, and folkloric dance) in the citrus and strawberry capitals of the world.
Paloma Garcia-Lopez is a graduate of Stanford University and the Stanford Graduate School of Education. She co-authored Learning to Teach For Social Justice, published in 2002 by Teachers College Press-Columbia University, with Dr. Linda Darling-Hammond and Jennifer French. At the time she was a credentialed social studies teacher in the San Francisco Bay Area.
Currently, Paloma is the board treasurer of the Community Science Workshop Network, a STEAM organization serving low-income families across the state of California. She serves on the board of the Coalition for Spiritual and Public Leadership based in Chicago. In 2021, she joined the Advisory Council of the Indiana chapter of Proteus, Inc.
Off the clock:
Paloma resides in South Bend with her husband and three children.
