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As a newly appointed Program Officer for the Ford Foundation, Manuela Arciniegas looks forward to two more career-defining decades of advancing racial justice nationwide. 

Arciniegas was formerly the Director of the Andrus Family Fund, where she managed a grantmaking portfolio of 65+ organizations addressing gun violence reduction, trauma-informed care, divesting from prisons, and the intersection between immigration and justice systems.

Reflecting on the transition, Arciniegas says “I’m thrilled with the progress we’ve made in centering our commitment to building power for youth on the margins, and to sharing power with communities.”

Indeed, Arciniegas has much to celebrate. Alongside an extraordinary career helping Black and brown youth hold governments accountable, she remains grounded by the transformative capacity of arts and culture. She’s currently pursuing a Ph.D from the City University of New York, studying the intersections of the African diaspora, Afro-Caribbean religion, music, and empowerment.

Undergirding her commitment to young people is the awareness that youth can be their own change agents. “Our young people are innovative and brilliant,” she says.

Arciniegas exhibits that rare kind of leadership that centers collaboration over competition. As a co-founder of We Are All Dominican, she partnered with a group of New York-based activists fighting human rights abuses of Haitian communities in the Dominican Republic. In her spare time, Arciniegas directs Legacy Women, an all-women’s traditional Afro-Caribbean music ensemble she founded to empower women and girls through musicianship.

She’s performed at venues like Symphony Space, and received honors from the National Association of Latino Arts and Culture, and the New York State Council of the Arts.