UPCOMING ULC EVENT
Youth & Young Adult Civic Engagement: See Differently
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Shamichael Hallman, Director of Civic Health and Economic Opportunity, Urban Libraries Council
Shamichael is a social, civic and tech innovator. As a '23 Loeb Fellow at the Harvard Graduate School of Design, he explored how urban design and planning can make for socially inclusive cities. He has served as the Senior Library Manager with Memphis Public Libraries where he guided the reimagining of the historic Cossitt Library. His 2020 TEDx talk "Reimagining the Public Library to Reconnect the Community" garnered international acclaim. In 2021 he co-founded Libraries as Bridges which focuses on evaluating how libraries build social cohesion, promote civic renewal and advance the ideals of a healthy democracy.
Elizabeth Clay Roy, Chief Executive Officer, Generation Citizen
Elizabeth Clay Roy is a lifelong leader of civic engagement and social change initiatives, and the new Chief Executive Officer of Generation Citizen, a national nonprofit committed to providing youth with the knowledge and skills they need to actively participate in our democracy. Leading Generation Citizen brings Elizabeth full circle to her childhood roots, when she campaigned door to door for candidates in Boston before she was old enough to vote. She was so active in voter registration drives that PBS’s show In the Mix chose her to lead youth coverage of the 2000 Presidential election.
Prior to joining Generation Citizen, Elizabeth was Executive Director of TakeRoot Justice, a New York City-based social justice organization that supports grassroots organizations and provides legal services to over 2000 clients each year. Elizabeth’s work at TakeRoot Justice built on her success as an entrepreneurial and collaborative leader, especially as Chief of Staff at Phipps Neighborhoods where she co-led South Bronx Rising Together, an education equity collective impact partnership. Elizabeth was the founding Deputy Director of Opportunity Nation, a national campaign to expand economic mobility where, with research partner Measure of America, she created the Opportunity Index, a first-of-its-kind measurement of contributing factors for economic opportunity at the state and local level. She began her career working in participatory planning in India and serving Massachusetts Governor Deval Patrick as a Policy Advisor and the Director of Grassroots Governance.
Elizabeth co-authored Shaping Vibrant Cities, a guidebook on effective community-led urban planning based on her participatory governance work with Janaagraha in Bangalore, India. A long-time champion of experiential learning, she serves on the Board of World Learning, a leader in study abroad and global development. In 2022, she received the EBONY Power 100 and Black Voices for Black Justice Awards, and in 2023, the 1954 Charles Hamilton Houston Beacon Award, all to recognize the power and potential of real-world democracy education to advance an inclusive, multi-racial democracy.
Vanessa Tucker, Senior Program Officer, Blank Family Foundation
Vanessa Tucker joined the Arthur M. Blank Family Foundation staff in June 2024 and serves as senior program officer for Democracy. In this role, Vanessa plays a key role in executing the foundation’s inaugural Democracy strategy. Vanessa previously served as a Program Officer on the democracy team at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation. She led the foundation’s grantmaking to improve campaigns and elections, prevent political violence and combat digital disinformation.
Before that, Vanessa served as vice president for research and analysis at Freedom House. In that role, her work included in-depth democracy research and collaborating with a network of ideologically diverse organizations and experts. She previously held positions at the Belfer Center and the Women and Public Policy Program at Harvard University’s Kennedy School.