Railyn Aguado

Railyn is a first-generation, Filipina immigrant, who has organized in California since 2019 within diverse non-profit organizations advocating for youth justice and immigrant rights.

At the University of California, Berkeley her passion sparked in fighting for spaces where voices are often unheard. This instilled her life mission to assure that the spaces she immerse herself in everyone is valued, visible, and heard.

Her work started at the Educational Opportunity Program, in assuring low-income, first-generation, and historically underrepresented students have the resources they need to succeed in higher education. With this, it led to her deepened advocacy of fighting for Undocumented students, through the Undocumented Students Program as the Communications Coordinator. During her last year, she worked for the Office of Civic Engagement and Immigrant Affairs (OCEIA) in San Francisco as a Grant Liaison with the LGBT Asylum Project, serving as the first and only immigration firm offering asylum support.

Upon graduation, she became the first Dr. Prince White Fellow with the Justice Reinvestment Coalition of Alameda County and led the Political Education Campaign in assuring residents are informed about their rights within the county.

During this time, she was also able to work with Free Our Kids, in advocating for a justified treatment of youth by terminating the use of pepper spray and prone restraints in juvenile halls. An experience that strengthen her motivations to join CURYJ, in continuing this work through the intersection of policy and communications.

She hopes that throughout her work, she is able to amplify the voices of the unheard and assure that stories are equally amplified and visible.