Rising Organizers builds local democracy—by and for the people living it.

Rising Organizers is more than a training school—we’re building a bench of leaders fighting for our collective futures. We know our communities and our democracy are not facing short-term problems, and so we don’t seek short-term solutions.

Instead, we build robust infrastructure that lasts. A five year longitudinal study found that 81% of our first class class was still organizing five years after the program.

The secret to this success is simple: our cycle of organizing which models how we train, develop, and organize alumni of our programs.

We place our fellows with organizations that matter, help them start new ones, and bring them into our democracy-building campaigns and programs.

(Some of) our wins

• Ioana (Spring ‘20) transitioned from being a public school math teacher to being an organizer in Maryland. In this role, she won a series of state-wide policies protecting immigrants from ICE, including closing a loophole that allowed ICE to exploit data to track, detain, and deport Maryland residents.

• Emily (Spring '18) led an organizing effort among fitness professionals that led to increased worker protections during COVID-19 and was covered in national outlets such as The Washington Post, BuzzFeed News, Men's Health, and Washingtonian.

• Hiram and Nancy (Spring ‘19 & ‘20) revived a faltering immigrant rights organization, which now has 16 staff members and provides hundreds of home-delivered meals to immigrants in DC alongside advocacy and know-your-rights programs.