Spotlight: Senior Fellow, Angelina Rueda
Bridging involves bringing people together, listening to diverse voices, and being active in your community. Senior Fellow Angelina Rueda has demonstrated years of commitment to these practices and continues to embody what an active citizen looks like. She has empowered change and created a community in Winona, Minnesota and exemplified what is possible when you keep an open mind, desire to know your neighbors, and bring people together for a common goal. Now a Senior Fellow at Engage Winona, Angelina has piloted programs and initiatives designed to bring the community together. She is a champion of what it means to be an active citizen, to care about your community, and strive for better.
Often, the real work of strengthening democracy begins at the local level. Angelina embodies this mantra. She has taken like a duck to water to her new community of Winona, in Southern Minnesota. Angelina originally came to Winona to attend Winona State and ended up falling in love with the town, as anyone who knows her will attest to. There, she discovered Civic Bridgers’ Campus Bridging Initiative, an immersion that unites urban and rural college students for cross-cultural cooperation.
As a Senior at Winona State, Angelina interned at Engage Winona to complete her degree in sociology, transitioning into a Civic Bridger Fellow at the same host site. Angelina has shown immense leadership and collaboration through the Community Builders Book Club. These monthly gatherings at Winona Public Library encourage discussion on local action, help bridge divides, and distinguish the roles of people and governments in shaping our communities. During Operation Metro Surge, these meetings helped people to respond thoughtfully to the events and gather in a space of healing and build a better civic culture.
Last year, she taught Civic Bridgers’ Beyond Civics course, teaming up with two teachers that teach kids with disabilities and Individualized Education Plans to teach civics at Winona Area High School.
Angelina felt that one year of service was insufficient to build the type of impact she wants to have in Winona. Now a Senior Fellow in her second year of service with Engage Winona, Angelina has grasped every opportunity to be an active leader in her community, showing how we can all embed ourselves into the places we call home, bring people together, and create positivity through local initiatives.
