Emily Connor is an MSW student at UAlbany. Currently, she is interning at a mental health clinic. Her internship during her undergraduate career, at United Tenants of Albany, sparked a passion for systemic reform that has carried on throughout her graduate career. She has been coordinating with Citizen Action with the goal of establishing a student volunteer group. She hopes this group will bridge the gap between micro and macro students, showing the importance of unity and a drive for social change.
Samantha Rini, LMSW is the Political Education Program Manager at Citizen Action of New York. She is also a licensed social worker and an alumni of the UAlbany School of Social Welfare (graduated in '18). Samantha has been working at Citizen Action for 6 months in this new program where the major goal is to shift the narrative about income inequality in our society and that racial justice is economic justice. She knows we must move forward through collective activism that calls out racial capitalism and its' societal impacts in communities and relationships.
Citizen Action of New York is a grassroots, membership organization that spans New York State- from New York City to Buffalo. They fight for social, racial, economic and environmental justice, and battle against the forces of racial capitalism. Citizen Action approaches their issue work on a trajectory of structural reforms. They take on issues that make people’s lives better today while creating the political and ideological environment for transformational change and a world full of opportunity, love, respect and dignity.
