Sandra Rodriguez has been with Impact Justice since 2017 and brings nearly 10 years of experience in restorative justice research, education, advocacy, circle-keeping, restorative community conferencing facilitation and resident-led, issue-based community organizing. In her role as senior program specialist on the Restorative Justice Project at Impact Justice, she works with several U.S. counties partnering with Impact Justice to implement community-based, pre-charge restorative justice diversion programs by providing customized training and technical assistance to nonprofit organizations and their respective system partners.
Prior to joining Impact Justice, Sandra attended San Diego State University’s dual master’s degree program in Latin American studies and public administration with a concentration in criminal justice. As part of her studies, she conducted field research on transnational crime networks in Oaxaca, Mexico, human rights violations by the Municipal Police Department in Tijuana, Mexico, and youth diversion in San Diego, CA. She is currently working on her master’s thesis on restorative justice in Latin America and among the Latinx diaspora in the United States.
As an organizer, she led the campaign to establish sustainable pre-charge restorative justice diversion for youth in the San Diego region as well as the campaign for the adoption of a resident-authored School Climate Bill of Rights at San Diego Unified School District, which prioritized district-wide implementation of restorative practices at one of the largest school districts in the nation.
Sandra currently volunteers as a facilitator for the Ahimsa Collective’s Victim Offender Dialogue program and as a co-facilitator for its REALIZE program inside Valley State Prison. Regardless of what form of restorative justice Sandra is involved in, she remains dedicated to working closely with communities near and far to build power by dreaming of and creating a reality where the definition of justice is the opportunity for healing and the result of collective healing is the liberation of all people.