Anna Salem

Anna Salem is an organizer with the ACLU of Northern California, where she works on the LGBTQ and Education Equity teams. She works in coalition with community activists and organizations to address the school-to-prison pipeline, focusing on policing in schools, school discipline, and creating safe and inclusive schools for queer and transgender youth.

Some of Anna’s current projects include monitoring the implementation of the School Success and Opportunity Act, which supports the rights of transgender students. She is also working with community members and organizations in Stockton, California to address school discipline policies and the presence of police on K-12 campuses.

Recently, Anna worked in coalition with organizations across the state to support SB 1111 and AB 420. Both bills became laws and now protect the rights of students across California. Anna also recently collaborated with several local Native American tribes in Del Norte County, including the Yurok tribe, to build support for the extension of a settlement agreement with the Del Norte County Unified School District. The agreement aims to ensure that Native American students have equal opportunities to achieve educational success in schools, and promotes professional development training to increase cultural competency among teachers and staff.

Prior to her work with the ACLU, Anna was the program director with Community Youth Center in Concord, California. In her work with CYC, she tutored middle and high school students, headed up initiatives for outreach and program growth, and managed budgeting and fundraising for the Academic Excellence Program, a tutoring program serving over 100 students daily.

Anna has interned with Public Advocates, Inc., where she focused on high school curriculum standards and educational equity, and with the Sexuality Information and Education Council of the United States, where she researched sex education programs across the country.

Anna served as student body president at Scripps College, where one of her major priorities was to work for increased administrative and campus support of transgender students. She graduated cum laude with a dual B.A. in Politics and Humanities with a focus in race and gender inequalities in U.S. public policy. Anna currently serves on the Regional Council for Bend the Arc: A Jewish Partnership for Justice, and previously volunteered as a peer facilitator at the Pacific Center in Berkeley.