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Josina Morita

Josina Morita is a Senior Research Associate of the Applied Research Center (ARC). She started at ARC in 2000 as an intern on the Welfare Race and Gender Equity project. In 2002, she came on staff to evaluate statewide collaborations addressing the impacts of devolution on welfare and social services. She moved to Chicago later that year as a Research Associate on the Racial Justice Leadership Initiative. With ARC, Josina has published reports on welfare, education, youth organizing and racial equity policy. She has also provided racial justice training to over thirty community organizations nationwide. 

 Josinas activism started at Berkeley High School, fighting an onslaught of racist propositions that would end Affirmative Action and bilingual education in the state, as well as deny healthcare and education to undocumented immigrants in California. She continued her racial justice work at Pitzer College where she co-founded the Student of Color Coalition, a multiracial student organization addressing racial profiling issues on and off campus. Josina received a B.A. in Sociology and International Race Relations from Pitzer College in 2002. She is now earning a Masters in Urban Planning and Public Policy at the University of Illinois at Chicago. 

 Josina's writings on immigration, racial profiling and Asian American issues have been published in the Daily Southtown, WarTimes and AREA magazine. She contributed to an anthology on the Fourth United Nations Conference on Women, Beyond Beijing, published by Beyond Media when she was 15-years-old. Her latest publication, Facing Race: Illinois Legislative Report Card on Racial Equity was released in the fall of 2006. 

 From 1998-2002, Josina was the Editorial Assistant for the Association of Black Psychologists monthly journal, Psych Discourse. In 2001, she worked on UNICEFs Diphalana Continuing Education Project in Mahalapye, Botswana, aimed at empowering girl-mothers to continue their education by providing advocacy, counseling, and free day-care services. Josina is an Executive Board Member of the Japanese American Service Committee and former Readers Bureau member of the Chicago Reporter.