NEW YORK, NY, NOV. 21, 2008 – Rinku Sen, Vice Chairperson of The Schott Foundation for Public Education, will receive the 2008 Progressive Leadership Award from Citizen Action of New York at an awards ceremony in New York City on Dec. 2, 2008.

“Rinku is a champion for racial justice. She’s a passionate, strategic and hard working leader, activist and intellectual force.  Whether she’s wielding the power of the pen or she’s convening a group of grassroots advocates, Rinku is a woman of extraordinary talent, drive and conviction. This award is well deserved,” says Dr. John H. Jackson, President and CEO of The Schott Foundation.

Ms. Sen recently published her latest book – co-authored by Fekkak Mamdouh – The Accidental American: Immigration and Citizenship in the Age of Globalization (Berrett-Koehler Publishers).  It looks at the challenges and contradictions of U.S. immigration policy. Her previous book, Stir It Up: Lessons in Community Organizing (Jossey-Bass), was released in the fall of 2003. She has written extensively about immigration, community organizing, and women’s lives for a wide variety of publications including Third Force, AlterNet, tompaine.com, Race, Poverty & the Environment, Amerasia Journal and Colorlines. She edited We are the Ones We Are Waiting For: Women of Color Organizing for Transformation, published by the Urban Rural Missions of the World Council of Churches in 1995. She has been the principal investigator on research projects for the Ford Foundation and the Ms. Foundation. She is also the author of “A Positive Future for Black Boys: Building the Movement,” a report published in December 2006 by The Schott Foundation. In 2004, Ms. Sen was honored with the Asian American Journalists Association Dr. Suzanne J. Ahn Award for social justice coverage.

Ms. Sen is the President and Executive Director of the Applied Research Center (ARC) and Publisher of ColorLines magazine. She started her organizing career as a student activist at Brown University, fighting race, gender and class discrimination on campuses. She received a B.A. in Women’s Studies from Brown University in 1988 and an M.S. in Journalism at Columbia University (2005).

About The Schott Foundation for Public Education

Founded in 1991, The Schott Foundation for Public Education seeks to develop and strengthen a broad-based and representative movement to achieve fully resourced high quality preK-12 public education.