Miguel A. Garcia JR.
Mr. Garcia, an only child, was born in New York City and raised in the Bronx. His parents migrated from Caguas and Dorado, Puerto Rico post World War II. He cites their struggle to achieve an education in Puerto Rico as his inspiration for pursuing higher education. Despite humble roots growing up in the South Bronx, he set his sights on college and earned a bachelor’s degree in History and Political Science from Fordham University, and a National Urban Fellow in Public Administration from The City University of New York, Baruch College School of Public Affairs.
Currently, he is the President & CEO of National Urban Fellows, Inc. (NUF), an organization that works to develop cohorts of diverse leaders in the public and nonprofit sectors. In this role, he is responsible for NUF’s overall vision, leadership, and management. He previously served as the organization’s director of programs and led the signature Master of Public Administration Fellowship Program, a full-time graduate degree program at Baruch, which focuses on bringing outstanding, diverse professionals into leadership roles in the public services arena.
Mr. Garcia, who founded Health Opportunities High School in the Bronx and served as its first Director, has also served as a program director for the National Themes Program at the Primerica Foundation, Dean of crisis intervention for special education students and Head Dean at DeWitt Clinton High School, and academic coordinator for an entrepreneurship honors program.
He is a member of the Hispanic Scholarship Fund’s New York Advisory Council, has served on several boards in New York City and New York State, and was elected to serve as a community school board member in the Bronx. He, himself, was a National Urban Fellow in 1985, and was also honored with an Institute for Educational Leadership Fellowship.
His advice to students about to graduate college: “Stay focused, work strategically and collaboratively, embrace change and success, develop authentic relationships, continually reflect on performance, work smart not harder, stay technologically proficient, remember family and community and, finally, stay in the fight for the long haul. Dream greatness and be unstoppable.”
Miguel is the proud father of Miguel III and Bianca Elysse, recent graduates of Baruch’s Marxe School and Emory’s Rawlings School. He is a charismatic individual and serves as a consummate role model to thousands of students who have come across his path and want to make enduring change.
