Role: Communications and Development Associate

Background: Ana María Sánchez-Castillo is the Communications and Development Associate, working to amplify foster youth voices through social media and through connecting the diverse departments of the organization to drive meaningful impact.

Ana María first began her career in empowering marginalized voices in high school, volunteering at Lansing for Cesar E Chavez foundation. There she learned and became invigorated by the power of community and creating spaces for underrepresented voices. At the University of Michigan, she became increasingly passionate about social justice, which pushed her to contribute in project building for the campus’s Latinx organization. Later, she took on leadership roles in a newspaper section dedicated to uplifting the voices of People of Color on campus. She was recruited by her older brother Lansing to join the NFYI Michigan Leadership Corps in 2019 and was emboldened to take part in reshaping and advancing children’s rights. Before returning to NFYI as a staff member, she worked in grassroots organizing, mobilizing communities to shape statewide environmental policies, building DEI programming, and facilitating race and ethnicity dialogue for adolescents in Metro Detroit.

Ana María graduated with a Bachelor’s degree in Global Environment and Health with a focus in Latin America and Spanish Language in 2024.

Why you like working at NFYI: As an alumna of the foster care system it has always been important to me to improve the circumstances of youth with similar trauma and pain. I also know and am grateful for the power of community and the care involved in it. It excites me to take part in the community of positively impacting young people.

Passions/Hobbies/Aspiration: Ana María loves reading and journaling daily, along with writing poetry and getting her daily steps in. She enjoys connecting with nature and people, spending time outdoors, expressing herself creatively, and sharing moments with friends. Her favorite genre to read is magical realism, which inspires her connection to the characters in her books. As the daughter of a Cuban refugee and having spent time in Cuba herself, she dreams of one day improving relations between the U.S. and her father’s motherland in hopes of improving the circumstances on the island.

Fun personal fact: Ana María has a cat named Tabby she renamed Princesa Josephina upon meeting her, because she believes it suits her better.