Monica Ruelas Mares (she/her/ella) is a South Sacramento native and is passionate about social change through the lens of healing and building transformational relationships. At Youth Forward, Monica serves as the coordinator of the Sac Kids First Coalition where she is building an advocacy platform with youth voices at the forefront. This includes organizing and building relationships with community based organizations and local schools to take action on policies and measures impacting kids in Sacramento.
Prior to joining Youth Forward, Monica was the Collective Impact Coordinator at the Latino Coalition for a Healthy California (LCHC) where she was a facilitator for LCHC’s Health Ambassador program providing women and youth of color in Los Angeles and the Central Valley advocacy tools to catalyze change in their local community.
Monica received her Bachelor of Arts in Geography from the University of California, Los Angeles. Aside from her work with Youth Forward she is the co-founder and facilitator of arise – a virtual support group for womxn across California. She is a certified facilitator of self awareness workshops and was certified through Self Awareness and Recovery (SAR) in Sacramento.
Monica is the proud daughter of immigrants from Mexico and the youngest of 4. Outside of work she loves spending time with her nieces and nephews, catching up on pop culture, and listening to good music!
