Program Director
As Program Director at Day One, Margarita oversees the Community Education, Peer Leadership and Legal Services programs. Margarita attended Georgetown University where she majored in English and minored in Women's Studies. She attended law school at the George Washington University School of Law where she participated in the Domestic Violence Legal Clinic, representing victims/survivors of domestic violence (DV) obtaining orders of protection from the DV Court in Washington, D.C. She was the recipient of the Maurice C. Shapiro Public Service Fellowship in her third year of law school, which funded her work at Ayuda Inc., representing asylum seekers in deportation proceedings in Washington, D.C. Her introduction to the New York City-based DV advocates' community was as an intern at the Community Law Offices of Legal Aid, Domestic Violence Unit, located in East Harlem.
Upon graduating from law school, Margarita was awarded an Equal Justice Works Fellowship in partnership with the Urban Justice Center's Mental Health Project to create a legal clinic for indigent Spanish-speaking mental health consumers in New York City. For three years, Margarita represented mental health consumers in a multidisciplinary setting, combining social and legal services, and represented clients in a wide array of civil legal issues, including disability benefits, housing, public assistance and Medicaid/Medicare. Afterwards, Margarita went on to serve the primarily Latina/o immigrant population of Washington Heights/Inwood at the Northern Manhattan Improvement Corporation (NMIC). At NMIC, Margarita defended tenants against evictions and represented survivors of domestic violence in family court and housing proceedings as well as filing DV-based immigration petitions.
