Daonese Johnson-Colón
Daonese Johnson-Colón is inspiring change in the New York City community, and across the country, through her amazing career and passion for educating and mentoring tomorrow's social justice leaders. Daonese has dedicated her career to building spaces that promote leadership, inclusivity, and equity to foster personal and professional development in education and criminal justice reform. She has 12 years of leadership experience in nonprofit administration and workforce management. Daonese has served as the faculty mentor for the New York Giants' annual cohort of five fellows in the Giants' Touchdown Fellowship program at John Jay College of Criminal Justice since the program's inception in 2019.
Daonese Johnson-Colón is currently the Chief Operating Officer at PushBlack, the nation's largest nonprofit media organization for Black Americans, reaching 9 million people across multiple platforms. PushBlack tells empowering stories on Black life and history that inspire people to take liberating actions in the best interest of Black communities. Her mission is to create compelling media on the richness of Black life and history that inspires people to take actions benefiting Black communities culturally, economically, and politically.
Prior to joining PushBlack, Daonese served as the Vice President of Operations/COO for JustLeadershipUSA (JLUSA), whose mission is to amplify the power of people who have been directly impacted by the criminal legal system to self-organize and empower their communities to dismantle racist and oppressive systems in their communities to build a more just country.
Daonese is also an adjunct lecturer for John Jay College of Criminal Justice's Accelerate Complete Engage (ACE) program, a cohort program designed to dramatically improve the percentage of students who graduate with a bachelor's degree by providing participating students with a comprehensive program of academic, financial, and social interventions. She's also involved with the Justice Capital Initiative Fellowship, which is designed to prepare students to explore careers related to their majors and interests.
For all of her amazing efforts, Daonese was a recipient of the NAACP Minority Achievement Recognition Award.