Sami Iwata was Senior Advisor at the San Francisco Human Rights Commission (HRC) and joined the Office of Racial Equity when Director Simley launched the office. She works with city departments to advance racial equity in San Francisco, providing technical assistance to build organizational capacity, skills and competencies. She has also co-led the HRC’s Racial Equity Foundations workshops for 900 City employees to date. With Director Simley, she leads the monthly Citywide Racial Equity Working group for City employees.

Sami was selected to be a FUSE Fellow and had the opportunity to join the HRC to work towards a more equitable world for her child’s generation and others. Prior to joining the City, Sami led teams and developed products and services in diverse industries such as higher-education publishing at Pearson, nonprofit sector at NatureBridge, design strategy at Frog, and technology at Adobe. Sami holds an MBA from the Haas School of Business at UC Berkeley and a BA from Yale University. She is also a trained personal coach.

Sami’s work in community started in college, leading playful theater game workshops at local elementary schools. She has guided for Environmental Traveling Companions, an accessible outdoor adventure nonprofit, and co-led its Diversity Committee for many years, served on the board of the San Francisco Bicycle Coalition, and volunteered with Reading Partners. Sami is currently a Board Member of Tandem, Partners in Early Learning. Tandem serves children 0-5 years old in the Bay Area, working at the intersection of early education and social justice by co-creating high-quality early learning experiences with families and communities.