This legislative session, we’ve hired a Policy Fellow to analyze the impact of proposed policies related to the LGBTQ community in all 50 states at the state legislative level. After a wide search with numerous qualified applicants, this week we welcomed Maryse Pearce to the team. Maryse is Equality Federation’s inaugural policy fellow. Her duties will be to analyze the impact of proposed policies related to the LGBTQ community in all 50 states at the state legislative level.

Maryse brings nearly a decade of engaging with LGBTQ communities and groups across the country, from Missouri to New York and Massachusetts. She spent four years at the Boston-based LGBT legal organization GLBTQ Legal Advocates & Defenders (GLAD), first as the Public Affairs and Education Assistant and then as the Community Engagement Coordinator. In that role, she educated youth and teachers about anti-bullying laws, lobbied the Massachusetts state legislature to pass healthcare protections for people living with HIV, and worked on a statewide coalition to improve services for transgender people.

She is currently a student at the Heller School for Social Policy and Management at Brandeis University, where she is receiving a Masters in Public Policy and an MBA in Nonprofit Management. She holds a bachelor’s degree in history from Washington University in St Louis. A native of Queens, NY, Maryse currently lives in Cambridge, MA, with her girlfriend and their cat. In her free time, she can be found biking or baking pies.

Send your welcome notes to Maryse here: maryse@equaltiyfederation.org

Welcome to the team, Maryse!