Pilar Maria Weiss ’94, has spent more than two decades doing the kind of work UWC hopes to inspire. This year’s UWC-USA Giulio Regeni Alumni Impact Award honors that sustained commitment: a life’s work rooted in justice, courage, and collective action.
Nominated by peers and friends, Pilar is described as both a strategist and builder—someone who doesn’t just join movements, but helps construct the infrastructure that allows them to grow. As founder and director of Community Justice Exchange, she has created a national hub supporting efforts to end mass incarceration, immigration detention, and systems of surveillance. Her work brings together organizers, researchers, technologists, and attorneys to challenge entrenched systems of inequity.
That vision is perhaps most visible in the National Bail Fund Network, which Pilar launched in 2016. What began as a bold idea is now a coalition of more than 90 community bail funds working across the United States. The network has helped free thousands of people from pretrial detention and immigration custody, while also supporting protest movements and defending the right to dissent. When millions mobilized in 2020 following the murder of George Floyd, this infrastructure enabled rapid action—raising tens of millions of dollars and mobilizing millions of donors in a matter of days.
At its core, Pilar’s work reflects a belief central to the UWC mission: that systems can be changed when people act with both conviction and connection across differences. Her approach bridges movements—linking labor rights, racial justice, and immigrant justice—while grounding strategy in community experience.
“It’s such an honor to be part of remembering Giulio Regeni and his brave work. When I first heard of Giulio’s murder in 2016, I was so moved as his story and research work represented so much of what UWC had meant for me. My time at UWC-USA imprinted a commitment to contesting and shifting power, while also teaching me to see the connections across movements and geographies. I hope that my current work, fighting for the abolition of the US carceral and immigration detention systems, can do its small part moving us a little closer to the larger, global vision of social justice our younger UWC selves could see so clearly.”
In honoring Pilar, UWC-USA recognizes not just impact, but a powerful continuation of its mission—lived with urgency and purpose.
Pilar will speak to our graduating students on campus during graduation in May.