About YWCA Madison

YWCA is dedicated to eliminating racism, empowering women and promoting peace, justice, freedom, and dignity for all. Founded in 1909, YWCA Madison:

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Gery Paredes Vásquez, CEO, Biography

Gery Paredes Vásquez (ella, tu, she, her) is a lifelong practitioner and collaborator for intersectional justice, healing and collective liberation. 

She is currently serving as YWCA Madison’s CEO, after six years of directing the Race and Gender department, in which role she collaborated with this beloved team and a growing community of artists, advocates, organizers, educators and practitioners in the co-creation of offerings such as the Racial Justice Series Community Series, YWCA Madison’s annual Racial Justice Summit, as well as intersectional race-based offerings such as the BIPOC Healing Justice and Co-Liberation Series. In this role,  she has also provided collaborative consulting services for equity to organizations via YWCA Madison’s Creating Equitable Organizations partnership program. 

Gery’s connection to YWCA Madison goes back to 2012 when she first  volunteered as a  facilitator for the Racial Justice series, to then become a full time  associate, later a  Race and Gender Equity Coordinator and Manager before becoming the Director of this same department.

Like many Latine people, Gery was born to families of mixed ethnicities and races due to colonization: Indigenous Quechua, Aymara and Guarani with Spanish. This reality shapes her personal journey of learning, unlearning and healing as well as continues to inspire her work for intersectional justice and collective liberation every day.

In the twenty years of her professional practice, Gery has collaborated with people, communities, and organizations from around the world. These experiences gave her the opportunity to co-create programs, build capacity and co-facilitate learning experiences that deliberately centered social justice with young and adult populations from a very broad range of race, ethnic, gender, socioeconomic and ideological identities in countries such as Argentina, Bolivia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Guatemala, Mexico, United States, Swaziland, Netherlands, Sweden, Spain and Italy. 

Gery has served as the Co-Curricular Director of United World College in Costa Rica, presided over the International Association for Experiential Education, as well as co-founded the community organization Wayna Hilaña Yanapaña together with youth peers in her home country of Bolivia. 

She is a graduate of the United World College of India, where she received a full scholarship to participate in a two-year multicultural and international residential experience centering education for peace while living and learning with two hundred peers from eighty-two countries. She received a bachelor’s degree in Interdisciplinary Social Justice Education from Prescott College, an Executive Certificate on Social Impact Strategy from the University of Pennsylvania, as well as continuing to participate in multiple community-based learning, unlearning, and practice experiences shaping  her ongoing journey. 

Photos of Gery

Confidentiality Notice

To protect the privacy of our program participants, YWCA Madison does not release any information, including names or photographs, to third parties without the participant’s prior written authorization

Interviews, Logos, Photos and Contact Information

If you are interested in scheduling an interview with a YWCA staff member or would like to request a photograph or YWCA Madison logo, please contact Jay Young, Marketing & Events Manager at (608) 257-1436 option 3.