Ayleen draws strength from a long tradition of collective investment in her potential, a commitment she honors through advocacy, teaching, and community work.

Ayleen Paola Correa Rodriguez is currently pursuing a PhD in Anthropology and History at the University of Michigan, where her research examines how women and youth navigate the lasting effects of state violence while cultivating life-affirming spaces of care and resistance. Through feminist, decolonial, and trauma-informed methods, she studies how practices of care emerge even in contexts marked by systemic harm. As a first-generation, Afro-Caribbean scholar raised in the Dominican Republic, she carries this work with both responsibility and gratitude to the communities that shaped her.

Ayleen’s journey has also taught her that trauma-informed, healing-centered research begins with the researcher. This lesson, introduced in a course with Dr. Sharim Hannegan-Martinez at U-M’s School of Education, has reshaped not only her scholarship but also how she approaches care for herself and others. As a Rackham Merit Fellow, Angus Campbell Scholar, and former Posse Scholar, Ayleen draws strength from a long tradition of collective investment in her potential, a commitment she honors through advocacy, teaching, and community work. She also serves as the Center for Global Health Equity’s Outreach Assistant– an experience that has deepened her belief in accessible, community-centered scholarship.

Ayleen’s academic path is inseparable from her caregiving. As the primary financial provider for her mother and nephew, she has learned persistence and resourcefulness, values first developed in her low-income New York City neighborhood. Graduate school deepened these values as she learned how to advocate both for her nephew and for herself in a new environment. She saw this opportunity to unlearn hyper-independence and embrace community.

These lessons shape Ayleen’s teaching, where she creates mindfully-paced, accessible, and collaborative classrooms. Recognized with the Outstanding Graduate Student Instructor Award, she envisions a career building spaces of care, memory, and connection that extend beyond academia and into the everyday lives of the communities she serves.

CEW+ recognizes Ayleen’s outstanding accomplishments as a scholar and educator and names her a Gail Allen Scholar.