Natalie Zamora '14 Makes AL DÍA's List of "40 Under Forty"

Natalie Zamora was born in Southern California to immigrant parents from Mexico and Colombia. Being raised by her undocumented mother and grandmother, she was selected to participate in a non-profit college access organization called Bright Prospect. With the help of Bright Prospect mentors and counselors, she attended Bryn Mawr College in Pennsylvania as a first-generation and low-income Latina. She graduated with an English degree in 2014 and immediately started working for her alma mater’s admissions office in order to serve the communities she came from as an admissions officer. After two years, she moved on to work at the University of Pennsylvania’s admissions office and has had progressive leadership in the evaluation and selection process for the undergraduate class.

In 2019, Natalie began her master of education journey at the University of Pennsylvania Graduate School of Education while working full time at Penn Admissions. In her graduate student journey, she took on leadership roles in the Latin American Graduate and Professional Student Assembly (LAGAPSA). Through LAGAPSA, she advocated for Latinx graduate student needs, established signature events to engage the Latinx community, and supported the needs of Latinx graduate students through the pandemic and back to campus.