Centro will celebrate the first-ever graduation ceremony of the Colibri Fellowship program in Wisconsin. The event will take place on Saturday, May 30th, with a ceremony at 2:30 p.m. and a reception from 3p – 5p, at Centro, located at 2403 Cypress Way in Madison.
This one-of –a- kind fellowship was launched by The Resurrection Project (TRP) to elevate Department of Justice (DOJ) accreditation as a viable and impactful career path while increasing the number of bilingual and bicultural legal professionals serving immigrant communities. This year, 53 Colibrí fellows throughout four states are graduating from the program: 25 from Illinois, 10 from Massachusetts, 10 from Oregon and for the first time, 7 graduates from Wisconsin.
Centro is the only organization designed to expand this critical workforce capacity through the Colibrí Program while strengthening access to culturally responsive legal advocacy and civic engagement.
Centro is uniquely positioned to host Wisconsin’s Colibrí Program because of the deep cultural understanding and longstanding commitment to immigrant justice across the state. Through structured mentorship and training in partnership with Villanova University and its VISTA program, Colibrí provides fellows with a comprehensive curriculum focused on leadership development, technical expertise, and legal advocacy skills.
As shared by Jhonatan Real Merino, a 2026 graduating Colibrí Fellow and Bilingual Legal Advocate for UNIDOS Against Domestic Violence:
“My participation in Centro (Hispano)’s Colibrí program, in partnership with VISTA at Villanova University, has been a transformative experience that provided me with strategic leadership tools to strengthen my capacity for legal and social advocacy. The impact of this program on my career has been profound, giving me the confidence to navigate complex systems and ensure that the voices of the most vulnerable are heard with dignity.”
Centro As the leading non-profit organization working with the Latinx population in Dane County, Wisconsin which includes Madison and the surrounding communities, Centro has a 40-year history of uplifting and strengthening local communities. The organization has worked tirelessly to keep up with the growth of the Latine community in Dane County and now supports over 10,000 individuals annually with more than 20,000 hours of programming. Centro’s initiatives are some of the only bilingual/bicultural programs focused on serving Latinx communities in Dane County and the organization serves as a key resource for the city, county, state and local school districts and partners with over a hundred nonprofits and employers in the area. To meet the growing needs of Latinx in Dane County, Centro has tripled the size of its staff and doubled the number of programs it offers from just ten years ago.
