policy-change
(2)
Rise
Rise is a civil rights nonprofit that teaches ordinary people how to write and pass their own laws. Founded in 2014 by Amanda Nguyen after her own experience with a broken rape-kit system, Rise wrote and passed the federal Sexual Assault Survivors' Rights Act unanimously through Congress, then scaled the model into state laws, a landmark UN resolution, and Rise Justice Labs - an accelerator that trains survivors and allies to turn personal pain into passed legislation.
Amanda Nguyen
Amanda Nguyen is a Vietnamese-American civil rights activist, author, and commercial astronaut who founded the nonprofit Rise after surviving sexual assault as a Harvard senior. She drafted the Sexual Assault Survivors' Rights Act, which passed Congress unanimously in 2016, and has helped pass dozens of laws protecting survivors. Nominated for the 2019 Nobel Peace Prize and named a 2022 Time Woman of the Year, she became the first Vietnamese and Southeast Asian woman in space aboard Blue Origin's NS-31 flight on April 14, 2025, fulfilling an astronaut dream she set aside for a decade to fight for survivors.