Director of Advocacy and Policy

We are seeking a Director of Advocacy and Policy to lead Children’s Rights’ growing advocacy and policy program. 

Location: New York City (hybrid).  Candidates based in Washington, D.C. will also be considered. 

Application Deadline: Applications will be accepted through November 10, 2026. 

Children’s Rights 

Children’s Rights is a national advocacy organization dedicated to improving the lives of children and families affected by America’s child welfare, juvenile legal, immigration, education, and healthcare systems. We use civil rights impact litigation, advocacy, policy, and lived expertise to hold governments accountable for keeping kids safe and healthy, and to create systemic change that will advance the rights of children for generations. 

Every day, government systems separate children unnecessarily from their families, institutionalize youth who need community-based supports, and deny children equal treatment and opportunity. These systems disproportionately harm historically oppressed youth, including children of color, LGBTQIA+ youth, and children with disabilities and mental health needs. Through relentless strategic advocacy and legal action, Children’s Rights holds governments accountable and creates lasting systemic change to disrupt ongoing harms to children and families. 

Our Advocacy & Policy Department  

Children's Rights’ Advocacy & Policy Department advances policies, laws, and systems change that protect children’s fundamental right to family integrity and improve their well-being. We have developed a reputation for producing careful research and policy analysis on pressing issues, including family surveillance and separation, institutional racism, discrimination against LGBTQIA+ youth, children’s mental and behavioral health, immigration, and deinstitutionalization.  

We partner with communities, lived experts, advocates, policy analysts, and government officials at the local, state, and national levels to advance policies and practices that strengthen children, families, and communities. Through these partnerships and our participation in coalitions, we identify opportunities for meaningful change. Throughout this work, lived experts play a central role in shaping our priorities, strategies, and recommendations. 

Job Summary: 

Children’s Rights’ advocacy is a core strategy for changing the laws, policies, practices, and public understanding that shape children’s lives. The Director of Advocacy & Policy leads a multidisciplinary advocacy program that brings together policy analysts, researchers, data specialists, and people with lived expertise. The Director sets advocacy priorities across Children’s Rights’ strategic priorities and draws on lived expertise, research, data, litigation, and developments in the field to develop policy campaigns, mobilize communities and coalitions, shape messaging, and influence decision makers. The Director oversees the team’s policy analysis, research, and written work, and ensures that each advances Children’s Rights’ strategic priorities.  

Racial justice is central to this work. The Director must understand the history of government control and forced separation of Black families, rooted in slavery and institutional racism, and how child welfare systems continue to disproportionately surveil, investigate, and separate Black families. The Director brings this lens to advocacy priorities, campaigns, policy recommendations, and public engagement, advancing changes that protect family integrity and children’s rights. The policy agenda spans multiple states, the federal level, and international forums, consistent with Children’s Rights’ strategic priorities, including family integrity, children’s health, the rights of children in government custody, and combatting discriminatory policies and practices.  

The Director of Advocacy & Policy is a member of the Executive Leadership Team, reports to the Executive Director, and helps shape Children’s Rights’ strategic priorities and overall direction. The Director works closely with the Litigation, Communications, and Development departments to coordinate advocacy with the organization’s broader work. 

Duties/Responsibilities:

• Set and advance a focused portfolio of federal, state, and local advocacy priorities with the Executive Director and Advocacy & Policy team, grounded in Children’s Rights’ strategic objectives and the needs and perspectives of children, families, and communities most affected.  
• Build and sustain strategic, trust-based partnerships with lived experts, community organizations, advocates, legislators, agency leaders, researchers, and funders. Connect people, expertise, and resources in support of shared change.  
• Foster collaboration across areas of expertise, ensuring that advocacy is closely integrated with litigation, research, and other program work, and, as a member of the Executive Leadership Team, help advance shared organizational goals through strategic coordination and partnership. 
• Develop and lead policy campaigns and coalitions at the federal, state, and local levels and, when relevant, in international forums. Set shared goals with partners, identify policy windows and decision points, map the people and institutions that can influence change, and coordinate clear roles and action steps to move campaigns forward.  
• Apply a racial justice and anti-discrimination lens across advocacy priorities, campaigns, policy recommendations, and public communications. In child welfare, this includes understanding the history of government control and forced separation of Black families and how current systems continue to disproportionately surveil, investigate, and separate Black families.  
• Advance policy agendas across Children’s Rights’ strategic priorities, including front-end reforms that keep children safely with their families and expand the economic, social, and community supports families need, including access to community-based physical, behavioral, mental, and developmental health services, alternatives to institutional and carceral placement, and stronger protections for children in child welfare, immigration, and juvenile legal custody. 
• Track policy, legislative, budget, and administrative developments, political conditions, and shifts in child welfare and related systems. Translate that field intelligence into timely, practical guidance and recommendations for organizational leaders, staff, and partners.  
• Engage lawmakers, agency leaders, and other decisionmakers to advance Children’s Rights’ recommendations through meetings, testimony, briefings, public comments, and other forms of direct advocacy, including engagement with international monitoring bodies when relevant.  
• Work with the Communications Department to shape clear, compelling messages to explain complex issues, elevate community priorities, respond to changing narratives, and move audiences toward action.  
• Oversee and contribute to reports, policy briefs, explainers, toolkits, articles, testimony, and other written materials that translate complex laws, policies, and research into accessible, actionable resources for policymakers, advocates, partners, and impacted individuals. 
• Provide strategic oversight of the Advocacy & Policy team’s research, quantitative and qualitative analysis, and policy guidance. Ensure that research is rigorous, developed in partnership with lived experts where appropriate, and used to inform advocacy strategy and policy recommendations. 
• Serve as a national spokesperson and thought leader for Children’s Rights, presenting its work to policymakers, media, partners, communities, and public audiences at conferences, town halls, and other convenings. 
• Partner with the Executive Director and Chief Development Officer to secure philanthropic support for advocacy initiatives and sustain relationships with funders.  
• Supervise, mentor, and support the professional development of the Advocacy & Policy Team, including three policy staff and paralegals. Set clear priorities, manage the department budget, and promote strong communication, collaboration, and accountability across the team.  
  

Qualifications: 

• 10+ years of progressively responsible experience in advocacy, policy, community engagement, legislative drafting and advocacy, or related work.  
• Substantial experience in child welfare policy, advocacy, or practice.  
• Experience in other systems affecting children and families, such as juvenile legal, children’s mental and behavioral health, disability, immigration, or education systems. 
• Demonstrated commitment to racial justice and a historically grounded understanding of how slavery and institutional racism shaped government control and separation of Black families. Ability to apply this analysis to advocacy priorities, strategies, and policy recommendations.  
• Demonstrated ability to build trust-based relationships with directly impacted communities, community organizations, advocates, and decisionmakers, and to work in genuine partnership with lived experts.  
• Experience developing policy campaigns and advocacy strategies, building and leading coalitions, engaging communities, coordinating partners, and working directly with legislators, public officials, or institutions.  
• Experience working closely with litigators or integrating advocacy with impact litigation. 
• Advanced degree in social work, public policy, law, or a related field, or an equivalent combination of education and relevant experience. 
• Excellent oral and written communication skills, including the ability to explain complex issues clearly, adapt messages to different audiences, and serve as a credible public representative and national spokesperson. 
• Strong relationship-building, organizational, project management, and coalition-facilitation skills, with sound judgment in identifying priorities and opportunities.  
• Demonstrated ability to supervise, mentor, and develop staff and promote clear communication, collaboration, and accountability.  
• Ability to oversee and use qualitative and quantitative research, data, and community knowledge to inform strategy, and support persuasive advocacy. 
• Experience securing foundation or other philanthropic support for advocacy initiatives is a plus. 

Supervisory Responsibilities:    The Director of Advocacy & Policy supervises three Advocacy & Policy staff and coordinates the work of paralegals, policy interns, and fellows, as applicable. 
 
Physical and Travel Requirements: 
Prolonged periods sitting and/or standing at a desk and working on a computer.  Travel is required. 
 
Salary: 
The salary range for this position is $165,000 to $185,000, commensurate with experience. This range reflects positions based in the New York City and Washington, D.C., metropolitan areas. For staff based outside these areas, compensation is adjusted based on geographic cost-of-labor and cost-of-living considerations, consistent with Children’s Rights’ compensation practices. 
 
Benefits: Children’s Rights offers an excellent benefits package, including generous PTO, medical, dental, flex spending accounts, paid parental leave, and retirement plan. 
  
To Apply: 
Please save your cover letter of interest and one recent writing sample as one file and upload to the Cover Letter upload field and upload your resume to the Resume upload field via childrensrights.bamboohr.com/jobs by November 10, 2026. If you have any additional questions regarding this position, you may send an email to info@childrensrights.org.  Due to the high volume of submissions, only applicants of interest will be contacted. No phone calls, please. 
Children’s Rights is an equal employment opportunity employer, and women, people of color, LGBTQIA+, people with disabilities, and people with unique lived experience or diverse professional or personal backgrounds and perspectives, are encouraged to apply.