Dr. Mañjon’s unwavering commitment to promoting racial and gender equity and social justice is evident in her extensive experience leading systemic change. With over 30 years of experience in higher education, nonprofit management, government administration, and public and private sector consulting, she has consistently championed these causes. Currently, as the Chief Academic Officer for the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts (PAFA) in Philadelphia, PA, she oversees educational opportunities offered through PAFA’s school and museum, including art education, K-12 school and community partnerships, public programming, continuing education, certificate programs, and graduate studies. PAFA, established in 1805, is the first art school and museum in the United States to focus on American art and to collect and exhibit art by women and artists of color. PAFA emphasizes the transformative power of art while supporting artists throughout their careers.
Dr. Mañjon’s academic tenure spans California, Ohio, and Connecticut universities. She taught in the Nonprofit Management Program at California State University East Bay and the Master of Nonprofit Program at the University of San Francisco. Sonia was the inaugural director of the Lawrence and Isabel Barnett Center for Integrated Arts and Enterprise, Associate Professor of Arts Administration, Education, and Policy, and Affiliate Faculty in Latinx Studies and The STEAM Factory at The Ohio State University (OSU). Dr. Mañjon mentored undergraduate and graduate students whose interests encompass entrepreneurship, community collaborations, and civic engagement. Her commitment includes the development of initiatives and programs that attract and retain students, faculty, and staff from underrepresented groups on campus. Her curricular expertise includes integrating art into society, community development through entrepreneurial practices, and student/community think tanks. A cultural anthropologist, her research focus includes collecting community and individual narratives using a participatory action methodology, photography, and video.
Before joining OSU, Dr. Mañjon was Vice President for Institutional Partnerships, Chief Diversity Officer (CDO), and Visiting Associate Professor of Theatre at Wesleyan University in Connecticut. As CDO, she developed a comprehensive diversity initiative, Making Excellence Inclusive (MEI), an ongoing and multi-layered process for academic and non-academic constituents, and established curricular and programmatic initiatives. As VP for Institutional Partnerships and a President’s Senior Cabinet member, she represented Wesleyan at local, state, and federal political and legislative meetings. As a faculty and administrative advisory board member, she helped develop and establish certificate programs and centers in education and civic engagement, including the Center for Prison Education and the Patricelli Center for Social Entrepreneurship.
Dr. Mañjon’s influence in shaping educational policies is evident in her active involvement in the Connecticut and California education reform debates. Appointed by former CT Speaker of the House Representative Donovan to the State Latino and Puerto Rican Affairs Commission, her focus was on education. She also served as a member of the Governor’s Education Policy Task Force, where she worked to reform teacher preparation programs for the CT State Department of Education. Her advisory role with the CT Parent Union and her close collaboration with several public and magnet schools further demonstrates her commitment to improving education. In California, she was a member of the Alameda County Education Reform Policy Board for secondary and post-secondary education. At the state level, she developed and implemented a statewide evaluation and site-visit protocol for the California Arts Council, which included capacity building for organizations founded and led by artists and administrators representing African American, Latinx, Native American, and Asian communities.
Dr. Mañjon’s academic career at the California College of the Arts (CCA) was marked by her leadership and innovation in arts education. As the executive director of the Center for Art and Public Life, founding chair of the Community Arts major, chair of Diversity Studies, and the Simpson Endowed Professor of Community Arts, she made significant contributions to the institution. Her tenure at CCA included the restructuring of the diversity studies curriculum, executive leadership of a six-year Irvine-funded campus-wide diversity initiative, and the establishment of the Community Arts Program, the first BFA program of its kind in the United States. She also created the Center’s Visiting Artists and Scholars program, raised over $8 million dollars for CCA initiatives, and implemented 100 Families Oakland: Art & Social Change, a highly successful community program that engaged over 500 Oakland residents in art-making and civic engagement.
Dr. Mañjon has completed numerous projects, video documentaries, and publications as an artist and cultural anthropologist. Most notable was 100 Families Oakland: Art and Social Change (documentation of a community-wide collaborative program model and its impact), Invisible Identity: MujeresDominicanas en California (a video/ photographic installation) presented at the California African American Museum as part of a more extensive exhibit, An Idea Called Tomorrow and currently touring as part of the 2024/25 exhibit A Love Letter to This Bridge Called My Back, in which she is also a contributor in the book by the same name. Dr. Mañjon also directed and produced a video documentary, Pieces of Cloth, Pieces of Culture: Tapa from Tonga and the Pacific Islands (a 50 min. DVD on Tongan Tapa making and community collaboration). Her second documentary, The Experience of Immigration and Acculturation of Four Generations of Dominican Women in California, is based on her dissertation.
Dr. Mañjon is a trustee of the Latino Community Foundation, serving as chair of governance, a member of the Hellam Foundation Collaborative Change Initiative, an advisor to the Magic Cabinet Foundation, and an advisory member of the National Creative Justice Initiative. She earned a Ph.D. in Humanities, specializing in transformative learning and change in human systems, and an MA in Cultural Anthropology and Social Transformation from the California Institute of Integral Studies, San Francisco. She received a Bachelor of Arts in World Arts and Cultures with an emphasis in Dance from the University of California, Los Angeles. She has two adult sons, Zyan and Ezra, and a grandson, Josiah.