Julie Noreene Bautista

Julie Bautista was born in the Philippines and moved to Guam in her high school years. Her lived experience as a minority and living in an island rich with indigenous culture drove her to pursue a career in advocacy for historically marginalized groups and immigrant communities. She graduated from the University of Virginia as a Foreign Affairs major with a Religious Studies minor with Phi Beta Kappa Honors. She interned at the Nationalities Service Center, a refugee resettlement agency in Philadelphia, and became interested in religious and ethnic minority oppression. In the Fall of 2020, she became the Teacher's Assistant for Nobel Peace Laureate, Professor Jerry White, in his Religion, Violence, and Strategy course. As native from the Philippines, Bautista has also been interested in research on decoloniality and indigeneity. She worked as a Research Assistant has developed a policy proposal that utilizes the United Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples as a framework to advance the right to self determination of Religious and Ethnic Minority groups, specifically the Kurds in Syria. During her last semester at UVA, she started interning for the Congress of Nations and States, a new international body that is being organized to facilitate dialogue between indigenous nations and states’ governments in an equal political plane. She also attended the Food Policy Summit initiated by The Food-Policy Clinic at Batten which is in conjunction with the UN Summit on Food Systems that examines policies on food security and nutrition. The outcome of this event was forwarded to the UN to inform their formal Summit events this year. These previous projects she has committed to is an attempt to center the focus on the marginalized groups and advocate for human rights

Field placement: Indigenous Food & Agriculture Initiative

Fayetteville, Arkansas

Julie completed her fieldwork at the Indigenous Food and Agriculture Initiative in Fayetteville, Arkansas. Her work involved developing educational resources to support tribal leaders in their "638" self determination contracts with USDA programs and to educate policymakers about the importance of traditional foods. Julie's work supported the IFAI mission of promoting tribal sovereignty, healthy food systems, and diversified economic development in Indian Country.

Policy placement: Bread for the World

Washington, D.C.

Julie Bautista is leading Bread for the World's Indigenous Farmers' Dialogue as a part of the 2023 advocacy campaign on the U.S Farm Bill. Through hosting Farmer Dialogues with, Julie is building relationships with Native groups who are affected by hunger and have firsthand experience in the U.S. food system. She will be educating Bread for the World's networks and will be informing their policy platform.

Publications & Blog Posts