Domenico Ruggerio is a nationally recognized nonprofit executive and equity strategist with over 17 years advancing systems change for LGBTQ+ and BIPOC communities. As Executive Director of We Are Family – South Carolina’s oldest LGBTQ+ youth-serving nonprofit – Domenico has led a transformative expansion: growing the budget from $200K to $1.15M, tripling staff capacity, and securing over $3.5M in philanthropic investments.
Under their leadership, WAF launched the SC Lowcountry’s first LGBTQ+ Community Center, scaled its statewide mental health program to reach over 1,600 youth annually, and deepened its commitment to intersectional health equity by embedding culturally responsive mental health care, peer-driven healing spaces, and access to gender-affirming resources across all core initiatives.
A seasoned strategist in narrative leadership, public policy advocacy, and trauma-informed systems, Domenico has positioned WAF as a statewide thought leader in crisis response and equity-centered service delivery. They’ve led campaigns in direct response to anti-LGBTQ+ legislation, leveraged coalition power to shift public discourse, and built healing-centered programs that embed joy, safety, and power into the lives of queer and trans youth.
Beyond WAF, Domenico co-founded the Transformative Teaching Collective, a BIPOC- and LGBTQ+-led cooperative that supports institutions in operationalizing equity and reimagining organizational culture. Their facilitation and strategy work spans national networks, philanthropic collaboratives, and government agencies – including the USDA, Santa Clara County, lululemon, and CenterLink – where they lead capacity-building engagements, justice-aligned consulting, and train-the-trainer cohorts rooted in collective care.
Prior to nonprofit executive leadership, Domenico spent over a decade in higher education advancing racial equity and student development at institutions including Vassar College, Bard College, Oberlin College, and the College of Charleston. They’ve directed identity centers, built civic engagement initiatives, and led access-to-education programs supporting first-gen, BIPOC, and LGBTQ+ students across the country.
Domenico holds a master’s degree in Social Justice Educational Studies from SUNY New Paltz and a BA in Sociology and Anthropology from Colgate University. They are certified in social justice mediation through UMass Amherst, with advanced training in multipartial conflict resolution, group process design, and liberatory facilitation.
They were selected for the inaugural New Profit Mental Health Equity Catalyze Cohort, and Young Futures Innovators Cohort for their leadership in championing belonging and social connection as protective factors in youth mental health. Their recognitions include the LGBT+ Icon Award by the Carolinas LGBT+ Chamber of Commerce, the Jefferson Award by Multiplying Good South Carolina, Charleston Regional Business Journal’s Forty Under 40, and SUNY New Paltz’s 2024 Forty Under 40.
Raised in the Philippines and on Long Island, Domenico leads from a deeply personal place shaped by their first-generation, multiracial, queer, and working-class identity. They bring relational trust, cultural clarity, and the conviction that transforming systems must be inseparable from building spaces of collective joy and healing.
