She was a Latina pathbreaker, a woman of many firsts who had an enormous impact on New York City. Now Hunter students will carry forth her legacy of public service.
Hunter College inaugurated a fellowship in honor of the late Carol Robles-Román — a former Bloomberg administration official and Hunter general counsel — at the Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute April 24.
The Carol Robles-Román Fellowship in Public Service, supported by Bloomberg Philanthropies, will provide two annual fellowships for outstanding students at Hunter College’s Roosevelt House Public Policy Institute. Roosevelt House prepares students to become active and informed participants in civic life through its academic programs in public policy and human rights, including minors and certificate offerings that lead to careers across a range of public service fields.
The 2025-2026 Fellows are JK Rajjo ’27, a political-science major who is earning certificates from Roosevelt House’s Public Policy and Human Rights programs; and Aymen Rasheed ’27, a political-science major and Thomas Hunter Honors Scholar pursuing a certificate in public policy. Both young men, like Robles-Román, are from immigrant families, and announced at the ceremony that they would undertake careers in public service: Rajjo in social work or law, and Rasheed in immigration law.
The fellowship also will provide an internship stipend and support travel to research-related activities and conferences, community engagement and networking activities, and meetings with elected representatives.
This fellowship is another example of Hunter’s commitment to providing opportunities for students to pursue high-impact careers in public service. For more than 150 years, Hunter has provided the city with some of its most effective leaders and changemakers, while serving as a prime engine of economic advancement and social mobility.
Carol Robles-Román
Robles-Román worked as Hunter’s general counsel and dean of faculty from 2019 through 2021. A civil- and women’s rights leader and passionate advocate of public higher education, she served for 12 years as New York City’s deputy mayor for legal affairs and counsel to Mayor Michael Bloomberg, and for 14 years as a CUNY trustee. She left Hunter to focus on treatments for her lung cancer, which took her life at age 60 in 2023.
“Carol Robles-Román was a force: brilliant, fearless, and unyielding in her fight for justice, equality, and the empowerment of women and girls,” said CUNY Vice Chairman of the Board of Trustees and Hunter alumna Sandra Wilkin. “Her impact resonates in the lives she changed and now through this fellowship and the lives yet to be enriched.”
Patricia E. Harris, CEO of Bloomberg Philanthropies, remarked during the program, at which the inaugural Carol Robles-Román Fellows were introduced, that “Carol's passion for public service helped her open doors and expand opportunity for a lot of people. Now, together with Hunter, Bloomberg Philanthropies is glad to help extend that legacy through this new fellowship in Carol's honor."
Robles-Román’s husband, Judge Nelson Román of the U.S. District Court of the Southern District of New York, also spoke at the gathering. Robles-Román’s daughter, Ariana, also shared some deeply moving personal reflections.
“She saw the world as it was, but also as it could be,” Ariana Robles-Román said. “And she was never content with theorizing about change. She became it. She was a champion of diversity, equity, and inclusion long before those were buzzwords. To her, they were not catchphrases; they were the framework for fairness, public trust, and better decision making.”
