Donna Hernández is the Special Events Coordinator and Operations Manager for the Applied Research Center's New York Office. A native of Philadelphia, PA, she has organized in her North Philadelphia community on police issues, housing and welfare rights and Puerto Rican independence. She graduated from Pennsylvania State University with a B.A. in Letters Arts and Science with a minor in African American Studies. She began organizing at an early age with the Women's Community Revitalization Project (WCRP) in Philadelphia. While at Penn State, she was active in student organizing and government. She worked with several groups aimed at recruiting and retaining students of color to higher education.

Prior to working at ARC, she was Executive Director of the Police-Barrio Relations Project (PBRB), a Philadelphia non-profit fighting for police accountability and providing community education programs and police cultural awareness workshops. As Executive Director, she was responsible for maintaining all of the organization's programs and staff and for overseeing a 1996 Settlement Agreement between the City of Philadelphia and the PBRP, NAACP and ACLU.