← All contributors
Kalika Curry

Nonprofits & social impact

Kalika Curry(she/her)

Executive Director · Eastside Pathways

Seattle Central College, Saybrook - Leadership Essentials

Growing up, she knew she wanted to create spaces where people — especially those who've been pushed to the margins — could truly belong, and that calling led her to build a career centered on racial equity and community change. Today, she works as a facilitator and leader who helps organizations, schools, and communities do the hard, meaningful work of dismantling systems that hold people back. If you're someone who wants to turn your passion for justice into a real career, her path shows that it's possible to build a life doing work that actually matters.

Their story

No college degree....now leader of social change

16 min

Watch the full story →

Watching requires a free Vitaes account.

Key quotes

“Working for the Y gave my life purpose. It wasn't just I suffered these things or I made some mistakes — it was more like these moments allowed me to connect with youth that felt like nobody understood them.”

Kalika Curry, Marketing Intern Program Coordinator

“It wasn't prescriptive. How I got here didn't feel prescriptive. It was me really very relational — me having conversations with folks and me always jumping in where I felt I should be.”

Kalika Curry, Marketing Intern Program Coordinator

“If you think you can go in the room and everybody's gonna look and think and talk and quack like me, then you're not gonna make it very far.”

Kalika Curry, Marketing Intern Program Coordinator

“On paper it says you're supposed to have a bachelor's, but I don't have a bachelor's. My journey has not been prescriptive.”

Kalika Curry, Marketing Intern Program Coordinator

“I love the dreaming of it. The ability to sit down and dream something up — it's creating a piece of artwork to me.”

Kalika Curry, Marketing Intern Program Coordinator

Career highlights

Say yes before you feel fully ready — opportunities build on each other.

Kalika describes jumping into things she was passionate about even when she didn't have all the answers, which is how she kept growing at the Y and eventually landed her current role.

Self-advocate out loud — tell your supervisors what you care about.

She says she would go directly to branch executives and tell them she was passionate about a project and wanted to be involved. That visibility opened doors for her.

Your lived experience is a professional asset, not something to hide.

Working with teens, Kalika realized that being open about her own struggles — loss, mistakes, fear — helped young people trust her and believe they could make it too.

A degree helps, but it's not the only path — how you show up matters too.

Kalika is honest that she doesn't have a bachelor's degree, even though most positions at her level require one. She made up for it by preparing, researching, and presenting herself with the same professionalism as her peers.

Build genuine relationships — your network is built on trust, not transactions.

She talks about the importance of integrity and doing what you say you'll do, especially in nonprofit and community work where people are showing up with their hearts open.

Nonprofit and community work is a real career — not just a side hustle or volunteer gig.

Kalika describes working for the Y as what gave her life purpose, and she's built a full career in it — with flexibility, impact, and a steady income as a single mom.

Student summary
Kalika Curry is the Marketing Intern Program Coordinator at the YMCA of Greater Seattle, where she builds and runs a program that places high school and college students into real marketing internships across 13 YMCA branches. Her job is part program design, part mentorship, part logistics — and she loves the creative, visionary side of building something from the ground up. She works closely with young people to help them discover their strengths in marketing, whether that's analytics, graphic design, social media, or storytelling. Kalika's path to this role was anything but straight. She grew up in a predominantly white, affluent area, lost a close friend to suicide in high school, and made a life-changing decision that same day to walk away from the people and habits that were pulling her down. She went to community college without a plan, got married young, became a stay-at-home mom, freelanced as an artist, and stumbled into working at a YMCA teen center almost by accident — through a conversation at a breast cancer walk. That first job teaching art to teens lit something in her that never went out. She climbed the ladder at the Y through relationships, showing up consistently, and self-advocating for opportunities she was passionate about — even without a college degree. She is open about not having finished her bachelor's, while many of her peers have one. Her advice? Your path doesn't have to look like everyone else's. What matters is that you keep saying yes, keep showing up, and keep being honest about what you need help with. For students of color especially, Kalika's story is a reminder that cause-driven work — nonprofits, community organizations, youth programs — is a real and meaningful career. It's not just volunteering or a stepping stone. It can be your life's work. She found purpose in being able to say to young people: 'I've been where you are, and you can make it through.' That kind of representation and connection is powerful, and it's exactly what she brings to her work every single day. If you're someone who wants to blend creativity, community impact, and leadership into a career, Kalika's story shows you a real and honest version of what that can look like — messy, evolving, and deeply worth it.