The CCSF Board of Trustees is composed of seven members elected by the voters of the Community College District and a student representative. The Board of Trustees assumes full responsibility for the general control and direction of the San Francisco Community College District.
Aliya Chisti was elected to the Board of Trustees in 2020. She is the first-Muslim woman to hold an elected position in the history of San Francisco. She was born and raised in San Francisco and is a graduate of San Francisco’s public schools.
Aliya is an educator, advocate, and policy analyst. Her deep commitment to education stems from her experiences overcoming barriers to pursue her academic dreams. She is a former educator and has over a decade of experience working in schools or on policies that impact schools. She also has experience in advancing policies to improve educational equity at the local and federal levels.
She earned an M.A. in Education Policy from Columbia University, where her thesis emphasized the need for higher education reform to reduce the student debt burden on college students. In 2016, Aliya was nominated by the U.S. Department of State as a Fulbright Scholar to teach English and study higher education policy in North Macedonia. She holds a B.S. in Nutrition Science from the University of California of Davis.
Aliya is excited to serve the City College community and welcomes comments and feedback at [email protected].
Luis Zamora serves as Vice President of the Board of Trustees for the San Francisco Community College District, which governs City College of San Francisco. Elected to the Board in 2024, Trustee Zamora is committed to protecting City College’s mission as an accessible, affordable, and high-quality public institution that serves students, workers, families, and communities across San Francisco.
A lifelong advocate for public service and educational opportunity, Trustee Zamora brings years of experience in government and community engagement to the Board. He currently works in the San Francisco City Attorney’s Office, where he supports executive, policy, and intergovernmental initiatives. Previously, he served in the California State Assembly as District Director and Field Representative for then-Assemblymember David Chiu, helping constituents navigate government services and advancing local and state policy priorities.
Trustee Zamora has also served in a number of civic and community leadership roles, including on the San Francisco Immigrant Rights Commission and as a board member of Openhouse, a nonprofit serving LGBTQ+ older adults. His work has consistently focused on expanding opportunity, strengthening public institutions, and ensuring that government is responsive to the communities it serves. As a Trustee, he is focused on student access, institutional stability, workforce opportunity, and the long-term success of City College of San Francisco as one of the city’s most important public institutions.
Ian Wong is a first-year Asian American student at City College of San Francisco. Originally from Berkeley, California, he graduated from Berkeley High School before coming to CCSF for a fresh start and the opportunity to build meaningful connections within a diverse and supportive community.
Coming from an immigrant family background, Ian was raised with strong expectations surrounding academic success. While those expectations motivated him to work hard and remain disciplined, they also helped him recognize the challenges many students face when trying to succeed without consistent support or guidance. These experiences inspired him to seek opportunities to uplift and advocate for others within his community.
Ian is passionate about strengthening student support systems and ensuring that every student has access to the resources, opportunities, and encouragement needed to succeed both academically and professionally. He hopes to help foster a campus environment where all students feel valued, supported, and empowered to achieve their goals.
Mx. Vick Chung was elected to the Board of Trustees in 2022. Vick previously served as the student-body-elected trustee from 2020-2021, and as the delegate of CCSF at the General Assembly of the Student Senate for California Community Colleges in 2021. Vick uses “they, them, their” pronouns, and they are the first, openly non-binary, gender-queer person to hold an elected office in the history of San Francisco. Vick was born and raised in San Francisco, is a child of Hakka-Chinese, Vietnamese refugees, and is a survivor of child incestuous abuse.
As a beneficiary of San Francisco’s K-14 public schools, public assistance programs and nonprofits (such as GLIDE) that assisted and empowered low-income families, Vick sought out and graduated with a Bachelor of Science in Neurobiology, Physiology and Behavior from UC Davis in the hopes of paying-it-forward by becoming a health care provider to low-income, marginalized, communities of color. However, after working to advance community health through serving in diverse capacities over the last decade–as a research lab aide and clinical laboratory technician, health care patient interpreter and advocate, aide to those filing taxes and applying for citizenship, advocate for federal legislation and funding for international aid–Vick gradually arrived as an advocate for community college education after spending the latter four years attending, working at, and advocating for City College of San Francisco. Vick is a proud former student worker of Project SURVIVE, Project SHINE, and STAR Center.
Ruth Ferguson is a community college graduate and policy advocate who has organized to advance education equity throughout her career. Raised in a small, rural town in a strained public school system, Ruth and her family found opportunity through community college — a pathway that enabled her to transfer to the University of Washington and later earn her Master’s in Public Policy from UC Berkeley. She went on to work as a staffer in the California Legislature, where she advanced legislation on housing, transportation, and student homelessness in CA community colleges. In 2022, Ruth came forward as a whistleblower and co-founded Stop Sexual Harassment in Politics (SHIP), successfully advocating with CA Legislative leadership to implement critical labor and accountability reforms. Currently, she works to advance street safety policies in San Francisco and advocates for housing affordability with District 9 Neighbors for Housing as a lead community organizer. Ruth is committed to bringing communities together to build a better world, and she is honored to prioritize student success and collaborative governance as Trustee of City College of San Francisco.
Anita Martinez has devoted her personal and professional life to equal access to educational opportunity, first as a San Francisco State University (SFSU) student activist, then as an SFSU English teacher, and finally as SFSU EOP Director. She returned to her first love, teaching, as an ESL instructor at City College and was elected President of her union, AFT 2121, and her Academic Senate. She was appointed Vice Chancellor of Instruction and then pursued advanced graduate studies at UC Berkeley, during which she served as City College’s Dean of Students. She expanded her administrative experience at neighboring colleges: Dean of Language Arts at Skyline College and then Vice President of Student Learning at the College of Marin. She also served as the College Board’s national community college representative. She has been a teacher and a learner in every role she has had.
During her career, Anita initiated and supported innovative programs/services that improved student learning outcomes. As both a local and statewide faculty and administrative leader, she served on California Community Colleges task forces and committees winning awards and honors for her work. She has served on local community based boards including the City of San Francisco Human Services Commission.
As a community college graduate, Anita appreciates the opportunity community colleges provide and understands the challenges students face in achieving their educational goals. As a board member, she supports efforts to increase opportunities to address those challenges.
Anita is proud of her indigenous Chicano roots in New Mexico and is committed to studies that deepen the understanding and appreciation of the contributions of diverse communities locally and globally.
Dr. Heather McCarty was elected to the City College of San Francisco Board of Trustees in December 2024, bringing 20 years of experience as a tenured Professor of History and Gender and Women's Studies at Ohlone College. A former community college student herself, Dr. McCarty understands firsthand the transformative power of accessible public higher education. At Ohlone College, she earned Faculty of the Year (2020) and has served in significant faculty leadership roles, including in the Academic Senate and as Chief Negotiator and current member of the faculty union negotiations team, developing deep expertise in contract bargaining, institutional finance, and shared governance. Dr. McCarty co-founded and co-directs the Lytton Center for History and the Public Good, is a former board member of ScholarMatch. As a CCSF Trustee, she is focused on fiscal accountability, protecting instructional programs, and ensuring the college remains a pathway to opportunity for all San Franciscans.
Susan Solomon was born and raised in San Francisco, and retired from a career in education in 2021, beginning as a daycare provider and culminating as President of United Educators of San Francisco and Vice President for Political Activities of the San Francisco Labor Council. Solomon attended public schools in the Bay Area from kindergarten through college, and thanks to union-financed affordable housing, she has lived in the Fillmore District for most of her life. She and her husband, Fred Pecker, raised their two children much like she and Fred were raised: in a politically active, pro-union family, attending civil rights and anti-war marches and union picnics, parties, and picket lines from an early age. Her children proudly graduated from SFUSD schools, as did her mother, aunt, uncle, cousins, and siblings; her two grandchildren who live in San Francisco are current and future students of the elementary school from which she graduated. Solomon attended the University of California at Berkeley, where she was a pre-med student with a major in genetics. During the last quarter of her senior year at U.C. Berkeley, she took an education class, which consisted of assisting in a third-grade class, and that's when she realized she wanted to be a teacher. Her Master’s degree in Early Childhood Education began with a Child Development class at City College, and she spent her early education career working as a teacher's aide, substitute teacher, and teacher in various early education settings. She also worked as a tutor in a community college writing center, where she first encountered the negative impact of high-stakes metrics on students from historically underserved populations. Solomon received her Master's in Early Childhood Education in 1980, and taught PreK and kindergarten until 2006, when John Swett Alternative Elementary School, her beloved school site, was closed. She transitioned to working full time for United Educators of San Francisco, where she served as a staff representative and elected union Secretary, followed by being elected Executive Vice President and then President. Solomon is now retired and spends her time working as a trustee for the invaluable CCSF and participating in volunteer activities.