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Civic Design with Equity in Mind
About Us
Powerful Pathways is an award-wining civic design lab and social practice that works in community development, public policy, and placemaking (placekeeping) using creative media and technology tools, the application of design thinking principles and a social equity lens. Our mission is to facilitate positive social change through programming, research, consulting and training to non-profits, government agencies and social enterprises. Areas and Interests of Work include but are not limited to:
• Community and Transportation Planning
• Sustainable Community Development Policy Research
• Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion Workshops
• Cultural District Planning
• Business Development Workshops
• Event Planning
• Equitable Creative Placemaking (Placekeeping)
We work with anyone, and with equity as a core value, we prioritize under-served communities, locally, nationally, and abroad. We also organize community initiatives, workshops, and civic hacks – events that highlight innovative interventions that disrupt chronic urban and civic challenges.
Who We Are
About the Founder:
Powerful Pathways was founded in 2014 by Allentza Michel, an urban planner, social practice artist, researcher and EDI specialist with 25 years of diverse experience across community & economic development, education, arts, food security, public health and transportation. Prior to her current roles, she was a community organizer specifically working on local policy and land use campaigns, and a youth worker supporting the leadership development of at-risk young people and their communities. Her experiences inform her civic design approach, at the nexus of sustainability creative community engagement, public policy, social equity and impact design.
A serial experimenter and entrepreneur, her personal mission is in designing approaches and experiences that translate into equitable and sustainable development and innovative, solution-based and long-term neighborhood revitalization without displacement, just economic strategies and inclusive public participation practices that lead to better policy outcomes and improve the quality of life for under-served communities.
Ms. Michel received a master's in public policy at Tufts University's Department of Urban & Environmental Policy and Planning, bachelor’s degrees in English and Social and Political Systems from Pine Manor College, and a graduate certificate in non-profit management from Boston University’s Questrom School of Business. She also studied Civic Media and Art Practice at Emerson College and was trained in design and public policy from Rhode Island School of Design. She was a 2013 Neighborhood Fellow at Tufts, the inaugural fellow for Association for Community Design in 2015, and a 2016 Creative Community Fellow with National Arts Strategies. In 2021, Allentza received the Perez Prize in Civic Design and Public Art, awarded by Americans for the Arts and the Perez Foundation, and was named a Next 1000 by Forbes. In 2023 she was awarded the Hometown Hero award by the Celtics Foundation. She has also received commendations from the City of Cambridge (2012) and the City of Boston (2018) and the Town of Randolph (2025).
Ms. Michel speaks English (native), Haitian Creole (native), Spanish, moderate French, and conversational Japanese. she navigates her time between, Boston, New York and Los Angeles.
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