Winstina Hughes receives the Yoast Care fund for her contribution to the WordPress community

Meet Winstina Hughes, a valued member of the WordPress Community Team! Her commitment and valuable contributions to the community are why Bud Kraus nominated her for the Yoast Care fund. Let’s learn more about this passionate WordPress enthusiast.

Nominator Bud Kraus: “Winstina is a deserving recipient, because she has done so much for the WordPress Community for years. She was the lead organizer for WordCamp NYC 2018, and ushered me into the WP Community then. She has organized countless Meetups in person and online. Winstina has spoken at many WCs and, most importantly, is now the founder of Support Inclusion in Tech, which assists many in attending WordPress events. If anyone deserves this honor, it is Winstina, who works tirelessly and with love so that we can all benefit.”

Let’s get to know Winstina Hughes

That’s quite an introduction, Bud! We would love to get to know Winstina even better. That’s why we asked her some questions about her work and her passion for WordPress:

Hi, Winstina Hughes! What do you do?

I contribute to WordPress, and my career is in transportation planning. The agency I work for sets the regional vision and planning goals for transportation and transit for 13 counties and two cities in New Jersey.

My role is to engage, listen, inform, educate, and seek input on these goals from the communities and governments we serve. Our region is one of the most diverse in the United States, both ethnically, racially, and in terms of income and physical features. The U.S. can be as different geographically and culturally as the U.K. is to Switzerland (Europe), South Africa is to Nigeria (Africa), and India is to Japan (Southern and Eastern Asia). We plan for 7 million people who live and work in a dense and rural geography, including skyscrapers and concrete, hills, farmland, and coastal developments.

New Jersey is home, and I’m so happy to be back! I recently transitioned to the North Jersey Transportation Planning Authority (NJTPA) from the Maryland Department of Transportation (MDOT State Highway). In addition to that, I am the Senior Manager of Outreach and am thrilled to work alongside a team committed to excellence. I am also excited to apply my DOT public engagement experience and skills to my new MPO role.

How do you know about WordPress?

In 2006-2007, my college GIS assignment required adding maps to a WordPress blog. I attended NYC Meetups to learn WordPress and, over time, became a community and core contributor. My community contributions include co-organizing more than 30 NYC Meetup events in person at venues such as WeWork Times Square, Microsoft, and Google offices. I co-organized over 40 online events on Zoom for those who couldn’t attend in person. Over 800 awesome members registered for in-person events, and more than 1400 for online events (proving that WordPress love knows no distance!)

As a lead organizer in 2018, I welcomed 43 speakers and 400 attendees and secured sponsorships working with a phenomenal team of 18 for WordCamp NYC. Collaborating with our team, managing our conference budget of $120,000, and welcoming our speakers and attendees was incredibly rewarding.

During the pandemic, Daniel Schutzsmith and I co-hosted a bi-weekly Twitter Spaces series called #WPTalks, where we discussed the human side of WordPress.

In 2022, I founded Support Inclusion in Tech (SiNC) with partners in the WordPress ecosystem. SiNC goes beyond inclusion – achieving a “fifth freedom”: a truly open and accessible tech environment for everyone. Our work has a global reach, helping send speakers from five continents to WordCamps in 2023. 57% of applicants identified as women, 43% identified as men. I’m deeply grateful to Yoast and Newfold Digital for partnering with 12 other companies to support diversity, equity, and inclusion in WordPress.

Why WordPress? 

I came to learn, and I stayed for our community. WordPress New York City Meetup is home. I’m touched to the core to be nominated for this award by Bud, whom I met at the first WordCamp NYC I helped co-organize.

Who is your WordPress mentor? 

This is such a great question. I don’t have a WordPress mentor. I would love one! If you are a C-suite leader and my skills and contribution align with your expertise and values, and you want to mentor me, please contact me!

While I haven’t had a mentor, I have been guided by incredible Automatticians and contributors throughout the years. Steve Bruner‘s leadership with WPNYC Meetup for nearly two decades is a model for establishing a long-term community. Cami Kaos guided me on how to host inclusive Meetup events. Together, we crafted language for NYC events tailored to women. We settled on ‘women and non-binary’ for inclusivity. Angela Jin suggested I switch out ‘sponsor inclusion’ to ‘support inclusion’ in tech. I did this to remove any thought that companies paid for speaker opportunities. Our speakers are selected on merit and seek travel funding from us. Jill Binder offered me insight on interviewing job candidates, which helped me hire my first remote employee, who is lovely! I’ve absorbed enough marketing wisdom from Mary Baum, Lindsey Miller, and Meryl Randman to know it requires talent and I shouldn’t do everything – it is wise to work with marketing experts. What Marieke van de Rakt created with the Yoast Diversity fund is inspirational. I trust them, and I’ve learned from each.

What would you love to do in the future?

I would love to expand the impact of Support Inclusion in Tech (SiNC) by investing more in our talent and multiplying the impact of our partners. One way to do this is to continue our mentorship program in 2025. Another is by offering past recipients travel support to professional conferences. This would foster a richer exchange of ideas in WordPress and bring their expertise to a wider audience.

I would love to bring a little Winstina to watch one of our speakers present. Introducing my little one afterward would fill my heart to the brim. And if they ask me about becoming a speaker, I’ll say, “Darling, let’s practice tonight with your dad.”

Before I retire, I would love to contribute to transportation planning at the federal level. Teaching a Federal Highway Administration (FHWA) course and working on a real-world case study with younger transportation planners as an adjunct professor would be amazing.

I would also love to continue volunteering in transportation research. Research in my field is crucial for saving lives and innovating with a constrained budget. I’m committed to contributing meaningfully to The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NAS) in the next three years. I was recently appointed to two NAS Transportation Research Board (TRB) panels. NCHRP 20-44(58) aims to implement findings from the previous study titled “Metropolitan Planning Organizations: Strategies for Future Success”, and NCHRP 07-37 is updating the AASHTO “Guide for the Planning, Design and Operation of Pedestrian Facilities.” Our goal is to improve engineering standards to prevent pedestrian deaths. Earlier this year, the research report from my first project panel BTSCRP BTS-17, “Determining the Effectiveness of Combined High Visibility Enforcement (HVE),” was published.” If you want insight into how we’re working to save lives, spend a few minutes reading it!

Where may people find you? Online, WordCamps, other meetups?

You can find me at a NYC Meetup, follow my work on my website, winstinahughes.com, and contact me through Support Inclusion in Tech’s Open Collective page.

Thank you for this interview, Winstina, and for all of your contributions to the WordPress community! Do you know someone like Winstina Hughes who also deserves to be in the spotlight? Go to our Yoast Care page and nominate them right away.