Cleo Rodriguez, Jr. is Executive Director of the National Migrant Seasonal Head Start Association in Washington, D.C., which runs programs especially designed to meet the unique challenges and opportunities faced by migrant and seasonal farmworker families with young children.   

Cleo previously served as the President and CEO of the United Corpus Christi Chamber of Commerce, where he stabilized the organization’s funding, doubled membership, and raised over 1.7 million dollars for small businesses following the devastation of hurricane Harvey. From 2002 to 2010, he was Executive Director and Board Chair of Raising Austin, a non-profit organization dedicated to serving the neediest infants and toddlers in the Austin, Texas area. He was Executive Director of the Texas Head Start Association from 1996 to 2002. 

Cleo has served as an invited member of the White House Roundtable Council on Hispanic Families and collaborated with the White House Initiative on Educational Excellence for Hispanics to amplify the voices of migrant students. He was co-chair of the National Hispanic Education Coalition from 2012 to 2020, and is a current member of both the National Farmworker Alliance, and the Child Labor Coalition.  

In 2017, Cleo received the prestigious Ohtli Award from the Mexican Government for his work with bi-national populations, and was named the Honorary Consul of Mexico to the Coastal Bend region of Texas.  

Cleo’s parents were both migrant farm laborers who worked in the cotton fields across the state of Texas and other Southern states, and he himself worked as a seasonal farm. This personal life experience provides an essential foundation for his work on behalf of the migrant and seasonal farm worker community. 

Cleo received a BS from Texas State University and serves as a member of the Alumni Association. He was recently honored with the prestigious title of Distinguished Alumni.