U.S. PIRG Staff

Rich Williams is the Higher Education Advocate for U.S. PIRG and the Student PIRGs' Higher Education Project. The Student PIRGs are a network of statewide student organizations on college campuses across the country with more than 100 full-time organizers who facilitate student engagement with local, state and national decision-makers on concerns such as access and affordability in higher education.

Mr. Williams has represented college students before the White House, Congress, and the Department of Education. His expertise is federal higher education policy, including affordable textbooks, student aid, grants, and loans. His views and opinions have appeared in the New York Times, Washington Post, USA Today and other major publications.

Mr. Williams helped coordinate two national campaigns that transformed the debate on federal student aid policy. While working to reduce student debt across the country, he played a major role in building support for the passage of landmark student aid bills including the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 and the Health Care and Education Reconciliation Act of 2010. He also served as a negotiator representing students on the Department of Education’s 2009 and 2010 Negotiated Rulemaking teams that worked to create regulations around federal student loans and program integrity issues.

A first generation college student, Mr. Williams started organizing for higher education while a student at Coconino Community College and Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff. As a student, he spearheaded a statewide affordable textbooks campaign, organizing public university students, professors and Regents to introduce and pass a bill in the state legislature making textbooks more affordable.