Melissa Funderburk

Activist| LGBTQI Advocate | Motivational Speaker | DEI Speaker/Trainer | Community Organizer | Project Manager | NAACP Carolyn Q. Coleman Trailblazer award recipient I Women’s Empowerment Leader

“Queen” Melissa Funderburk brings has always been transparent with her life experiences. As a child, she grew up in the NC foster care system. She has experienced being homeless, and dropped out of school in the 7th grade to become a single, teenage mother raising a chronically ill child. She has protested in the streets for racial justice, and has fought to be successful through higher learning.

Melissa Funderburk is an activist and community organizer. She is deeply involved in local advocacy and social justice groups including; Charlotte JustUS League and NC Community Action Network. She is a former panelist for the Dr. Maya Angelou Institute for Health & Equity, and is a member of the Speaker’s Bureau for Warren & You for the Continent of South Africa.

In her current work, she organizes to connect people to healthcare resources who have been impacted during the COVID-19 pandemic; which caused cultural shifts in HMP communities. Teach leaders and communities to work together in order to create stronger, solid and sustainable futures for HMP communities and individuals.

She holds an MBA, MAOM(Organizational Management ), with a specialization in Marketing, a Bachelor’s Degree in Healthcare Administration with a specialization in Project Management, and Certifications in Comparative Equality & Anti-Discrimination Law, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (DEI) workplace interventions, Mental Health Instructor, member of PMI(Project Management Institute), and numerous others.

She brings all of this to uplift, encourage and give hope to others through speaking engagements and other platforms.

Her motto is “LET’S MAKE IT DO WHAT IT DO!”