Meet our amazing team of speakers and performers
Adriana Alejandre
Adriana Alejandre is a Trauma Psychotherapist and Speaker from Los Angeles, California. She specializes in adults who struggle with PTSD and severe traumas at her own private practice. She has done disaster relief work for Hurricane Harvey and the Las Vegas shooting survivors. Adriana’s expertise has been featured in LA Times, Telemundo, USA Today, the New York Times and Buzzfeed, among many others.
Adriana is the founder of Latinx Therapy, a national directory of Latinx Therapists and global, bilingual podcast that provides education to combat the stigma of mental health on the ground, and in the digital spaces. In 2019, she won Hispanizice’s TECLA award for Best Social Good Content award, and in 2020 she was one of 5 Latinx influencers chosen for the #YoSoy Instagram and Hispanic Heritage Foundation award. Adriana’s mission is to create spaces to spark dialogue about mental health struggles and strengths in the Latinx community.
Ana Tijoux
Tijoux was born in France to a French mother and a Chilean father in political exile during Pinochet’s dictatorship. After the return to democracy, the family moved to Chile. She found a home in the emerging hip-hop scene of Santiago and first started rhyming in French, then later in Spanish.
“Tijoux is an artist with the promise to cross borders and genres.”
– BILLBOARD
Anastasia Kim
Anatasia S. Kim, Ph.D., is a Professor at The Wright Institute in Berkeley, CA. She received her B.A. in Psychology from UC Berkeley and her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology with a minor in Developmental Psychology from UCLA. She is a National Ronald McNair Scholar and the recipient of a number of awards including American Psychological Association Minority Fellowship, Okura Mental Health Fellowship, and APAGS Guardian of Psychology Award. In addition to graduate teaching, she has a private practice specializing in treating patients with anxiety disorders, depression, and neuro-cognitive disorders using Cognitive Behavioral Therapy, Attachment Theory, Family Systems, and Buddhist Psychology. She also provides Diversity Equity and Inclusion (DEI) consultation and training to organizations. In recent years, she served as President of the Alameda County Psychological Association, Chair of California Psychological Association (CPA) Immigration Task Force, CPA’s state Diversity Delegate, and APA Division 31 Diversity Leadership Development Program.
Anjali Enjeti
Anjali Enjeti is a former attorney, journalist, teacher, and author based near Atlanta. Her books Southbound: Essays on Identity, Inheritance, and Social Change, and the novel, The Parted Earth were published earlier this year. Her other writing has appeared in The Oxford American, Harper’s Bazaar, USA Today, the Atlanta Journal-Constitution, Washington Post, and elsewhere. She is the co-founder of the Georgia chapter of They See Blue, an organization for South Asian Democrats and in the fall of 2020, served on the Georgia Asian American and Pacific Islander Leadership Council for the Biden Harris campaign. A former board member of the National Book Critics Circle, she has received awards from the South Asian Journalists Association and the American Society of Journalists and Authors, and was recently nominated to Good Morning America’s 2021 Asian American and Pacific Islander Inspiration List.
She is a graduate of Duke University, Washington University School of Law, and the MFA program at Queens University in Charlotte, and teaches creative writing in the MFA program at Reinhardt University.
Anne Friedman
Anne Friedman is an Interfaith Minister ordained by the Berkeley Chaplaincy Institute. Her spiritual work is rooted in helping people recognize their gifts and heal from their wounds. She uses her work as a writer, Reverend, and investor in pursuit of a more just and compassionate world. She graduated from Stanford University with honors, has a MBA focused on entrepreneurship and innovation, and co-founded an impact-driven hedge fund devoted to building systems of liberation. Prior to becoming ordained, Anne worked as a speechwriter and communications consultant for individuals and non-profits.
Anthony McGill
Hailed for his “trademark brilliance, penetrating sound and rich character” (New York Times), clarinetist Anthony McGill enjoys a dynamic international solo and chamber music career and is the principal clarinet of the New York Philharmonic—the first African-American principal player in the organization’s history. He is the recipient of the 2020 Avery Fisher Prize, one of classical music’s most significant awards. McGill appears as a soloist with top orchestras, including the New York Philharmonic, the Chicago Symphony Orchestra, Metropolitan Opera, Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, and Kansas City Symphony. As a chamber musician, McGill is a collaborator of the Brentano, Daedalus, Guarneri, JACK, Miró, Pacifica, Shanghai, Takács, and Tokyo Quartets, as well as Emanuel Ax, Inon Barnatan, Gloria Chien, Yefim Bronfman, Gil Shaham, Midori, Mitsuko Uchida, and Lang Lang. He performed alongside Itzhak Perlman, Yo-Yo Ma, and Gabriela Montero at the inauguration of President Barack Obama, premiering a piece by John Williams. He serves on the faculty of The Juilliard School and Curtis Institute of Music. He is the Artistic Director for the Music Advancement Program at The Juilliard School.
ARKAI
ARKAI channels the diversity of the world through genre-bending music, forging new possibilities for what a violin and cello can be. Winners of the 2021 Astral Artists National Auditions, their past engagements have included performances at The MET Breuer, The Juilliard School, Lincoln Center, Carnegie Hall, and the 92nd Street Y. Their electronic debut composition, “Letters from COVID”, was featured at TED@PMI for a global audience of over 30,000 people from 182 countries.
ARKAI was recently commissioned by the Museum of Chinese in America to write a piece for their new exhibition Responses: Asian Americans Resisting the Tides of Racism. Other commissions have included a piece for Silver Lining Ltd’s Impact 5X initiative — a global economic justice project supporting hundreds of small business owners from underserved communities around the world.
Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson
Ash-Lee Woodard Henderson is an Affrilachian (Black Appalachian) woman from the working class, born and raised in Southeast Tennessee. She is the first Black woman to serve as Co-Executive Director of the Highlander Research & Education Center in New Market, TN. As a member of multiple leadership teams in the Movement for Black Lives (M4BL), Ash-Lee has thrown down on the Vision for Black Lives and the BREATHE Act. Ash-Lee has served on the governance council of the Southern Movement Assembly, the advisory committee of the National Bailout Collective, and is an active leader of The Frontline. She is a long-time activist who has done work in movements fighting for workers, for reproductive justice, for LGBTQUIA+ folks, for environmental justice, and more.
Audrey Malek
Audrey Malek, from Gilmanton, New Hampshire, is a dancer with The Washington Ballet. She went to Dance Theatre of Harlem, Ellison Ballet, and ABT’s NYC intensives, and competed at the YAGP Boston semifinal in 2016, where she placed in the Top 12 Senior Classical division and at the Connecticut Classic that same year, where she made the Top 10. She joined TWSB’s PTP on a full scholarship for the 2016.17 season, and was then accepted into the Trainee program the following year. Malek’s repertoire with the company includes Julie Kent’s staging of Giselle and The Sleeping Beauty, Fokine’s Les Sylphides, Balanchine’s Serenade, Allegro Brillante, and Slaughter on Tenth Avenue, Paul Taylor’s Company B, John Heginbotham’s RACECAR, and Septime Webre’s The Nutcracker..
Brandon Santiago
Brandon Santiago is a Puerto Rican Poet, Writer, Producer, and critical educator who has 15 years of experience and expertise in diverse fields. He led the top Critical Literacy Arts origination, Youth Speaks, as the Interim Executive Director, directed the world’s largest Spoken Word Festival, Brave New Voices, and served as a VP at one of the fastest-growing educational Non-Profits in the country the Future Project. He has taught at Universities Like Stanford and Cal Berkely and has traveled the world as an educator and performer.
As an Innovative cultural strategist and creative social impact leader who holds additional expertise in narrative strategy and cultural equity, he has impacted companies and communities across the globe. He also co-hosted the first-ever all Latino Sports Radio show in the Bay Area on 95.7 the game.
Daniel Hope
British violinist Daniel Hope has enjoyed a thriving international solo career for more than 30 years. Celebrated for his musical versatility and dedication to humanitarian causes, he has been recognized with a string of honors including the Order of Merit of the Federal Republic of Germany and the 2015 European Culture Prize for Music. Besides undertaking solo recitals, chamber concerts and concerto collaborations with the world’s leading orchestras and conductors, Hope directs many ensembles from the violin, succeeding Roger Norrington as Music Director of the Zurich Chamber Orchestra in 2016 and becoming Music Director of San Francisco’s New Century Chamber Orchestra two years later. An exclusive Deutsche Grammophon artist since 2007 with an award-winning discography, he is also a popular radio and television host who may currently be seen in Hope@Home on Tour. In 2019 he completed his 16th and final season as Associate Artistic Director of Georgia’s Savannah Music Festival as well as becoming Artistic Director of Dresden’s Frauenkirche Cathedral.
Davone Tines
Heralded as a “singer of immense power and fervor” and “[one] of the most powerful voices of our time” by The Los Angeles Times, the “immensely gifted American bass-baritone Davóne Tines has won acclaim, and advanced the field of classical music” (The New York Times) through his work that blends opera, art song, contemporary classical, spirituals, gospel, and songs of protest, as a means to tell a deeply personal story of perseverance that connects to all of humanity. Called a “next generation leader” by Time Magazine, Mr. Tines is a path-breaking artist at the intersection of many histories, cultures, and aesthetics.
Devin Allen
Devin Allen was born and raised in West Baltimore. Allen gained national attention when his documentary photograph of the Baltimore Uprising was published on a Time Magazine cover in May 2015 – only the third time the work of an amateur photographer had been showcased there. Allen has turned his attention towards arming the youth of Baltimore with cameras, not guns. The mission of his Through Their Eyes project is to spread “hope and love through art” by training students from districts where arts education programs have been underfunded on how to use photography to express themselves. Through crowd-sourced fundraising, Allen provided students with cameras, donated his time holding youth photography workshops, and organized an exhibition of the students’ work. Allen is dedicated to empowering young people to tell their stories and the fellowship will support the continuation of his Through Their Eyes project.
Dr. Camara Jones
Camara Phyllis Jones, MD, MPH, PhD, is a senior fellow at the Satcher Health Leadership Institute and the Cardiovascular Research Institute in the Morehouse School of Medicine, and she is a past president of the American Public Health Association (2015–16).
Jones is a family physician and epidemiologist whose work focuses on naming, measuring, and addressing the impacts of racism on health and well-being. She seeks to broaden the national health debate to include the social determinants of health (including poverty) and the social determinants of equity (including racism), alongside universal access to high-quality health care. Jones’s allegories on race and racism illuminate topics that are otherwise difficult for many Americans to understand or discuss, and she aims to catalyze a national campaign against racism.
Elham Fanous
The 24-year old Elham Fanous is the leading Afghan pianist of his generation. His life’s work is to embody a positive face of Afghanistan’s future and to provide hope to musicians and artists living under threats to their creative expression all around the world. Elham has performed as a soloist on US State Department-sponsored appearances at the Kennedy Center in Washington DC and Carnegie Hall in New York City in 2013. He has performed at the Library of Congress for the 2017 Anne Frank Awards Ceremony, members of the diplomatic corps of Australia, China, Germany, Italy, and Korea, and at the Afghan Embassy in Washington DC through the Embassy Series: Uniting People Through Music Diplomacy. Elham has been profiled on National Public Radio’s Morning Edition by host Renee Montagne, in BBC, on NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt, Military Times, New York Post, and other international media outlets. He is a recipient of the Young Musical Scholars Foundation and Anna Sosenko Assist Trust Fund. He is the subject of a German television documentary (ZDFtivi), and one of the featured artists in WQXR’s “20 for 20,” Artists to Watch. He is a graduate of Manhattan School of Music, Hunter College, and Afghanistan National Institute of Music.
Helga Paris-Morales
Helga Paris-Morales started dancing in her native Puerto Rico when she was three years old. She came from a musical family and loved to dance to and makeup shows. When she was eight years old, her family moved to Cincinnati and she began training at The Cincinnati Conservatory of Music. From 2008-2016 she studied tap, musical theatre, and ballet. Helga participated in Summer Intensive programs at American Ballet Theatre, The Joffrey Ballet, and Cincinnati Ballet. At age 16 she began auditioning for major ballet companies and received a scholarship to train with Kansas City Ballet. She was also offered the opportunity to join the Professional Training Program at The Washington Ballet and came to DC. Helga was promoted to Studio Company in 2019. She has choreographed a multitude of pieces for The Washington Ballet including the recent TWB’s Center Stage-inspired gala, and Create in Place.
Hunter Genia
Hunter Genia, is Anishinabek from the Saginaw, Swan Creek, and Black River Bands of Chippewa and also Grand River Bands of Ottawa. With a strong upbring in culture and activism, much work has gone toward healing, social justice, and empowerment in tribal communities.
He has been working exclusively across Turtle Island (North America) as a trainer, facilitator, speaker, and activist for the past 31 years to bring healing and understanding through collective native wellness community work. Although proud to have received his Master’s of Social Work degree, Hunter is most proud to be a dad of three beautiful sons.
Irene Ashu
Originally from Cameroon in West Africa, Irene Ashu grew up in a bright, vibrant, and rhythmic culture that ushered her into the world of choreography, movement direction, and creative direction. Ashu studied her craft across the world in Tokyo, Paris, Germany, Brazil, Cameroon, and Los Angeles. Ashu’s artistry is influenced by African culture, contemporary art, neo-classical styles of movement, technology, and sculptures. Beyond her artistic practice, Ashu obtained an B.S. in Economics And International Relations, and an MBA in marketing and branding.
Ashu has worked with notable artists and brands such as Victoria’s Secret, R.Shemiste, Yeezy, SKIMS, Moncler, Under Armour, Serena By Serena Williams, Hollister, Apple, Sony, Google, Android, Toyota, & Huawei Technology. Additionally, Ashu has worked with an array of music artist such as Nicki Minaj, Chris Brown, Big Sean, SZA, Lady Donli, Superfruit, Jennifer Hudson, David Guetta, Afrojack, DJ Carnage, Wiz khalifa, TY-$, School Boy Q, Teyana Taylor, WIZKID, Fanny Neguesha, Aluna George, Jeremih, SHIN, Carrie Underwood, Little Mix, Beba Rexha, MAJOR LAZER, Arashi, and more.
Jimin Han
Jimin Han was born in Seoul, South Korea and grew up in Providence, Rhode Island; Dayton, Ohio; and Jamestown, New York. Currently, she lives outside New York City with her husband and children. She attended Cornell University and Sarah Lawrence College, from which she holds an MFA.
A new novel is forthcoming from Little, Brown & Co. in 2023. A Small Revolution, her first novel, was among Entropy’s Best Fiction of 2017, Pleiades Editors’ Choice 2017, Redbook Magazine’s 20 Books By Women You Must Read This Spring, Buzzfeed’s 6 Binge-Worthy Literary Books of May, CNN’s Summer Beach Reads, and Electric Literature’s list of Ten Galvanizing Books About Political Protest.
Other writing can be found at NPR’s “Weekend America,” Catapult Magazine, Poets & Writers Magazine, Electric Literature, Hyphen Magazine, and elsewhere. She teaches at The Writing Institute at Sarah Lawrence College and Pace University.
John Holiday
Countertenor John Holiday has established himself as “one of the finest countertenors of his generation” (Los Angeles Times). His voice has been praised as “a thing of astonishing beauty” (New Yorker), “arrestingly powerful, secure and dramatically high” (Wall Street Journal), “exceptional [and] strong…even in its highest range” (The New York Times) and “timeless” (Washington Post). Holiday’s unique voice and powerful story have been the subject of profiles in The New Yorker, CNN’s Great Big Story, Los Angeles Times, and more.
In 2021, Holiday will make his anticipated Metropolitan Opera debut in Matthew Aucoin’s Eurydice as Orpheus’s Double, and is slated to make his role debut as Cherubino in Le Nozze Di Figaro at Dallas Opera. An acclaimed concert singer, Holiday has performed at world-renowned venues such as Carnegie Hall, The Kennedy Center, Lincoln Center, London’s Barbican Center, and the Philharmonie de Paris. His career highlights have included a tour with Gustavo Dudamel and the Los Angeles Philharmonic; the Sorceress in Barrie Kosky’s production of Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas, and the world premiere of Matthew Aucoin’s Eurydice as Orpheus’s Double at the Los Angeles Opera;the world premiere of Daniel Roumain’s We Shall Not Be Moved with Opera Philadelphia and the Dutch National Opera; title role in Xerxes at the Glimmerglass Festival; and Caesar in Handel’s Giulio Cesare in Egitto at Wolf Trap Opera.
Jose Rodriguez
José F. Rodriguez is currently a Feature Film Programmer at the Tribeca Festival. He was formerly a senior staffer at Tribeca Film Institute, where he oversaw the growth, funding & overall strategic vision for all their documentary programs as well as their filmmaker/industry market, TFI NETWORK. During his 10 years at TFI, he also led documentary workshops in the United States and throughout Latin America.
In the past four years he has made two short films: the documentary short ADOLESCENCIA (ADOLESCENCE) and the experimental short Mama,mama.
Judy Rodgers
Judy Rodgers was working in media when she turned her attention to a study of consciousness and meditation twenty-five years ago. She held executive positions in media companies such as CBS/Fox Video and New World Entertainment for fifteen years, translating the ideas of authors and thought leaders to video. In 1999 she helped found Images & Voices of Hope, a global media initiative dedicated to media as a force for good. She oversaw the merger of ivoh with The Peace Studio in 2020.
Her interest in raja yoga meditation as taught by the Brahma Kumaris led to an extended study of consciousness and applied spirituality on how the quality of our awareness affects our thoughts, vision and experience in the world. Over the past twenty-five years she has returned to India roughly forty times to continue her study and practice of raj yoga and has supported many Brahma Kumaris initiatives. In 2009 she co-authored a book on altruism called Something Beyond Greatness.
She divides her time between her work as a consultant and communication strategist and her commitment to a raja yoga meditation practice. She lives in a retreat center in the Catskill Mountains, north of New York City.
Jung Yun
Jung Yun was born in Seoul, South Korea and grew up in Fargo, North Dakota. She is the author of O BEAUTIFUL, which will be published by St. Martin’s on November 9, 2021, and SHELTER, which was long-listed for the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize and a finalist for the Barnes and Noble Discover Great New Writers Award. Her work has appeared in Tin House, The Massachusetts Review, The Indiana Review, The Atlantic, The Washington Post, and The Los Angeles Review of Books, among others. Currently, she lives in Baltimore and serves as an Assistant Professor of English at the George Washington University.
Jyoti Sarda
Jyoti Sarda (executive producer) brings twenty years as a senior global marketing executive with major studios to developing impact-creating content through her company Nimble Media LLC. She produced an award-winning limited series, AND SHE COULD BE NEXT, that aired on POV(PBS) in 2020 and told the story of a women of color led movement to transform politics from the ground up. She is also Co-Executive Producer of EQUAL MEANS EQUAL, an unflinching examination of the discrimination against women in the US legal system. Currently, Jyoti is Executive Producer on an independent motion picture, LILLY, in production about the remarkable life of fair pay icon Lilly Ledbetter. Formerly, Jyoti was Vice President of Marketing at Paramount Home Media leading acquisitions and all facets of global marketing operations for partner brands. Jyoti serves on the board of GlobalGirl Media, an organization training young women to become civically engaged through citizen journalism and LAANE, a leading LA-based social justice nonprofit.
Kairyn Potts
Kairyn Potts (he/him) is a proud Two-Spirit winkte man from the Alexis Nakota Sioux Nation. Originally from amiskwaciwâskahikan (Edmonton) he now makes his home in Dish With One Spoon Treaty territory in Tkaronto (Toronto) where he works as an Indigenous youth advocate, motivational speaker, resource developer, content creator, fashion model, actor, and comedian. His creative projects allow him to utilize platforms like Tiktok, Instagram, and Twitch to share his culture, his passions, and some laughs with others. His youth advocacy work centers around queer Indigenous youth, youth in care, mental health awareness, Two-Spirit/gender identity, and life promotion.
Kate Stanforth
Kate Stanforth is a dance teacher, model, disability activist and charity founder from England, UK. After becoming disabled at 14, she’s strived to make the world more accessible with a particular focus on the dance industry. Now best known for her inclusive dance academy and high profile dance campaigns, she’s a woman on a mission to give everyone who wants to the chance to dance.
Laura Downes
Pianist Lara Downes has been called “an explorer whose imagination is fired by bringing notice to the underrepresented and forgotten” (The Log Journal). An iconoclast and trailblazer, her dynamic work as a sought-after performer, a Billboard Chart-topping recording artist, a producer, curator, activist, and arts advocate positions her as a cultural visionary on the national arts scene.
Ms. Downes’ musical roadmap seeks inspiration from the legacies of history, family, and collective memory, excavating the broad landscape of American music to create a series of acclaimed performance and recording projects that serve as gathering spaces for her listeners to find common ground and shared experience.
Lennon Flowers
Lennon Flowers is hell-bent on creating spaces where humans can be human, out of a belief that nothing is done in isolation, and that self-help only works in community. She’s the co-founder & Executive Director of The Dinner Party, a community of mostly 20-, 30-, and early 40-somethings working to transform our most isolating experiences into sources of meaningful connection and forward movement. Since 2014, The Dinner Party has connected more than 13,000 grieving peers to one another, including 2,000 since the start of the pandemic. She’s the co-founder of The People’s Supper, which uses shared meals to build trust and connection among people of different identities and perspectives. Its work is born of the popular adage that change moves at the speed of trust, and a simple question: What needs healing here? Since 2017, The People’s Supper has brought more than 10,000 people together for suppers in more than 100 cities and towns across the country, in partnership with dozens of local government & civic groups, faith-based organizations and communities, colleges & universities, and workplaces. She is an Ashoka Fellow and Encore Gen2Gen Innovation Fellow, and her work has been featured on OnBeing with Krista Tippett, NPR’s Morning Edition, CNN, CBS This Morning, the New York Times, the Washington Post, and dozens of other publications.
Leslie Rangel
Leslie Rangel is the founder of The News Yogi | Yoga for Journalists. She teaches mental wellness healing tools in BIPOC safe spaces through yoga and community. With nearly a decade in news, Leslie has dealt with chronic stress, traumatic news coverage and the challenge of understanding how her life experiences directly impact such a high-stress career. After years of self-study and yoga training, Leslie is now on a mission to teach journalists how to understand trauma, stress, depression and anxiety and how to take yoga practices on the mat into their lives off the mat.
Leslie is also a morning anchor in Austin, Texas. She created, produces, shoots and edits her own franchise, Good Day Together where she focuses on sharing stories from the BIPOC community to help them see themselves in a way that’s different from perceptions.
Leslie has been a featured presenter for journalism conferences including RTDNA, IRE, and ONA. Her yoga for journalists work has been featured in Yoga Journal and the Journalism Institute National Press Club. Leslie has more than 800 hours of yoga training in trauma-informed yoga and meditation. She’s just completed 300 hours in Advanced Yoga Psychology with a licensed psychotherapist and yoga/meditation teacher.
Manolia Charlotin
Manolia Charlotin (she/her), a co-founder of Press On, tells stories that feed spirit and amplifies voices that seek liberation in her roles as multimedia journalist, curator, strategist, and educator. Over the last 15 years she has helped lead several media organizations and campaigns, including the Boston Haitian Reporter, The Haitian Times, and Feet in 2 Worlds. Most recently, she was the Associate Director at The Media Consortium, a network of leading independent news media, where she advanced the sector’s racial equity strategy, development of emerging local media networks, coverage of social justice movements, and editorial management for a landmark scientific study on the impact of collaborative storytelling. Currently, as a social impact and equity consultant to movement-building organizations and independent media platforms, she’s helping change agents channel their resources to center the capacity of communities of color to build institutions in their image. Manolia also serves on the board of directors for Bitch Media and YES! Media.
Maryam Ishani
Maryam Ishani is a specialist on the impact of armed conflict on civilians. She has worked at the United Nations in monitoring and reporting for the Security Council on human rights abuses in the Democratic Republic of the Congo and Sudan. She has also taught International Humanitarian Affairs at Columbia University and has conducted field research in emergency zones, most recently in Afghanistan, Iraq, and Colombia.
Currently, she is the director of The Journalist Connection, an on-line news service reporting from areas of conflict, and is writing a book about non-combatants caught between national militaries and irregular armed groups.
Maya King
Maya King is a national politics reporter at POLITICO, where she covers state and national campaigns as well as the intersection of race and politics. She has written for POLITICO for two years and has covered education, breaking news, political advertising and gubernatorial campaigns. Prior to joining POLITICO, Maya held positions at NPR, USA Today and the Democracy Fund.
Mayor Steven Reed
In November 2019, Steven L. Reed made history as the first African-American to be sworn in as Mayor of Montgomery, Alabama, a city known globally as The Birthplace of the Civil Rights Movement.
A native of Montgomery, Mayor Reed is committed to realizing his vision of a more equitable, progressive, and compassionate city. To that end, he is advancing an agenda that puts Montgomery on track to become a leader in the New South.
In his first year in office, Mayor Reed successfully led a transformational ballot initiative to increase investment in Montgomery Public Schools for the first time in over 30 years. Amid the height of the COVID-19 pandemic and its sweeping effects on public and private sector budgets, Mayor Reed restructured the city government to increase efficiency and effectiveness while the City maintained a balanced budget, increased reserves and avoided employee furloughs and layoffs. As a result, bond rating agencies awarded Montgomery its best grades since the Great Recession. In the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder Mayor Reed is proud to have steered the city through peaceful protests without any personal or property incidents, while also leading initial police reform efforts.
MELIM
Born in Niterói, brothers Rodrigo, Diogo and Gabi are Melim. Owners of several hits in Brazil, such as Meu Abrigo, Ouvi Dizer, Gelo and Eu Feat. Você, they ventured into music early on, still in solo careers. These four songs were on “Spotify Brazil Top 200”, and Melim spended 144 weeks at “Spotify’s Top 100 Songs” . They got together to sing at a festival, and have never been apart since.
After the success of their first album “Melim”, they recorded the album “Eu Feat. Você”, which was nominated for the 2020 Latin GRAMMYs in the category “Best Portuguese Language Album”.Riching more than 3 million views in one week video. And in early 2021, they released the second part of the project: “Amores e Flores”, collecting more than 23,6 million views. The group has two times diamond singles with the song “Meu Abrigo” and one time diamond single with “Ouvi Dizer” on more than 300K copies sold.
Also in 2021, Melim released “Deixa Vir Do Coração”. A 13-track project in honor of Djavan, with his participation on the track “Outono”, collecting until now more than 5 million players on Spotify and Youtube .Riching 3,94 million monthly listeners, Melim is the one of biggest Brazilian pop group.
Michael Koenigs
Michael Koenigs serves as the executive producer of ABC Localish, developing shows for ABC that highlight the good happening in cities across America. He also serves as the host of ABC’s “More In Common,” a show about people coming together despite their political and personal differences.
Previously, Koenigs was a reporter for ABC News covering events ranging from presidential campaigns to breaking news. He began his TV career producing for Chris Cuomo at “20/20,” before joining Diane Sawyer’s team at “ABC World News Tonight.” As a senior coordinating producer for ABC’s Lincoln Square Productions, he developed original TV formats for Disney Channel, ABC and Hulu.
In 2016, he biked 1,000 miles across America for his original series “Election Cycle” which ran across ABC News platforms including “Good Morning America” and “Nightline.”
Michael Skoler
Michael Skoler works with NYT columnist David Brooks on the Aspen Institute’s Weave: The Social Fabric Project in Washington, DC. Weave supports a grassroots movement that is repairing America’s frayed social fabric by bringing communities together to support and serve each other.
Michael is a non-profit executive, journalist and serial collaborator. He served as a science and foreign correspondent at NPR, led public radio’s regional newsroom in the Twin Cities and founded the Public Insight Network, the first major crowdsourcing system for newsrooms. He stays centered through parenting, meditating and backpacking.
Mike Slaton
Mike Slaton is the Executive Director of the Louisville Pride Foundation, a non-profit organization serving the LGBTQ community. The Foundation is working to open an LGBTQ Community Center in Louisville by the end of 2021.
Mike previously worked for Louisville Metro Government for 10 years, in both the Parks Department and the Office of Management and Budget. During his tenure at Metro, Mike expanded the Adopt-a-Park program and helped revitalize the Iroquois Amphitheater. Mike helped form the city government’s first LGBTQ employee resource group before he left. Before working for the city, Mike was a volunteer and then staff member at the Fairness Campaign, where he was involved in the successful effort to protect school board employees from discrimination based on sexual orientation. Mike received his Bachelor of Arts in History from the University of Louisville and a Master of Public Administration from Indiana State University. He is a graduate of St. Francis High School in Louisville.
Mike volunteers with Every1 Reads and Big Brothers Big Sisters of Kentuckiana. He has served on the board of the Fairness Campaign and the Kentuckiana Association of Volunteer Administrators. Mike and his husband Jake were among the first legally married same-sex couples in the state of Kentucky, and they became foster parents in 2018. In addition, they have two dogs, Pepin and Selena. Mike enjoys hiking, studying history, theater, ballet, and jigsaw puzzles.
Myda El-Maghrabi
Myda El-Maghrabi is an artist and yoga teacher whose work in both has arisen out of a need to understand the various dimensions of human experience. Through a previous more physical, artistic practice to a currently more subtle, introspective one, she mines the nature of the self- in its multitudinous relationships with itself and others and the vast harmonies and cacophonies that those relationships precipitate.
Through different types of media, from wax and wood to sound and silence, she searches for what underlies our basic humanness, that which engenders the viscerality of emotions. She questions how a raw feeling can translate into something more concrete, something more tangible- how an experience of sadness, for example, can transform into a thought, a word, an artwork, a belief system, a body. And how we, in turn, through a deeper understanding and knowing of ourselves and each other, may better shape, build and sustain a stronger resonance for our humanity’s unfolding.
Myda has a BA in English Literature from Boston University, an MFA in Sculpture from Stony Brook University and has been teaching yoga, meditation and sound work throughout NYC for over 10 years (and Zoom for over 16 months).
Master Per van Spall
Master Per van Spall is a spiritual guide of Chinese, Indonesian and Dutch descent from the Netherlands. Partially raised by his Chinese grandmother who was knowledgeable in traditional Qigong. His western upbringing contained a touch of eastern inspired spiritualism.
Master Per’s powerful Qigong energy work unblocks energy that keeps your life force from flowing freely – boosting your immune system, releasing physical and emotional stress and imbalances, leaving you feeling rejuvenated, relaxed, grounded, connected at ease and at peace.
Per is a certified Master in the Art of Qigong Healing. He provides Body-Mind guidance to promote physical well-being, spiritual growth and emotional healing. His understanding of Western rationalism paired with his deep connection to Eastern spiritualism allows him to act as a bridge between the East and West but also between the intellect and the intuition.
His clients hail from diverse cultural and professional backgrounds.
Rosa Maria Zamarron
Rosa María Zamarrón is a Documentary Photographer from Southwest Detroit. She graduated from Grand Valley State University with a B.A in Photography, focusing primarily on Documentary/Photo-journalism. She has exhibited in various cities such as Grand Rapids, New York City, Detroit, Austin, and Rome, Italy. Her work has been in various publications including Vogue, Hour Detroit Magazine, The Detroit Free Press, Metrotimes, BridgeDetroit, D Business Magazine and WDET.
Rosa María is co-founder of La Sirena Studio, which is a collaborative female lead studio in Southwest Detroit that provides studio space in the community. Rosa María has also collaborated with local non-profits like Capture Belief and Young nation to teach photography to the youth in Southwest Detroit. She currently lives and works in Detroit, Michigan.
Scarlet Rivera
Grammy-nominated American musician Scarlet Rivera burned a hole in the fabric of rock history as a pioneer of electric violin. From a classical background she bent the accepted norms by experimenting with all genres of music from Rock fusion and Jazz to Latin polyrhythms. She was a revolutionary from the start.
Bob Dylan was the first to discover and acknowledge Rivera, inviting her as an integral part of the legendary album ‘Desire’ and Rolling Thunder Revue tour. Dylan recognized the genius of Rivera’s vision as a violinist who played much like a lead guitarist. Rivera’s dynamic presence led the way to the inclusion of other string players in Rock music. ‘Desire’ was chosen by Time Magazine as one of the top five albums of Dylan’s career and was Rivera’s debut on the world stage.
Shakita Brooks Jones
Shakita Brooks Jones is a Montgomery, AL native. Shakita is a graduate of Troy State University with a B.S. in social work and a master’s in social work from the University of Alabama. Shakita also has a master’s degree in public administration and a nonprofit management certification from Auburn University Montgomery. Shakita is an Assistant Clinical professor within Auburn University’s social work program. She is the founder of Central Alabama Alliance Resource & Advocacy Center. Shakita is also a strategy and facilitation consultant with Radical Optimist, a cooperative team of practitioners that serves to support groups in racial healing learning.
Sonali Kohli
Sonali Kohli worked for the L.A. Times for six years covering education and breaking news. She was part of the Times staff that won a Pulitzer Prize
for coverage of the 2015 San Bernardino mass shooting, and in 2020 was named the best education journalist in the U.S. by the Education Writers Association.
Most recently Sonali was a Spencer Fellow in Education Reporting at Columbia University, working on a young adult nonfiction book about teen activists. A
product of Southern California, Sonali grew up in Diamond Bar and graduated from UCLA. She worked as a metro reporter for the Orange County Register and as a reporter covering education and diversity for Quartz before joining The Los Angeles Times in 2015.
Tayo Rockson
Tayo Rockson is a writer, speaker, consultant, podcaster, professor, co-founder and brand strategist at UYD Management – a strategic consulting firm that empowers organizations to incorporate sustainable diversity and inclusion practices.
As the son of a diplomat, Tayo grew up understanding the nuances of multicultural diversity while living on four continents. He leveraged his experiences to establish himself as an authority in communicating effectively across cultures and personal branding. He graced various stages to share his knowledge including TEDx, the prestigious Chautauqua Institution, and the United Nations.
Tayo is the host of As Told by Nomads, a podcast ranked in the top 5 tier of the Top 25 Business Podcasts for Entrepreneurs on Entrepreneur.com. He’s the author of Use Your Difference To Make A Difference, and in 2020, he launched the national anti-racism campaign called #LetsTalkBias.
Tejal Patel
Tejal (she/her/hers) is a first-generation Indian American yoga teacher, social justice educator, podcaster, and community organizer.
Tejal aims to educate and empower individuals and communities around the world by teaching yoga through a social justice lens. She is co-lead of the Yoga is Dead Team which offers a podcast questioning who and what killed yoga, workshops and training about cultural appropriation, and live events about the issues with modern yoga. She created the abcdyogi village, where South Asian teachers reclaim the yoga and mindfulness space.
Tiffany Yip
Tiffany Yip, Ph.D. is a Professor, and Chair of Psychology at Fordham University. She completed an undergraduate degree at Cornell University, earned her MA and PhD at NYU, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Michigan. Her research on ethnic identity, discrimination, and sleep among ethnic/racial minority adolescents and young adults has been published in American Psychologist, Child Development, Developmental Psychology, and Current Directions in Psychological Science. She serves as an Associate Editor for Developmental Psychology and was a former Associate Editor for Child Development, Cultural Diversity and Ethnic Minority Psychology, and the Asian American Journal of Psychology. She is a Fellow of the American Psychological Association and the Association for Psychological Science, and her research has been funded by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation. Her research has been featured in outlets such as the NY Times, Washington Post, Los Angeles Times, CBS and Psychology Today.
Tonika Lewis Johnson
Tonika Lewis Johnson is a photographer/social justice artist and life-long resident of Chicago’s South Side neighborhood of Englewood. She is also co-founder of two community-based organizations, Englewood Arts Collective and Resident Association of Greater Englewood, that mobilize people and resources for positive change in Greater Englewood. Her multi-media project titled “Folded Map” that illustrates Chicago’s residential segregation while bringing residents together to have a conversation, was exhibited at Loyola University’s Museum of Art in 2018. Since then she has transformed this project into an advocacy and policy-influencing tool that invites audiences to open a dialogue and question how we are all socially impacted by racial and institutional conditions that segregate the city.
Tony Weaver
Tony Weaver, Jr. is an award-winning writer and educator creating diverse stories that make young people feel seen and valued. After seeing the impact that media stereotypes had on students in his community, Tony embarked on a journey to create new media narratives that would challenge the status quo. He is the CEO of Weird Enough Productions, where he developed The UnCommons, an award-winning comic with over 2 million readers. In 2018, Tony made history as the first comic writer to ever be selected for the Forbes “30 Under 30.” He was named a History Shaker by Coca Cola, a Global Barrier Breaker by Marriott International, and a Champion for Change by CNN.
Tramaine EL-Amin
A mental health equity advocate, Tramaine EL-Amin currently serves as the Client Experience Officer (CXO) for Mental Health First Aid USA® at the National Council for Behavioral Health in Washington, D.C. In this role, she provides oversight of corporate and community engagement and leads strategic initiatives. As a certified master trainer and national instructor, EL-Amin has contributed to more than 2 million individuals being equipped to recognize signs and symptoms related to mental health, substance use and suicide across the country. Prior to her tenure at the National Council, EL-Amin oversaw health equity initiatives at the City of Philadelphia Department of Behavioral Health and Intellectual disAbility Services (DBHIDS) —a publicly held behavioral health managed care organization. Her efforts focused on diversity, equity and inclusion, community engagement and a strategic approach to addressing public mental health and substance use disparities in service delivery for more than 1.5 million youth and adults throughout Philadelphia.
Travis Laplante
Travis Laplante is a saxophonist, composer, improviser, and qigong practitioner who is based in New York City and southern Vermont. Laplante leads the acclaimed tenor saxophone quartet Battle Trance and Subtle Degrees; his duo with drummer Gerald Cleaver. Laplante also recently composed long-form works for new music ensembles the JACK Quartet and Yarn/Wire while performing alongside them. Laplante is also known for his raw solo saxophone concerts and being a member of the avant-garde quartet Little Women.
Laplante has toured his music extensively and has appeared at many major international festivals such as The Moers Festival (Germany), Jazz Jantar (Poland), Saalfelden (Austria), Jazz em Agosto (Portugal), Earshot (Seattle), Hopscotch (North Carolina), and the NYC Winter JazzFest. As a composer, Laplante has recently been commissioned by the Lucerne Festival (Switzerland), the JACK Quartet, Roulette (Brooklyn, NY), Yarn/Wire, Yellow Barn Music Festival, and The Jerome Foundation. As a qigong student of master Robert Peng, Laplante has undergone traditional intensive training. His focus in recent years, under the tutelage of Laura Stelmok, has been on Taoist alchemical medicine and the cultivation of the heart. Laplante is passionate about the intersection of music and medicine. He and his wife are the founders of Sword Hands, a qigong and acupuncture healing practice based in Putney, Vermont.