Jemima is a student at Loyola University Chicago, where she is studying Political Science and Sociology. Originally from Austin, Texas, she spent her junior and senior years of high school as the Youth Justice Ambassador for the Texas Criminal Justice Coalition. While there, she researched and worked with students to study Restorative Justice practices as an alternative to Zero Tolerance, resulting in the report “Reversing The Pipeline to Prison in Texas: Ensuring Safe Students and Safe Schools”. Jemima has worked with students across Texas, listening to their stories about the harsh standard of disciplinary policies throughout the state. She believes that the youth justice movement is in an unprecedented moment and, if utilized correctly, can create long-lasting generational change.

Beni is a 22-year-old Youth Organizer/Advocate who identifies as a transgender (FTM) Chicano. He was born and raised in South Central Los Angeles by two immigrant parents from Mexico. Through Beni’s art work in high school, he began to focus on social injustices that were occurring in his community towards people of color. After high school, he attended Los Angeles City College where he obtained an Associate’s Degree of Transfer in Administration of Justice (a.k.a. Criminal Justice) in June 2022. During college, Beni began working as the System Free Arts Coordinator at Youth Justice Coalition, recruiting youth of color into transformative spaces and coalitions to not only tune in but also share their voice.

Angelina is a Diné (Navajo) and Guatemalan woman, who was born and raised in Inglewood, California. She currently resides in the Inland Empire County, on Kizh and Tongva territory. As a Youth Fellow Organizer, Angelina helps bring Native and Indigenous youth across California to a safe environment where they can express who they are without being judged from what background they came from. She is also currently an Ambassador with The California Endowment: President’s Youth Council, where she brings justice to Native and Indigenous communities in California. When Angelina isn’t serving her community, she loves to spend time with her relatives off and on the reservation. She also enjoys playing the guitar, singing, playing soccer, and spending time on self-care habits.

Xochtil is a 22-year-old college student and 2018 recipient of the California Endowment Youth Award as a Community Champion. She served as the youngest Fellow of the Peer-to-Peer Initiative through the Community Justice Network for Youth Program of the Burns Institute. She is also a vital youth commissioner on the Alameda County Juvenile Justice Delinquency Prevention Commission. Xochtil is an accomplished and relentless community activist and leader. She works in the trenches of local grassroots mobilizing, the laboratory of regional youth program development and building youth capacity for a fruitful society without tokenizing our voices, and the progressive planning of national restorative justice reform to empower young people. As CURYJ’s Youth Justice Program Associate, Xochtil brings her own innovative Youth Transformation Curriculum to detained juvenile youth and is a respected alumni researcher and advisor in Dream Beyond Bars justice system transformation recommendations.

Angie is a writer and community educator. They are a queer Latine immigrant and first-generation college student studying English and Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies focusing on Social Justice Theories. She works to see queer and immigrant communities flourish despite the barriers placed before them; she advocates for mental health awareness and generational healing in the Latino community. As a community educator, she has experience working with immigrants, LGBTQ+, and youth of color using a culturally responsive, intersectional and trauma-informed approach. She believes that community healing, accessibility and intentionality can empower communities of color to create change.

Ahmed’s work has mainly focused on BIPOC food justice. He has worked with Modest Family Solutions to distribute 10,000+ pounds of fresh (local BIPOC farmed) produce monthly to communities in need. Being a part of this endeavor has given him great pride and satisfaction in the work he has done. Some topics of interest aside from food justice are minority ownership, justice system reform, BIPOC youth-led community engagement and reforming discriminatory practices in the educational environment/corporate world. He believes that youth are the voices of tomorrow and, with the power of 21st century tech and social media, why put off for tomorrow what we can do today?

Fabiana is an 18-year-old incoming college freshman at the University of Florida. As a woman of color from the Hispanic community, Faby hopes to offer unique insights, especially regarding how people of color are disproportionately affected by social injustice and misinformation, as well as the way culture and religion affect the coming out experience. Her most notable social justice campaigns have happened as a ChangeMakers Leader, a program offered by the Alliance for LGBTQ+ Youth. Faby was excited to deepen her knowledge of the LGBTQ+ community’s different demographics and to explore how she could make a change in her own community to create safe, accessible living spaces for the LGBTQ+ community. Throughout her time in the program, she wrote an op-ed about the Don’t Say Gay Bill, which was featured in the Sun Sentinel, helped lead and put together campaigns like a book club and informative presentations for members of the community, and even attended a roundtable with Dr. Murphy, the Surgeon General of the United States. Her areas of focus include the relationship between queer theory and feminism, improving access to LGBTQ+ history, and access to comprehensive sexual education that supports the wellness of the LGBTQ+ Community, which she hopes to continue to explore. She is excited to learn more about the philanthropic side of social justice and hopes to gain invaluable experience through the Visionary Freedom Fund.

Jaidyn is an 18-year-old rising sophomore at Harvard College, studying Cognitive Neuroscience & Evolutionary Psychology. She is also an enrolled member of the Lower Sioux Indian Community in Minnesota and is Dakota. Jaidyn has been involved in gender and racial equity work for many years as a member of the Young Women’s Cabinet of Minnesota and the National Young Women’s Cabinet. She also has a strong passion for STEM and has presented and published research on the prevalence of depression in American Indian Diabetics at the National Institutes of Health through their STEP-UP internship. Jaidyn also served as a Youth Ambassador for her community and on the Lower Sioux Health and Human Services Advisory Council, where she helped work on two policies to improve her community’s health. She remains dedicated to social justice work, continuing to advocate for herself and her community.

Laura is a 20-year-old junior at Florida International University in Miami, Florida. Between her freshman and sophomore years, she participated in the Sierra Club Student Coalition Program (Sprog) in Puerto Rico, where she became politically activated through education and resources for community engagement. Upon her completion of Sprog, she worked as a community canvasser and intern at Power U Center for Social Change and a member of the Youth Leaders Board at S.O.U.L. Sisters Leadership Collective. Through this work, Laura has followed her family tradition of activism through local grassroots organizations that have abolitionist, anti-capitalist, and feminist values to create the conditions possible for a better future.

Tauheedah is a 26-year-old Black Muslim Woman who earned her Bachelor’s degree from Cal State LA In Pan-African Studies. As a child in the foster care system who has also been affected by mass incarceration, she has been organizing since she was 13 years old. Tauheedah currently works to end mass incarceration and the foster to jail pipeline with Youth Justice Coalition and Reimagine Child Safety. Her work also addresses gender violence and gender inclusivity. Additionally, she is the author of a poetry book, “Hide and seek.”

Hassan is a community activist from Richmond, Virginia who is committed to the advancement of African-American youth and urban neighborhoods. He believes in the promotion of healthy communities and creating an opportunistic environment for youth. Hassan currently serves as a national youth leader for the Youth First Youth Leader Network (YFYL), which is a group of youth advocates who are helping to lead campaigns to close youth prisons and invest in community alternatives in their states. Hassan is also a youth leader for Virginia nonpartisan organization, R.I.S.E. (Reinvest In Supportive Environments) for Youth. He also serves in the faith community, working with Destiny Community Church of Richmond, VA in different capacities — serving the Southside Richmond area through community engagement, mentorship and leadership development. Aside from activism, Hassan is a musician, producer and artist, performing and recording with Richmond-based band, The VybeHouse and has produced for various artists in Richmond. He is also a Minister of Music.

As the daughter of an undocumented immigrant serving 30-to-life in a New Jersey prison, Tanisha “Wakumi” Douglas has dedicated her life to building leadership among youth most impacted by mass incarceration and other oppressive systems. She is the Co-founder and Executive Director of S.O.U.L. Sisters Leadership Collective based in Miami. Wakumi has worked as a restorative justice circle keeper, social worker, community organizer, trainer and popular educator for community organizations and foundations including the New York Women’s Foundation, NoVo Foundation, United We Dream, Dream Defenders, Harlem Children’s Zone and Children’s Defense Fund. Wakumi holds a bachelor’s degree from Georgetown University and a Master of Social Work degree from Columbia University, where she founded and organized the first “Columbia University Beyond the Bars” conference in 2010 as a student organizer. She is also a 2017 Move to End Violence fellow. Wakumi’s work has been featured in Dr. Monique Morris’ 2019 documentary PUSHOUT: Criminalization of Black Girls in Schools as well as Huffington Post, NPR and Miami New Times. She has spoken on stages at Google, Obama’s White House and the National Educators Association. She has moderated a plenary featuring Dr. Angela Davis and Ericka Huggins on healing in our movements at the 2017 NACRJ Conference and has shared the stage with Congresswoman Ayanna Pressley at the 2019 Congressional Black Caucus Conference.

Hernán is the Founder & CEO of Healing Ninjas, Inc., a health and wellness company aiming to build and deepen community between people on healing journeys. He is a Chicano social entrepreneur, community organizer and leader in the fight to end youth incarceration. Currently, he is also the National Youth Partnership Strategist at the Youth First Initiative, a national campaign focused on closing youth prisons and reinvesting that money into community alternatives. He manages the Youth Leaders Network, which provides young emerging leaders with the training and tools to lead the fight against youth incarceration. He is also an advisor to the Credible Messenger Justice Center, serves as a board member for Community Connection for Youth, and is a grant-making committee member for the New Youth Program of the Prospect Hill Foundation. Previously, he was as a Program Analyst at the Vera Institute of Justice, where he worked to ensure that youth and families were included in statewide policy reform efforts around the country. He’s trained policymakers, non-profits, foundations, and professionals in probation, child welfare, juvenile justice and corrections, on different approaches to empowering directly impacted youth in policy advocacy, community organizing, and in creating a new vision for youth justice in America. He was awarded the “Spirit of Youth Award” by the Coalition for Juvenile Justice and the “Next Generation Champion for Change” award by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation. He has a B.S. from John Jay College.

Erik is a Native funder who is a member of the Carry the Kettle (Nakoda) First Nation. He is currently the Executive Director of Native Americans in Philanthropy (NAP), a Native-led organization that advocates for increased investments by the philanthropic sector in tribal organizations and communities. Prior to joining NAP, he led the Center for Native American Youth at the Aspen Institute. Erik has always believed in the power of young people to challenge the status quo and move the world toward a more just future. Early in his career, he served as a queer youth organizer in Seattle. Erik holds a JD and MA in American Indian Studies from UCLA and BA from Whittier College.

Loan is a queer, bilingual writer and organizer of color based Durham. Loan is currently Co-Executive Director at the Southern Vision Alliance, board member at the Highlander Research and Education Center and part of the leadership team at The Rising Majority. Following the passage of HB2 in North Carolina, they served in the leadership body of the Queer and Trans People of Color Collective, and helped create the HB2 Queer Mobilization Fund to move resources for resistance led by queer and trans people of color. Loan has previously served on the board of G.L.S.E.N. and the advisory board of the Emergent Fund. Loan was a featured speaker at the Historic Thousands on Jones St. (HKonJ)/Moral March and has had their writing and commentary featured in numerous publications, including New York Times, The Advocate and Gendered Lives.

Paula joined the Raikes Foundation as program officer on the youth homelessness strategy in August 2019. Prior to joining the foundation, she served as The Mockingbird Society’s Youth Network Coordinator before being promoted to Director of Youth Programs, where she oversaw Mockingbird’s statewide Youth Programs, which has a dual focus on youth development and systems reform. She also initiated and chaired the agency’s Race Equity Committee. Before joining to Mockingbird, Paula worked at the YMCA of Greater Seattle as an Independent Living Resource Specialist focusing on youth transitioning out of foster care. With over a decade working in this field, Paula continues to elevate the voices of young people at decision making tables. Having both lived experiences in foster care and youth homelessness, she brings a crucial perspective to the work. Paula earned a Master’s degree in Teaching from Seattle University, where she was also the first graduate of its Fostering Scholars program.

Mishi is the Director of AFF. She oversees a $4 million grantmaking portfolio advancing AFF’s mission to support the self-determination, power, and liberation of Black, Brown, AAPI, and Indigenous youth impacted by youth incarceration, child welfare, and other disruptive systems.

As a recognized leader, advocate, and organizer in youth justice, Mishi has helped bring significant advances to youth justice and criminal justice policy throughout her career.

Most recently, Mishi served as president of Youth First Initiative, an AFF grantee partner and national campaign to end youth incarceration and invest in community-based supports, services, and opportunities for youth. In this role, she supported state-based juvenile justice campaigns and secured widespread policy changes. Previously, Mishi worked as the juvenile justice policy strategist with the ACLU, the director of the Women in Prison Project and the Juvenile Justice Project with the Correctional Association of New York, the director of youth justice programs at the Children’s Defense Fund-NY, and as a senior advisor to the Commissioner at the New York City Department of Probation. She currently serves on the board of Community Connections for Youth, a nonprofit organization in the South Bronx.

Mishi received her bachelor’s from Swarthmore College and holds graduate degrees from Oxford University and the New School for Social Research.

Born and raised in the Bay Area, Iris‘ work has focused on mobilizing resources for collective activism that advances social change and addresses systemic injustice. In her current role, she focuses on grantmaking that transforms youth justice in Alameda County. She also co-manages the All in for Oakland Initiative to end the criminalization of young people of color in Oakland and Akonadi’s So Love Can Win rapid response fund. Additionally, she co-chairs the California Criminal Justice Funders Group, is a Steering Committee Member of Hope & Heal Fund and Board Chair for San Francisco Women Against Rape. She remains committed to a vision of liberation and community safety based in healing and love. Outside of work, you can find her studying at a local dance studio. She believes deeply in the transformative power of dance and derives much joy from her dance community.

April (formerly Julie Peterson) manages the Youth Justice Portfolio at the Pinkerton Foundation. She joined Pinkerton in 2013 after three years as Director of Public Private Partnerships for the New York City Department of Probation during the Bloomberg Administration. A graduate of Cornell and Harvard Law, she has represented displaced Navajo people in Arizona, worked in private practice and a variety of nonprofits. She has served as a consultant to several foundations as well as the Vera Institute of Justice. A fierce advocate for the incarcerated and, especially, court-involved youth, she has written about the valuable role that “credible messenger mentors”—people with direct experience in the criminal justice system—can play in preventing others from repeating that history.

Thena joined the Foundation in 2021 as its Program Director overseeing the foundation’s portfolios in the Southern part of the United States.
Thena is a racial justice lawyer with over a decade of experience advancing community-led efforts for education and youth justice. Previously, she served as Program Officer at Communities for Just Schools Fund, a national donor collaborative, where she managed a grants portfolio of grassroots community organizations leading local and national efforts for education justice and an end to the criminalization of Black and Brown youth in schools and communities.
Prior to her work with Communities for Just Schools Fund, Thena served as Director of the Advancement Project’s Opportunity to Learn Program, supporting local and state-based organizing campaigns to end the school-to- prison pipeline. Thena also served as Executive Director of Rethink, a New Orleans-based youth organizing and leadership organization. Earlier in her career, Thena served as a Staff Attorney for the New Orleans office of the Southern Poverty Law Center.
Thena is currently an adjunct professor of law at the University of Pittsburgh School of Law, teaching the Education Justice & Civil Rights Seminar. She is a graduate of Loyola University New Orleans College of Law and Hampton University in Virginia.

Gina is currently a Program Officer for the Human Rights program at the Heising-Simons Foundation, where she is committed to building power and capacity of grassroots organizations working to end the mass criminalization that leads to mass incarceration and immigrant detention. She also serves as co-chair of the California Criminal Justice Funders Group. Previously, she worked for the W. Haywood Burns Institute (BI), a national non-profit organization working to eliminate racial and ethnic disparities in the justice system by creating community-based alternatives to system-involvement and served as a Deputy Probation Officer, where she helped connect system-involved youth and families to community-based, culturally responsive, and healing-informed programs. Gina has experienced the detrimental impact of incarceration first hand, as she has witnessed her friends and family swept up by the criminal legal system. She is committed to developing a deep understanding of the systems that negatively impact Black, Indigenous and other communities of color. She lives in Oakland, California with her son, Isaiah, and life partner, Benito.

Amarilis believes identity is a central way to navigate spaces and brings her authentic self while working with communities. Her framework for social change focuses on youth developing their critical consciousness as a methodology to dismantle structural oppression and fight for liberation. Amarilis is currently a Program Officer at the Perrin Family Foundation, where she ensures PFF’s grant strategy and programs are aligned with youth-led social change. She also manages PFF’s grantmaking portfolio, capacity building initiatives and cultivates supportive relationships with grantee partners. Prior to joining PFF, Amarilis dedicated 10 years to youth development and managed a vibrant youth development department serving over 1,700 youth annually. As a youth development practitioner, Amarilis designed and implemented initiatives that bridged leadership development, college access, visual arts, social emotional wellness, undergirded by an anti-oppressive lens and analysis. She has expertise in building leadership pipelines, developing workshops, retreats and conferences dedicated to centering the analysis of race, culture and structural oppression in youth work.

Maisha’s career has been guided by her commitment to build power and self-determination in marginalized communities. Her two decades of on-the-ground leadership as a social justice organizer, community programs director, arts and policy manager and family advocate are essential to her role as a Program Officer focused on Criminal Justice & Drug Policy Reform work. Prior to her current role, she served as the Multicultural Fellow at the San Francisco Foundation, Community Programs Director at EastSide Arts Alliance, Communications Director and Family Advocacy Coordinator at Legal Services for Prisoners with Children. Maisha has campaigned with Committee to Free the San Francisco 8, Stop the Gang Injunctions Coalition, the Committee for the Defense of Human Rights and the Malcolm X Grassroots Movement. She currently serves as adviser to the Center for Political Education, is a recent fellow of both the Justice Funders Network’s Harmony Initiative and CompassPoint’s Arc Towards Justice Leadership and Solidarity Program, and is presently a poetry fellow with Cave Canem. A Bay Area native, Maisha holds a BA in African American Studies from Barnard College at Columbia University and an MFA in Poetry from Mills College.

Isabel Sousa-Rodriguez was born in Bogota, Colombia and moved to New York from Florida. Prior to joining Hazen, Isabel was the Director of Membership and Organizing at the Florida Immigrant Coalition. In 2010, Isabel was one of the founders of the national Trail of Dreams, walking with other students and families 1,500 miles from Miami to D.C., a mobilization that was instrumental in the negotiations with the Obama administration for the creation of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program (DACA) that has protected over 700,000 undocumented youth from deportation since 2012. In Academia, Isabel earned a Bachelor’s Degree in Sociology from the University of South Florida and then attended the City University of New York Graduate Center where she published academic articles detailing the effects of legal status and marginalization on undocumented mothers, their families, and adolescents. While in graduate school, Isabel was the state coordinator of New York’s Mexican Initiative on Deferred Action that provided legal aid consultations to thousands of immigrant youth and their parents across NY state. She has also played leadership roles in the Trans Justice Funding Project, DREAM.US Undocumented Youth Scholarship Fund, Miami Worker’s Center, Unite for a Fair Economy, and Central Florida Jobs With Justice.

Liz has spent more than two decades running non-profit organizations. This work included securing millions of dollars of public investment in youth development work in the South Bronx which culminated in her securing funding for the Phipps Beacon School, a multi-service initiative serving young people and families in the East Tremont section of the Bronx, serving as the inaugural director of that program. She has since led organizations at the intersection of youth-organizing, the arts and youth-development, developing public-private partnerships in support of that work. Since her move to philanthropy in 2008, Liz has focused on the development of strategies that are grounded in principles of social justice philanthropy, organizational strengthening and partnership. She recently co-authored an article on evaluation for The Foundation Review and her writing has appeared in the Chronicle of Philanthropy, Foundation Center and numerous blogs. She has spoken extensively on evaluation, impact, organizational development, and social justice philanthropy at industry conferences and as an adjunct assistant professor at NYU’s Wagner School of Public Service and has served on several boards including Philanthropy New York, Hetrick Martin Institute and the Empire State Pride Agenda.

Judy is a program officer in the Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity and Expression (SOGIE) program at Wellspring Philanthropic Fund. She has more than 20 years of experience working to create a more just and liberatory world through supporting the leadership of LGBTQ youth of color and people of color. Judy has led and overseen a variety of innovative youth justice advocacy, youth leadership, and arts programs serving LGBTQ communities and communities of color. Previously, Judy was the Director of the Juvenile Justice Project at the Correctional Association of New York (CA), where she oversaw and managed the CA’s youth justice advocacy reform efforts in New York, including its legislative campaigns, community organizing and engagement, and youth leadership development programs. She also served as Director of Programs at APEX, an Asian American youth organization in NYC, and Associate Director of the youth program at the NYC LGBT Community Center, where she managed the health education, arts and training programs. Judy currently serves on the board of directors of Queer|Art and Funders for LGBTQ Issues. She is also a writer, queer Asian American femme and a believer in the power of a bold lip.

Jessica is a national leader in civil rights with expertise in youth engagement, organizational development and training. Her passion for organizing started at UC Santa Cruz, where she was elected as Student Union Assembly President for two terms. After graduating, Jessica served as the Organizing Director for the United States Student Association (USSA), where she led campaigns in more than 15 states. During her tenure at USSA, she led efforts to pass the College Cost Reduction and Access Act – the largest increase to grant aid since the passing of the G.I. bill. With leaders of the Generational Alliance (GA), Jessica led efforts to develop Generation Vote, a coalition of 20 organizations invested in building a youth voting bloc that generated over 1 million youth contacts. Jessica then served as the National Training Director for the NAACP, where she helped to coordinate national election efforts for the 2012 election to turnout over 1.2 million Black voters and build uniform capacity and training programs at the national, state and local levels. Most recently, Jessica was the National Chair for Black Youth Project 100 (BYP100), where she focused on capacity-building and sustainability efforts through civic engagement, convenings and trainings. Jessica has committed herself to building power through training, working with organizations such as Wellstone Action, Midwest Academy, and the Center for American Progress. To date, she has personally trained more than 20,000 people. She has been featured in Ebony, PBS Newshour, BET, CNN, and Buzzfeed and has won numerous awards including the 21st Century Innovator Award from the Midwest Academy.

Bryan is a national leader in youth engagement with expertise in grassroots organizing, campaigns and communications as well as organizational, campaign and leadership development. He is the founder and former Executive Director of Ignite NC/Ignite NC Action Fund as well as part of the founding team at the Southern Vision Alliance. These North Carolina-based organizations have become national models for youth engagement, including two feature case studies on their best practices for youth civic engagement. He has also served as the Communications and Development Director for the Youth Organizing Institute, where he was able to help win policy change around school discipline. He was among the first 17 people arrested during the “first Moral Monday” and became a leader in this movement, serving as the youth speaker at many events. He is the recipient of the 2016 Mario Savio Youth Activist award and was the commencement speaker at the 2014 NC State University graduation for the non-profit studies department. Bryan has appeared on MSNBC, MTV, and PBS regarding racial justice and voting rights. He is on the boards of Bull City Safe Schools, Southern Partners Fund and Southern Vision Alliance. He holds a bachelor’s degree in Business Administration with a minor in Nonprofit Studies from NC State University and a master’s degree in Public Administration, Nonprofit Management and Policy from NYU Wagner School of Public Service.