Aria is a conduit, constantly bridging worlds; Black and white, movement and mainstream, ethnic studies and finance. She holds multitudes of them all, and the essence of her work is creating for others that which she wants for herself: a world where all people’s whole selves belong. Aria believes that building trust and transformational partnership across differences is the key that can unlock that world, and that building a culture of repair is the path to true belonging for Black people, and all people, in America. Aria loves trekking at high altitude with just a backpack and no cell service, enjoying a Brooklyn (Lenape Land) speakeasy with the fullest-bodied glass of red wine they have, and long, lively dinners with her people.

Becina Ganther (she/her/hers) is a researcher, planner, and historian committed to reimagining institutions, building community, and driving systems-level solutions that honor Black voices and create a more equitable society. She is interested in using stories and data to search for patterns and threads of connection between ideas, people, and events. She is curious about how developing a more comprehensive and complex understanding of our collective past — rooted in analyses of power dynamics and structural injustices — can inform our present and transform our future. She has made a home in many places, including Columbus, OH (Shawnee, Potawatomi, Delaware, Miami, Peoria, Seneca, Wyandot, Ojibwe, and Cherokee land); San Francisco, CA (Ohlone land); and Manhattan, NY (Lenape land). Becina loves visiting historic sites, telling puns, curating cozy spaces, and reminiscing with her loved ones.

Karin is a planner and strategist dedicated to constructing and sustaining just systems that foster a world where all thrive. She believes that through collective voice and unified action, our communities can dismantle the detrimental systems currently prevailing in the world, pave the way for healing, and initiate the journey toward repair. Karin enjoys quality time with her loved ones, global adventures, sampling diverse cuisines, and embracing her sociable nature during warmer seasons while preferring quieter moments during the colder months.

Jennie is a daughter and a friend — born on Lenape land (New York City), she is a student of power, paradox, and pleasure. Jennie is exploring what it means to be in right relationship with ourselves, each other, and the natural world. She believes that radical redistribution of resources, heart-centered communication, and joy are preconditions for dismantling white supremacy and building a culture of repair. Jennie loves ripe fruit, the sun, being loud and quiet, and cooking for loved ones.

Sahana is an organizer, working to build the relationships, strategy, and power necessary to bring about a world that ought to be. She strives for movements where all people can feel belonging and live into our responsibility to create a different future. Sahana believes in learning from the past, from elders and ancestors, to chart our course. Her approach is grounded in her desire to return to age-old values embedded across cultures: humility, responsibility, and reciprocity. Sahana loves to travel and eat her way through the places she visits – often on street food tours where she learns how history, culture, and movements live in everyday flavors. She lives in New York City on Lenape land.

Alex is a storyteller, strategist, and people-lover who believes in the power of narrative to transform the human condition. Rooted in the cultural rhythms of the Mississippi Gulf Coast (Choctaw land) and vast global experiences, he sees communication as a portal where local wisdom and systems thinking infuse to challenge dominant meta-narratives and surface liberatory truths. With a sharp cultural lens and an expansive heart, Alex utilizes narrative and story as technologies to help undergird and usher in better worlds and futures now. Deep laughs, great meals and ice cold gin martinis with loved ones always make him happy.

Amity is a strategist, communicator and connector dedicated to creating progress for communities of color using powerful storytelling. She is a lover of sci-fi and believes that all social justice work is a way of creating fiction – envisioning and then creating the new kinds of worlds we want to live in. She enjoys food, from farming to cooking and gathering community for meals and lives on a homestead in upstate New York with her husband.