Alejandra Aguilar

Program Specialist, California Partnership to End Domestic Violence

Alejandra, Mexican-UnitedStatian, formerly undocumented. As counselor, advocate, and Preventionista, she has supported teens & adults impacted by IPV/SA, developed culturally humble & trauma-informed prevention services in English and Spanish. She speaks up about the relationship between abuse & oppression, the interconnectedness of social justice efforts, the need for diverse prevention & intervention services, and ways in which white people can make space for people of color.

Workshop: Creating Space for Women of Color: Conversation for White Women

Anisa Ali

Program Specialist, Futures Without Violence

As Program Specialist at FUTURES, Anisa develops educational materials and provides technical assistance on state and national programs of health care and domestic violence partnerships. Prior to her work at FUTURES, Anisa worked and interned for women's rights organizations, served as an AmeriCorps volunteer in Madison, WI, and taught English as a Fulbright scholar in Turkey. Anisa earned her MA in Gender and Women's Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

Workshop: Beyond Halal and Haram: Muslims, Sex, and Relationships

Antoinette Schrader

Housing Services Manager, House of Ruth

Toni M. Schrader is a domestic violence advocate and licensed counselor currently serving as House of Ruth's Housing Services Manager. Toni has an extensive background in domestic violence, education, and counseling. Toni is a founder of the Black Counselors Association and has done extensive research centered around serving families and youth of color, community violence exposure and PTSD, and providing culturally competent therapeutic interventions.

Workshop: Family Business: Unpacking the Silence of Black Victims of Intimate Partner

April McGill

Director of Community Partnerships & Projects , California Consortium for Urban Indian Health

April McGill M.P.A. (Yuki, Wappo, Little Lake Pomo, Wailaki), is an enrolled member of Round Valley Indian Tribes living in San Francisco raising her son in the Urban Indian community. She graduated from San Francisco State University in 2009 with a BA degree (Honors) in American Indian Studies.She currently works as the Director of Community Partnerships & Projects for the California Consortium for Urban Indian Health (CCUIH) leading the violence against women Red Woman Rising Project (RWR).

Workshop: The Red Women Rising Project: Implementing Culturally Responsive Services

Beth Hassett

Chief Executive Officer, WEAVE

As the CEO of WEAVE, Beth leads the charge to foster communities that promote safe and healthy relationships and support victims of sexual assault, domestic violence and sex trafficking. Under her direction, WEAVE has grown to be a $10 million agency offering a robust array of comprehensive services including emergency and transitional housing, legal assistance and advocacy, therapeutic counseling and prevention education. Beth received the 2016 Ed Stout Memorial Award for Outstanding Victim Advocacy from the Congressional Victim’s Rights Caucus and the 2011 Director’s Community Leadership Award from the FBI. An active volunteer, she is Vice Chair of the Sacramento First 5 Commission, Treasurer of the California Coalition Against Sexual Assault (CALCASA) and a member of the HomeAid, Midtown Association and Sacramento Theatre Company boards of directors.

Workshops: Increasing DV Agencies' Capacity to Serve Survivors with Disabilities

Changing to the Equity Lens: Steps Domestic Violence Organizations Can Take

Christie Munson

Deputy Executive Officer, CalVCB

Ms. Munson serves as the Deputy Executive Officer of the California Victim Compensation Board. Previously, she worked as a prosecution-based victim advocate and as the director of a sexual assault crisis center. She provided technical assistance to state sexual assault coalitions through the National Sexual Assault Coalition Resource Sharing Project, served on the board of the Iowa Coalition Against Sexual Assault and was president of the Iowa Organization for Victim Assistance.

Workshop: Accessing Compensation for Victims of Domestic Violence

Connie Chung Joe

Executive Director, Korean American Family Services

Connie has been the ED of KFAM since 2009, during which time the agency has more than tripled its budget and staff. KFAM, which was founded in 1983, serves 6,000+ clients annually through culturally responsive services around domestic violence, mental health and child welfare. Connie is a passionate advocate for the needs of API and other underserved communities, including through the Culturally Responsive DV Network and the CA DV Advisory Council. Connie's a recovering attorney.

Workshop: Reach Across the Aisle: How 2 Feminists Worked with Christian Conservatives

Dominique Waltower

Speaker, Inspire Perspective

Dominique is a violence prevention advocate and a dynamic motivational speaker who has presented nationally and internationally about his journey through domestic violence. He speaks about being a victim as a child, becoming abusive as an adult and what was necessary for him to not only change his behavior but to change his thinking about abuse. Dominique speaks about the the important difference between a behavior change and a heart/mind change.

Workshop: Evolution of Boy: From Survivor to Abuser, A Story Of Responsibility & Becoming a Healer

Gayle Guest-Brown

Exec. Leadership Coach, Trainer, Author, Speaker, , Guest Brown impact

Gayle Guest-Brown is an Executive Leadership Coach, leadership trainer, author and keynote speaker empowering leaders to access their strengths, connect to their values and reach their best strategies and solutions through one-on-one confidential and customized coaching. Gayle serves on the board of directors of the CA Partnership to End Domestic Violence. She also facilitates Safe Black Space and Emotional Emancipation community healing circles. She is the author of Girl Get it Right!

Workshop: Stepping into cultural inclusiveness and equity in the DV field

Haleema Bharoocha

Tech Equity Policy Fellow, The Greenlining Institute

Haleema is a public servant driven by her commitment to the liberation of all people. Uplifted by generations of women of color, Haleema centers her work in compassion and justice. She is a Tech Fellow at Greenlining and the Bay Area Director of Malikah, a nonprofit that supports women. Haleema has a B.A. in Sociology with from Seattle U, where she founded the Gender Justice Center. Haleema is motivated to build a world free of gender-based violence through policy and organizing.

Workshop: The Role of Technology in Addressing GBV and Disaster Relief

Kate Jastram

Senior Staff Attorney, Center for Gender & Refugee Studies

Kate Jastram is Senior Staff Attorney & Gender Asylum Campaign Director at the Center for Gender & Refugee Studies, UC Hastings College of the Law, San Francisco. She has served as an asylum officer in the San Francisco Asylum Office, US Citizenship and Immigration Services. She was a legal advisor in the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Refugees in Geneva and in Washington, DC. She has been a member of the faculty at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law since 2002.

Workshop: #ImmigrantWomenToo: How Domestic Violence Intersects with Asylum Protection

Kate Vander Tuig

Sr. Program Specialist, Futures Without Violence

Working as an advocate and community educator for over a decade, Kate believes that strong and connected communities hold the answers to healing from and preventing violence. Kate is responsible for resource development and technical assistance and helps to coordinate the National Conference on Health and Domestic Violence.

Workshop: Removing the Margins: Anti-Racism Work for Reducing Domestic Violence

Kendall Evans

Co-Chair, Association for Batterers Intervention Programs

Kendall Evans works with perpetrators and survivors of relationship abuse and violence.She also provides psychotherapy at Open Paths Counseling Center. Kendall supervises Trainees and Associates at Another Way and Open Paths. Kendall is a transwoman and she provides LGBTQIA specific supervision and services. She has presented workshops for therapists on domestic violence dynamics and treatment and other topics. She is Co-chair of the Association for Batterer's Intervention Programs.

Workshop: Confront without Shaming; Support without Colluding

Khirin Carter

Graduate Prevention Program Manager, PATH to Care Center, University of California, Berkeley

Khirin studied Psychology and Criminal Justice at Grambling State University, and earned an MA in Sociology. At UC Berkeley, Khirin designs and implements prevention programming utilizing a social justice lens and community-based approaches for graduate students. She collaborates with graduate student leaders and campus partners to implement interventions that enhance personal and professional well-being, and address intersections of violence impacting traditionally marginalized identities.

Workshop: Discomfort of Change: Organizational Accountability as Prevention

Laurel Meleski

Program Coordinator II, RedRover

Laurel Meleski has been working at RedRover for 11 years helping people and the pets they love. She always knew that she wanted a vocation helping animals and feels that she has truly found her purpose working to preserve the bonds between people and their pets. The love and devotion that pet guardians show their pets are driving forces in her work toward helping animals heal and making sure that no one has to choose between safety and family.

Workshop: Pets are Family: Creating Pet Friendly Programs

Liat Wexler

Prevention Manager, Faculty and Staff, PATH to Care Center at University of California, Berkeley

Liat Wexler is a consultant & trainer who has worked to end partner abuse and sexual assault since 2001. They have provided direct services, trained crisis staff, served on board of directors, and currently focus on prevention with faculty and staff at UC Berkeley. Liat has presented at statewide and national conferences on issues related to violence within LGBTQIA+, polyamorous, and BDSM communities. They co-founded San Diego Trans Pride and Genderqueer San Diego, and puppies make them cry.

Workshop: Discomfort of Change: Organizational Accountability as Prevention

Molly Nugent

OVW Disability Grant Program Manager , WEAVE

Molly Nugent is the manager of Shared Vision Sacramento, an OVW-funded collaboration between WEAVE and Society for the Blind. The purpose of this collaboration is to improve services for survivors of interpersonal and sexual violence who are blind or low vision.

Workshop: Increasing DV Agencies' Capacity to Serve Survivors with Disabilities

Nia Mitchell

Enviromental Equity Fellow, The Greenlining Institute

Nia Aisha Mitchell is the daughter of an Afro Cuban immigrant mother and a southern born Black American father. The understanding that space and race are connected to produce exploitative outcomes for low income and communities of color never left her. Empowered (and disheartened) by that knowledge she focused on helping create change through honing her organizing and educational outreach skills with the Afrikan Black Coalition, Communities for a Better Environment, and DemocracyNow!

Workshop: The Role of Technology in Addressing GBV and Disaster Relief

Nilda Valmores

Executive Director, My Sister's House

Nilda Valmores has served as the Executive Director of My Sister's House for the past 14 years. My Sister's House is the Central Valley's domestic violence shelter that focuses on helping Asian and Pacific Islander victims of domestic violence and human trafficking. A BSCF's Strong Field Leadership 1st cohort, Nilda has also served as a board member for the California Partnership to End Domestic Violence and is in her first term as a member for the California Domestic Violence Advisory Council.

Workshop: Changing to the Equity Lens: Steps Domestic Violence Organizations Can Take

Orchid Pusey

Executive Director, Asian Women’s Shelter

Orchid Pusey is the Executive Director of Asian Women’s Shelter where she has worked since 2001. Orchid led a national domestic violence training and technical assistance program for ten years, focused on building movement capacity to address the unmet needs of marginalized survivors of violence. Orchid leads AWS’s Community Interpretation Training Institute (CITI), Multi-Lingual Digital Storytelling Project, and other projects focused on violence prevention and intervention through an anti-oppression lens. Orchid specializes in training on interpretation and translation, cultural responsiveness, trauma-informed organizational development and sustainability, violence prevention and relationship wellness in LGBTQ communities, community-based participatory research and program evaluation, and intersectional community engagement to end violence based on sex, gender, and/or sexual orientation. Orchid grew up living back and forth between rural Pennsylvania and Beijing, China, and holds a BA in Social Anthropology and an MA in Linguistics.

Workshop: Removing the Margins: Anti-Racism Work for Reducing Domestic Violence

Robin Foemmel Bie

Assistant Deputy Executive Officer, CalVCB

Robin Foemmel Bie, LCSW joined the California Victim Compensation Board in 2007. Ms. Foemmel Bie has held various management positions within CalVCB and currently serves as the Assistant Deputy Executive Officer. Ms. Foemmel Bie has over twenty years of social work experience, both direct and indirect services, in the fields of health, mental health, child welfare, and victim services through employment the state of California and the private sector.

Workshop: Accessing Compensation for Victims of Domestic Violence

Sarah Hyde

Youth Services Coordinator, Safe Alternatives to Violent Environments

Sarah Hyde, Youth Services Coordinator at SAVE, is a sex educator, violence prevention advocate, and healthy relationships specialist. Sarah attended university in Southern California, where she studied social work and realized the impact of rape culture and purity culture on her life. She has worked with youth for four years and believes in making youth equal partners in her work. She'd like to thank the 30 youth who assisted in the creation of "Safer Sexting" for their collaboration!

Workshop: Safer Sexting: Not Your Parents' Sexting Talk

Sunny Kim

Domestic Violence Program Manager, Korean American Family Services (KFAM)

Sunny is an AMFT with an MA in Clinical Psychology and BA in Psychology. She joined KFAM in 2015, 1st as a Clinical Counselor and then as a Victim Advocate and currently as the DV Program Manager. A 1st generation immigrant, her bilingual/bicultural skills allows her to address the distinct needs of Korean immigrant survivors. Sunny provides not only direct services to DV survivors, but has led batterers' classes and prevention campaigns targeting Korean faith leaders and the media.

Workshop: Reach Across the Aisle: How 2 Feminists Worked with Christian Conservatives

Tonjie Reese

Founder, eleven24 inc

Tonjie is Detroit native, preventionist, and creative. She is the founder of eleven24, a training and consulting agency that utilizes identity affirmation, anti-oppression methods, media literacy, and youth centered programming methods to enhance prevention programs. She has held roles as a prevention program director, shelter advocate, community educator, and national community initiatives coordinator. Tonjie holds a BS in Behavioral Science and a MA in Education, Leadership, and Change.

Workshop: Meet Me at the Intersection: Including Anti-Oppression Work in Prevention