Teri Brezner (she/her) is a healing-centered Facilitator, Coach, and Network Weaver who comes from the "space in between" — a Black mixed-race daughter of Guyanese immigrants whose own life has taught her the art of belonging in liminal spaces and building bridges between worlds. For nearly two decades, she's designed and led equity-centered leadership and organizational development programs for social change leaders across 15+ countries, helping organizations shift toward self-managed, shared-power models of leadership rooted in trauma-informed practice, decolonized learning, and deep relationship. Her purpose is to hold and co-create relational space for transformative change and collective liberation — and she stays with this work, through all its joys and hard edges, because she believes: if it is necessary, it is possible. Outside of work, you can find her bringing people together on the dance floor as an amateur DJ, beach hopping and learning how to navigate the world of Pokémon from her kiddo.

Allen Cooper is a leadership coach and organization development consultant with over 20 years of experience supporting social change and environmental groups. Through his firm, Kestrel Insight, he connects strategy, leadership development, and inclusive culture to help organizations thrive and achieve exceptional results.

Nicole Cruz is an executive coach who helps accomplished leaders build lives and careers around what actually excites them, rewriting the rules of what leadership is supposed to look like. After a 10+ year corporate career, she brings insider knowledge and a culturally informed approach to leadership that makes room for the whole person. Her work centers women of color and first-generation leaders, and resonates with anyone rethinking what leadership can look like. She is a TEDx speaker, host of the First to Thrive podcast, and has led sessions for teams at Google, Yelp, and The Kennedy Center. She is also a new mom, which is its own kind of leadership training.

Patti Dayleg, MPH, is a Leadership and Team Coach and founder of Malaya Solutions, partnering with nonprofit leaders, small business owners, and coalitions to build cultures rooted in care and collective power. She has collaborated with over 100 leaders in movements focused on sustainability, climate change, health, education, food justice, and immigrant rights. Before founding Malaya Solutions, Patti spent a decade driving high-stakes systems change — advocating for disaggregated data and health funding for Asian American immigrant communities, securing six- and seven-figure opportunities for underserved communities, overseeing DEI compliance across $20 billion in NYC contracts, and serving as one of Broadway's first Directors of Equity, Diversity, and Inclusion. Today, she coaches women of color and their teams who are ready to grow by deepening the relationships that make it all work. Patti also hosts What We Made Possible, a podcast on healing, leadership, and systems change.

Dr. Mel Michelle Lewis serves as the inaugural Executive Curator of Root to Flourish Collective, cultivating deep relationships and promoting interconnectedness between people and nature. Their work ensures systemically marginalized voices are central to shaping the future of environmental stewardship. Dr. Mel is a conservation sector thought leader, scholar, writer, and transdisciplinary artist deeply committed to amplifying critical voices and creative visions for structural change, sustainable practice, environmental justice, and social transformation. Originally from Bayou La Batre, Alabama, Dr. Mel’s transformative justice approach is grounded in the lessons of the Gulf South’s lands, waters, cultures, and cherished Ancestral lineages. Dr. Mel’s academic background is rooted in environmental humanities, Black queer theory, Black feminist thought, and ethnic studies with an emphasis on movements for liberation and systemic change. Previously, they provided strategic guidance for the future of clean water as Vice President for People, Justice, and Cultural Affairs at American Rivers, leading organizational transformation equity initiatives. They have co-chaired environmental movement coalition work, including America the Beautiful for All’s Freshwater Workgroup and Uncommon Dialogue's Workforce Diversity Workgroup. They also recently held the role of Affiliated Researcher with the Penn Program in Environmental Humanities at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Mel was Associate Professor and Director of the Ecosystems, Sustainability, and Justice Program, co-founder of The Space for Creative Black Imagination: An Interdisciplinary Making and Research Institute, and Chair of the Humanistic Studies Department at Maryland Institute College of Art where they continue to support interdisciplinary learning. They chaired the Center for Geographies of Justice, the Women, Gender, & Sexuality Studies Department, and Africana Studies Department at Goucher College, as well as the Department of Ethnic Studies at Saint Mary’s College of California. They’ve earned a PhD, MS, MA, MPP certificate, and BA in multiple interdisciplinary justice based fields. In addition to their professional life, Dr. Mel is a writer and artist whose creative work depicts life in rural coastal settings through the lens of Black, Creole, AfroIndigenous, and queer embodied knowledges. Their transdisciplinary visual and performing art features ancestral altars, installations, and photography. Their research and creative writing appears in top journals, anthologies, and creative writing publications; their book Biomythography Bayou is available via The Griot Project Book Series at Bucknell University Press and their forthcoming project Waterbody is supported by American Bird Conservancy‘s Afrofuturism Collective and Re:wild. Dr. Mel is deeply committed to meditation, conjure and Ancestor veneration, southern foodways, and community mutual aid practices. They live in Baltimore on Piscataway and Susquehannock lands with their wife and a clutter of free range community alley cats.

Christina Martin Kenny is a nonprofit fundraising strategist, consultant, and founder of Guava Tree Strategies. A recovering Development Director with over 15 years of experience, she has raised more than $20M for organizations focused on voting rights, affordable housing, human rights, paid leave, affordable childcare, and education — and has been the burned-out solo fundraiser herself. She founded Guava Tree Strategies on a belief most consultants won't say out loud: staff retention is a fundraising strategy. She works with nonprofits in the $1M–$10M range to build sustainable fundraising systems and the strong teams needed to run them. The name Guava Tree is a nod to her Dominican and Cuban roots and represents the resilience of the nonprofit community and the people committed to doing this work.

("Raisa"/"rise-ah") is a dedicated network weaver and community catalyst. Accompanied by over a decade of deep civic engagement and a non-profit career centered on coalition building at growing levels of influence, Riyza engages her joy for connecting with others through her alliances with distributed advocacy networks and action coalitions. She champions missions that put people over profit and build the capacity of humanity for a more liberated, resilient, and peaceful future. Through her practice at Rooted Networks, Riyza elevates networks/community as critical infrastructure for systems change and transformation. Her role as a weaver is to cultivate trust, belonging, and intuitive interrelationality as networks collaboratively act/innovate to address our world's complex polycrisis. Her work is steeped in an ethos of participatory governance, intersectionality and interculturalism, and authentic leadership. Riyza's roots are found in her hometown of Tampa, Florida - her life a confluence of diverse socio-cultural experiences and a long-held personal mission to simply do what she can to advocate for herself and her community. While pieces of her heart are scattered in many parts of the world, she has called Cary, North Carolina (Skaruhreh/Tuscarora, Catawba, Lumbee lands) home since 2023, where she continues to find her dreams coming true one day at a time. She is often found loving life while laughing among treasured friends, cooking (and eating) soup, hollering from the crowd at a live jazz night, or scoring points at her weekly mahjong club. Other interests include open-air naps, spicy food competitions (more eating), karaoke, Star Trek, and her banana collection (surprisingly, no eating here). Though woefully unfunny herself, Riyza remains a lifelong fan and student of comedy.

In 2012, Charles Orgbon founded Greening Forward, a nonprofit organization that trains and funds young people to lead climate solutions, and transition economies away from consuming more dinosaur juice. His youth climate activism caught the attention of national environmental leaders, from Audubon to the White House. Funders such as singer-songwriter Jack Johnson, media mogul Ted Turner, and many corporations took notice. Through Greening Forward campaigns sponsored by Disney, Wells Fargo, and State Farm, Charles saw how corporations could drive real climate action. This drove his decision to become a consultant with Deloitte & EY, specializing in helping Fortune 100 companies identify climate risks, measure environmental impact, and accelerate commitments towards solving the climate crisis, transforming sustainability buzzwords into actionable KPIs. Now, he advises many clients from major corporations to higher education institutions to grassroots non-profits and philanthropies on sustainability and social impact strategies. Namely, he's the Managing Director of The Carbonate Group, which drives bold results at the intersection of climate, equity, and social change, empowering our clients to launch high-impact funds, breakthrough campaigns, and measurable ESG strategies. The Carbonate Group has delivered millions in new giving, enabled first-of-their-kind climate and equity initiatives, and brought nonprofit, foundation, and corporate partners into full alignment on shared goals. Charles holds a B.S. in Environmental Science from the University of Georgia, where he serves as a founding trustee for a diversity scholarship. And during graduate studies at the Johns Hopkins University, he studied the intersection of climate and social issues. Meanwhile, the two-time TEDx speaker continues to serve on the Board of Directors for Greening Forward and has been named a Captain Planet Foundation Superhero for the Earth, an Environmental Excellence Award recipient from SeaWorld, and a GreenBiz 30 Under 30 Awardee.