Fellows

Efland, North Carolina

Dolores Chandler (they/them) is a mixed race-black, transmasculine and gender non-conforming, tender, tough human. They work as a radical social worker with over 10 years of experience as a facilitator, trainer, performer, writer, and angelic trouble maker. Continue reading

They entered into this work through drag kinging and gender performance which led them to community organizing. Dolores obtained their MSW in 2014 from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Dolores approaches their work through a violence prevention lens, as well as a racial and gender justice lens. Professionally, they have worked in sexual violence prevention education and supporting LGBTQ and POC youth leadership development. They currently live in Efland, North Carolina with their dog Tucker, a most handsome lad, and cat, Mona Luna Lovegood, a.k.a. Southern Snow Leopard.

Tuscon, Arizona

Claudio Rodriguez is a migrant from Sonora/Oaxaca who set roots in south side Tucson. He has over ten years experience organizing with Tierra Y Libertad Organization around migrant, environmental and food justice issues. Continue reading

As an ex-gang member he teaches and mentors youth to become leaders in their community and control narrative of their own stories. As the Community Education Coordinator for the Community Food Bank of Southern Arizona he oversees the development of school gardens as outdoor learning spaces that foster learning, respect and advocacy for a just food system.

Santa Fe, New Mexico

Christie Green is a designer weaving the elegant and the edgy among land, art, ecology and people. Continue reading

Raised in Alaska, with an educational background in Cultural History from UC Berkeley and Landscape Architecture from the University of New Mexico, her award-winning land-based projects educate and inspire connection between people and place. Ms. Green founded Down to Earth, LLC, a landscape design-build firm in Santa Fe, New Mexico, in 1999 with the politically motivated intent to make edible gardens, native plant landscapes, repurposed materials and recycled wastewater more prolific than the two-car garage. Healthy food, water, soil, wildlife and habitat are the guiding principles behind Ms. Green’s regenerative work. Ms. Green activates dialogue and interaction about land, food and water through unlikely insertions and educates via interactive workshops and presentations locally and nationally. In 2014, Christie Green established radicle, a complementary adjunct to Down to Earth, offering a community forum for collaboration and artful activism. Ms. Green hunts and harvests for herself and her daughter, and offers curated, seasonal suppers as interactive, educational and sensual opportunity to connect to each other and place through food.

Santa Fe, New Mexico

Alena Paisano is an experienced practitioner of Farm to School dedicated to the development of just and local food systems serving our youth, families and communities.

Alena is deeply invested in her work with National Farm to School Network (NFSN), where she partners with native communities to expand and sustain farm to school activities as a strategy for advancing food sovereignty. Her past work has been focused on supporting diverse partners to reach their goals for improving community well-being and access to healthy local food by engaging in development of food policy with schools and farmers to achieve their vision for farm to school in action. She is passionate about working with partners in Native American communities to uplift the many unique assets highlighted in their efforts for others to learn from; promoting indigenous knowledge and supporting community leadership as foundations to movement building throughout Indian Country. As a multicultural indigenous woman with roots in the Pueblo, Apache and Dine cultures, Alena is deeply committed to working in the SW region. Based out of Santa Fe, NM she is active in local/state food policy efforts as a community advocate and a mother, seeking to contribute to a healthier, more equitable future for our next generation.

New York, New York

Athena Bernkopf is a cross-pollinator flexing at the intersections of healing justice, land sovereignty, and black and queer liberation.

Brooklyn born and bred, they have worked as a facilitator and organizer across New York City in roles such as cop watch and community safety trainer with Harlem Cop Watch; tenant rights and anti-displacement advocate at the Legal Aid Society; member of The Audre Lorde Project’s 3rd Space Wellness Collective; and project coordinator at the East Harlem-El Barrio Community Land Trust. They dream up cityscapes abundant in ancient trees taller and more common than skyscrapers, and are driven by a commitment to co-creating liberated futures with and for oppressed peoples.