Kristiana Huitrón (ella/she/her) Coloraduense Mexicana and Métis, is the Executive Director of Voces Unidas for Justice, founded in 2010. She has been working to end domestic and sexual violence for over twenty-years in rural and urban settings, in both Spanish and English, with adults, adolescents, and children, men and women. She has worked nationally with Red Wind Consulting, Inc. as editor of Creating Sister Space, and providing SAFE and SART training across Indian Country; and with Casa de Esperanza’s National Latin@ Network on the Research and Evaluation Team. She has contributed to publications in her field and co-authoring the Finding a Way report. She has spent 5 cumulative years at Violence Free Colorado (Colorado Coalition Against Domestic Violence), once in response to child and youth programming, and once in response to culturally and linguistically appropriate programming as one of the states only innovators in Promotoras as advocates in the work to end violence. Locally, to Colorado Springs, she has been providing community-based programming for over a decade, with youth, Spanish speaking community, and in both cultural and professional settings. Voces Unidas for Justice published the research around un/under-served victims of violence, Finding a Healing Way and has converted this to a statewide awareness campaign to connect historically marginalized victims to culturally relevant, community-based supports. She is spearheading projects to address the intersection of trauma and substances, and the intersections of survivorship and incarceration for women of color. Most recently Ms. Huitrón has been appointed as a commissioner to the Colorado Commission on Criminal and Juvenile Justice, and is a member of Resonance Network’s Navigators Circle.
Raven E. Freeborn
Raven E. Freeborn (they/themme) is a savvy queer healing justice and liberation strategist. Their work spans reproductive, gender, economic, and racial justice movements. They make offerings as a licensed clinical social worker, full-spectrum doula, harm reductionist, community educator, storyteller, and a damn good cook. Raven’s mission is to build beloved community that reckons with the truth of historical and present-day oppressions to actualize liberating solutions for all people—particularly people who are Black, brown, queer, and gender expansive.
Sanu Dieng
Sanu Dieng (she/her/hers) is a mother, community organizer originally from New York City with roots in the anti-violence movement. Her passion for transformative justice, anti-violence policy and healing practices for survivors of interpersonal and state sanctioned violence was shaped by her work as the Executive Director of a domestic violence agency in Hampton, Virginia. After a decade of advocacy in the interpersonal violence field, she is pivoting to facilitating racial equity workshops and community planning with black indigenous communities of color.
She has been honored for her work by the Virginia Sexual and Domestic Violence Action Alliance receiving the Hope Award. She was also recognized by the National Sexual Violence Resource Center receiving the Visionary Voice Award for her groundbreaking violence prevention programs for youth and initiatives.
She is a proud graduate of Hampton University. She is affiliated and involved in several organizations to include the National Resource Center on Domestic Violence as the Board President, Advisory to the Governor of Virginia on the Statewide Domestic Violence Advisory Committee, Virginia Sexual and Domestic Violence Action Alliance Training Institute and Public Policy Committee, Hampton Family Violence Prevention Council, Kiwanis Downtown Hampton Club, Women of Color Caucus of Virginia, Women of Color Network and Newport News Alumnae Chapter of Delta Sigma Theta Incorporated.
Quentin Walcott
Quentin Walcott (he/him) known as “Q,” is a leading national and international anti-violence activist, educator and writer.
A hallmark of Quentin’s work over the past 22 years has been engaging men and boys as allies and activists in the movement to prevent intimate and gender-based violence. The foundation of Quentin’s work is a focus on the intersections of violence—race, class and gender—and its impact on marginalized communities.
Quentin was named a New York New Abolitionist in 2014. Prior to taking the helm of CONNECT in 2013, Quentin developed the CONNECT Training Institute (CTI), the leading anti-violence learning facility in NYC, and was director of CONNECT’s Community Empowerment Program.
Quentin is one of 100 U.S leaders selected by the NoVo Foundation to participate in its groundbreaking Move to End Violence initiative, a 10-year program to strengthen the movement to end gender-based violence in the United States. He’s also a member of the Resonance Network‘s Navigator’s Circle. In 2018, Quentin was selected to serve on the NYC Domestic Violence Task Force Steering Committee and was appointed to the NYC Mental Health Advisory Group.
He is co-founder and chief organizer of the Father’s Day Pledge Against Violence, an annual event established in 2010 and which is observed in 50+ U.S. cities. Quentin was a speaker at the first White House United State of Women Summit (2016) on gender equality, and shared the dais with TV actor and activist Matt McGorry.
Quentin was awarded the United NationsTrust Fund to End Violence Against Women Award in 2014. He was the first man to receive the NOW-NYC Susan B. Anthony Award (2012).
After graduating college, Mr. Walcott was mentored by Dr. John Aponte, the foremost leader in batterers’ intervention in New York City, and began his life work in 1996 facilitating batterers’ intervention programs and various other groups for men and youth throughout the five boroughs. For 6 years, he co-chaired the NYC Coalition on Working with Abusive Partners, which is comprised of representatives of organizations concerned with preventing and ending abusive behavior in abusive intimate relationships.
Quentin has partnered with Cornell University ILR School to create Men and Women as Allies, an in-depth training for corporations and labor unions to respond to and prevent Domestic Violence in the workplace violence, bullying behavior and workplace violence.
Quentin partnered with V-Day Artistic Director Eve Ensler to create and bring V-Men programming to New York City in 2006.
Quentin has participated in international anti-violence forums and led trainings in Brazil, Canada, Fiji, France, India, Kenya, Saint Martin, South Africa, Switzerland and Thailand.
Yesenia Veamatahau
Program Manager
Yesenia (they/them) lives and learns in East Oakland || Huichin, with family roots stretching back to the 70’s. The Pacific Ocean links their folks along the lands of California, México, Tonga, and back. Their experiences as a youth organizer, data nerd, ops wizard, plant guardian, and culture worker form a spider’s web pattern, weaving space for healing and thriving.
They believe that in our bodies and communities, we already hold the answers we seek, and as a budding historyan, they are dedicated to recording and sharing those recipes. Along their path, they’ve come to consider ruby-throated hummingbirds and redwoods as mentors. Yesenia is grateful to contribute to Resonance Network as Program Manager.
Megan Shimbiro
Project Manager
Megan (they/them) is a fierce advocate for effective policymaking to build an impact economy. A firm believer that economic inequalities affect women more, thus, more women need to participate in politics and spaces that promote women’s roles in democratic advocacy since politics largely determines how resources are distributed.
Megan is a policy and governance practitioner with a project management background. They have hands-on experience in strategic planning, project design, implementation, and tracking results. Megan leads cross-functional strategic projects to impact while applying skills gained from different engagements. Before joining Resonance, Megan worked with both private sectors and NGOs, including as an administrator at DBK Publishing Co., and project manager at Wisconsin Right to Life et al. Megan has championed the rights of women and children through working with organizations such as Action for Human Rights and Women Aid Foundation through the formulation of grants/project proposals. In collaboration with Badili Africa, Megan participates in the ongoing Feminizing Political Spaces campaign.