I developed Ready, Set, THrive using a holistic lens to cultivate healing, inspire healthy relations, and to empower people to remember and reclaim the act of thriving as a birthright.
I AM womanist, a tiler of the soul who calls into being the traditions and practices of embodied liberation. This work is about unearthing and healing all the collected dirty pain that resides within all communal bodies worldwide.
I am a wife, an awesome grandmother, a sister, an auntie, a cousin, a daughter, a conscientious neighbor to those in need, and a beloved friend.
I identify as an indigenous Black wombman to the Lands now called North America. I choose to live in rural Maine as an act of reclaiming my indigenous heritage, sovereignty, and personhood by recalling the traditions of my ancestors who were gifted cultivators of food and plant medicines.
With 30+ years in the field of social work, art, community mental health, and education, I continue to train in embodied practices of trauma, racial equity, and communal healing across all relations.
I am the curator and producer the Mama Africa Show (WMPG Community Radio), Community Dialogues on Racism as a Public Health Crisis amid COVID-19, founder and executive director of The Harriet Tubman Movement Coalition (me), and I create somatic liberation dance wave experiences in Maine.
In 2012, I became involved with child welfare resiliency education following the ACEs study (Kaiser ‘97) championed by the works of Nadine Burke. In 2014 I opened a private practice and completed my Somatic Experiencing Practitioner (SEP) in 2015. I am a member of the Black Association of Social Workers, The Association of Black Psychologists and The National Association of Social Workers.
I grew up in New York City as a dance and art major. I began exploring performance art in the 80’s while living in Williamsburg Brooklyn and performing and working in the lower east side – venues include CBGBs and Danceteria. My career in Maine began in 1996 as an Ameri-Corps Vista Volunteer. Working in Maine introduced me to White rural poverty-this was a very different context from the inner city structure of poverty I had learned to internalize about people who looked like me.
M.A. Social Work, University of Southern Maine, Portland ME 2005
· International social work service volunteer: Dominican Republic
B. A. Social Work, University of Southern Maine, Portland ME 2002
· Magna Cum Laude, 1st African American President; Phi Alpha Honors Society
· Parents as Scholar (PAS) Graduate
Certificate: Somatic Experiencing Practitioner 2016
Certificate: Kriplau Yoga Instructor-Stockbridge, MA May -Sept. 2008
Certificate: Early Childhood Education. Borough of Manhattan Community College New York City, 1985Student Leadership Awards in recognition of campus civility
· Award University Tuition Waiver for outstanding academic achievements for an entering graduate student.
· Awarded Presidents’ Excellence in Education
· Award -Outstanding Commitment to Diversity as a DID: Dialogues in Diversity leader, facilitator & Chair ’99, ’00,01
Research
· Dialogues in Diversity: Multicultural students sharing their realities in Portland Maine
Pedagogies of Diversity; Diversities of Pedagogy Conference on Diversity and Scholarship
at the Turn of the 21st Century, USM November 3, 2006
· Dialogues in Diversity: Multicultural students sharing their realities in Portland Maine
Black New England Conference June 23-24 2006
