I am a survivor of child sexual abuse who has dedicated my career and my life to creating more channels for people to influence public policies that directly affect their lives. I have helped create public schools, afterschool programs, adult training programs and artistic performances with this aim in mind. I am talented at bringing people together and creating spaces for them to discuss what is traditionally taboo and unspeakable.
I love big cities in general, but I especially love New York City. I grew up 20 minutes outside the city, and have lived within the five boroughs since 1999. While NYC has a reputation for encouraging anonymity, I find that the city actually allows for everyday intimacy to flourish between neighbors, friends, colleagues, and even subway co-passengers.
I want more child sexual abuse survivors to share their stories publicly, so that allies and service providers can better understand the diversity of narratives about how this violence happens, how social taboos silence victims, and how better intervention and prevention strategies might be designed. In the long-run, I want interpersonal and institutional violence against young people to end.
Since 1999, I have worked as a program manager, educator, youth organizer and consultant at nonprofits, public schools, and universities in New York City, Washington DC, and Los Angeles. I have interned and/or worked at the US Department of Justice Violence Against Women Office, NOW Legal Defense Fund (Legal Momentum), Global Kids, Make the Road NY, Kingsborough Community College (CUNY), and The Broad Foundation. I am currently a graduate student at NYU's Wagner School of Public Service, where I am also a Catherine B. Reynolds Fellow.
I began working with Ping Chong & Company, a nonprofit theater group in NYC, in Fall 2009 to create Undesirable Elements: Secret Survivors.
