MarAzul-Cozamalotl Moreno, MSW.

MarAzul has extensive experience, great passion and love for serving older adults. They are also currently of service to people living with HIV/AIDS, and providing Hypnotherapy, End of Life Support for the dying and their loved ones.

They dedicate themselves to being of service and of sharing as much love and kindness as possible.

They are a proud descent and seed of their elders and ancestors from Michoacan y Aguascalientes, Mēxihcah.

Moderator

Dr. Patty Ramirez is Xicana Indigena Salvadorena activist and transnational social worker. Dr. Patty is the Founder of KLBRI, a grassroots healing-centered leadership development organization. Dr. Patty believes that reimagining how we heal and lead will increase sustainability of social justice leaders, organizations, and social justice movements.

​For nearly a decade, Dr. Patty has dedicated her work to advocating against gender-based violence and serving immigrant victims of crimes, and justice-impacted folks. Dr. Patty’s path to violence prevention was directly related to her own experience as a victim of sexual violence. She became committed to prevention and education work around sexual and domestic violence, stalking, dating violence and gender-based violence including the femicides in Juarez, Chihuahua, Mexico. Dr. Patty’s experience ranges from working with victims of sexual and domestic violence, unaccompanied children, victims of trafficking, and asylum seekers. She also has engaged in reproductive justice, criminal justice policy advocacy, program and curriculum development, and organizational development. She is also a founding member of the survivor-led Los Angeles County Crime Victims Advisory Board.

Panelist, Emerging Youth Activist + Student Filmmaker

Cristina Flores is a trained Xinachtli Rites of Passage Facilitator and a Consultant at KLBRI and is obtaining her B.A in Film and Social Justice from Mount St. Mary’s. She hopes to pursue her passion to tell her community’s stories and inspire young artists to tell their stories and take more space in the industry, because there aren't enough women of color filmmakers.

Cristina enjoys connecting with nature and grounding with her medicine. Cristina has been on her healing journey of connecting back to herself with support from her community.

Panelist, Xinachtli Curriculum Author

Sara has worked 25 years as a grassroots community organizer, trainer and outreach specialist. Sara developed Xinachtli- an innovative youth health and rites of passage curriculum for young women and girls. She is a fellow of the California’s Women’s Policy Institute and a recipient of the 2007 Los Angeles AFSC Peace Maker Award. Sara worked as a fundraising trainer for Grassroots Institute for Fundraising Training and completed 10 years with the National Compadres Network. She has served as a field representative for the International Indian Treaty Council, working at the U.N. Commission for Human Rights in Geneva, Switzerland.

Her work is centered on the wellness and development of girls and facilitating intergenerational healing spaces through the Xinachtli Comadres National Colectiva. Additional work includes disseminating the Xinachtli Rites of Passage Curriculum, grassroots fundraising training, Indigenous leadership and capacity building – specifically for women and girls. Sara has extensive experience working with communities and organizations.

Panelist, Film Director, Founder and Executive Director of Justice For My Sister

Kimberly Bautista is a Colombian-American award-winning writer, director, and producer. Her feature-length documentary film titled "Justice for My Sister" about femicide in Guatemala was broadcast on PBS Stations and TeleSUR. The film screened in 20 countries to audiences who also received training in violence prevention with the trauma-informed curriculum that Kimberly authored. Over 15,000 live audience members partook in the community screening and trainings, and over 100,000 people saw the film on television broadcast. As a result of community organizing and the film’s multi-year tour, she founded the arts nonprofit Justice for My Sister Collective to train youth to make films that transform trauma into healing, in order to promote racial equity and gender justice. Kimberly is a fierce champion of youth leadership, human rights, and the arts to promote healing and social change.

Kimberly obtained her Bachelors from Pitzer College and her MFA from University of California, Santa Cruz in Social Documentary.

Panelist, Chican@/o Studies Adjunct Professor

Dra. Silvia Toscano is a Chicana Mexicana who is self-actualizing through ancestral, cosmic connections seeking to undo colonizing stigmas surrounding empowerment of feminine energies and creative expressions. Her ancestry is rooted in Michoacán, Durango & Chihuahua, Mexico. She earned her PhD in Chicana and Chicano Studies from UCSB in 2016 & has over 20 years of teaching experience at the community-college (as well as high school and university) where she centers culturally relevant & responsive curriculum in the service of humanizing pedagogies of transformation. Her recent work is contributing author and co-editor of In Search of Our Brown Selves: A Transdisciplinary College Reader: https://he.kendallhunt.com/product/search-our-brown-selves-transdisciplinary-college-reader