Our work is led by a collective of seasoned executives, policy strategists, and community organizers: individuals who have spent decades navigating, leading, and transforming complex educational institutions and non-profits.

We are former leaders, educators, and policy makers who bring deep, on-the-ground experience to your challenges. This lived expertise, combined with a shared commitment to rooted justice and a culture of courageous reflection, ensures our partnership with you is grounded, strategic, and profoundly impactful.

We pool our diverse wisdom to serve as your catalyst for strategic transformation, because the most enduring change is built by many.

Cathleen Antoine-Abiala, Principal Strategist- Education & Organizational Culture

Cathleen Antoine-Abiala is a Principal Strategist specializing in education systems, organizational culture, and community-centered change. With more than two decades in K–12 education and a decade of experience leading facilitation, coaching, and organizational strategy, she supports schools, nonprofits, and mission-driven organizations in building structures that strengthen belonging, accountability, and long-term sustainability.

Her work spans K–12 education, higher education, and community-based organizations, where she has led leadership development, staff training, and curriculum design focused on strengthening relationships, addressing conflict, and aligning institutional practices with core values. As a founding partner of Restorative Practices NYC (RPNYC), she co-developed the Wisdom of the Circle reflection deck and has supported teams across the country in building trust-based learning and working environments.

Cathleen has partnered with institutions including New York University, True North COH, and RE-Center to support large-scale culture change and professional learning initiatives. She holds a master’s degree in Sociology of Education from Teachers College, Columbia University, and is known for integrating strategy, facilitation, and creative tools to help organizations move from intention to impact.

Ana Catalina Duque, Principal Consultant

Ana Catalina Duque (she|her|ella) is a seasoned educator, facilitator, and coach committed to fostering change and transformation. With two decades of experience in education, she honed her skills as a teacher, curriculum designer, adjunct professor, clinical supervisor and equity practitioner.

Grounded in emergent strategy and abolitionist praxis, Ana's facilitation style blends strategic frameworks with a commitment to healing and community building. Through storytelling and embedding historical context, she creates learning spaces that encourage reflection and dialogue, empowering participants to explore the intersections of identity, power, and privilege.

Ana's impact extends far beyond the classroom, as she has served as a facilitator and coach for organizations such as NYSED Office of Special Education, NYU Metro Center, The Center for Racial Justice in Education, and Re-Center, guiding educators towards fostering equitable and inclusive learning environments.

Outside of her professional endeavors, Ana finds joy in learning new crafts, reading, exploring museums, and embarking on hikes with her friends and family.

Erin Dunlevy, Principal Consultant

Erin Dunlevy (she/her) is a restorative justice practitioner, educator, and equity leader with over two decades of experience advancing justice-centered approaches to education, organizational culture, conflict transformation and the arts. Her work sits at the intersection of restorative practice, equity, racial identity development and institutional change, with a focus on helping clients build cultures rooted in belonging, accountability, and relational trust.

A longtime justice-based educator, Erin has worked extensively in K–12 and higher education settings across the United States, supporting districts, schools, and community-based organizations that influence education systems. Her areas of expertise include restorative justice models for peacemaking across lines of difference, truth-telling and reconciliation processes, critical consciousness and white racial identity development. She has been a strong advocate for culturally responsive pedagogy, native language arts education, and the use of in-class restorative circles as tools for equity and relationship-building.

In addition to her academic and organizational leadership, Erin has written and presented widely on the evaluation and implementation of restorative practices in institutions grappling with disproportionality, racialized harm, and systemic inequity. She is also a certified intimacy professional, bringing a consent-forward, trauma-informed lens to her work in arts education and theater, film and television. 

Erin is a NYS certified teacher (7-12), an Adjunct Professor at Columbia University and a Visiting Professor at the United Nations University for Peace where she supports global learners engaged in peacebuilding, dialogue, and conflict transformation. She currently serves as Vice President and principal consultant at True North Center for Organizational Health.  She is also the co-founder of Restorative Practice NYC and the co-author of Wisdom of the Circle; a Restorative Practitioner’s Deck. Across her teaching and facilitation, Erin is known for creating learning environments that are rigorous, relational, and deeply human.

Jeremy Chan-Kraushar, Principal Consultant

Jeremy Chan-Kraushar is an attorney, educator, and organizational strategist who began his career as a teacher for students with learning disabilities in a public school in Brooklyn. Jeremy has developed and directed multiple initiatives and programs for New York City Public Schools including the Competency Collaborative, a City-wide Implicit Bias Awareness Initiative, and Culturally Responsive and Sustaining Education implementation programming. He has served as the Director of PEDC's CRSE Leadership Institute, and worked with UCLA School or Law, the Coalition of Asian Children and Families, NYC Men Teach, and the Center for Racial Justice in Education, among many others. He has personally facilitated equity-related workshops in-person and virtually for over 20,000 participants nationally.

Jeremy holds an M.Ed in Special Education, an M.P.A. with focus areas in public policy and public administration, and a J.D. with a focus on civil rights and education. He identifies as a biracial, Chinese, white, Jewish-American cisgender man.

jchankraushar.com

@jchankraushar

Find Jeremy on LinkedIn.

Corey M. Jackson, Principal Consultant

Corey M. Jackson (he/him/his) is a Principal Consultant and Leadership Coach at Studio Uprise, where he specializes in turning aspirational equity goals into operational reality. With over fifteen years of leadership experience within educational institutions, Corey serves as a high-impact thought partner for leaders navigating the complexities of school culture, academic achievement, and community engagement.

His work is grounded in the belief that deep-rooted transformation requires both strategic rigor and courageous reflection. Beyond his role at the Studio, Corey is a pivotal consultant with the RE-Center and a key collaborator with the Anti-Racism Leadership Institute, where he coaches emerging leaders through the adaptive shifts necessary for systemic change. An advisor for the Annenberg Institute at Brown University, Corey is dedicated to unearthing institutional norms and co-creating the infrastructure needed for collective liberation.

Dr. Khalya Hopkins, Principal Consultant

Dr. Khalya Hopkins (she/her) is a Black mother, educator, truth-teller, documentarian and book lover. Approaching her 20th year in education, she brings a wealth of knowledge in the areas of special education, literature, African-American studies and adult learning. As an instructional coach, she has facilitated professional learning for school administrators, teachers, related service providers and paraprofessionals in New York City Public Schools.

Her work lies in the intersection of race and (dis)ability. She addresses the disproportionate special education referrals for Black students and their disparate outcomes. In addition, Dr. Hopkins teaches graduate courses preparing students to become special educators emphasizing tier one instruction, reading interventions and progress monitoring. She has collaborated with school districts outside of New York City, creating modules focused on specially designed instruction for students with disabilities. She has been on numerous panels ranging in topics from educational ethics, educational equity, educational leadership and women’s empowerment. 

Her podcast, Black Women Be Knowing documents the experiences of everyday Black women and centers our well-being, truth-telling, analysis and joy. She enjoys spending time with her family, reading, and intricate nail designs.

She can be contacted on LinkedIn, Dr. Khalya Hopkins Profile and Instagram @blackwomeneknowing.

Lonice Eversley, Principal Consultant

Lonice J. Eversley is a liberatory educator, Master Teacher, and equity-centered consultant with over 27 years of experience teaching 12th-grade English and Sociology in East Harlem and the South Bronx. Grounded in a multigenerational legacy of Black educators and freedom dreamers, she understands education as a site of liberation rather than compliance. Lonice currently serves as a district-level Master Teacher and as Senior Consultant for Equity and Liberation in Education through Lotus Lorraine, LLC, where she partners with schools and institutions to dismantle systemic inequities through culturally responsive, sustaining, and project-based pedagogies.

Her professional journey spans education policy, classroom practice, and teacher development, including prior work as a Congressional Black Caucus Fellow and Legislative Finance Analyst. Lonice has designed and facilitated professional learning across the U.S. and in Canada, centering critical inquiry, mastery learning, and liberatory, equity-centered practices that cultivate student intellectual agency. She has collaborated with the Institute for Critical Race and Ethnic Studies at St. John’s University in support of equity-driven scholarship and practice. Lonice attended Clark University for her undergraduate studies and NYU and Fordham University for her graduate studies. Find Lonice on LinkedIn and her publications here.

Jodi Friedman, Principal Consultant

Jodi Friedman has more than 20 years of experience as an educator and social justice advocate. As a teacher, elementary school leader, adjunct professor, and CRSE facilitator, she leads professional learning and dialogue on identity, race, privilege, culturally responsive education, and anti-racism in public schools, districts, and organizations in New York City and beyond. Her work includes the op-ed “What Happened When One NYC School Really Started to Talk About Race.” Jodi was honored with the NYC Department of Education’s Equity in Leadership Award in 2018 and named Culturally Responsive Educator of the Year by the Coalition for Educational Justice in 2019. She helped author the NYC DOE definition of Culturally Responsive Education and engages in related policy advocacy. From 2018–2020, she was a U.S. Department of Education School Leader Ambassador Fellow focused on racial disproportionality. She is a systems-thinker who leads with love and accountability in order to change mindsets, policy and practices. She loves hanging with her two daughters and dancing in her living room!

Nakeeba A. Wauchope, Principal Strategist

Nakeeba A. Wauchope (she/her/hers) is the Founder and Principal Strategist of YeyeX Educational Consulting, where she leads transformative training, coaching, and professional learning grounded in equity, cultural responsiveness, and systems change. Her work centers racial literacy, critical consciousness, culturally responsive and sustaining education, implicit bias, civic engagement, and the dismantling of structural inequities across educational, organizational, and community-based spaces.

With over 20 years of experience in education, including service as a Special Education teacher in New York City Public Schools, Ms. Wauchope has designed innovative curricula, assessments, and professional learning models for institutions across New York City, nationally, and internationally. Her practice spans restorative justice, trauma-informed teaching, social-emotional learning, and hip-hop pedagogy, and explores interdisciplinary connections among music, movement, social justice, and the ethics of sport in American culture.

She has partnered with organizations including NYC Public Schools, NYU, Bank Street College of Education, DC Public Schools, and the NYC Comptroller’s Office, and continues to support institutions in cultivating inclusive, affirming, and transformative learning environments.

Régine Romain, Principal Consultant

Régine Romain is a multilingual Haitian-American artist, educator, visual anthropologist and racial justice strategist. As a community-based researcher and cultural producer, she delves into all of her projects with a passion  to heal historic wounds.  

With 25+ years of  teaching, training, and supporting intergenerational communities, she uses photography, film, and podcasting as mixed-media educational tools to nurture awareness, respect, justice and collective engagement in addressing issues of race, representation and culture through participatory and reflective learning practices. Through an extensive global network, she produces transformative curricula, workshops, salons, performances, forums, exhibits/festivals, and tours. 

In 2016, she founded the WaWaWa Diaspora Centre in Benin West Africa seeking to advance cultural  innovation, reconciliation and healing for the Black descendants of the TransAtlantic Slave Trade on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean. 

A 2022 Brooklyn Public Library Heritage Ambassador and NYSCA filmmaking grant recipient - her work bridges storytelling as cultural recovery, while creating spaces to deepen critical and curative consciousness.

Régine holds a BA | Bowie State University and a MA | Goldsmiths, University of London, and is pursuing a PhD in Cultural Studies. Find Régine here: www.REGINEROMAIN.com.

Lyrica Fils-Aime, Principal Strategist

Lyrica Fils-Aime (she/her) is a facilitator, therapist, writer, and leadership coach whose work centers on supporting individuals and organizations in practicing more ethical, reflective, and liberatory ways of working together. She has worked across early childhood, K–12, and higher education settings, partnering with educators, administrators, and helping professionals to strengthen leadership practices while attending to power, context, and impact.

Lyrica’s areas of expertise include decolonizing leadership and management, analyzing and reducing harm and complicity in social work and educational practice, and advancing social-emotional learning in schools through an equity-informed lens. Drawing from her clinical training and lived experience, Lyrica creates learning spaces that invite honest reflection, challenge dominant norms, and honor the complexity of people and systems. She holds a BA from University of Richmond, an MSW from NYU, an MS in Nonprofit Leadership from Fordham University, and is working on a PhD at the CUNY Graduate Center in Social Welfare. She likes her reality TV messy, her pikliz extra spicy, and her work rooted in liberation.

LyricaFilsAime.com

PilonHarlem.com

Lyrica's LinkedIn

Luis Alejandro Tapia, Principal Strategist

Luis Alejandro Tapia, a son of Caribbean immigrants, serves as a social impact and systems change consultant, a racial and restorative justice coach and trainer, circle keeper, social justice educator, and transformative facilitator at the intersections of spirituality, justice, healing and liberation. Luis Alejandro is committed to supporting the power of people of the global majority to create change and to transform leadership and learning into spaces of justice, equity and freedom.

Steve Quester, Equity and Justice Coach

Steve Quester (he/him) is a queer, white, Jewish, cis-male retired early childhood educator in Lenapoking (Brooklyn, NY). He taught for 28 years in the New York City public schools, 24 of them in a program that integrates children with disabilities, and for two years in a Jewish day school.  Steve relies on the principles and analysis of the People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond (PISAB) and their Undoing Racism Workshop to ground his work. He organizes with PISAB and Jews for Racial and Economic Justice (JFREJ), and is an alum of the 1985 Columbia U. blockade for divestment from South Africa, the AIDS Coalition to Unleash Power (ACT UP), and the International Solidarity Movement in Palestine.  Steve has worked since 2016 with public, private, and charter schools to advance racial equity through organizations including the Center for Racial Justice in Education, RE-Center Race and Equity in Education, and Firefly Worldwide. @SteveQ on UpScrolled, @steve_quester on Instagram

Janelle Naomi Rouse, Principal Consultant

Janelle Naomi Rouse (she/her) is a restorative practices leader, racial equity strategist, and educator dedicated to transforming school and organizational culture through liberatory, relationship-centered frameworks.

Born in Washington, D.C., and trained in psychology and special education, Rouse brings over a decade of experience across classrooms, charter networks, nonprofits, and national education initiatives. She currently serves as Director of LAIRP East with the Los Angeles Institute for Restorative Practices and as Program Coordinator with the Center for Racial Justice in Education, designing professional learning that integrates racial equity, restorative culture-building, crisis renewal, and culturally responsive leadership.

Rouse approaches restorative practice as a structural framework rooted in dignity, accountability, historical consciousness, and collective healing. Grounded in African diasporic traditions, right-brain research, and trauma-informed practice, her work supports educators in aligning policy, practice, and culture to build sustainable systems for lasting transformation.