SHIFT is a women of color, racial and gender equity education and consulting group, established in 2017 in the height of the #metoo movement. It’s founders - Natalie Bui, Kausar Mohammed, and Veline Mojarro - were deeply craving a space for their own communities to engage in honest dialogue and community accountability. And as women of color, survivors, and educators themselves, it was imperative to center and elevate the work from people in Black, Indigenous, and people of color, LGBTQIA+, and disabled communities.
SHIFT provides a space to not only support the building of tools to create institutional, sustainable, and transformative change -- but a space to engage in radical re-imagining. SHIFT strives to create spaces that are centered on infinite possibilities, care, studentship, accountability, and true relationships and community building.
SHIFT operates as a collective of facilitators that allows them to better speak to their individual experiences and lead your session with deeper connection. Your session could be led by one of the many incredible facilitators within their team best suited for your needs.
ABOUT THE CO-FOUNDERS OF SHIFT
Natalie Bui is a second-generation, Vietnamese American and comes to SHIFT with a background in policy and organizing. She's previously worked on voter education at Planned Parenthood, immigrant rights at the ACLU of San Diego, and policy advocacy at Asian Americans Advancing Justice - Los Angeles. She's also an illustrator and cares deeply about centering the narratives, identities, and politics of communities of color. Through her artwork, she's collaborated with organizations such as The National Women's Law Center, United State of Women, Asian Prisoner Support Committee, and more.
Kausar Mohammed’s strategic intention is to create more visibility for communities of color and historically marginalized folks. She does so by fostering community in her daily life; producing and acting in TV, film, and live comedy projects; and facilitating discussions around race and gender through SHIFT. Kausar is accredited by NBC, Huffington Post, and Al-Jazeera for her comedy and activism work and has worked with various non-profits, such as LACER Afterschool Programs and Aga Khan Foundation, on their development and marketing campaigns. She is Queer, Muslim, and a Hufflepuff/Slytherin hybrid.
Veline Mojarro is a second-generation Chicana, whose work is informed by ant-racisit organizing, reproductive justice, and art making for social change. Previously, she served as the Director of Equity, Safety, and Inclusion for every one, a Goldenvoice initiative to prevent and stop any form of harassment at Coachella and Stagecoach music festivals, and was a Lecturer in the Department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance at UCLA, where she also served as Director of Community Programs for the UCLA Art and Global Health Center.
Building Inclusive and Equitable Communities on Campus
In this session, SHIFT shares a framework for students to understand what it means to build inclusive and equitable communities within their campus. We’ll explore how undoing implicit biases will help us tap into our individual privileges while also stepping into our individual and collective power. We share tools on how students can understand what a culture of bias and hate is and how it is shaped, help name common microaggressions, and then share approaches on how to combat a culture of hate: by centering acts of compassionate accountability and solidarity-building with one another. We close out this session inspiring students to create the just environment they want to see.
Skills for Difficult Conversations and Compassionate Accountability
Designed for student leaders on campus, this workshop introduces a framework on how to model compassionate accountability: the ability to hold challenging, critical, difficult conversations with care and intention. SHIFT introduces their framework on what radically reimagining a world of community care means, what those values are, and ways to begin practicing them. They close out this workshop by sharing their practice to deepen solidarity and build a movement around critical connection and care.
Women of Color Entrepreneurship and Leadership
The Co-founders of SHIFT share lessons learned as Women of Color navigating entrepreneurship and leadership. From challenging respectability politics, pushing back on imposter syndrome, and calling into our power and strength, SHIFT vulnerably shares the tools and tips that have learned along the way. They will transparently share back their studentship in running a business that operates in white supremacist capitalist systems, whilst also trying to challenge those same systems.
Professional Development Series on DEIA Competencies and Criteria
SHIFT also provides a certificated 3-part series that’s ideal for community college and university faculty and staff looking to deepen their professional development and capacity to practice justice, equity, diversity, and inclusion principles (JEDI) and to build space centered in integrity, honest dialogue, and compassionate accountability within your personal and professional lives. Contact SpeakOut for more series details.
Challenging White Supremacy through Community Care
SHIFT will unpack the ways we internalize white supremacy values and share practices on how we can begin reconstructing a culture that recenters our humanity. Building off of the work of Tema Okun and the People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond, we will explore what it means to support and commit to practices rooted in care, rest, and honoring processes. Through this workshop, participants will leave with an awareness of what it means for us - as individuals and organizations - to challenge white supremacy through shifted value sets and in the ways we interact with each other in the workplace and beyond.
