Join us online for another show live streamed show from our old home of Caveat in New York City! This month, we partner with the Black In Mental Health initiative to present four stories from Black mental health practitioners.
Hosted by The Story Collider’s Paula Croxson and Mani-Jade Garcia. Stories produced by Paula Croxson and Gastor Almonte.
Livestream tickets are on sale now for $8 at the link below.
This show is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Kathy Hochul and the New York State Legislature.
Stories by:
Brianna A. Baker (she/her/hers) is a second-year doctoral student in the Counseling Psychology Ph.D. program at Columbia University. Born and raised in North Carolina, she graduated from The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill with an undergraduate degree in Psychology and African American Community Health and Resilience. Currently, she is a Health Equity Strategist at Takeda Pharmaceuticals where she uses her expertise to promote community engagement and diversify clinical research. Her research interests include sociopolitical determinants of mental health, positive Black youth development, and ameliorating sociohistorical racial trauma through community-focused program development.
Brianna is the co-founder of the Black in Mental Health Initiative, which aims to bring together Black mental health researchers, practitioners, and advocates in community. She is also the creator of the Becoming Dr. Baker Youtube Channel, where she regularly documents mental health topics specific to BIPOC communities. Most recently, Brianna founded Girls Reaching Optimal Wellness (G.R.O.W.), a school-based mental wellness program for BIPOC young women in the Southern US that uses intersectionality and holistic identity exploration to promote healing from racial trauma. Known for her courage and outspokenness for Black mental health, Brianna's commitment to mental health equity has been featured on Spectrum News, Refinery 29, WebMD, and other prominent media outlets.
Dr. Camille Adams Jones, is a recognized psychotherapist in the Washington, DC metropolitan area. Dr. Jones earned her doctoral degree from the University of Southern California where she focused on family dynamics and trends with a special emphasis on Divorce Trauma in school aged youth. This author and organizational behavior scientist oversees a flagship Federal Occupational Health and Work/life balance program where she has become a standout corporate cultural transformation advisor and advocate for wellness in the workplace via Employee Assistance Programming. Dr. Jones is also a celebrated private practitioner for couples, hosting relationship restoration retreats and family rebuilding symposiums. Lastly, she works as a Parent Coordinator and Custody Evaluator in partnership with Washington, DC and the state of Maryland court systems. In her free time she is a mother of three of the best modes of inspiration a person can ask for. Together with her husband Jerome, the two launched a real estate investment firm that has flourished since its inception in 2017. Most recently Dr. Jones has added the title of farmer to her credentials, purchasing over 88 acres of farmland to build a wellness retreat with specific intent of exposing health, care, and restoration to all.
Mani-Jade Garcia, or MJ (they/them) is a Black-Indigenous-Latinx two-spirit abolitionist, science communicator, artist, and certified holistic yoga teacher exploring the relationship between indigenous healing practices and mental health. Mani-Jade works as an educator for the Racial Trauma Center at Genesee Valley Psychology and as a community-based researcher/evaluator with Social Insights Research). Mani-Jade is currently completing their doctorate in Clinical Psychology. They are co-founder of Black In Mental Health (Twitter/IG: @BlackInMH), Black In Data (Twitter: @BlkInData) and founder/director of Refuge Workgroup (Twitter: @RefugeWorkgroup) a movement dedicated to bringing safety, accountability, and healing to academic and professional spaces. Contact Mani-Jade at manigarcia.com.
Roque (Pronounced: ROW-Keh), the son of Dominican-American immigrants is a 500-hour trained Yoga teacher. Roque is a proud co-founder of Suryaside Yoga in Queens, NY. When he’s not teaching the Suryaside community and mentoring his new teacher trainees, he is dedicated to spreading love and yoga to underserved and under-resourced communities through programs and partnerships such as, Liberation Prison Yoga which provides yoga and meditation to incarcerated people and his I Can Breathe Yoga program which offers teacher training scholarships to BIPOCs who want to bring yoga to their community. He is an advocate for prison abolition and community organizing.