Povi-Tamu Bryant, they/them | Co-Creator
Povi-Tamu Bryant is a paranormal fiction connoisseur, a crafter, a parent and Angeleno living on unceded Tongva land, where they were raised. As a Black queer and nonbinary person who has experienced housing insecurity and relied on public transportation, with limited income, they are dedicated to building and supporting communities who live at the intersections of multiple forms of oppression.
Povi-Tamu is a migrant, with family roots from Chicago, and they have lived primarily in communities among other migrants. They have spent time in and around nonprofits in the Los Angeles area, working as a bookkeeper, program manager, trainer, and managing director. Povi-Tamu is committed to building and strengthening the capacity of organizations to show up better for the people who work there.
From facilitating strategic vision processes to designing leadership development programs for marginalized communities, Povi-Tamu has worked with organizations to address a diverse set of needs and supported leaders struggling through challenging moments. Their past work includes roles in Leadership Development in Intergroup Relations, a program of AJ SoCal, the LA Black Worker Center, and the board of Gender Justice LA. Povi-Tamu co-created Freedom Verses in the summer of 2018.
Offerings:
- leadership trajectory coaching for emerging leaders and mid-career staff
- coaching for existing leaders, focusing on putting values into practice and supporting authentic, aligned leadership
- organizational development, including articulating and operationalizing values for organizations
- transformative conflict management through coaching, workshops, and mediation
- human resources technical assistance: supporting work culture through updating HR practices; aligning policy and procedures with organizational values; offering guidance in structural change and support
- interactive speaking engagements: favorite topics include deepening understanding of anti-blackness and how to interrupt it; cultivating communities of care; taking risks to advance anti-racism; queering parenting
Contact: povitamu@freedomverses.org
Audrey Kuo, they/them | Co-Creator
Audrey Kuo is an interdisciplinary artist, abolitionist, and mischief enthusiast working toward collective liberation. Audrey supports individuals and communities in connecting with their values and purpose, through the lenses of disability justice, transformative justice, healing and somatics, and the power of storytelling. Their work is shaped by their identity as a disabled trans person in the Taiwanese, Chinese, and queer diasporas.
In 2017, Audrey co-created Freedom Verses with their friend and comrade Povi-Tamu Bryant, drawing from their joint experiences organizing and working within nonprofits. Audrey is particularly drawn to transformative coaching, as a pathway for individuals to identify their personal values and roles in the struggle for justice and liberation in our lifetimes.
As an abolitionist with big theater kid energy, Audrey believes that the work of liberation asks us not just to dismantle systems of oppression, but to offer compelling, joyful, just, and tangible alternatives. They lean on play, improv, and scenario work as exploratory spaces to imagine beyond our current realities. Their past work as a journalist and editor, youth worker, and nonprofit multitool inform their investments in the power of questions and narrative to transform the world around us. In addition to their work with Freedom Verses, Audrey supports grassroots trans-led organizations as a coach for grantees of Borealis Philanthropy’s Fund for Trans Generations. Their past roles include executive director, senior development officer, and program director.
Audrey is also developing time travel practices as an offering for community members to connect with ancestors, future visions, and collective dreaming. They enjoy playing capoeira, dancing, cooking for and with chosen family, baking bread with their 10-year-old sourdough starter, Fezzik, and bringing trans and queer people to the outdoors. Audrey currently resides on unceded Tongva lands and shares their home with two cats, Jean Grey, and Dr. Hank McCoy.
Offerings
- life coaching for individuals seeking support in connecting with values and purpose and navigating life transitions
- team and organizational coaching with a focus on developing leadership models, membership recruitment, board development, fundraising, navigating conflict and communication
- facilitation and holding space: supporting groups and organizations, with a particular focus on organizational culture; rest and balance; strategic planning; and mission, vision, and values
- technical assistance sprints: short-term and one-off support through troubleshooting sessions, offering advice, high-level suggestions, and additional resources
- speaking engagements and panels: favorite topics include: prison abolition and transformative justice; arts and organizing; community and collective care; creating safety teams and plans; disability justice; bread
- supporting retreats, particularly for trans and queer young people, multigenerational spaces, and community organizing
- transformative communication and conflict resolution grounded in transformative justice principles, through coaching, workshops, group conversations, and supported dialogues
- copy editing / sensitivity reader: particular focus on abolitionist texts, including anthologies; LGBTQ young adult fiction; disability and trans themes
Contact: audrey@freedomverses.org
Krystal Torres-Covarrubias, she/her | Senior Consultant
Krystal Torres-Covarrubias is an advocate, facilitator, and learning designer from Gilroy, California [unceded Amah Mutsun territory]. In all things, she is informed by her experience as a queer, brown, femme pursuing healing and liberation. Her journey as a first-generation college graduate allowed her to build a practice that is grounded in relationship building and political education in service of advancing more just, equitable and liberating communities.
She is invested in co-building communities, experiences, and processes where folks thrive. Her past work includes parent organizing with and alongside school partners, national program and campaign development, and professional development for educators and administrators. Krystal has also worked on local and state policy with an emphasis on education, training, curriculum development, and learning management. She is skilled at forming group processes, designing dynamic people-centered experiences, and driving systems change.
Prior to joining Freedom Verses as a senior consultant in 2020, Krystal’s previous work included being a team member and consultant for City Year Los Angeles, Los Angeles LGBT Center, The Museum of Tolerance and various clients across the education, non-profit and cultural ecosystems. In her spare time she enjoys being with family and community, supporting conversations about eradicating structural injustice, and imagining new approaches to facilitate better adult learning.
Offerings
- creative process design for people and groups who are taking on something new, reworking something used, and helping to vision and create pathways to their destinations
- curriculum design, for virtual, in-person and experiential learning pathways, including train-the-trainer models that allow members of a group or community to take charge of collective growth and transformation
- joy-forward community building and learning including retreats of various lengths and modalities that leverage joy to engage connection and collective action
- coaching for mid-career staff and managers, focusing on putting values into practice and supporting authentic, aligned relationships
- organizational development, including articulating and operationalizing values for organizations and teams
- facilitation and holding space, to support groups and organizations to hold necessary conversations when things get tough
- resource development for teams and organizations looking to package skills and knowledge into something tangible to share with others, including websites, toolkits, resource books, etc.
Contact: krystal@freedomverses.org