Brittaney Robinson-Whitenhill (she/her) is a multifaceted horticulturist, spiritual herbalist, and community leader that specializes in Afro-Indigenous ethnobotany, working closely with local BIPOC communities to regain food sovereignty and normalize herbal healing as a communal practice. As the founder of Our Backyard LLC, she enjoys designing and cultivating edible gardens for commercial and residential communities as a channel for reconnection back to land and the power it holds. She also has the privilege of serving as the Education Director at Cooperative Empowerment Directive (COFED), equipping land stewards with the resources necessary to embody the practice of cooperative economics. Her practice places education at the heart of her services, aiming to empower her clients to see their relationship with the earth as essential to their wellness.

Delphine Sellars (she/her) is the co-founder of Urban Community AgriNomics (UCAN), a 501(c)3 nonprofit established on April 29, 2016. She is the retired Director of the Durham Center of North Carolina Cooperative Extension and Executive Director of UCAN and the Catawba Trail Farm. Sellars holds a Master’s of Science Degree in Organizational Management from Pfeiffer University, and an undergraduate degree in Social Studies from North Carolina Central University. Mrs. Sellars has 30+ years of experience in social & human services where she worked as a Community Outreach Coordinator, Social Worker, Adult Vocational School Director & Employment Specialist. Her passion since 2018 has been the reclaiming of a former plantation into the Catawba Trail Farm. The land, having been abandoned and neglected for over seventy years currently has a Youth and Community Garden, high tunnel, bees, walking trails, repurposed buildings as well as programs and services that include the Land and Legacy Reentry, Youth Advisor Board, Gardeners As teachers, Youth Conservation and Summer Youth Enrichment. Sellars currently resides on the Board of the Eno River Association and The Society of Saint Andrews and a number of committees. Mrs. Sellars is a skilled public speaker, facilitator, and grant writer who resides in Durham, NC with her husband. They have two adult sons and four grandchildren. Says Sellars, “My entire career has been one of service to others; making a positive differences that build resilience.”

kamil (she/her) is a writer, grief worker, and skilled facilitator committed to fostering emotional resilience and community healing. With a focus on social-emotional learning, she supports people in developing and discovering the tools they need to navigate life’s challenges with empathy and self-awareness. As a writer, kamil brings voice to often overlooked and stigmatized topics such as grief, death, addiction, and mental health, inviting deeper understanding and connection. Through her grief work, she cultivates spaces with people from around the world to have honest conversations that serve as a catalyst for collective healing.

Read her writing and learn more about her grief work at: https://thewritetoliberation.substack.com/ 

Ashley (she/her) is a grower, healer, herbalist, nurturer, teacher, and scholar. She was trained as a farmer at Sankofa Community Farm and is currently a member of Glenwood Green Acres Community Garden in Philadelphia. Ashley is also a member of Soil Generation, a Black & Brown collective of women farmers and organizers working to ensure people of color regain community control of food & land, protect & commune with the land, grow food, share resources, and prioritize community healing. Ashley is also a graduate of Sacred Vibes Spiritual Herbalism Apprenticeship Program.

 In the summer of 2020, Ashley founded and created Land Based Jawns. Land Based Jawns is a Black woman-owned business that offers education, mentorship, and community building events rooted in land based ancestral knowledge and self-determination. The business and organization were established as a result of Ashley processing and composting the personal grief associated with her parents’ deaths and the collective grief from racial injustices throughout the world. After reading Octavia Butler’s Parables, Ashley felt that OEB left a roadmap for survival and community building in the face of war, genocide, and climate disasters. While first using the novels’ stories to guide her personal practice of safety and survival, Ashley realized that there were many others in her community seeking the same sense of safety, protection, skill-building, and healing. Today, Land Based Jawns has grown to provide healing and educational services in the form of skillshares, herbal medicines, curated events, workshops, and book clubs.

Ashley is also an assistant professor in environmental health and with the Ubuntu Center on Racism, Global Movements, and Population Health Equity at Drexel University. There, she focuses on supporting students and researching the ways we remember, return to, and practice land-based ancestral wisdom

Reverend Kim Crutcher, LCPC is an Interfaith Minister, psychotherapist, writer, educator, and community herbalist. Her passion for herbs and plants was ignited by her grandmother, Mai Alice Crutcher, when she was growing up in rural Tennessee. For over 30 years herbalism has been an outlet for her curiosity, and the affirmation of her belief that the Earth loves humanity. For the last five years Kim has worked with Urban Growers Collective, a Chicago based organization committed to growing food for the cultivation of physical, mental and economic health. In her role as Herbalism Conductor, she welcomes the community and apprentices into the herbal garden classroom to experience the possibilities for redemption and balance when individuals are offered an opportunity to come into relationship with plants and the natural world.  Kim uses the title ‘Conductor’ in homage to Harriet Tubman, who was an herbalist; and as a reminder to privilege liberation, gift making, individual agency, and responsiveness over paradigms of expertise.