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our staff
Tierra T, Director Ejecutivo (ellos ellos)
T es un neurodivergente nativo de Durham que ha estado trabajando dentro de la comunidad de discapacitados desde 1997. Pasó más de 15 años en educación especial, enseñando en escuelas locales públicas, autónomas y privadas . En 2008, fundaron el Centro de Apoyo y Defensa del Autismo, donde desde entonces han trabajado para crear programas para abordar las brechas sistémicas y participar en el trabajo de defensa que tiene sus raíces en la justicia de discapacidad y el movimiento de la neurodiversidad. Anteriormente, se desempeñó como presidente de la Sociedad de Autismo del condado de Durham y como miembro de la junta de las Olimpiadas Especiales del condado de Durham. En 2020, obtuvieron un certificado en Gestión sin fines de lucro de la Universidad de Duke.
Sam Respass, Communications & Storytelling Team Lead (she/they)
Sam is a black, transwoman with a love of visual storytelling. She’s spent 8 years helping organizations realize their potential when it comes to art & design and, after incorporating engineering into her vast array of skills, Sam began using that knowledge to further advocate for creativity and (most importantly) accessibility in digital spaces.
Antonia Brown, Farm Co-Manager (she/her)
Antonia is originally from Minneapolis, Minnesota and has lived in Durham for the past four years. She holds a bachelor's degree in ecology and has spent all of her adult years working in the outdoors. She believes that having a connection to the earth, specifically through agriculture, is so life-giving and strives to create safe, welcoming, easeful spaces in the outdoors. She hopes to foster and exemplify the joy that can be experienced in the field. Her dream is to be a lifelong farmer.
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Abijiah Gattis, Farm Co-Manager (he/they)
Abijah, deeply rooted in Durham, currently resides in Greensboro alongside his human and animal companions. Their journey from an indoor kid to becoming a passionate agricultural educator stems from their work-study experience at the Guilford College Farm and involvement in food security initiatives in Greensboro during college. After earning a degree in History and English, Abijah planned on pursuing a career in journalism but decided to go into farming because the pandemic showed the huge gaps in our food system.
Today, Abijah’s agricultural endeavors are guided by his profound appreciation for seed lineages and his exploration of African American and indigenous foodways, intertwining history, culture, and environmental stewardship. Reflecting on his own experiences, from summer camp to farm work, Abijah acknowledges the lack of inclusivity in outdoor spaces and in agriculture. With a commitment to fostering confidence and security for Black and disabled individuals within the outdoors and the food system, he endeavors to create an inclusive framework that promotes accessibility and sustainability for all on the farm.
Leah Broadwell, Part & Parcel Team Lead and Coordinator of Staff Sustainability and Interdependence (she/her)
Leah has called Durham her home for the past 9 years and has spent most of her time focusing on what it means to connect to community through food. She spent 10 years at a local NPO working within the disability community through food, creative arts, farming and community building. She now works at Part and Parcel in Downtown Durham. As a queer indentifying person living with chronic invisible illness, she is particuarly invested in engaging with & learning more about community building, accessibility, advocacy work and how to connect disabled & neurodivergent creatives.
Lou Jent-Clough, Storytelling and Amplification (they/he)
- Development Team
Hello, my name is Lou Jent-Clough & I am a 45 year old accessibility self-advocate. I moved to (the occupied Native American territory of the US known as) Durham exactly 20 years ago with the goal of working for and with autistic people, which was the first step on a long journey of self-discovery. Now, I know am an autistic person (with other neurodivergences), and also identify as a multiracial, physically disabled, fat, intersex, trans/ non-binary, queer/ pansexual individual. Along my path, I became a parent to a now-15 year-old kiddo who shares some of these identities, which has been the most deeply impactful work of my life. Because of tending their needs to grow, I became able to blossom, as well.
It took a lot of weeding (un-camouflaging) to find myself, and I am proud to be an advocate for my intersectional communities and to humbly keep learning from others. In Greensboro before Durham, and since moving to rural NC when I was six from southern IL, I have had the pleasure of learning every day from the land and the people who live on it, as well as the people who were forced both to leave it, die on it, and were kidnapped from their homes to be enslaved here and build this country. I have been and will continue to be educated in the abolitionist movements of the south, so I hope to learn and share in the spirit of mutual aid in my position as Development Coordinator.
Creatively, I am a writer, theater, and visual artist, my deepest desire is to create more public art in the future. My other future goals include creating a media company to lift lived experiences and past recorded oral histories of the marginalized into the digital ecosphere, using data from that project to affect public policy. My special interests include karaoke, data science, human irrationality, rocks, cats (of course), and neuro chemisetry.
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Rezilience Williamson, Workshop Facilitator (they/them)
- Education & Advocacy Team
Rezilience is a neurodivergent nonbinary person going places, who fosters hope in a world full of hype. Rezilience is a Durham-born, Black queer poet who has been working with community and nonprofit organizations in areas of storytelling, strategic communications, and advocacy since 2018. They believe that poetry is a powerful source for liberation, exploration of voice, and community building. In 2021, they earned a bachelor’s in Cultural Anthropology with a minor in Education from Duke University. As an aspiring educator, Rezilience tends to move with their arms wide and their vision panoramic as they try to include as many voices as they can in whatever they cultivate, whether it be an event or an experience. Rezilience hopes to engage in storytelling advocacy and stewardship to facilitate programming for queer neurodivergent folks to explore their artistic voices.
Andre, West End Free Market Assistant (he/him)
Andre is 19 years old, and was born in Zacapa, Guatemala. Andre attended Hope Creek Academy in Durham, and graduated in 2021. After graduation, he did an internship at the YMCA through Project See and The Arc of the Triangle. Andre has been working with ASAC and Part & Parcel for almost 3 years. He enjoys bowling in a local league, playing piano, growing vegetables, traveling with his family, and walking as many steps as possible around his Durham neighborhood.
Fatima Daif, West End Free Market Assisant (she/her)
Malachi, West End Free Market Assisant (she/her)
Malachi is a local soapmaker and helps run her family's business “Soap & Sudz”. Malachi is also a team member of Part & Parcel and the ASAC. As a Durham Native, she particularly loves connecting with her community through food. Whether she is helping with the West End Free Market, attending community cooking classes, or sharing recipes with friends; food and access to food is a huge part of her everyday life. When she is not out in the community, her favorite thing to do is play with her puppy.
Tim, West End Free Market Delivery Organizer and Driver (he/him)
Tim is passionate about food justice and has been engaging with the West End Free Market for almost year, helping ensure our Disabled and Elder members of the community do not have transportation and/or mobility as a barrier to healthy food. Tim is regularly found volunteering with Durham Community Fridges too. He is also a licensed massage therapist who enjoys offering free and sliding scale massage to community members.
Mo, PREP Class Chef (she/her)
Mo is owner and operator of Food Vibez Way, where she puts her passion for food and helping others into one place. Food Vibez was created to teach all individuals how to cook, learn the history of food, and much more. Chef Mo has been working with Neurotypical, Neurodivergent and Disabled clients for over 5 years.