PTI Facilitators

Trainings are facilitated by a core training team of local PTI organizer, US FOR staff (national PTIs), and experienced peace and justice activists from the Fellowship of Reconciliation and co-sponsoring organizations. An emphasis at local PTIs is placed on connecting participants to guest facilitators from the local/regional peace and justice community.

Past PTI Facilitators:

Nico Amador is a fierce queer Chicano and trans-identified person from San Diego.  Nico has worked most closely on issues related to racial and economic justice including living wage, access to education, counter recruitment, the prison industrial complex and hate crimes. He is currently a Freeman Fellow with the Fellowship of Reconciliation and a volunteer with Critical Resistance. He loves documentaries, zines, blue popsicles and Zapatistas.

Danae Davis is recently graduated from Messiah College with a B.A. in American History. As a FOR Freeman Intern she is involved in organizing PTI’s for the Nonviolent Youth Collective and promoting the 'I Will Not Kill' campaign. She has also worked in the areas of anti-racism, Christian ministry, youth education, youth development, and community service and organizing. Danae is interested in exploring nonviolence as a tool for change and is eager about learning and teaching the knowledge needed to conform this world to the cause of social and economic justice.

Maryrose Dolezal is the lead coordinator of the Peacemaker Training Institute program with the Fellowship of Reconciliation. She coordinates and facilitates National Basic PTIs and Regional Advanced PTI training for trainers and supports a team of local PTI organizers who coordinate and facilitate nonviolence trainings in their own communities around the nation. She is currently a student of two graduate programs at Hamline University.

Natasha Burrowes was an intern with the FOR youth and economic justice programs. She is a graduate of Macalaster College with degrees in comparative North American studies and African American studies. Natasha organized extensively with campus activist groups at Macalaster and also worked with various community-based organizations in the St.Paul/Minneapolis area.

Gregory R. Elliott - Born in Factoryville, PA, Greg was raised Quaker and began his work for social justice by being a camp counselor at Journey's End Farm Camp, which seeks to empower the campers to gain a greater respect and love for all things. In his senior year of high school, he was one of the founding members of Youth Organized Against Hate (YOAH), an inter-faith peace and justice group for youth all over Northeastern Pennsylvania. For his work in YOAH, he received the Student for Peace Award in 2002 from the NEPA Peace Center. He now attends Earlham College, a Quaker school, in Richmond, IN. In January 2003, Greg attended a PTI in Bangor, PA at the Kirkridge Retreat Center, which inspired him and four of his friends, all FOR members, to organize and facilitate a PTI at Earlham. This past summer, he worked at Journey's End once more, and plans to bring a group of Drepung Gomang Monks to the campus to do performance and education on Tibet. He is also continually improving himself as a white, heterosexual, middle-class, male, Buddhist/Quaker ally for social justice.

Hayden Nelson-Major: Hayden gets really excited about anti-racist work, queer issues, youth non-violent resistance, and learning about economic and environmental justice. Hayden is in her third year as a women's studies major. At college she edits and writes for a campus feminist journal, organizes with the student activist union, and works part time with the women's studies department.

Kavitha Rao: With a background in environmental justice and sustainable living, Kavitha joined The Odyssey: World Trek for Service and Education. She spent 2 years traveling to countries overlooked in most textbooks, writing about history, culture, contemporary issues, and grassroots movements for the free educational website that was used by over 3000 teachers world-wide (www.worldtrek.org). She has since co-founded Common Fire, which aims to train, inspire and rejuvenate individuals who demonstrate the utmost commitment and passion for service across a broad spectrum of issues, and to empower youth to find their own paths to service. Common Fire will ultimately do so through programs and retreats for youth, activists, teachers, and artists, all offered in the context of a community that is itself dedicated to service and models best practices in altruism and sustainability. While developing Common Fire, Kavitha works with the international scholarship service camp, Camp Rising Sun, facilitates for FOR’s Peacemaker Training Institute, and is author of the forthcoming book for youth From Cape Town to Timbuktu: An African Odyssey. She is currently working on the Next Generation young activist retreat with the Omega Institute and Utne Reader and creating free non-violence, peace and conflict resolution curriculum for teachers via The Odyssey's latest www.peacetrek.org Kavitha is a long-time student of yoga and loves teaching the practice that has helped fuel and sustain her activism.

alejandra c. tobar alatriz is an antiracist organizer and trainer with the Fellowship of Reconciliation. As a 2002-2003 Freeman intern, she is working with the Peacemaker Training Institute and Racial and Economic Justice program. Born in Santiago, Chile, alejandra was raised as a Chilena in Texas. She attended the University of Texas where she focused her studies on Psychology and the performing arts. alejandra has also worked in hte areas of education, human rights, sexual assault, domestic violence and transforming racism.

The PEACEMAKER TRAINING INSTITUTE, a project of the FOR, is made possible through generous gifts from Adele Thomas, the New York Friends Group and the Kirkridge New Generation Fund. The FOR gratefully acknowledges their support.

Fellowship of Reconciliation
Peacemaker Training Institute
1050 Selby Ave. St. Paul, MN 55104
Phone: 651.647.4465 Email: pti@forusa.org