Our Better Selves Fellowship Advisors

The Better Selves Fellowship advisors are a dedicated group of alumni and friends of the fellowship, mostly from the Northeast, who have committed 3 years to constantly improving this program and making it available to people in their communities.

Those with contact information provided below have agreed to answer questions about the fellowship. Feel free to contact them.

Our 2024-2027 Advisors

DZIDZOR AZAGLO, she/her

Boston, MA

Dzidzor (pronounced Jee-Joh) is a Ga-Ewe folklore performing artist and led by her curiosity. Her unique approach blends call-and-response with a rich tapestry of sound, fusing poetry, storytelling, and auditory elements to create an immersive experience that grounds the audience in their own bodies.

Through her performance art, Dzidzor dismantles the conventional notion of a passive audience, instead beckoning them to step forward and become integral participants in the experience. Her body of work is a tapestry woven with threads of curiosity, exploring profound inquiries about divinity, community, home, blackness, and identity. She sensitively acknowledges those ensnared by a system that has historically overlooked black and brown individuals. She leans into Octavia E. Butler’s question, “What do we need to do now, to create the world we want to live in?” Dzidzor explores the possibility within bodies to unshackle themselves from internalized oppression, both in the mind and body, through practices of rest, deliberate stillness.

Dzidzor has performed at the ICA Boston, Old North Church, Isabella Stewart Gardener, Marsh Chapel, Harvard, University of Ghana and so much more.

Presently, Dzidzor is engrossed in her latest venture, ‘Wilderness’, an experimental performance piece that probes the essence and complexity of womanhood, existence, and spirituality in the context of religious teachings and the divine.

Simultaneously, she serves as a Community liaison for the Reckonings Project and pursues a master’s in Divinity at Boston University. Her passion for the curiosity of sound and experimentation has the distinguished title of ‘rhythm architect’, bestowed upon her by Knoel Scott of the Sun Ra Arkestra.

DEB BICKNELL, she/her

Portland, ME

Deb hails from due East of Knoll Farm (well, close enough!) from the beautiful State of Maine; Dawnland, land of the Wabanaki, of salt, stone and Scottish-English and Italian ancestry. She runs an international organizational and educational consultancy working in the fields of intergenerational-change making, youth engagement, conflict and organizational transformation, and embodied facilitation and creative design. Her work with people and organizations seeks to mine for truth, sculpt beauty, create connections and empower dreams. She spends much of her time accompanying leaders into the unknown, supporting entrepreneurs in building systems around bold dreams and offering facilitation and design for those seeking thoughtful process. She also works humbly within the creative fires of tension, discomfort and conflict, supporting growth within the messiness of being human. Deb is a poet, a lover of people’s complexities, and is a big-hearted, joyful global citizen who believes that a deep enough question can crack open insight, and that a community in conversation is an unstoppable river. She is currently working on her first book (a commitment remembered and deepened at a Better Selves Fellowship!) and lives, works and loves community worldwide from her home city of Portland, Maine.

Contact Deb

GAIL BURTON, she/her

Providence, RI

Gail Burton is a Story and Narrative Strategist for Northeast Sustainable Agriculture Working Group (NESAWG).

She grew up in East Harlem, NYC and learned gardening in an empty lot commandeered by the Renegades of Harlem street gang, next door to the brownstone that her family lived in. The master gardeners were her mother Sylvia originally from Smithfield, Virginia and a neighbor known as “Grandma” who had migrated from Alabama. There she learned that some folks grow collard greens in full sun while others believe in a bit of shade.

She is a Joker of Theater of the Oppressed, a facilitator of Story Circle process (created by John O’Neil of the Free Southern Theater), a playwright and dramaturg. Her new play Truth celebrates the psycho-spiritual basis of resistance in 19th century black female freedom fighters. Truthplay.org

Contact Gail

DAYNA-JOY CHIN, she/her

New Rochelle, NY

Dayna-Joy Chin is a historian, educator, and consultant based in New York. Her work explores Black history, Africana studies, and histories of the African diaspora. Dayna-Joy is passionate about creating inclusive educational spaces for individuals of all ages and participates in a number of artistic and earth-based projects. You can learn more about her work and approach at her website.

Contact Dayna-Joy

PAIGE CURTIS, she/her

Cambridge, MA

Paige Curtis is a Boston-based communications professional and writer working on climate change issues. Formally trained in Environmental Management from the Yale School of Environment, she believes that moving climate to the center of public discourse is critical. Her writing has appeared in The Atlantic, The Guardian, Vox, Grist, Yes! Magazine, Sierra, and other publications. The Better Selves Fellowship gave her the courage to start a climate humor newsletter called Bad Environmentalist.

CAMILO ESQUIVIA

HB LOZITO, they/them

Brattleboro, VT

Since 2014, HB Lozito has served as the executive director of Out in the Open. Out in the Open is a multiracial, mostly working class, movement & capacity building organization that connects rural LGBTQ+ people to build community, visibility, knowledge, and power.

In addition to their work at OITO, they are a Senior Fellow of the Environmental Leadership Program, a 2019 Better Selves Fellowship alum, a former Lost River Racial Justice Nucleus member, and a Board Member of Vermont Public, the organization formed by the merger of Vermont Public Radio & Vermont Public Television. In 2022, they were named one of The Advocate’s “50 Champions of Pride.” HB is also the recipient of the 2023 Con Hogan Award for Creative, Entrepreneurial, and Community Leadership.

They love laughing, playing cribbage, carving wooden spoons, growing & cooking food, and finding blue sea glass. HB lives in Vermont with their partner, Mel.

Contact HB

GRACE OEDEL, she/her

Burlington, VT

Grace grew up in the city of Atlanta, GA and journeyed/ learned/ worked all over the globe before finding her way to the Green Mountains. She now serves as the executive director of the Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont, building power, tending land, providing support and nourishing community towards a verdant, thriving, delicious and just future for all. Grace is also an ordained rabbi and a core organizer of the L’Chaim Collective, an earth- rooted, justice-seeking, post-nationalist Jewish community growing peace, liberation and song. Additionally, she loves to serve as a doula for birth, death, and change-making; writes a Substack called “here we are“; sews quilts with scrap fabric; acts as sous chef for her nine year old who runs a neighborhood desert CSA; and enjoys tending her small homestead with her partner and three rambunctious young children.

C. BRANDON OGBUNU, he/him

New Haven, CT

Brandon Ogbunu is Computational Biologist and complexity scientist at Yale University, and is an External Professor at the Santa Fe Institute. His research investigates complex problems in epidemiology, genetics, evolution, and society. In addition, he runs a parallel research program at the intersection of science, society, and culture.

He is currently an ideas contributor at WIRED and writes a column at Undark entitled “Selective Pressure.” He has written for a range of publications including Scientific American, The Undefeated, The Atlantic, the Boston Review and several others.

You can learn more about Brandon’s work here.

J. PABLO ORTIZ-PARTIDA, he/him

Merced, CA

Pablo Ortiz grew up in Jalisco, Mexico, the birthplace of Tequila and Mariachi. From an early age, he felt a deep connection to water—whether it was the rivers, lakes, or oceans that surrounded him, they always felt like home. Today, Pablo serves as the Director of Innovation and Collaboration at the Union of Concerned Scientists, where he focuses on breaking down barriers to new ideas and building stronger connections within the organization and with partners.

Before this role, Pablo worked as a Senior Climate and Water Scientist, developing strategies to help vulnerable communities adapt to the challenges of climate change, particularly water-related impacts. In 2022, he participated in the Better Selves Fellowship, an experience that made him feel he belonged to places beyond his home country.

You can learn more about Pablo’s work here.

DÁLIDA ROCHA, she/her

Worcester, MA

Dálida Rocha (she/her) is the Executive Director of Neighbor to Neighbor. This member-led organization combines base-building, coalition-building, policy development, and electoral organizing to win multi-racial, working-class governing power in the state of Massachusetts.

Before joining Neighbor to Neighbor Massachusetts, Rocha served as Executive Director of Renew US, and before that, she served as the Political Director for SEIU 32BJ New England District. This is the nation’s largest property service workers union, with 175,000 members. The New England district represents 20,000 janitors, security officers, and other property service workers at office buildings, universities, convention centers, and other major institutions. In her role as the Political Director, Rocha convened and served as the Co-Chair of the Driving Families Forward coalition. The coalition was convened to pass the Work & Family Mobility Act legislation, also known as driver’s license. In 2022, Rocha served as the Field Director for the Yeson4 for Safer Roads campaign to keep the Work & Family Mobility Act law.

The work of justice is not one that she takes lightly. Whether it is immigration, climate, racial, and/or economic justice, we can always count on Rocha’s commitment to liberation.

Dálida is a proud African immigrant from Cabo Verde.

Contact Dálida

ANG ROELL, they/them

Montague, MA

Ang Roell resides in the Connecticut River Valley Watershed, on the ancestral lands of the Pocumtuc, Nipmuc, and Wabanaki Dawn Land Confederacy. They live alongside their human and nonhuman kin, including over 200 beehives. As a co-founder of They Keep Bees (TKB), Ang focuses on raising Varroa-resistant queen bees, leading climate adaptation research, and facilitating skill shares and collaborative networks for climate resilience.

Beyond the farm, Ang works as a strategist, facilitator, and mediator, with a deep passion for storytelling. They write a newsletter exploring the intersections of their work in climate-impacted ecologies and transformative change-making.

JASMINE AYANA SUDARKASA, she/her

Newport, RI

Jasmine Sudarkasa builds confidence, relationships, organizations, and systems. As the Chief Storyteller at Love N ow Media, she leverages systems and stories to build empathy-centered media products that resonate from Philadelphia to the world.

Prior to joining Love Now Media, she specialized in early stage projects and strategic pivots, serving as an independent consultant for founding executives and the founding Executive Director of the Curve Foundation, an philanthropic organization dedicated to lesbian and queer women’s culture.

From 2019-21, Jasmine was the program Fellow for the Effective Philanthropy Group at the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, where she contributed to the foundation’s approach to effective philanthropy. In 2020, she designed and led a $15 million anti-racist grantmaking effort, a personal and career highlight.

Before philanthropy, she led training and technical assistance at Girls Educational & Mentoring Services, subject agency of the film ‘Very Young Girls’, delivering national curricula & best practices for serving exploited and trafficked youth.

Contact Jasmine