Meet the Team

Li is a first generation immigrant from Colombia who moved to the United States in 2003. After graduating from college with a BA in languages and education, and after doing a short stint as a teacher, Li discovered her passion was languages. For the past 17 years, Li has worked and volunteered with a variety of nonprofits whose work revolves around justice issues (immigration, domestic violence, workers rights, economic inequality, health access, LGBTQIA+ issues, and others.) in Western North Carolina. Li currently works for a local county government, is a contract translator and interpreter for a language justice cooperative based in NC, and will be furthering her education as a translator with UMass Boston in the fall.

As a new member of STW, Li is focusing on providing interpretation and translation, with the long-term aim of developing a language justice approach inside the organization, to support STW’s goal of building an inclusive global community that empowers change-makers from all walks of life. Li is looking forward to becoming more familiar with the organization to provide support in other areas.

In her spare time, Li enjoys hiking in the Blue Ridge Mountains, sharing meals with friends along with quite a lot of dancing, reading, and learning to play the ukulele.

Charlotte is a senior web developer & a WordPress specialist. She is jumping on anything that is tech-based and her goal is to make the life of her fellow wavemarkers easier so they can keep saving the world making waves.

Born and raised in France, Charlotte loves spending time outside with her girlfriend Justine and their pets. She is learning the ukulele and is passionate about animals and finding ways to communicate with them, especially through positive reinforcement.

Porter is a neurodivergent queer, advocate, activist, and, by trade, legal counsel for a media collaboration SaaS company.

Within STW, she primarily works on the business-related items, including partner relationships and collaborations, corporate paperwork and filings, and nonprofit strategy and governance.

Porter digs absolutely everything STW stands for. She hopes to use her privilege to elevate historically excluded folx and to advocate for a better future for all. She has a true passion for learning and strives to continue to grow and evolve. Porter is extremely thankful to be part of STW and to see all of the positive change that this beautiful STW community is creating.

With over ten years of administrative work under her belt, Chan brings a wealth of experience in growing and supporting strong nonprofit organizations by bolstering their operations. They have a breadth of training working with and supporting various sized organizations to develop robust internal systems. Like with the pronunciation of her name, pinning down their pronouns is sometimes a challenge.

Ever since she was seven years old, singing along to Rhythm Nation 1814 and reading every Black history book she could find at the library, social justice and service have been at the forefront of their work and their life. Chan’s wish is to continue that life’s calling at Start the Wave.

When she’s not dreaming of ways to streamline operations, Chan can be found hiking around town searching for the best vegan soul food, browsing the aisles of their local comic book shop, or imploring movement leaders to truly rest. Chan lives in Northern California, where she tends to her goats and cats that they lovingly call her dummies.

Danielle is a strategy & operations executive at an information technology and services company when she’s not volunteering for Start the Wave.

She focuses on STW’s social media needs such as brand amplification & alt-text/image description creation, managing email marketing & communications and support the orgs’ objectives through leveraging existing & emerging technologies. Danielle is passionate about helping others and hopes to impact meaningful change, give back and do good.

In her free time, you’ll find her in California where she enjoys tv/movies, music, great food & wine and playing board games with her husband Jim.

Randi is a Social and Political Organizing professional whose focus in life has always been to help bring about positive change.

Randi’s drive for a better future led her to Start the Wave where she spends most of her time on project coordination, resource research, and caption text for social media posts.

In her spare time you can often find Randi marching in meaningful protests, shopping at local health food stores, or hanging out on a patio with the wonderful group of humans she calls her family.

Taylor is a strategic communications and community outreach professional, currently working for an environmental health and justice-centered organization.

Taylor’s passion for intersectional advocacy work, strategic issue campaigns and lifting up grassroots voices brought her to Start the Wave, where she’s excited to focus on video content, storytelling and amplifying the voices of STW’s funded projects. Overall, she’s immensely excited to get involved in various areas of the work of the organization, learn from her fellow team members and grow in her work as an advocate.

In her free time, Taylor enjoys cooking for friends and family, going on strolls with her dog Sebastian, FaceTiming her mom and sister for hours on end, trying new restaurants, and playing video games.

D2 currently works in Change Management Communications for a major financial institution, where they have nurtured their strategic planning and graphic design skill sets.

They manage STW’s graphic design needs for all channels and communications, strategize the content and roll out for our Instagram account, and track and organize all of our projects. They are passionate about how positive change can impact the world and strongly believes in the work STW is doing to achieve that goal. They are a constant advocate for kindness in all forms and uses that as a foundational pillar in raising their son, Toby.

When not working/volunteering, you’ll find D2 spending time with Toby, creating art in any form they feel inspired by (sketching, painting, upcycling, etc.), and enjoying nature on one of the many hiking trails near home.

Dom is a queer, non binary, gender fluid, light-worker, activist and artist.

They are best known for their role in Syfy’s TV show – Wynonna Earp, where they played a bisexual young woman coming into her sexuality and personal power.

With a huge passion for growth and healing as well as dance and music, they are exploring the intersection of these practices, using creativity as a vehicle for transformation.

They profoundly believe that we all have magic inside of us and when we listen deeply to our hearts calling, let go of our systematic conditioning, and find the courage to follow our purpose, amazing things can transpire.

One of their greatest joys is to support wavemakers in their important work of bringing in a brighter tomorrow.

The individuals and projects that Start the Wave has collaborated with are a huge source of inspiration for Dom and they feel honoured to continue growing this movement alongside such an amazing community.

Portia is a bubbly and smiley bean who loves to make people smile and laugh. Her biggest wish is to make people happy and her one gift would be to make just one person smile a day.

At Start the Wave, Portia's primary role is researching and vetting resources for the community. She also loves getting involved with all the projects the team have going, and helping out wherever she can. Her big passion is making neurodivergent voices heard, especially fellow autistic voices, and making sure everyone feels like they are valid and important. She loves the community aspect of Start the Wave and the learning, understanding and connection it brings to the world. Portia hopes by being part of Start the Wave she is helping create positive change, one smile at a time. She is extremely proud to be part of Start the Wave and holds every community member in her heart.