Staff

Research Assistant

Maham Ali

Maham Ali (She/Her) serves as a Research Associate for the Building Movement Project. Currently pursuing her PhD at The Ohio State University, Maham utilizes quantitative and qualitative research methods to examine how nonprofit organizations engage with and respond to the growing demands for racial and social justice. Recently, she presented her research titled “#Tweeting for Social Justice: Community Foundations’ Social Media Activity in Response to Black Lives Matter (BLM)” at the ARNOVA (Association for Research on Nonprofit Organizations and Voluntary Action) conference. Her research contributes to the fields of nonprofit management, public affairs, and organization studies.

Prior to embarking on her doctoral studies, Maham held several management roles in nonprofit organizations. In her most recent position with United Way, she collaborated with multiple local nonprofit organizations to expand services for students and families in community schools. Maham also remains actively involved as a volunteer with organizations that strive to bring about social change through community engagement. As a first-generation college student herself, Maham mentors other first-generation college students, drawing upon her own experiences and knowledge to support and guide them.

Director, Race Equity Assessment

Mercedes Brown

Mercedes Brown is the Director of Race Equity Assessment at the Building Movement Project. In this new role, she is charged with launching and bringing to scale BMP’s new organizational race equity assessment process to better equip the nonprofit sector with the foundational capacities needed to build more racially equitable workplaces. Mercedes brings deep expertise in public policy, data analytics, and equitable cross-systems transformation through nearly 17 years of experience in the social services sector. Throughout her career in government and the nonprofit sector, she has always led with her passion for advancing social and racial justice through complex systems change.

Before joining the Building Movement Project staff, she served as Michigan Director at the Corporation for Supportive Housing (CSH), where she established CSH’s strategic priorities for the State of Michigan and managed a statewide portfolio of cross-sector projects aimed at ensuring equitable access to high-quality housing and services for marginalized communities. Mercedes holds a Master’s in Social Work from the University of Michigan, where she currently works as a part-time lecturer teaching policy and community organizing courses. She also holds a Juris Doctor from Western Michigan University. Mercedes serves on the Board of Directors for the Washtenaw Housing Alliance and the United Way of Washtenaw County’s Community Impact Committee. In her spare time, Mercedes enjoys baking, dabbling in interior design work, and traveling with her fiancé.

Senior Manager of Finance, Grants and Operations

Maggie Deptola

Maggie Deptola (she/her) is the Senior Manager of Finance, Grants and Operations for the Building Movement Project. She is responsible for building and maintaining systems that support the organization’s administrative functions. 

Maggie is passionate about economic mobility, educational equity, and capacity-building for nonprofits. Her previous roles include consulting with local and state governments on topics such as capacity-building and program design, a brief stint in tech, and supporting a variety of nonprofits in program and operations roles. Most recently, she served as the first Chief Operating Officer of Coded by Kids, a Philadelphia-based tech education nonprofit serving K-12 students ages in the mid-Atlantic region. 

Maggie has a bachelor’s degree in international area studies from Drexel University and a master’s degree in Public Administration from the University of Pennsylvania. She serves as the Vice Chair of the Philadelphia Robotics Coalition. 

Associate, Administration and Finance

Ava Fields

Ava Fields (she/her/hers) is the Associate of Finance and Administration, where she focuses on building and maintaining BMP’s operationss systems and supports administration.

Outside of BMP, Ava Fields is a Horror Advocate, Crime Trends Expert, Researcher, Ghostwriter, Cryptanalyst, and Poet based in Boston. After graduating with a Master of Science in Criminal Behavior in 2016, and with a long history of community organizing, she began to work in the non-profit sector with a focus on fair and equitable practice for engaging independent creators, including developing a fiscal sponsorship program to build organizational capacity.

Senior Director, Strategic Initiatives

Deepa Iyer

Over the course of two decades supporting social movements, Deepa has played many roles: weaver, frontline responder, storyteller, and guide. Her political and community homes include Asian American, South Asian, Muslim, and Arab ecosystems where she spent fifteen years in policy advocacy and coalition building in the wake of the September 11th attacks and ensuing backlash. 

Deepa leads projects on solidarity and social movements at the Building Movement Project, a national nonprofit organization that catalyzes social change through research, relationships, and resources. She conducts trainings, uplifts narratives through the Solidarity Is This podcast, and facilitates solidarity strategy for cohorts and networks. Previously, she served as executive director of South Asian Americans Leading Together (SAALT) for a decade, and also held positions at Race Forward, the US Department of Justice’s Civil Rights Division, the Asian Pacific American Legal Resource Center, and the Asian American Justice Center. 

Deepa’s first book, We Too Sing America: South Asian, Arab, Muslim, and Sikh Immigrants Shape Our Multiracial Future (The New Press, 2015), chronicles community-based histories in the wake of 9/11 and received a 2016 American Book Award. Deepa’s second book, a guide based on the social change ecosystem map, is available in late 2022 (Social Change Now: A Guide for Reflection and Connection is available here).

Deepa serves on the advisory council of the Emergent Fund. She has been an adjunct professor at the University of Maryland in the Asian American Studies and Public Policy programs.

Deepa is an immigrant who moved to Kentucky from Kerala (India) when she was twelve years old. She graduated from the University of Notre Dame Law School and Vanderbilt University. In her free time, Deepa loves to make memories with her son, share random tips about astrology with her patient friends, read, and discover a new series to binge.

Co-Executive Director

Frances Kunreuther

Frances Kunreuther co-directs the Building Movement Project, strengthening U.S. nonprofits as sites of civic engagement and social change. She is co-author of two books, From the Ground Up: Grassroots Organizations Making Social Change (Cornell, 2006) and Working Across Generations: Defining the Future of Nonprofit Leadership (Jossey Bass, 2009). Frances was a senior fellow at the Hauser Center for Nonprofit Organizations at Harvard University for five years and is currently affiliated with the Research Center for Leadership and Action at NYU where she also teaches. In the 1990s, Frances headed the Hetrick-Martin Institute for LBGT youth and was awarded an Annie E. Casey Foundation Fellowship for her work with homeless youth and families, undocumented immigrants, crime victims, battered women, and substance users. She writes and presents frequently on issues related to nonprofits, leadership, and social change.

Senior Director, Institutional Advancement

Romana Lee-Akiyama

Romana Lee-Akiyama (she/her) joins the Building Movement Project as the Senior Director, Institutional Advancement after having served as the executive director of the Mayor’s Office of Public Engagement at the City of Philadelphia. Romana is a global cross-sector leader at the intersection of social change, equity, community well-being, and the arts and culture. Throughout her career, she has served as a skilled advocate and partner to nonprofit and community-based leaders and organizations, grantmakers and funders, and government institutions. Her expertise lies in unknotting challenging situations and complex systems to drive towards equitable results through strategy, planning and engagement.

Romana is civically engaged and active in her community. She is the founding director and curator of the Chen Lok Lee Legacy Project, which she founded in 2021 as a tribute to her late father, an artist, printmaker and professor whose immigrant story continues to inspire the next generation of artists. As a curator and facilitator, Romana has focused on bringing together diverse communities to explore commonalities and challenge biases, and to create environments of welcoming and belonging. She serves as the Co-Vice Chair of the Pennsylvania State Advisory Committee to the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, a member of the Penn Museum Community Advisory Group, Board of Advisors to the Bryn Mawr College Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research, and a board member of Live Work Philadelphia. 

Romana holds a BA in International Relations from Tufts University and a Master of Social Service and Master of Law and Social Policy from the Bryn Mawr College Graduate School of Social Work and Social Research. She is a 2023 Marshall Memorial Fellow with the German Marshall Fund of the United States, and a Fellow with the Center for Asian Pacific American Women. Romana enjoys practicing and teaching yoga in her spare time. 

Communications and Operations Associate

Jasmine Leeward

Jasmine (they/them) serves as the Communications and Operations Associate at Building Movement Project. Jasmine develops communications strategies, performs operational and administrative tasks, and supports various projects across the organization.

Jasmine is a visual artist and storyteller committed to the delicate work of challenging state violence and shifting culture towards Black liberation, particularly in the U.S. South. Jasmine has worked as a communications strategist in different movement formations since 2016. They are a 2021 Rockwood Leadership JustFilms fellow and a 2022 Broadway Advocacy Coalition Artivism Fellow.

Senior Manager of Partnerships

Héctor Malvido

For over 10 years, Héctor Malvido (he/him/él) has been deeply involved in policy, advocacy, and direct service in a variety of roles that have taken on issues ranging from tenant protections and homelessness, food insecurity, police reform, and immigration injustice.

Héctor’s faith in the inherent power and teachings that communities possess has informed his approach in creating meaningful and community-led changes that move the needle closer towards self-determination and healing.

Since moving to the Bay Area in 2015, Héctor has worked on the ground, building bridges between service providers, advocacy organizations, and residents to close the gaps that exist across sectors and build community power and transform systems. During the COVID-19 pandemic, his work has shifted dramatically to respond to the emergent needs of the communities that have been the most impacted, working to pass eviction moratoriums, tenant protections, and close the racial equity gaps that prevent access to rent relief and COVID vaccines.

Race Equity Assessment Associate

Camryn Snell

Camryn Snell (she/hers) serves as the Race Equity Assessment Associate for the Building Movement Project. In this role, Camryn is charged with supporting the launch and development of the BB4C, BMP’s race equity assessment for nonprofit organizations. Ultimately, she aspires to motivate and support nonprofits in their development of the foundational capacities necessary for building more racially equitable workplaces. Camryn firmly believes that the current workplace culture is a reflection of our popular culture. As such, she hopes that these shifts will be realized throughout our communities.Camryn brings both lived and learned experiences to this role. The intersections of Camryn‘s identities make her uniquely prepared and knowledgeable of the necessity of normalizing, organizing, and operationalizing race equity efforts in all spaces. Before joining BMP, she attended the College of Charleston where she earned a Master of Public Administration degree. There, Camryn also served in the Community Assistance Program, a high-level capacity building clinic that serves nonprofit and municipal organizations. She co-managed four social-justice based projects and had hands-on experience with dismantling inequities, specifically  White Supremacy Culture, in workplaces in addition to fervently advocating for greater representation of Black and African-American people in Charleston’s prominent industries. Camryn also co-led the cultivation of the City of Charleston‘s first-ever Race Equity Framework. Prior to this, Camryn earned a Bachelor of Art in both Political Science and Spanish at the College of Charleston.  Camryn deeply values equity-oriented service and works to ensure that communities have the necessary tools and resources to affect sustainable change.

Co-Executive Director

Sean Thomas-Breitfeld

Sean Thomas-Breitfeld (he/him) co-directs the Building Movement Project. Prior to joining the BMP staff, Sean spent a decade working in various roles at Community Change, where he developed training programs for grassroots leaders, worked in the communications and policy departments where he coordinated online and grassroots advocacy efforts, and lobbied on a range of issues, including immigration reform, transportation equity, and anti-poverty programs. Before joining Community Change, Sean worked as a policy analyst at UnidosUS, where he focused on employment and income security issues. Sean holds a Master’s in Public Administration from NYU’s Wagner School of Public Service and a bachelor’s degree in social work and multicultural studies from St. Olaf College in Minnesota.

Coordinator, Movement Building Programs

UyenThi Tran Myhre

UyenThi (pronounced “Wing-T”) Tran Myhre (she/her) is the Movement Building Coordinator with the Building Movement Project, supporting communications work, curriculum development and trainings, and solidarity cohorts. 

Prior to joining BMP, UyenThi held leadership roles at the YMCA of the North Equity Innovation Center and the University of Minnesota Women’s Center, where she worked with college students, K-12 and higher education faculty and staff, as well as nonprofit professionals in various sectors. She holds a Bachelor’s in Journalism and Certificate in Gender and Women’s Studies from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a Master’s in Educational Psychology from the University of Minnesota.

UyenThi is interested in storytelling and narrative-shifting as strategies for social change and creating a better world. She is part of the team at Project Yellow Dress, a platform uplifting voices and stories from the Southeast Asian diaspora. As a daughter of refugees, writer, and facilitator, her work explores the intersections of family, feminism, abolition, and beyond, often through a pop culture lens.

Senior Manager of Movement Building Programs

Adaku Utah

Born in Baltimore, Maryland, raised in Festac, Nigeria, grounded in her legacy of organizers, farmers and healers, Adaku (any pronouns) harnesses her seasoned skills as a political strategist, holistic healer, transformative facilitator, somatics coach and ritual artist as an act of love and commitment to her community. She enjoys co-cultivating social justice leaders and organizations to be more strategic, sustainable, and impactful.  For over twenty years, their work has centered on movements for radical social change, with a focus on gender, reproductive, race, youth, and healing justice.

She most recently was the Organizing Director at the National Network of Abortion Funds, building and mobilizing organizing power and movement building efforts with 90+ member organizations, thousands of individual members, and network leaders across the country and world.

For the past 9 years, they have also been co-facilitating Harriet’s Apothecary, an all-Black collective of healers, organizers, and artists committed to embodying Harriet Tubman’s legacy of centering abolition and healing justice in how we organize to create and sustain liberation and transformation.

She is a Senior teacher and coach with BOLD (Black Organizing for Leadership and Dignity), a national leadership training program designed to help rebuild Black social justice infrastructure to organize Black communities more effectively and re-center Black leadership in the U.S. social justice movement. She also teaches and coaches with Generative Somatics, a national organization that supports social and climate justice movements in achieving their visions of a radically transformed society by bringing somatic transformation to movement leaders, organizations, and alliances.