Bio / Resume
Ain Bailey (she/they) is a restoration practitioner whose work is in service to Sacred Futures. She understands sacred futures to be representative of many things, most prevalently in this moment it is defining itself as any present treated with deep reverence and a committed intention to practice our collective, liberated future now.
She is the Founder and Co-Executive Director of New Seneca Village, a retreat center space and social ecosystem for cis, transfeminine and non-binary women leaders of color focused on restoration, connection and visioning.
All of Ain's work, including her healing centered coaching practice, are grounded in creating containers within which folks can connect with themselves, with others, with nature and higher consciousness to access their individual sovereignty, purpose and agency for the benefit of the collective.
Ain lives and works on the unceded and ancestral land of the Coosati and Muskoke people colonially known as Alabama.
When not working, they can be found vigorously avoiding screens, reading, contemplating, journaling, making up songs and playing with their dogs, Bijoux and Sega.
ENTREPRENEURSHIP
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Founder & Co-Designer, New Seneca Village [2021 - Present]
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Healing Centered Coach: Provide possibility oriented coaching designed to center inner knowing, embodied practice and visioning for nonprofit leaders [2022 - Present]
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Design + Structure, Jubilee College [2022 - Mar. 2024]
PHILANTHROPY
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Katz Amsterdam Foundation: Inaugural Racial Justice Program Director. Focus on civic engagement and mental behavioral health
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Borealis Philanthropy, Program Officer: Invested in racial equity practitioners who provide deep organizational development processes to nonprofit organizations.
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Consultant: Libra Foundation: Supported grantee relationships and completed grant making processes for the Criminal Justice program during staff maternity leave.
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Consultant: Chan Zuckerberg Initiative: Provided strategic scaffolding for 10+ housing organizations in the development of an emerging coalition designed to advance suburban housing justice organizing in the Bay Area.
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Consultant: The Case Made: Provided strategy support for Tipping Point Community Foundation within a narrative shift project to reframe poverty
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San Francisco Foundation, Initiative Officer: Designed the implementation of a Bay Area wide fellowship program designed to stimulate collaboration between governmental and nonprofit organizations to advance progressive housing policies.
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City of Oakland Community and Economic Development Agency: Managed local, small business improvement grant program; developed city-wide internal racial equity strategy and training curriculum
15+ years experience designing and implementing large-scale organizational, local and regional initiatives in government, philanthropy and non-profit spaces.
AREAS OF FOCUS
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Designing Liberatory and Transformational Spaces: Intentional Process + Structures
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Rethinking Work and Productivity
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Liberatory Giving + Coaching
EDUCATION
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BA, Spelman College
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MPA , Baruch College via the National Urban Fellows program
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ThetaHealing Practitioner - Certified
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Certified Professional Coach via the Blooming Willow Healing Centered Coaching Program.
FELLOWSHIPS
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Jubilee Gift [2021 -2022] - An invitational journey into Money & Belonging; to join with others in healing and shifting the upstream consciousness from which money was created, and then used, to reinforce extraction, racism, domination, ecocide, and other forms of separation and violence.
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Design team for Jubilee Gift 2023 course.
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Just Economy Institute (ICI) [2020 -21] For financial activists committed to leveraging capital with an integrated and strategic approach to impact social mission.
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Harmony Initiative [2018 - 19] In-depth exploration of both transitional and transformational philanthropic practice to bring about a Just Transition for philanthropy.
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Fulcrum Fellowship [2017] Positions fellows to help disinvested communities achieve their environmental, social and economic priorities by advancing strategies that overcome barriers to investment.
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Government Alliance for Race and Equity (GARE) [2015 - 17] Member of inaugural N. California cohort and City of Oakland inter-departmental RE team.
BOARD SERVICE
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Retreat Center Collaborative, Listening Circle member, 2023
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African - American Arts & Culture Center, Board Vice President, 2018 - 21
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City of Oakland Library Advisory Commissioner, 2013 - 17
Why she / they?
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I contain multitudes, including the ancestors on whose shoulders I stand
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I am in solidarity with any action that advances our collective liberation, especially the expansion of our language
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Non-binary Being aligns with my spiritual cosmology
In sacred futures there will be no need for constructs - our society will have finally learned to cherish all of that which makes each of us unique.