About Equity Allies.

There are many options for diversity, equity, and inclusion training. Most are didactic, lecture-based learning. While those structures may allow clients to check the box of HR training compliance, Equity Allies offers a model that ensures long-lasting impact on organizations and individuals. 

Recent data indicate that stress is embedded in the body, and that a significant source of stress originates from the lived experience of racial discrimination. Equity Allies promotes healing through a trauma-informed, body-first methodology that engages the nervous system, both physically and intellectually. This approach ensures that:
a. In addition to intellectual learning, the lived wisdom embedded within the bodies of participants is centered, surfaced, and honored, and the healing process is prioritized while avoiding re-traumatization. b. The tools for equity which are imparted and exercised interpersonally become embedded in muscle memory, allowing the individual greater agency to respond to harmful situations effectively, even through discomfort. 

Instead of lecture-style training, Equity Allies offers activity-based learning that draws upon the wisdom present within the group and amplifies existing skills, while strengthening community. This asset-based approach acknowledges that participants are experts in their lived experiences and that their expertise is drawn upon in order to make individuals feel seen and valued. Equity Allies prioritizes collaborative learning and builds in plenty of opportunity for small group dialogue and co-created meaning. The outcome is a more engaging workshop, where participants are more likely to experience long-term impact from multi-sensory learning.

Whether your organization is seeking base-level learning for all employees, Train the Trainer employee learning to ensure effective integration of equity practices, or long-term consulting around equitable and inclusive policy and procedure, Equity Allies will ensure that your time is meaningfully spent and that the learning has measurable, deep-reaching impact.

Team Members.

Marissa Metelica
Founder & Facilitator

Marissa Metelica is an anti-oppression educator, artist, and healer with nearly a decade of experience training and consulting organizations in race and gender equity. She has provided curriculum and training to government agencies, non-profits, and universities. Through Equity Allies, which she founded in 2019, Marissa offers interactive, trauma-informed anti-oppression training that invites and honors individual truth. With her background in Applied Theatre, Marissa weaves body-centered learning and healing into all of her justice work. Marissa strives to welcome the shadow and centralize the most marginalized stories in order to heal and grow into our highest capacity for grace and equity. Her work in theatre for peacebuilding and reconciliation has taken her to Rwanda, Uganda, and Northern Ireland. Marissa has also served as an adjunct professor at Drew University, and she is the Director of Programs at the Applied Theatre Collective. ​

​​Dax-Devlon Ross, J.D.
Program Developer & Facilitator

Dax-Devlon Ross, J.D., has led a career as an educator, non-profit executive, equity and impact strategist and journalist with a focus on social justice. After receiving his Juris Doctorate from George Washington University, he joined New York City Teaching Fellows where he taught in middle and high schools in Brooklyn and Manhattan. He later helped lead the national training and replication team at the Posse Foundation, one of the country’s foremost college access organizations. He founded the New York and New Jersey chapters of After-School All-Stars, a national youth development nonprofit, and later served as the organization's inaugural northeast regional executive director where he managed growth strategy, programs, partnerships, fundraising, board governance and operations in five states. Dax is the author of five books and his journalism has been featured in Time, The New York Times, Washington Post, The Guardian, Huffington Post, Virginia Quarterly Review, Nonprofit Quarterly Review and other national publications. He was the winner of the National Association of Black Journalists’ Investigative Reporting Award for his coverage of racial jury exclusion in North Carolina courts. He is a fellow at Type Media Center and a Principal at Dax-Dev Inc. and Third Settlements.

Austin Greene 
Program Developer & Facilitator

 Austin is an artist, graphic designer, educator, activist and organizer. He currently serves as the Director of the DreamYard Art Center in the Bronx. At DreamYard, he previously served as the Social Justice Pedagogy Expert and Lead Teaching Artist for the ACTION Project. ACTION is a four year social justice and creative arts program for Bronx high school students. ACTION participants use visual art, theatre, and poetry to talk back to the world and embody the change they hope to see in society. Austin is from Brooklyn, New York.

Michelle O'Connor-Hill
Facilitator 

Michelle O’Connor-Hill is the Executive Director of The Applied Theatre Collective (ATC) an organization dedicated to establishing creative space for dialogue and capacity building using arts-based strategies. Michelle is Adjunct Faculty at New York University’s Center for Global Affairs, teaching courses that explore creative approaches to difficult problems and facilitation. Michelle works with middle school youth with literacy based disabilities at The Churchill School and Center and directs for the Junior Youth Theatre at The City University of New York where she received her MA in Applied Theatre. Under her leadership, the Applied Theatre Collective has lead workshops with educators, mediators, and social workers in Dohuk, Iraq; Bucharest, Romania, Eastern Tennessee, and New York City. (For more information on ATC visit: www.appliedtheatrecollective.com

Contact Us.

Equity Allies offers many options for engagement. Workshops can be tailored to the needs of your organization. 
Please complete the contact form below for more information about our services. We would be thrilled to create a custom curriculum  for your organization or you can choose from our "off-the-shelf" workshop options.