(she/they/siya)

Visionary and Founder

Maio Buenafe is the founder of the Unlearning Community School and is a bilingual immigrant, genderqueer, multi-ethnic Indigenous Filipino (Ifugao, Itneg, Ilokano, Tagalog and Fujian Chinese) who has lived most of her life between the ‘Philippines’ and ‘California’. As a Cultural Strategist, Maio has worked with grassroots community organizations, business owners, and non-profit organizations providing direct services to frontline communities impacted by systemic injustices.

They have a myriad of roles in their community work: administrative coordination, training/curriculum design and facilitation, conducting qualitative fieldwork research with Indigenous communities, reviewing grant applications or proposals, program design and development, and providing technical assistance through facilitating training or workshops within organizations and multi-site initiatives.

A college professor for 10 years, they have taught Applied Cultural Anthropology, Social Sciences, Political Science, Critical Diversity Studies, and Ethnic Studies at various universities and colleges in the US and in the Philippines. As a qualitative researcher and scholar for over 15 years, Maio specializes in decolonial cultural and political education through Indigenous knowledge systems and practices, intergenerational knowledge transfer, & food and water sovereignty.

Maio combines her extensive experience as an educator-scholar-researcher with her work as a community consultant, cultural strategist, and mentor for transitional age youth and diverse community leaders. 

(she/her)

Advisor & Co-Host of Ask an Auntie Oracle

Mary Roaf is a life-long educator and learner. She started teaching in K-12 with 7th graders in 1993. Since then, Mary has taught the entire span of K-12 and university from toddlers, elementary and high school, to her current position as a professor of Ethnic Studies and Black Studies at California State University-Stanislaus. Mary enjoys dancing, traveling, building community, and savoring the ebbs and flows of life’s journey. She has expanded her horizons through participating in the 2019 Black Decolonial Transnational Feminist summer program in Brazil, and her 2023 Fulbright to South Africa. Mary continues to cultivate her connection with Mayo from Stan State to the Unlearning Community School as a fellow Oracle in Service and transformative force within and outside of institutions.

(they/them)

Vision Collaborator (Ask An Auntie Oracle)

hii ⪩༏⪨⋆.ೃ࿔*:

I am a lover of cats, tattoos, trees of all kinds, kpop, sunsets, ramen, dragonflies, and the color blue 🌀

My name is Anika, close friends call me Ani, Mandarin speakers call me 美玲, and I am a queer nonbinary Chinese American adoptee. While I was raised in “Portland,” my ancestors remain in 邵阳,湖南 (Shaoyang, Hunan). It was through adoption that I was forcibly removed from my motherland and made a settler on Turtle Island.

I am on my own journey of (un)learning how to better be in community with those around me–animals and nature alike. It is through mentors and knowledge-holders, such as Maio, that I am a student of decolonial and abolitionist praxis. My praxis recognizes the absolute necessity to abolish carceral systems and logics of punishment if we are to be liberated. What we build in its place will be radical, regenerative, and abundant. Furthermore, we have entered a new cycle of the lunisolar calendar, welcoming the year of the Wood Snake. The Wood Snake invites us to engage in radical transformation by shedding old skin and releasing what no longer serves us.

My role as the video editor for the Ask An Auntie Oracle series has required that I step into my stretch zone as a creative and community organizer. However, I am guided by the teachings of the Wood Snake and recognize my role in the Unlearning Community School as one way to engage in radical transformative change. 

I hope you all will accept the invitation to transform from the Unlearning Community School and Wood Snake by joining us in this journey of meaning-making through art and sharing our collective knowledge.

蛇年快乐~

(she/her/siya)

Community Collaborator

Founder & CEO of Rino Consulting Solutions, Raynelle began her career in the sciences as an ecology field researcher, then moved onto grassroots environmental education and social justice organizing. Her love for nature and youth development brought her to teach in unique settings like alternative high schools, environmental justice neighborhoods, parks, and juvenile justice facilities. Her personal journey through life up to now has carved a well-rounded and powerful pathway with the support and guidance from her Spiritual Mentor, and Curandera, Tereza Iniguez-Flores.

In 2016 Raynelle started Rino Consulting Solutions, a nature-based consulting firm that provides coaching and consulting services for professionals and other businesses. Its mission is to support and inspire the leaders of today to live in the confidence of their identities as they move through a world in the midst of social, racial, and environmental transformation. Raynelle is a certified professional coach through Leadership That Works. Her "Hike It Out Coaching" Programs blend her science, environmental justice, and spiritual connection to nature by providing "Healing Hikes", where clients increase their capacity to create change with the support and guidance of the nature experience. To read more about the healing hike experience, read this feature in Outside Magazine.

(she/they)

Balikbayan Program Collaborator and Co-learner

Marian ‘Ayan’ Sanchez is a Community Development worker, Indigenous woman, and self-taught visual artist. She is a board member of the Cordillera Women’s Education Action Research Center (CWEARC), a grassroots  organization focused on empowering women through education, action, and research on as means for advocating and advancing the collective rights and self-determination of Cordillera peoples. 

Ayan is currently a guest at ᐊᒥᐢᑲᐧᒋᐋᐧᐢᑲᐦᐃᑲᐣ (Amiskwacîwâskahikan),Treaty 6 Territory, in Alberta, Canada completing her PhD in Public Health. She works with the Cordillera Poeples Alliance- Kalinga and the Sumkad para iti matagoan, para iti karbengan, daga ken dayaw Movement documenting local resistance to development aggression and articulating Indigenous land connection as critical health promotion.

Research Collaborator

Digital Media Contributor