I was born and raised in Los Angeles, CA and I am a proud first generation Mexicana and daughter of Immigrants. Throughout my childhood, I received consistent support from family and community, which allowed me to overcome many obstacles in my life.  My lived experience has grounded me in my work to be a student centered, trauma informed and community responsive educator and therapist. 

Almost 2 decades ago, I moved to the Bay Area and began my youth and community work by serving communities that mirrored the one I grew up in. I worked to support Pre-K students in developing literacy skills, empowering families to advocate for student’s education, supporting workers in accessing workplace rights and coordinating a year round after-school program. 

My work has always been grounded in community, connection, empowerment and creativity. 

For the past decade, I have dedicated myself to supporting in a school counseling and therapeutic capacity. I have created Mental Health Counseling programs in Oakland and worked with staff, families and community to meet the needs of our students and families. As the Founding Counselor at Roses in Concrete Community School, Lead Counselor at Lighthouse Community Public Schools and MH Counselor at Aspire Lionel Wilson, I provided community responsive counseling services for all students and families through tiered interventions such as, class presentations, parents workshops and wellness events. Community Responsive Counseling comes about when you identify the needs in your school and creatively meet those needs through services offered. Given my clinical training, I provided more intensive counseling support through groups, individual counseling and clinical supervision. Using a community centered approach, I partnered with organizations to meet our student basic needs through an established food pantry, puberty presentations, food distributions, resource fairs, workshops, training, etc. 

In my work as an adjunct professor, mentor counselor and clinical supervisor,  I strive to instill community responsive and social justice focused counseling programs to serve youth and their families. After years of supporting schools and future counselors in developing their counseling programs, I want to continue to expand my impact in developing healing spaces for young people that honor them. It brings me much joy to build counseling programs that normalize mental health and accessibility to counseling supports for young people. I truly believe that harnessing our strengths and creativity can transform the Social-Emotional work we do within a school system. 

Meeting the mental health needs of students can be a daunting task. There is often an increasing amount of needs which can be tough to support. It is possible for your school to meet the Mental Health and Social Emotional needs of all students and families. 

I want to support your School, Organization, Counselors or Therapists. I do this by: 

• Providing community responsive consultation on a current mental health program 

• Coaching new (or veteran) counselors on using their strengths and getting creative in meeting the needs of all students 

• Creating Personalized Professional Development and SEL curriculum to ensure community responsive mental health services for ALL 

I cannot wait to start working with you to support your school or organization in providing Community Responsive Social -Emotional support for all students, families and staff.