ANGELA FEATHERSTONE
FOUNDER & PRESIDENT
Letter of Recommendation:
"...As a former foster youth herself, who experienced significant poverty, criminal neglect, and physical abuse before and during her time in foster care, Angie truly understood the challenges these kids face every day, as they try to exit in a system that is overburdened and under-resourced for the things these children need, such as trauma-informed therapeutic interventions and caring individuals who can help them to heal and thrive. Angie also understood the incredible resilience of remarkable survivors, if they can get the support they need before and after they exit the foster care system.
Today, Angela is a committed advocate for children in foster care and has dedicated her life to a holistic approach to helping these kids heal. Her organization is much needed and I sincerely hope it receives the support it needs. Our foster youth will truly benefit, as will society as a whole, if we can help these young people heal and thrive. I wholeheartedly endorse Angie and this much-needed program.”
— Randi E. Thompson CEO, President of Kidsave International
Brief Bio, Fostering Care Founder, Angela Featherstone ~
Within a year of emancipating herself from foster care at 17, Angela Featherstone became Canada's top model when her September, Flare magazine cover broke all previous records for sales. She quickly expanded upon her success and left for New York where she signed with the illustrious Click agency. She would travel the world as a top fashion model, working with such great photographers as Oliviero Toscani, Piero Gemelli, Irving Penn, Albert Watson, David Bailey, and Bruce Weber. But for her life's work of acting, she downplayed her striking features to play unlikely roles, emerging as an actress with exceptional versatility. She is best known for playing Chloe in Friends and the fiancé (Linda) who left Adam Sandler's character (Robbie) at the altar in The Wedding Singer. Most recently she played the role of Maggie on Showtime’s Ray Donovan and Jame on Girls for HBO. She has created sitcoms for Sony, DreamWorks, and NBC television, and written nonfiction for Time, Jane, Flare, The Huffington Post, Dame, and Zoomer. Her essay about childhood trauma, God Said No, was published in the 2014 edition of Gargoyle Magazine and nominated for the Pushcart Prize. In 2011, she curated Fuck Pretty, a show at the Robert Berman Gallery featuring important and emerging female photographers, and recorded “Coattail Glide” with Raymond Pettibon and the band The Niche Makers. Angela, a committed advocate for children in foster care, volunteers with the Children's Action Network curating their Heart Gallery from 2011- 2019 and served on their Winter Wonderland committee 2014 & 2015. She has also mentored a child in foster care through Kidsave from 2011-2020. In 2014, she lectured at the ICAN Nexus Conference; Violence Within the Home and its Effects on Children and continues to lecture and write about healing PTSD, child abuse, human trafficking, and intimacy. Her 2015 essay on child sex trafficking for DAME was picked up by Salon.org and MSN and exposed to over 7 million viewers. That year she was also an adjunct lecturer at the UCLA Professional Producing Program. 2022 marked her 13th year studying Moral and Spiritual Psychology with Rabbi Mordecai Finley, Ph.D. Recently, Angela served as a consultant on the important documentary about the effects and healing of trauma, Cracked Up.
Meet the advisory board
Meet the advisory board
Dr. Gabor Mate Renowned speaker, and bestselling author, Dr. Gabor Maté is highly sought after for his expertise on a range of topics including addiction, stress and childhood development.
Rather than offering quick-fix solutions to these complex issues, Dr. Maté weaves together scientific research, case histories, and his own insights and experience to present a broad perspective that enlightens and empowers people to promote their own healing and that of those around them.
After 20 years of family practice and palliative care experience, Dr. Maté worked for over a decade in Vancouver’s Downtown East Side with patients challenged by drug addiction and mental illness. The bestselling author of four books published in over thirty languages, Gabor is an internationally renowned speaker highly sought after for his expertise on addiction, trauma, childhood development, and the relationship of stress and illness. His book on addiction received the Hubert Evans Prize for literary non-fiction. For his groundbreaking medical work and writing he has been awarded the Order of Canada, his country’s highest civilian distinction, and the Civic Merit Award from his hometown, Vancouver. His books include In the Realm of Hungry Ghosts: Close Encounters With Addiction; When the Body Says No; The Cost of Hidden Stress; Scattered Minds: The Origins and Healing of Attention Deficit Disorder; and (with Dr. Gordon Neufeld) Hold on to Your Kids: Why Parents Need to Matter More Than Peers. His next book, The Myth of Normal: Trauma, Illness & Healing in a Toxic Culture, is due on September 13, 2022. His second next book, Hello Again: A Fresh Start for Parents and Their Adult Children, is expected in 2023. Gabor is also a co-developer of a therapeutic approach, Compassionate Inquiry, now studied by hundreds of therapists, physicians, counselors, and others internationally. More on his books and programs can be found here.
Dr. Stuart Sovatsky
Stuart Sovatsky Ph.D., Receiving its top Club Scholarship, Stuart was degreed in Religion & Ethics from Princeton University in 1971 with a thesis on Nietzsche & Advaita. He was initiated into the Lakulish-Kripalvanand Pashupata lineage in 1973. He was first in the US to bring yoga & kirtan to incarcerated youth & to the homeless mentally-ill in the mid1970s & was first choice to clinically-direct the Ram Dass Prison Ashram, receiving the first federal grant to bring meditation into schools, police departments & mental health agencies in 1976. He has some 30,000hrs of counseling experience & directed the first "Spiritual Emergence" service in the world since 1983, the Kundalini Clinic that helped modify psychiatry’s Diagnostic Manual to include Spiritual Issues & distinguish Dissociative Disorders from meditative states. His Admiration Therapy was certified by the Russian Government that he has used in transforming over 300 breakup-bound couples & has been awarded over $2M in grants. A Berkeley Mental Health Clinic named a room after him for 26 years of directorship, including thwarting several suicidal and one homicidal situation. From 1997-2000, he was founding-consultant for the Oakland $34million award-winning sustainable Greencity Lofts. Stuart was secretly flown to Slovenia to chant over the dying Chair of Unaligned Nations of the World & to S Africa as the first Caucasian to chant with Sangoma shamans in 2001 and in 2008, he convened a 40-country World Spirituality Conference in India where Lama Samten represented the Dalai Lama and Jack Kornfield, the Prelate of the Ramakrishna Order & Robert Thurman keynoted. Stuart gave Sanskrit benedictions for Sri Sri Ravi Shankar & presented on One World Family. He is the author of Advanced Spiritual Intimacy, Words From The Soul [in acquisition review by Harvard University Press], Passions of Innocence, The History of Yoga in America in the Columbia University Desk Reference on Eastern Religion [contract] & over forty yoga & clinical articles & chapters & was interviewed by the Science Editor for The New York Times on kundalini-tantra. His academia.com articles are commonly in the top 5% of 23million. He was chantmaster with San Francisco band, Axis Mundi for 20yrs pioneering cave-simulating electronica for 130 Burning Man community events, leading kirtan events throughout Europe, India & the US, with numerous World Fusion recordings in the top 20 of 1000s at Soundclick He received the CIIS forty-Year Most Outstanding Alumni Award, was president of the Association for Transpersonal Psychology for 20years; Lead Inaugural Panelist, 13th International Vedanta Conference, Co-convener with Robert Thurman of the Indic Wisdom Roundtable, Columbia University; Advisor for Georg Feuerstein’s Yoga Research Institute & for the Johns-Hopkins University Psilocybin Study; Teacher of Teachers for Helen Palmer’s Enneagram Institute. In 2020, he will lead Bhakti retreats in Brazil, Romania, Moldovia, Spain, Estonia and Italy . https://princeton.academia.edu/StuartSovatsky
JOHN G PELEUSES
John has more than 50 years of experience in the healthcare sector. This vast experience includes direct patient care as a licensed respiratory therapist, management of hospital operations including department director, vice president of operations, and chief executive officer.
John has also provided consulting services for healthcare organizations throughout the Western United States. As an independent consultant, he works with these organizations in providing assessment and solutions for improvement of operations, reimbursement, and patient care. He has provided assistance and oversite for re-opening of hospitals including licensing with State of California Department of Public Health, accreditation with The Joint Commission (TJC), Healthcare Facilities Accreditation Program (HFAP), The Center for Improvement in Healthcare Quality (CIHQ), and DNV GL Healthcare.
A resident of Costa Mesa California for nearly 40 years, John is married with three children and enjoys all beach activities with a passion for scuba diving. Having served on the medical staff at the Indianapolis 500 for 30+ years – he also enjoys racing and fast cars!
Johanna Greeson, PhD, MSS, MLSP, is an Associate Professor at the School of Social Policy & Practice at the University of Pennsylvania. She is also the Managing Faculty Director at the Field Center for Children’s Policy, Practice, & Research. She is passionate about reforming the child welfare system, using research to build better
futures for youth who age out of foster care, and realizing the power of connections to
caring adults for all vulnerable youth. Her research agenda is resiliency-focused and
based in the strengths and virtues that enable foster youth to not only survive but thrive.
Dr. Greeson’s published work includes scholarly articles on natural mentoring, evidence-based practices for older youth in foster care, including independent living programming, residential group care, and intensive in-home therapy, low-income homeownership, child/adolescent traumatic stress, and domestic minor sex trafficking. Her work has been cited over 3,000 times in the scientific, peer-reviewed literature. She is also the developer of Caring Adults ‘R’ Everywhere (C.A.R.E.), a novel, trauma-informed
natural mentoring intervention for older youth in foster care, intended to heal the aging out crisis. Her TEDx Talk about how to heal the aging out crisis has been viewed nearly 100,000 times. Dr. Greeson received her PhD in social work from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in 2009.
Johanna Greeson, Ph.d., mss, mlsp
Keith Garde
Familiar with the terrain, not just the map, in challenging, evolving environments, Keith thrives when working with entrepreneurs, teams and emerging technologies and their applications. His unique and powerful understanding of organizational and individual dynamics, marketing, creativity and resourcefulness have led to the discovery, creation and rejuvenation of successful entities, markets and global brands.
From creating businesses that provide opportunities to visual artists, to co-managing rock superstars Aerosmith, developing their global brand, cutting-edge digital presence and online community, Keith has put his talents to use to drive omnichannel commerce and maximize customer engagement and experience. Through PKA Management, Keith continues to innovate to advance the reach, impact and earnings of celebrity clients. He has brought his leadership and experience to hundreds of students as a lecturer at NYU, MIT-Sloan, and Berklee College of Music, and through his service to the community, serving on boards of numerous organizations promoting the arts and substance-abuse recovery.
Skills include: Complex project leadership | Strategy | Entrepreneurship | Market Making | Market Identification | Organizational Behavior | Change Management | Negotiation | Consulting | eCommerce and multichannel marketing | Public Speaking and Education | Business and partnership development | Creative Partnerships | Client Management | Customer Engagement | Online Community Building | Digital Marketing | Videography and production | Merchandising and Licensing | Media Relations | Resource Management | Operations Management
Examples of past collaboration partners include: Aerosmith | Sony | Disney | Paramount Pictures | Viacom (VH1, MTV, CBS TV) | NBC TV | ABC TV | Oprah Winfrey | Clear Channel | Procter & Gamble | Clear Channel | Live Nation | Daimler-Chrysler | NFL | MLB | ESPN | Apple | iTunes | Amazon | Make-a-Wish Foundation | William Morris Agency | CNN | Harper Collins | AP | Reuters | CAA | Stand Up 2 Cancer | EMI Publishing | ITB | Activision | GTECH
Michelle Esrick
Michelle Esrick is an award-winning filmmaker, poet and social activist. Her most recent film, Cracked Up, The Darrell Hammond Story had its theatrical premiere in September 2019 and was released on Netflix May 1st, 2020.
In Cracked Up, we witness the impact that childhood trauma can have across a lifetime through the incredibly courageous and candid personal story of comedian, actor and Saturday Night Live legend Darrell Hammond. With her unyielding commitment to not just raising awareness but to the actual implementation of trauma-informed care, Esrick, along with Darrell Hammond, made her way to the nation’s Capital where they screened Cracked Up for members of both the Senate and the House of Representatives. Following the showing, in discussion with the legislators and their staff, Esrick and Hammond reinforced the compelling statement made by the film that childhood trauma is a root cause of addiction - particularly relevant in addressing the enormity of the opioid crisis.
Esrick is proud to have played a role in the adding of nine provisions for trauma-informed care to the ‘Support for Patients and Communities Act’ which was signed into Law on October 24, 2018.
Esrick directed and produced The Wavy Gravy Movie: Saint Misbehavin’ - Executive produced by the late legendary, Academy-Award winning filmmaker, D. A. Pennebaker.
Esrick Executive Produced the Netflix Original film, Ram Dass, Going Home, featuring spiritual teacher and best-selling author Ram Dass who reflects on love, life and dying. Widely acclaimed, the film was short-listed for a 2017 Academy Award.
In May 2020, Esrick created a new virtual series with Darrell Hammond called Cracked Up, The Evolving Conversation which candidly explores through intimate conversations the many different aspects of childhood trauma and its long term effects as well as how we recover ourselves, help others and change systems to better serve our communities. Special guests have included Dr. Bessel van der Kolk, Jane Fonda and Dr. Gabor Mate’.
Chaplain Sondos Kholaki
Chaplain Sondos Kholaki serves as a hospital staff chaplain and a community chaplain in Southern California and is an AMCLI fellow. She is a board-certified chaplain with the Association of Professional Chaplains (APC). Sondos earned a Master of Divinity degree in Islamic Chaplaincy from Bayan Islamic Graduate School/Claremont School of Theology and a Bachelor of Arts in English and Creative Writing from UCLA as a Regents Scholar. Sondos completed five units of Clinical Pastoral Education (CPE) residency where she served care seekers of all faiths and educated staff and volunteers on Muslim spiritual care. Sondos is the author of Musings of a Muslim Chaplain ( 2020) and the co-editor of Mantle of Mercy: Islamic Chaplaincy in North America ( 2021). She also serves as Vice President of Healthcare for the Association of Muslim Chaplains (AMC). Sondos enjoys sipping a perfectly brewed cup of coffee, listening to Quran recitation by Turkish reciters and singing her heart out at spiritual gatherings. She is married and has two children.
Matt Rich
A graduate of the Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Matt Rich was the distinguished Henry Cabot Lodge Fellow in his 2nd year there. Soon after he was tapped by then US Ambassador Jeane J. Kirkpatrick to assist with speech writing as America’s 1st female UN representative. Rich formed his boutique company PlanetPR now approaching its 35th year. It is a widely respected representative with a roster of Political, Corporate, Non-Profits and Entertainment clients.
Rich sits on several advisory boards and private family funds. He has been a lifelong avid horseman. For generations his family seat has been Boston, Massachusetts where his paternal ancestor founded Boston University. Rich is the son of a US Air Force military officer and thusly had 15 home in the 16 years. He lived with his family in this itinerant military style before being accepted to university. Currently Rich continues as Founding CEO of PlanetPR.