We have new board members! Over the summer, our board of directors voted on three new at-large members. Then, at our Leadership Conference earlier this month, our members voted on our newest member representative to the Equality Federation and Equality Federation Institute Board of Directors.
These incredible leaders will help to expand the board’s reach in order to better equip the Equality Federation and the Equality Federation Institute to partner with the state-based movement. Get to know our newest board members!
At-Large Board Members
Katie Keith (she/her) is a principal at Keith Policy Solutions, LLC, a boutique consulting firm where she advises nonprofit and foundation clients on ways to secure state and federal health care priorities. Her work includes an emphasis on the Affordable Care Act and its impact on underserved populations, such as the LGBTQ community. Katie also maintains a part-time appointment at Georgetown University’s Center on Health Insurance Reforms, teaches courses at Georgetown University Law Center on the Affordable Care Act and LGBT Health Law and Policy, and provides “Following the ACA” rapid response analysis for the Health Affairs Blog. She is a proud co-founder and steering committee member of Out2Enroll, a national initiative to connect LGBTQ people with health insurance, and an appointed consumer representative to the National Association of Insurance Commissioners. Katie previously served as a Peace Corps volunteer in Ghana in West Africa and ran an AmeriCorps program in Nevada. She received her law degree from the Georgetown University Law Center and holds a Master’s in Public Health from Johns Hopkins University.
Rebecca Gorena (she/ella) is the Senior Program Director at the Alliance for Youth Action. Rebecca first started organizing in various social justice movements ten years ago after receiving her B.A. in Rhetoric & Writing and Government from the University of Texas at Austin. Rebecca comes from the Reproductive Justice movement where she found her passion building programs that incorporate traditional voter engagement tactics into non-traditional issue-based campaigns. After serving as the Field Director at URGE: Unite for Reproductive and Gender Equity for a number of years, she currently works to build capacity and support youth-focused grassroots organizations across the country that focus on progressive issues and democracy expansion work. She currently lives in Austin, Texas with her dachshund, Poboy.
Shea Waldron (they/them) is VP of Client Success at Hustle, where they work to support movements through technology. An Equality California staff alum, Shea has focused on mobilizing resources and implementing innovative tech solutions for gender justice and LGBTQI+ rights organizations on five continents for over a decade. As part of the Women Win team, they launched the International Guide to Designing Sport Programs for Girls, an open-source, wiki-style knowledge sharing platform. They are a White House LGBTQ Tech and Innovation Fellow and co-author of FRIDA Fund’s Resource Mobilization Toolkit for Girls, Young Women and Trans Youth. Shea played NCAA basketball, holds a BA in Politics from Whitman College, and is an alum of the THNK School of Creative Leadership.
Member Representative
Abbi Swatsworth (she/her) is the Executive Director of OutNebraska – a statewide education and advocacy organization that is working to celebrate and empower thriving LGBTQIA+ communities throughout the Cornhusker state. Abbi holds a BSW from University of Nebraska – Omaha; graduating Magna Cum Laude. She has more than 20 years of nonprofit experience working in domestic/sexual violence, reproductive rights, and mental health. She has an equally long history of grassroots work for LGBTQIA+ liberation. In addition to leading OutNebraska, Abbi is a member of Rotary, serves with the Lincoln Mayor’s Commission on Women and Gender, and the advisory board of the Lincoln/Lancaster Women’s Foundation and Omaha’s Huespring.
We’re thrilled to invite these leaders to be additions to the Equality Federation Board!
