As Local Partnership Manager, Bre’Shaun prioritizes co-leading strategic relationship expansion in disinvested communities, bridging the gap between local change makers and policy makers. Bre’Shaun has over a decade of experience in non-profit work, often aligning with both environmental conservation and workforce development. Bre’Shaun comes to the Alliance with over 5 years of experience at Cara Collective, a non profit where they fostered relationships and developed life changing opportunities for the most marginalized and vulnerable among us including individuals with barriers to an equitable life, like incarceration history, domestic violence, mental health challenges and homelessness.
At Cara, Bre’Shaun led several different initiavies including partnership development and management, strategic planning, leadership in empathy, and programmatic innovation. Starting in 2013, Bre’Shaun worked for Friends of the Forest Preserves where they dedicated their time to invasive species removal, conservation efforts and native species propagation throughout countless Forest Preserves in Cook, Will & DuPage county. Bre’Shaun also served on Student Conservation Association as a Crew Manager, developing and leading disinvested youth on Chicago’s South side and Northwest Indiana. These efforts led to The Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore advocacy and planting over 2,000 trees towards stormwater mitigation plans in marginalized communities like Hammond and Gary, Indiana.
The Great Lakes, community conservation and engagement are core to Bre’Shaun’s professional life. Personally, Bre’Shaun loves leading meditations in nature, reading a good science fiction novel, writing poetry and spending time with their cat, Pumpkin and life partner.