Who’s got your back in the fight for media justice? Who do you build with and learn from? Who supports your leadership with their own?
In our fight for a world where we’re all connected, represented and free, we’re constantly amazed by the brilliance of our people. The skills and experience that MediaJustice Network members share with each other ensure that this is a movement that’s always growing. It’s why we’re so excited to tell you about our incredible Mentors for this year’s MediaJustice Network Fellowship!
Mentors are leaders in their field who are invested in developing the leadership of a new generation of media justice advocates and organizers. MediaJustice Network Fellows will gain deep insight from our Mentors into their fight against surveillance, incarceration, racialized disinformation and much more.
Get all Fellowship details, dates, and application information here. Questions? Get in touch with us at [email protected].
Janice Gates brings several years of experience in program management and logistics as well as organizational operations, vision and strategy. As Director of the Equitable Internet Initiative (EII), she has worked with community anchor organizations to implement EII in Detroit neighborhoods, and develop strategies for sustainability, business and expansion planning, strategic partnerships, workforce development and Digital Stewards trainings.
She is committed to the EII Principles that focus on collaborative problem solving, storytelling, education, organizing, community ownership, authentic relationships, digital security, privacy and consent as well as the Detroit Digital Justice Principles that focus on access, healthy communities, participation and common ownership. Her certifications include Ubiquiti Enterprise Wireless Administration and Ubiquiti Broadband Wireless Admin.
She has presented on the Equitable Internet Initiative at the Brooklyn Public Library, Columbia University, Internet Freedom Festival, University of Michigan, Allied Media Conference, Stanford University and the Re:publica Conference. Her background is in program development and implementation, management, marketing, public relations, and communications.
Janice is also an Intuitive Energy Healer, reiki practitioner and core collaborator with Healing by Choice, a circle of women and gender non conforming people of color health and healing practitioners that offer modalities for self and community care for the reduction of racial harm in mind, body, spirit and institution.
Brandi Collins-Dexter is a former Senior Campaign Director at Color Of Change where she oversaw the media, culture, and economic justice departments. She is also a researcher at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Shorenstein Center on Media, Politics and Public Policy. As part of her work, she researches, writes, and presents on issues that are core to Black participation in democracy and the US economy, with particular focus on the role technology and information integrity play in improving or deteriorating community health.
At Color Of Change, she led a number of successful campaigns for accountability including getting Fox’s The O’Reilly Factor taken off the air; getting R. Kelly dropped from RCA; fighting for national and state net neutrality and privacy protections; pressuring financial companies to pull funding from over 100 hate groups; and persuading Disney not to Whitewash the features of their character Princess Tiana. She has testified in front of Congress on issues related to privacy and economic justice and also was one of the prominent leaders involved with persuading Facebook to undergo an unprecedented civil rights audit to address the platform’s negative impact on marginalized communities.
She came to Color Of Change from the Center for Media Justice. Before that, Brandi worked at Safer Foundation in Illinois, creating state and national recommendations on job opportunities and reentry for people leaving prison. Brandi holds a B.A. in history from Agnes Scott College, and a J.D. from University of Wisconsin-Madison Law School.
Brandi is a regular commentator in the media on racial justice. The Hill named her a 2017 “person to watch.” In 2019, she was listed in The Root 100, an annual list of the most influential African Americans, ages 25 to 45. In 2020 she received an EPIC Champion of Freedom award from the Electronic Privacy Information Center, for her work on data privacy protections. She sits on the boards for Action Center on Race and the Economy (ACRE), Public Citizen, Decode Democracy, and the American Economic Liberties Project.
Brandi is currently working on a book, tentatively titled Black Skinhead: Hope, Change and Disillusionment in Black America, and lives in Baltimore with her husband David.
Chijindu ‘Jindu’ Obiofuma is a movement researcher and attorney dedicated to writing, strategizing and convening groups around issues related to the abolition of the juvenile and broader criminal legal systems. She is a manager at the Lab’s Youth Justice Initiatives team whose work is premised on eliminating youth incarceration and divesting from carceral approaches to youth altogether.
In addition to conducting targeted research and developing key resources alongside community partners and advocates, she provides site-specific advising and support for community and system partners hoping to transform what justice means for youth in their communities.
She is committed to building accountable relationships between the academy and impacted communities, especially Black, Brown, poor, young, undocumented and otherwise marginalized folx whose expertise and leadership must be honored in the work to build community-based and -led alternatives to the juvenile carceral system.
Betty Yu is a multimedia artist, photographer, filmmaker and activist born and raised in NYC to Chinese immigrant parents. Ms. Yu integrates documentary film, new media platforms, and community-infused approaches into her practice, and she is a co-founder of Chinatown Art Brigade, a cultural collective using art to advance anti-gentrification organizing.
Ms. Yu has been awarded artist residencies and fellowships from the Laundromat Project, A Blade of Grass, International Studio & Curatorial Program, Intercultural Leadership Institute, Skidmore’s Documentary Storytellers’ Institute, Asian American Arts Alliance, En Foco, and Santa Fe Art Institute. Her work has been presented at the Brooklyn Museum, Queens Museum, Margaret Mead Film and Video Festival, Tribeca Film Festival’s Interactive Showcase, the 2019 BRIC Biennial; Old Stone House, Squeaky Wheel Film and Media Art Center and in 2018 she had a solo exhibition at Open Source Gallery in New York. In 2017 Ms. Yu won the Aronson Journalism for Social Justice Award for her film “Three Tours” about U.S. veterans returning home from war in Iraq, and their journey to overcome PTSD.
She holds a BFA from NYU’s Tisch School of the Arts, a MFA in Integrated Media Arts from Hunter College and a One-Year Certificate from International Center Photography New Media Narratives program. Ms. Yu teaches video, social practice, art and activism at Pratt Institute, John Jay College, and The New School, in addition she has over 20 years of community, media justice, and labor organizing work.
In the Fall 2020, Betty had her curatorial debut as she presented Imagining De-Gentrified Futures, an exhibition that featured artists of color, activists and others along with her own work at Apex Art in Tribeca, NYC. Betty sits on the boards of Third World Newsreel and Working Films; and on the advisory board of More Art.
Excited yet? Don’t forget to apply for the MediaJustice Network Fellowship— applications close August 12!
Let us know if you have any questions: f[email protected]
