Staff

Corrine Oqua Pi Povi Sanchez, PhD, of San Ildefonso Pueblo is Tewa Women United’s Executive Director. She holds a doctorate in Justice Studies from Arizona State University.

Dr. Sanchez has contributed to building Indigenous Knowledge through her work with Tewa Women United for the past 30 years, including co-creation of TWU’s research methodology and the Theory of Opide, a braiding of practice to action. She has extensive training and experience in the fields of sexual assault prevention, educational awareness, advocacy, and trauma informed care. Dr. Sanchez has presented at many national conferences on Sexual Assault in Indian Country, Advocacy Needs of Native Sexual Assault Survivors, Forensic Interviewing of Native Children, and Child Witness to Violence.

Dr. Sanchez currently serves on the National Sexual Violence Resource Center’s Advisory Council and is a Board member of the Attach Your Heart Foundation. Most recently, she has been selected to serve on the Governor of New Mexico’s Advisory Council on Racial Justice.

Nathana Bird, M.A., is from Ohkay Owingeh and Kewa Pueblo, a life-partner to Ray Naranjo (a talented chef) and a mother of four. She enjoys taking care of her plants, spending time with family, road trips, and organizing.

Nathana first became involved with Tewa Women United as a board member in 2007. In 2014, she transitioned onto staff as the Coordinator of the A’Gin Healthy Sexuality & Body Sovereignty Project, and became the organization’s Associate Director in 2019.

Nathana began organizing in Northern New Mexico and regionally through various youth organizations and continued on this path for many years, focusing primarily on environmental justice issues and education. Her educational background includes an MA in Language, Literacy & Socio-Cultural Studies with a concentration in American Indian Education, and a BA in Integrated Studies in Psychology.

Nathana is passionate about continually connecting back to the teachings of her people and to embody the wisdom that has been passed down to her from the mothers and grandmothers in her life.

Email: nathana@tewawomenunited.org

Bernadette is an enrolled and active member of the Pueblo of Nambé and has resided there her entire life along with her daughter, Hayle Trujillo. Her work with Tewa Women United began in March of 2012 and she is pleased to be part of an organization committed to the well-being of women. She has completed many credit hours of study in accounting at Northern New Mexico College. Bernadette has fifteen years of finance experience working for Accounting Departments at Eight Northern Indian Pueblo Councils, Inc., and Nambé and Pojoaque Pueblos. In addition to her current work with Tewa Women United, she serves the Pueblo of Nambé as the Tribal Enrollment and Social Services Coordinator (2013-Present) and completed two consecutive terms (2012-2019) as a Board Member for the Nambé Pueblo Housing Entity. Her dedication to making the world a better place is evidenced in the depth of her service to community.

Email: bernadette@tewawomenunited.org
Main Office: 505-747-3259 x1205
Direct Line: 505-210-8143

Talavi Cook (she/hers) originally from Ohkay Owingeh Pueblo, Hopi, and Dine, joined the Tewa Women United staff in March of 2022 as the Environmental Health & Justice Program Manager. She is a former student of Fort Lewis College and obtained a B.S in Environmental Biology in 2016. Talavi was introduced to Tewa Women United in 2018 to collaborate and host an environmental workshop while working closely with Santa Clara Forestry as the Reserved Treaty Rights Lands Program Coordinator. During her time working at Santa Clara Pueblo, she also became the only women wildland firefighter among a crew of 30 plus men. In 2020, she then completed a M.S in Tropical Conservation Biology and Environmental Science from the University of Hawai’i at Hilo. She continues to hold passion for forestry, firefighting, natural resources, and conservation, and is committed to helping her communities to ensure the land and the people are healthy and resilient. On her off time, you can find her looking at plants, doing art, or adventuring in the desert.

Email: talavi@tewawomenunited.org
Phone: 505-210-8142
505-747-3259  ext 1204

Kayleigh Warren (she/her) is Tewa and Tiwa from the Pueblos of Santa Clara and Isleta. She was raised in the traditional Pueblo farming lifeway in Santa Clara Pueblo. From her land-based upbringing as well as through community and professional mentorship, she has focused on becoming an advocate for ancestral lands protection and the preservation of Pueblo land-based lifeways, especially farming and ethnobotanical traditions. She has worked in native plants preservation, monitoring and cultivating threatened and endangered plant species in western Oregon and southern New Mexico, and in supporting Indigenous food sovereignty initiatives in communities across the country. Her undergraduate studies are focused on botany and ecology. Outside of the office, Kayleigh spends her time preparing and promoting traditional foods, seedkeeping, tending her family’s fields and gardens in Santa Clara Pueblo, and continually learning about and loving on the flora of her homelands.

Email: kayleigh@tewawomenunited.org
Phone: 505-210-8146
505-747-3259 ext 1203

Ms. Carmella Quam is a member of the Pueblo of Zuni, and mother to two adult children and grandmother to a 12-year-old granddaughter. She loves and enjoys spending time with her family, they fill her heart with love and youthfulness. Carmella is passionate about farming, seed saving and learning about new and old farming methods. She enjoys living life, the outdoors, camping and traveling, and loves cooking for family and friends.

Carmella holds a bachelors degree in social work from New Mexico Highlands University with a focus on Community Organizing, Program Development and Management. She has experience in collaboration and partnership building within Native communities and organizations. Prior to joining the TWU staff, Carmella was part of The Leadership Institute and Student Wellness Department at the Santa Fe Indian School for a decade. Her highlighted contributions are the programming of the New Mexico Summer Youth Tribal Employment which provided paid internships opportunities for Native high school and college students and young parents. She was part of implementing the Farm to School program to create educational programming on food sovereignty for the school community.

Email: carmella@tewawomenunited.org
Direct Line: 505-210-8140
Main Office: 505-747-3259 x1202

Diana is from Santa Clara Pueblo, a US Navy veteran, and mother. She is certified as an Infant Massage Instructor, Indigenous Breastfeeding Counselor, Technology of Participation facilitator, Care for Kids instructor, and International Center for Traditional Childbearing Doula. Diana is experienced in community outreach and collaboration, and completed a 40-hour course in Advocacy Training and Skills/Organizing for Healthy Native Communities. She is also trained in topics of Toxic Stress, Adverse Childhood Experiences and Brain Development, Shaken Baby Syndrome, and Pregnant Survivors of Childhood Sexual Abuse. She received doula assistance from the Yiya Vi Kagingdi Doula project and decided to become a Doula to give back that same help to other mothers and families.

Email: diana@tewawomenunited.org
Main Office: 505-747-3259 x1206
Direct Line: 505-210-8144

Pilar Trujillo, Indigenous Women’s Health Events and Training Coordinator, is a land-based Chicana who was born and raised in Española and now lives on ancestral farmland in Chimayo. An acequia farmer at heart, Pilar is passionate about traditional and regenerative agriculture, natural healing modalities, and making herbal remedios for her family and community. She is a strong believer in the beautiful possibilities to heal generational trauma through caretaking of the land, water, and seeds. Pilar graduated with a B.A. in Environmental Studies through Prescott College in 2007, and worked for 10 years in the acequia community as an advocate and project coordinator. Pilar joined TWU as staff in 2019, and is very grateful to have the opportunity to deepen her life skills and knowledge of traditional birthing practices through coordination of the YVK doula training. She is the mother of a beautiful home-birthed daughter and a proud recipient of YVK Doula Services for her homebirth. Pilar happily volunteers her energy for two local organizations in Chimayo: Barrios Unidos for the development of a community remedios project for families suffering with grief, pain and substance use disorder; and the Chimayo Museum for implementation of cultural programming for youth and the community. Tewa Women United is now a partner in the remedios project as it expands.

Email: pilar@tewawomenunited.org
Main Office: 505-747-3259 x1207
Direct Line: 505-210-8145

Heaven is Korean American and moved to New Mexico in 2002 from southern California. What was originally meant to be a temporary stay became permanent when Heaven fell in love with the singular beauty of New Mexico. Heaven has a diverse background from early childhood development to community organizing in partnership with the local Indigenous communities in Gallup, NM. Heaven’s personal journey navigating the reproductive healthcare system has given her an understanding of the difficulties people in marginalized communities face; particularly Black, Indigenous, and other people of color, members of the LGBTQIA+ community, the youth, immigrants, and people with disabilities due to economic, social, gender, and racial inequalities. She has a passion for reproductive justice work so that one day people in these communities will have full autonomy and access to unbiased resources to make well-informed healthy decisions about their bodies in all areas of their lives.

Libby is originally from Albuquerque, NM (occupied Pueblo, Tiwa, and Manso territory) and has had the privilege to weave her life all over the SouthWest and seeks to support the web of relationships that hold her and her values. She recognizes the violent history and context from which she comes and seeks to utilize the power of that truth to construct something better. She is a lifelong learner and is wildly excited to get to listen to the people, landscape and communities of Northern, NM as she has before as a wildland firefighter in Taos and Rio Arriba counties. She’s in love with water and the desert and the delicate dance they do. She has organized and educated around issues of sexual violence, land defense, water protection, anti-racism, police/ border abolition and serves as an abortion doula. She looks to leadership that identifies the root and recognizes the tangled nature of it all to find sustainable solutions.  She is inspired by non-hierarchical collaboration and aims to live in joy and love in that pursuit. She has begun a love affair with strapping skates to her feet and asking others to give her a shove (it is a nice outlet in a world that summons many heavy feelings). She can also be found in a kitchen distilling or baking something experimental or outside testing how lost she can get. If you’re unfortunate enough, you may even hear a poem she crafted in the wee hours of the morning. She is grateful for most things: simple and complex and hopes you feel that gratitude.

Email: libby@tewawomenunited.org 
Main Office: 505-747-3259 x1207
Direct Line: 505-210-8144

Elder Kathy, a fluent Tewa language speaker, is a native spirit-rooted social activist, community educator, and traditional black ware potter from San Ildefonso Pueblo, New Mexico. She is inspirational in doing presentations, trainings, and program development in her many roles for Tewa Women United for more than twenty years. Her work includes developing transformative tools such as the “Two-World Harmony, Butterfly Model” and “Trauma Healing Rocks” which address integrative wisdom of healing colonial trauma of mind, body, heart and spirit all from Native women’s lived perspectives.

Email: kathy@tewawomenunited.org
Main Office: 505-747-3259 x1203
Direct Line: 505-210-8141

My name is Alex Rose Gutierrez Jaramillo I am 26 years old and a mother.

One of the most humanistic acts we can do is to willingly take part in nurturing committed relationships with others. Relations with others offers insight for individual and collective growth. The reciprocal sacredness of life is shown through the interactions of relationships human and non-human. I have learned through my process that we need to feel safe enough in order to stop running and fighting and begin healing.

Non-duality unfolding into duality: creation. When we are truly present with life we are content not needing or asking for anything else, no longer does a thought come from the past or future, there is no need to balance or rest from people or life because we are already in homeostasis-the neutral observer and unconditional lover.

Email: alexa@tewawomenunited.org
Phone: 505-747-3259

Kevin is a member of the Pueblo of Zuni/half Salvadoran and currently residing in Tewa Territory. Outside of his role at Tewa Women United, Kevin’s a successful photographer, skateboarder, farmer, loves the outdoors/camping and spending time with loved ones!