POLLINATE! 2021 COHORT

Alexx caceres

Alexx (they/them) is a Queer Non-Binary warrior raised in East New York Brooklyn. Alexx has indigenous roots in Mesoamerica and is learning more about their Ancestors through farming and working with herbs.

Alexx's involvement in food justice came from the disparity within the ENY community regarding food access and food apartheid. They volunteer and learn with East New York Farms and Hattie Carthan Community Markets to continue to fight systematic oppression in Black and Brown communities.

shyanne rayne

My name is Shyanne Rayne Washington. I’m a Black queer feminine woman from the SOUTH BRONX. I’m soft and vunerable to the interconnected life force that connects all living things. I’m grounded in good faith and my heart that is a servant to divine will. I’m motivated by the breath, laughs and cries of my ancestors and all who inhabit this land. I’m committed to the practice of cultivating community care, trust and service. I am a steward of land, people and love. I’m in a constant state of knowing, feeling, singing, flowing, moving, dancing, laughing and loving. I am my ancestors’ wildest dreams. And I have unwavering faith in the universal truth of abundance, space, and grace for all that is. My wildest dreams are to feed the revolution and help envision, plan and execute a future of care, safety, joy and essential non-negotiable needs for all living things.

amanda everich

Amanda (they/them) is a queer and nonbinary seed of African and Ukrainian diasporas, teaching artist, facilitator, play advocate, radical mapmaker, collaborator and farmer-in-forever-training from the Bronx, New York - unceded Wappinger Munsee Lenape land. Their passion for farming, food sovereignty and land stewardship was seeded as a child digging for worms in the soil, the revolutionary work, love and guidance of Indigenous land stewards in Lares, Puerto Rico and Mauna Kea, Hawaii, the community gardens of NYC and most recently, Black and Brown focused land and food projects of the south and in upstate NY, all doing the damn thang.

carena miles

Carena Miles (she/her) is a Black queer farmer and educator that would describe herself as a quiet old soul with a subtle Leo ego. From Fredericksburg, Virginia, her dedication to land stewardship and food sovereignty grew from time spent outdoors roaming her grandparents’ rural farm land. The great granddaughter of a Black sharecropper, Carena lends a valuable knowledge of the historic inequity, survival, and joy amid Black farmers and growers. She has a M.A in Food Studies from NYU, a B.S. in biology from Hampton University and a Farm School NYC alum.