Another year around the sun

Dear colleagues and friends,

2017 has been another momentous year for the Avarna Group. We want to thank you for continuing to support us, inspire us, and serve as champions for a more socially and environmentally just world.

Here’s our year in numbers:

• 101 days of travel
• 32 places
• 55 partners since we launched: 35 new partners this year
• 2 new Avarna team members (José González and Katie Koga)
• Support of 2 identity-specific summits (PGM ONE & the LGBTQ Outdoor Summit)

This summer, we welcomed Katie Koga who joins our team as Director of Operations. For the past eight years, Katie has worked in numerous multi-faceted roles with non-profits, programs, and community groups working in the areas of fair housing, service-learning, girls’ empowerment, racial justice, and coalition building. She is an experienced facilitator and coordinator and specializes in operational administration. We are thrilled to have Katie contribute her strong organizational and systems-thinking skills to support our work.

Like 2016, this year we traveled this continent to facilitate workshops, make presentations, attend board meetings, meet with partners, and continue to grow our network. This December we thought we would do something a little different to celebrate the passage of another year of our business. We want to honor the indigenous peoples on whose lands and waters we have traveled: the Abenaki / Abénaquis, Ahwanechee, Anishinabek, Central Sierra Miwok, Cheyenne, Chinook, Chochenyo, Chumash, Coastal Miwok, Coastal Salish, Duwamish, Eastern Shoshone, Haudenosaunee (Iroquois), Kalapuya, Kaw (Kansa),Ktunaxa, Lenape Lummi, Massa-adchu-es-et, Miami, Nipmuck, Nlaka’pamux, Northern Arapaho, Northern Paiute, Odawa, Osage Patwin,Pend d’Oreille, Pequot Mohegan, Potawatomi, Pueblo people, Ramaytush, Siuslaw, Skwxwú7mesh, Úxwumixw, Southern Sierra Miwok, Sto:lo Nation, Tsleil-Waututh, Ute, Ventureño, Wabanaki Confederacy, Wampanoag, Washoe, Wiyot, W̱SÁNEĆ, xʷməθkʷəy̓əm, and Yavapai people.

The places we have had the privilege of visiting would not be so beautiful had they not been and continued to be taken care of by indigenous peoples. To honor those whose lands we have traveled through, we’ve mapped out all the places we’ve been based on the peoples of these areas rather than Western place names.

Thanks to the creators of and contributors to https://native-land.ca/ for putting together an amazing map of indigenous peoples, languages, and treaties of North America, which we used as our resource for putting our map together.

Celebrating 2018 with you!