Sr. Director of Communications, Digital and Content - Nesima Aberra

Nesima Aberra is a writer and digital strategist dedicated to working at the intersection of media and social impact. She joined Change Consulting in August 2020 as a Senior Communications Manager, specializing in digital media. Previously, Nesima worked as an audience engagement editor at The Atlantic and the Center for Public Integrity. Her articles have been published in outlets such as The Atlantic, Vox.com, Everyday Feminism and the Christian Science Monitor. She got her start in nonprofit communications at Mission Asset Fund in San Francisco as a New Sector Fellow.

A creative writer at heart, Nesima is an alum of workshops with VONA (Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation), THREAD at Yale, Catapult, and The Power of Diverse Voices: Poynter Minority Writers Workshop.

Nesima has a master’s degree in International Media from American University in D.C. and bachelor’s degrees in Journalism and Global Studies from Arizona State University. Connect with her on Twitter at @NesimaAberra.

Senior Communications Manager, Digital Strategist - Kiah Albritton

Kiah is a digital strategist with a deep love for and belief in the power of storytelling. She has been “chronically online” since joining Tumblr as a teenager, and she’s passionate about wielding digital media as a strategic tool in our fight for liberation.

She joined Change Consulting in April 2023 as a Senior Communications Manager specializing in digital media. Previously, Kiah worked at the Human Rights Campaign, leading digital content to amplify HRC’s state political work amid the ongoing legislative assaults against LGBTQ+ people. She began her career in digital communications at The Education Trust in Tennessee where she honed her skills in distilling complex education policy down into 280 characters or less to connect with state advocates and changemakers.

She is a product of excellent public education institutions and holds a master’s degree in Higher Education from Florida State University and a bachelor’s degree in Public Relations from the University of Tennessee, Knoxville. Kiah currently lives in Washington, DC, but is a proud Southerner with deep roots in Tennessee.

Vice President of Media Relations - Ahuatl Amaro

Ahuatl Amaro (he, him, his) is a media relations and government affairs professional with over fifteen years of experience developing and leading strategic marketing communications campaigns for nonprofits. He has worked on over 100 pieces of legislation on workers’ rights, reproductive health, affordable healthcare, immigration reform, criminal justice reform, environmental justice, racial justice, and LGBTQ+ equality.

He has trained doctors, lawyers, scientists, engineers, professors, military officers, and activists on how to effectively share their stories during interviews with CBS Nightly News, MSNBC, the New York Times, USA Today, BusinessWeek, Le Monde (France), El Universal (Mexico), the Economist and The Guardian (UK), and others.

His editorials have been published in the Los Angeles Times, the Dallas Morning News, the San Diego Union – Tribune, the Fresno Bee, the San Jose Mercury News, The Advocate, the Huffington Post, La Opinion, El Diario (New York), among others. He has served as a spokesperson for several social justice campaigns and has been interviewed by ABC, PBS, CNN, NPR, Univision, Telemundo, the Washington Post, the Miami Herald, and more.

He has served on the board of LGBTQ+ community nonprofits, has raised thousands of dollars for HIV/AIDS clinics, and has campaigned to elect progressive women to public office. He earned his Bachelor of Arts in English from Georgetown University. He enjoys playing soccer, participating in outdoor recreational sports, and writing creatively in his spare time.

Sr. Communications Manager - Engagement, Content - Nicole Carroll

Nicole has a knack for helping organizations increase their impact and reach their organizational goals. Her previous communications, advocacy, and media outreach work has helped her clients push for social change, garner awareness of injustices, and engage with their communities.

As a former consultant, Nicole helped clients reach target audiences by developing messaging, crafting strategic communications plans, launching social media campaigns, and drafting media relations materials. 

Nicole previously worked with Compass Family Services, where she advocated for affordable housing opportunities for homeless families living in San Francisco. In her work there, she informed community members about the growing housing inequality in the Bay Area and pushed for policies that positively impacted those most affected by San Francisco’s housing crisis.

In her roles with public relations agencies, Nicole supported clients such as the National Institutes of Health and the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. Through advocacy and storytelling, her work helped to increase public health awareness and promote policies that improved educational opportunities for girls and students of color. 

Nicole graduated from the University of Maryland with a bachelor’s degree in Public Relations and received her master’s in International Affairs from The New School. After living in the District of Columbia, New York City, and San Francisco, she has finally decided to call Atlanta home. In her free time, Nicole enjoys spending time with her family, jogging, and leading her book club, which focuses primarily on novels written by women of color.

Sr. Communications Manager - Strategy - Mariah Cochran

Mariah (she/her) is a writer, communications strategist, and visual artist committed to writing and imagining realities that speak joy and liberation into existence. Her work rests on the foundational belief that words matter, and the words we choose to describe our realities can either reinforce harmful systems or dismantle them.

Mariah has over 6 years of experience developing communications strategies and message platforms that center the voices and experiences of Black people and people of color in education and health policy spaces. She has a passion for strengthening the brand identity, core messaging, and digital voice of community-based organizations and initiatives.

Before joining Change Consulting, Mariah worked with the Education Trust–West, leading communications strategies and digital advocacy efforts that helped win local and statewide policy change. Mariah cultivated her passion for storytelling and advocacy communications during her time as a youth program coordinator, working alongside high school students to create multimedia social marketing campaigns about inequities in their communities.

Mariah is an MFA candidate in Social and Environmental Arts Practice at Prescott College, focusing her studies on clothing as a visual language and the relationship between textiles, memory, and the racialized body. She received her BA in American Studies from UC Berkeley.

Director of Operations - Layla Crater

Layla Crater joined Change Consulting, LLC, as a Communications Coordinator in August 2016, helping drive PR and media relations for changemakers. Previously, she served as Account Executive and Showroom Manager for a boutique PR agency in San Francisco, managing media relations and providing operational support for some of the Bay Area’s most beloved brands, such as Blue Bottle Coffee and Timbuk2. She first discovered her passion for working for social change and nonprofit communications while working in documentary film production as a Production Manager for a PBS Frontline Film, “END GAME: AIDS in Black America.”

Layla holds a BA from UC Davis in Communications with an emphasis in American Studies. Layla has lived in Oakland since 2011 and is dedicated to serving her community.

Communications Director - Strategy - Kay Cuajunco

Kay Cuajunco is passionate about amplifying stories that center resilience and self-determination. With more than a decade of experience as an organizer, filmmaker, and communications strategist, she joined Change Consulting in 2022 as Communications Director specializing in narrative strategy, brand and messaging development, coaching and training.

Kay has worked with frontline organizers and statewide alliances across movements for racial, economic, educational, and environmental justice. As the Senior Narrative Strategist at Power California, she advanced narratives about the leadership of young people of color flexing their power from the streets to the ballot box on issues from affordable housing to police free schools. Prior to that, she was Communications Manager at the California Environmental Justice Alliance where she uplifted the voices of communities of color to win groundbreaking state policies for climate justice and supported local organizing to transform toxic hotspots into healthy neighborhoods. She first cut her teeth as an organizer for food justice and farmworker rights, reclaiming her connection to land as a granddaughter of rice farmers in the Philippines.

Kay holds a Bachelor’s in Political Science from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and an interdisciplinary Master’s from San Francisco State University. Her films have screened nationally at the Queer Women of Color Film Festival, Seattle Asian American Film Festival, San Francisco Green Film Festival, and the Allied Media Conference in Detroit. She finds joy swimming, surfing, skating or riding her bike all over Oakland.

Communications Director - Engagement, Earned Media - Kyung Jin Lee

Kyung Jin Lee is a veteran community and cultural movement builder, journalist, and communications professional. She returns to Change Consulting after a tenure in-house with Impact Justice, where she ran its communications department. 

Kyung Jin spent more than a decade advocating for Asian and Korean American immigrants in the United States, peace and reunification in Korea, and building national and international solidarity. She then received a master’s degree in journalism from the Medill School of Journalism at Northwestern University so she could further amplify the stories of her communities. Her stories aired on public radio outlets and programs including NPR, The World, KQED News, and KALW News.

She has since turned her focus back to supporting movement leaders and their organizations working towards racial and social justice through strategic communications.

Sr. Director of Communications, Earned Media - Alexis Meisels

Alexis brings unstoppable passion, curiosity and creativity to collaborations that restore justice and health to our people and our planet. She’s a dogged news-hound and media strategist, introducing transformational ideas, organizations, and leaders to the world’s most visible and passionate journalists.

She contributed to the launch and exposure of Liberation in a Generation, Wildfires to Wildflowers, and the Center for Artistic Activism’s Unstoppable Voter Project, and has overseen media campaigns with the Ella Baker Center for Human Rights, the UC Berkeley Labor Center and the Climate Defense Project. In her first two months at Change Consulting, she delivered repeat segments on MSNBC’s American Voices for the Black Girl Freedom Fund, helped launch the California Black Freedom Fund in the Associated Press, and secured feature coverage in SF Chronicle for Akonadi Foundation’s Creatives in Place listening project.

Alexis draws on fifteen years of prior cross-sector experience, communicating on behalf of urban planners, experiential theaters and artists, as well as digital security and privacy experts. Alexis is also an active Alumni member of Bay Area Resource Generation, where she organizes people with wealth to divest and redistribute their inheritance and access to power to low-income, working-class, and Black, Indigenous and people of color-led social justice movements. She lives in the Richmond District in San Francisco, where she dyes and sews her colorful wardrobe.

CEO - Bilen Mesfin Packwood

With 15 years of experience in media and communications, Bilen Mesfin Packwood is the founder and principal of Change Consulting, LLC. She has established a reputation as a trusted strategic communicator and advisor to some of Northern California’s leading changemakers.

Prior to founding Change Consulting, Bilen advanced communications efforts for then San Francisco District Attorney Kamala D. Harris. While there, she created and implemented strategies to roll out the District Attorney’s key initiatives, such as truancy and reentry; led outreach to local, statewide and national multicultural media; helped manage crisis communications issues as they arose; and served as the Office’s day to-day print and on-camera spokesperson.

As a journalist, Bilen has written for the Associated Press, the Nashville Tennessean, Edutopia and Art & Antiques, among other publications. She has a Master’s in Journalism from the University of California, Berkeley, and a BA in English from Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee. Connect with Bilen on twitter: @bmesfin.

Vice President of Communications - Engagement - Stephanie Ong

As Change Consulting’s first Vice President of Communications, Stephanie Ong will lead the content, digital and earned media teams.

Stephanie is a communications professional with over 20 years of experience leading strategy for nonprofit organizations, electoral campaigns, and government agencies. She has a breadth of work on issue areas including education equity, tech policy, criminal justice, immigration reform, children and family focused policy, and healing and trauma informed practices.

Stephanie has served as Director of Communications for The Education Trust-West, Common Sense Media, Californians for Safety and Justice, Center for Youth Wellness, and for San Francisco District Attorney George Gascón. She was also a pioneering co-founder and principal of a political consulting and public relations firm where she ran candidate, issue driven, and media campaigns that focused on the needs of children, families, and communities of color. In these leadership positions, Stephanie drove messaging and communications strategy, oftentimes building a communications infrastructure from the ground up. She thrives on harnessing the power of storytelling to shape the narrative on complex issues.

Originally from the Philippines, Stephanie immigrated to the United States when she was nine years old. She received a Bachelor of Arts in English and a minor in Asian American Studies from San Francisco State University. She lives in Oakland with her partner and seven-year-old son, who is a second grader at Oakland Unified School District. @Stephongtweets

Communications Director - Strategy - Dina Sigal

Dina comes from a long line of storytellers, movers in their own right, and those that lean in to their curiosity. Her passion for advancing racial and social justice derives from being a first generation immigrant and experiencing firsthand the inequities that millions more continue to be forced to navigate through. She is committed to using the power of research, narrative, and stories to drive action and create change within those systems.