Nikishka (she/her) is the founder and CEO of The Guild, focused on building community wealth and power through cooperative models of real estate and entrepreneurship. She has over a decade of experience in building the solidarity economy as a consultant, entrepreneur, writer and organizer. She uses a ‘systems thinking’ and emergent strategy approach across her work in finance, racial justice, equitable development, and climate action.

Nikishka believes "another world [beyond racial capitalism] is not only possible, she is on her way" (as Arundhati Roy puts it), and wrestles with that possibility throughout her work in building alternative models of capital, ownership, and governance. She is a co-host and producer of the podcast Road to Repair. Nikishka is a 2022 UC Berkeley Terner Housing Fellow, 2020 Aspen Institute Fellow, 2020 Common Future Fellow, 2018 RSF Social Finance Fellow, and was a 2016 “30 Under 30” Greenbiz leader in sustainability. As a mother to a toddler and infant, spare time is a foreign concept to Nikishka, but she is passionate about weaving the same questions around our collective liberation that she applies in her work to her parenting.

Nikishka sees the potential for high impact with the breadth of what Olamina is doing and the amount of capital it’s stewarding.

Prairie Rose (they/them) is a citizen of the Three Affiliated Tribes of North Dakota, and descendent of the Sahnish/Arikara, Northern Cheyenne, and Lakota Nations. Their work is rooted in making a positive difference for Native people through public policy, community organization, and education. Prairie Rose currently serves as the program manager for Advance Native Political Leadership Action Fund, the only national Native American-led organization working to address the vast inequities and pervasive barriers that exist for Native people to achieve a more reflective democracy in U.S. politics. They have also served on the Midwest advisory council to the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis, advising on labor, nonprofits, and tribal government, and hosted a radio show focused on community building and reconciliation efforts.

Prairie Rose believes that moving from an unjust to a just system begins with deconstructing systems of oppression, acknowledging the truth of how these systems came to be. They see our economy as one that feeds off the ills that are destroying our earth, separating people, and contributing to the racial and cultural divisions across the country.

Prairie Rose has joined the Community Advisory Board for the opportunity to do work with a group that is willing to invest in organizations that have been left out of systems, and help build their capacity. They have seen little resources going into the hardest-hit communities, and Olamina’s interest in investing in these communities gives them hope.

Cheryl (she/her) is the former Managing Director for CornerSquare Community Capital and the NC Rural Center. Her diverse knowledge in the financial sector is largely due to over two decades of experience in various roles such as president, financial accountant, and lender and underwriter for consumer, small business, and mortgage loans.

Until recently, her career path centered mostly around the banking and financial arena, where she spent the bulk of her career fighting for affordable and fair lending to the underserved communities and advocating for individuals to build and create generational wealth with credit unions. Being that policy and advocacy work are at the fabric and core of who she is, she decided to switch paths and continue championing for rural communities in a different capacity - the public health sector. Currently, she is a graduate student at East Carolina University in the School of Public Health. Cheryl believes the health issues plaguing our rural and minority communities across the country are troubling. It is her desire to mesh her financial and public health knowledge, ensuring people receive adequate access to financial and healthcare services while advocating for fair and equitable health policy changes.

Cheryl believes that the lack of African-American representation in executive-level roles, and the limited investment in African-American owned businesses by way of limited access to capital and intentional patronage for corporate America, have stifled growth and development in the African-American community for far too long.

Cheryl is interested in the Olamina Fund largely because of its deliberate impact on disenfranchised populations. She believes that people whose identities align with that of her own will benefit from Olamina. She sees serving on the Community Advisory Board as an opportunity that will afford her more ownership in a narrative that is important to her both personally and professionally.

Mariela (she/her) is the product of her Venezuelan and El Salvadoran roots, and Bay Area upbringing. She has spent her career cultivating local economies, resilient food systems, and new models of investment that center and uplift Black, Indigenous and POC entrepreneurs, farmers, land stewards, and community-based organizations. She is a co-founder of Manzanita Capital Collective, a collective working to shift power and capital to BIPOC-led food, agriculture, and land stewardship to advance racial and economic justice. Prior to Manzanita, Mariela was the Interim Executive Director of Mandela Partners, an Oakland-based non-profit organization that works to increase access to healthy food, good jobs, and ownership opportunities. At Mandela Partners, Mariela spent more than a decade seeding and growing economic opportunity initiatives – including: a food hub, restaurant, and community food hall; entrepreneurship and wealth building programs; and non-extractive capital products. Mariela has a wide breadth of experience in community-rooted economic development, integrated capital, financial planning, collaborative stewardship, and more.

Mariela holds B.A. degrees in Economics and International Relations from the University of California, Davis, and an M.A. in Latin American Development from Vanderbilt University. She is the chair of the Equitable Food Oriented Development Collaborative’s Community Investment Committee, a member of The People's Land Fund, on the Olamina Fund Community Advisory Committee, and on California Farmlink's Board of Directors. Mariela is a current Castanea fellow, and a former Institute for the Future, Common Future, NALCAB Colegio, and Kiva fellow. She also proudly serves as the Board Treasurer for Somos Famila, a Bay Area based LGBTQ+ Latinx non-profit.