Ya Ya Staff

Youth at the Ya-Ya Network political education program are from 15-19 years old. The staff are predominantly organizers of color and generally 1/2 of the staff identify as LGBTQ, and the majority of the staff are women. We are a youth driven organization that maximizes the potential for involvement and ownership of the work we do in our communities. 

Ya-Ya Staff

Amy Wagner - Executive Director 

 amy@yayanetwork.org 

Amy Wagner joined the social justice movement when she was marching in utero to ban the bomb. Amy spent her formative activist years during the the anti-apartheid and Latin American solidarity movements. With a masters degree in Social Work from New York University, she worked for many years as a social worker in alternative public high schools. She founded YA-YA Network in 1998, and in its fourteenth cycle, the program is still cultivating the next generation of young activists. Amy also has served as the director of the Rose & Sherle Wagner Foundation since 1997.

Denise Romero - Youth Trainer & Mentor 

denise@yayanetwork.org 

Denise Romero Franco is an undocumented [unapologetic & unafraid] immigrant, born and raised in Mexico, now residing in Queens, New York. She is a former participant of Global Kids and alumni of the Ya-Ya Network where she worked in counter military recruitment, organizing against the revoking of student metrocards and educational justice work.  She studies at the City University of New York majoring in Latin American Studies. She was formerly a campus organizer with New York Students Rising and Students United for a Free CUNY, fighting against budget cuts and tuition increases. She is now working in political education and activist training using a popular education model and focusing on youth empowerment.  She is currently working with the Migrant Power Alliance, Radical Arts Collective, and a NYC based Feminist/Womynist Collective. She is a vegetarian and a self-proclaimed artist and writer. 

Julian Guerrero - Youth Trainer & Mentor 

julian@yayanetwork.org

Born and raised in Queens, David Julian Guerrero is the first child of two that belong to Colombian immigrants who arrived to the United States in the last century. Brought up in a small one bedroom apartment with a family of four, he spent a lot of time learning and playing alongside his younger sister as the family spent many months traveling between New York City and Colombia. Once in High School, he became conscious of the world around him following the dramatic events in the early 2000's. Since then he has become a dedicated political activist and community organizer. He has been deeply involved with organizations that have fought against austerity and have that organized for Worker's, Immigrant's, and Student's rights and community empowerment. He is a senior at CUNY Hunter College majoring in Sociology. He plans to dedicate his life to community and labor rights organizing and empowerment.  

Sharmin Hossain - Youth Trainer & Mentor 

sharmin@yayanetwork.org 

Sharmin Hossain is a Queens bred, South Asian womanist, writer, hip hop head, student at CUNY Hunter College, student organizer and youth activist trainer at the Ya-Ya Network. She is alumni at the Ya-Ya Network, where she organized in counter military recruitment, anti-war, education and the fight for student metrocards in 2010. Before attending Hunter College, Sharmin was a student at SUNY Albany, where she organized with Save Our SUNY in solidarity with New York Students Rising to fight against budget cuts, tuition hikes and the shutdown of departments. Sharmin is currently working in popular political education and youth empowerment through activism, a NYC based Feminist/Womynist Collective, and studying in the South Asian studies and Political Science department. She is working and organizing in Jackson Heights alongside a radical arts collective seeking to connect socio-political and cultural work with her vision and desire for community building and movement through collective action. 

Uruj Sheikh - Youth Trainer & Mentor 

uruj@yayanetwork.org 

Suzanne C. Persard - Program Director 

suzanne@yayanetwork.org

Suzanne C. Persard is a queer Jamaican, Bronx-born & bred writer & activist (and a die-hard Yankees fan!). Literature & ink inspires her, as do movements inciting the decolonization of our world, centralizing LGBTQ rights, and fighting gender-based oppression. Suzanne has prioritized the work of LGBTQ issues and reproductive justice in the Indo-Caribbean community in her role as a founding member of Jahajee Sisters. Working with the phenomenal LGBTQ youth of color at the YA-YA Network is a dream come true for her. A self-proclaimed alter ego of Charlie Brown (though her friends affirm she's more Snoopy), writing has been her first love for as long as she can remember.  

Shalena Broadnax Krumm - Organizational Development Consultant  

shalena@yayanetwork.org 

Shalena Broadnax Krumm is committed to her native hometown of Brooklyn, NY. She began her social justice path at the age of 17, as a YA-YA Network youth activist. Shalena spent the next few years working on youth leadership with organizations like The Door, Global Kids, Scenarios USA, and Save the Children-Malawi, which focuses on strengthening communities and developing next generation talent. For three years she worked with Echoing Green, an organization that supports over 500 social entrepreneurs and aspiring changemakers to develop careers with social impact. There, she was able to thrive at the crossroads of social change and communications, and played a key role in the organization's rebranding and marketing initiatives. In addition to her work with Ya-Ya Network, she consults with a human rights and activism organization working throughout China and Southeast Asia. Shalena is a 2012 recipient of the Dalai Lama Fellowship, New York University Catherine B. Reynolds Social Entrepreneurship Fellowship, Jeannette K. Watson Fellowship and StartingBloc New York Fellowship. She is a founding board member of Brooklyn Movement Center in Bedford Stuyvesant, Brooklyn. 

Ya-Ya Youth 2013: 

Naimah Iniss, Shayla Machado, Brian Dawson, Primi Akhtar, Arlene Cornejal, Cyrena Hayes, LeShone Sobers, Chantae Edwards, Samantha Ing, Andrew Opong, Georgia Owusu, Marvelous Nkrumah, Cynthia DeLeon, Emmanuel Luzon, Lily Johnson, Nancy Uddin. 

Ya-Ya's 2010-11

Zara Afridi, Khaleeq Alfred, Stormy Behlin, Kevin Davis, Jesse Graves, Lisa Flores, Melissa Kissoon, Anthony Ramirez

Ya-Ya's 2009-10

Ciarra Boyd, Zahyia Brown, Sajid Fernandez, Laasia Jones, Sharmin Hossain, Tracey Hobbs Jennifer Lee, Julissa Morban, Miguel Rodriguez, Denise Romero, Arleen Thelemaque

Ya-Ya's 2008-09

Dez Camara, Malika Evans, Tracey Hobbs, Quinn James, Michael Jones, Sabita Ramsaran, Enoel Reyes, Zaire Smalls

Ya-Ya's 2007-08

Juan Antigua, Adana Austin, David Emilien, Nakimuli Francis, Alexandra Manigat, David McNeil, Danielle Smith

Ya-Ya's 2006-07

Micheala Davis, Christine Feliciano, Sean Lewis, Adana Austin, Jessica Rivera, Farah Cruz