Victor Lewis

Victor Lee Lewis, MA, is Co-Director of the Center for Diversity Leadership (CDL), a human relations training and consulting firm. A veteran diversity worker with national recognition, he specializes in teaching, guiding and inspiring individuals and organizations in the creation of communities learning and taking action to heal and dismantle racism, sexism, anti-Semitism, homophobia and the other "isms" that undermine people's ability to live, love and work well together. Lewis was born in Rochester, New York in 1958, to a single teen mother. He grew up in the public housing projects and slums of Cleveland, Ohio, where he was raised by his mother and grandmother. An intense curiosity about the world led him early in life to what has become a life-long commitment to deepening his understanding through pursuing knowledge, nurturing the life of the spirit and cultivating the artistic imagination.

Since entering the path of diversity work in 1982, Lewis has conducted seminars, workshops, keynote speeches and "train the trainer" programs throughout the United States, as well as in Australia, New Zealand, Ireland and Germany. He is best known for his inspiring leadership role as the prophetic voice of The Color of Fear, an unusually powerful video about racism which received the Golden Apple Award for "Best Social Studies Documentary" of 1995 from the National Educational Media Association. He is co-author, with Hugh Vasquez, of Beyond the Color of Fear, a facilitation and discussion guide for use in organizations wishing to integrate this video into their curricula and training programs.

Lewis has served as Chaplain/Spiritual Director at the Starr King School for the Ministry (Unitarian Universalist), a seminary of the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California. An ally in the struggle to end sexism, Lewis is a former member of the Leadership Council of the National Organization for Men Against Sexism (NOMAS). From 1993-1995 he also served as Co-Chair of the organization. Between 1990-96, Lewis served as Director of Adult Education at the Oakland Men's Project (OMP), one of the oldest and most respected multicultural violence prevention training programs in the nation. He is a past member of the board of A Safe Place, the battered women's shelter program for the city of Oakland, California. Currently, he is Co-Chair of the Black Church and Domestic Violence Institute. An activist with deep environmental concern, Lewis is a co-founder of the Urban Habitat Program, and a former board member of Urban Ecology, Inc.

Lewis received his Master of Arts in Culture and Spirituality in 1987 from the Institute in Culture and Creation Spirituality (ICCS) at Holy Names College in Oakland, California. He served on the faculty at the Institute from 1987-1991, and worked closely with its founder, Rev. Matthew Fox, author of Original Blessing and The Reinvention of Work.

Hugh Vasquez

Hugh Vasquez is Founder of the Todos: Sherover Simms Alliance Building Institute in Oakland, CA. Driven by a deep sense of fairness, equity, and justice, Hugh has emerged as one of the nation's top leaders in working to create environments where people from all cultures are honored, respected, and valued. In the past 20 plus years, Hugh has worked with hundreds of organizations who want to take on the challenges of eliminating the social conditions that produce racism, sexism, classism, homophobia and the like. He has assisted national organizations such as Planned Parenthood Federation of America to establish nation-wide diversity initiatives and he has provided training to thousands of individuals throughout the country. Hugh is also a presenter with Speak Out, a national organization providing top speakers on social justice topics.

One of Hugh's greatest accomplishments is the creation of a youth program (New Bridges) that helps teenagers learn to eliminate discrimination and prejudice. School districts in the San Francisco Bay area have implemented this program as a primary strategy to promoting inclusion and equity. Hugh's leadership and experience with youth led organizations in other countries to seek assistance as well. He has trained leaders in Nicaragua to work with youth on race, gender, class, and sexual orientation issues and provided training to civil rights workers in Guatemala.

Hugh is a primary cast member in the award-winning film The Color of Fear and appeared with the rest of the cast on the Oprah Winfrey Show. Hugh is also the lead facilitator in the film Skin Deep, a documentary on race relations with college students, and he was an advisor to It's Elementary, a film addressing homophobia with children. He has co-authored the books No Boundaries: Unlearning oppression and building multicultural alliances and Making Allies Making Friends: A curriculum for middle schools, as well as published various articles on strengthening cultural roots and eliminating privileged systems.

Hugh has a Masters Degree in Social Work from the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He serves as adjunct faculty to John F. Kennedy University in the Graduate School of Professional Psychology and has taught courses at New College of California and California Institute of Integral Studies. He is a native Californian currently residing in the San Francisco area and the father of two powerful children.