OUR PEOPLE
EDESSA RAMOS, M.A. MPA, Dr.h.c.
Co-Founder and Executive Director
Edessa is a Psychology and Mental Health practitioner, with 9 years of experience in MHPSS and protection program delivery for war-affected families in Iraq, Syria, and Ukraine, particularly women and children. As a security/risk expert, she founded the social enterprise Strategic Edge to help ensure the safety of humanitarians in complex and high-risk environments. She has 20 years of non-profit programming expertise for international and national organizations, focused on designing and delivering NGO management systems, humanitarian programs, training curriculum, monitoring and evaluation, and research. She is an experienced capacity builder with over 4,000 NGO personnel from 45 organizations trained worldwide. Edessa has worked for 7 years as emergency medic, including frontline trauma injury response in Syria, Iraq, and Ukraine. She received the 2018 Humanitarian Award from the Iraqi Red Crescent Society, and an Honorary Doctorate from the University of Armenia for her emergency work in Mosul, Iraq. She currently serves as a subject matter expert for European Commission member agencies dealing with children and women returning from Iraq and Syria and the handling of cases of children associated with violent extremism. Edessa is based in Zurich, Switzerland.
ANGELA MASCARENAS, Ph.D.
Co-Founder and KOI Institute Director
Angela is a longtime community organizer, educator-trainor, and researcher. She co-founded CIRCA-PINTIG (CP), a three-decade-old Chicago-based community arts organization, and has served on the boards of numerous nonprofits and foundations in the U.S. Angela has developed integrated-arts curricula and conducted workshops for community engagement and movement building in the U.S. and the Philippines. As CP’s founding Executive Director and later as its Community Engagement Director, Angela has led the development and implementation of artistic-educational campaigns as CP’s participation in the passage of several key legislation, namely, the WWII Filipino Veterans Equity Compensation (FVEC) Fund (2009), the Illinois Domestic Workers’ Bill of Rights (2016); and the TEAACH (Teaching Equitable Asian American Community History) Act (2021). Angela received her doctorate in Sociology from the University of Illinois Chicago. Angela’s doctoral dissertation documented the decades-old cultural organizing work of CIRCA-PINTIG and developed the theoretical foundation of CP’s own concretization of the theatre of the oppressed practice called “collective historicizing”. She has taught courses and conducted action research on social movements, race & ethnic relations, immigrant organizing, and cultural activism. Angela is based in Chicago, Illinois.
GUSTAVO OTT
Communications Manager and Program Assistant
Gustavo has managed the social media presence of Amalna since its founding in 2018. He has also worked as an English, Humanities and Writing Tutor for students at the University of Illinois Chicago (UIC) and Harold Washington College (HWC). He has served as the News Editor of the Herald, HWC’s Campus newspaper from 2013-2015, and has volunteered in CIRCA-Pintig and other community organizations. Gustavo received a BA in English and Creative Writing from UIC. Gustavo is based in Chicago, Illinois.
HERMAN EZRA
Board Member
Herman is a licensed Physical Therapist both in the United States and the Philippines with over 30 years of experience. He graduated with a BS in Physical Therapy degree from Southwestern University, Philippines. He has practiced in the states of Illinois, Florida, and Nevada USA. Heman served as a Board member and has been an active supporter of CIRCA-Pintig, a three-decade old Chicago-based community arts organization, for over twenty years.