“Sarah takes her responsibilities as a strong White ally seriously. Sarah never shies away from doing the necessary work to advance our schools towards more inclusive and equitable places. She is a relentless ally and a good listener, able to call White people into the work while continuing to learn from People of Color equally entrenched in diversity work.”

Dr. Sandra “Chap” Chapman, Director of Equity and Community, Little Red School House & Elisabeth Irwin High School

Sarah hershey

FOUNDER
 

Sarah Hershey is a social justice educator who began her career as a middle school teacher. She holds a M.Ed. in Social Justice Education and teacher certifications in middle school and social science. Since 2003, Sarah has worked with groups of youth and adults to facilitate a process of developing nuanced social justice analyses. For over a decade, Sarah has been a curriculum designer and lead facilitator for the white affinity group sessions at the National Association of Independent Schools’ annual People of Color Conference.  She also now serves on the white affinity group facilitation team at the annual White Privilege Conference. After becoming a parent in 2010, Sarah was determined to expand her own toolbox to include effective strategies for talking about social justice issues with very young children.  She founded Courageous Change Consulting out of a sense of urgency to work with her fellow white people to advance racial justice.

Sarah’s consulting work engages white people with issues of racial justice through community building, self-reflection, dialogue, role-play, storytelling, and tangible strategies for change.  She is particularly committed to creating supportive learning environments in which people can have meaningful dialogue, confront challenging issues, and push themselves outside of their comfort zones.  She has facilitated these challenging but rewarding conversations with middle/high school students, teachers, school administrators, non-profits, and community members.  A recent focus of Sarah’s consulting work is supporting parenting adults in raising racially conscious white children.

Sarah currently lives in the San Francisco Bay Area where she spends her rare free moments singing, reading, and raising two young children.