The Director’s Advisory Council is a broadly representative, deliberative group that meets quarterly with the Director of the Memorial Art Gallery to advise them on diversity, equity, accessibility, and inclusion strategies that support, strengthen, and otherwise sustain the MAG and its community of staff, volunteers, guests, and visitors.
Kevin Spencer Beckford
Kevin Spencer Beckford (he, his, him) is an internationally recognized change agent, anti-racist strategist, and executive servant leader with experience working in the for-profit and non-profit sectors.
Kevin is currently SVP Chief People Officer of GRYT Health Inc., a healthcare technology company. Prior to that, Kevin was Sr. Director of Diversity, Equity & Inclusion (2017-21) at the University of Rochester (UR). In this role, Kevin provided anti-Racism and equity strategies, as well as direction to assist the UR in realizing a more equitable and inclusive culture for its 32,000 employees.
As a change agent, Kevin has led people, process and technology transitions within call center operations, information technology, marketing and technical communications, supply chain, purchasing, bank financial operations, and healthcare.
Additionally, Kevin has served in executive operational leadership roles at Bank of America, PNC Financial, Bank of Montréal, and executive roles in healthcare and academic Institutions. Kevin has also provided senior- and executive-level transition and change management consulting services for large, medium, and small companies.
Throughout these assignments Kevin has brought a focus on operational excellence, effectively managing change, and championing diversity, equity, and inclusion in every aspect of the workplace.
Kevin is also active in the community, working on social justice, anti-poverty, anti-racism, and education initiatives. In November 2017, Kevin was elected to the Pittsford, NY Town Board and is the first African American to serve on the Pittsford Town Board in its more than 200-year history. He is also the co-founder of the Rochester Anti-Racism Coalition (RARAC).
Kevin received an Associated in Applied Science (AAS) degree in Electrical Engineering Technology from Monroe Community College, and a Bachelor of Science degree in Organizational Management from Roberts Wesleyan University. Kevin is a life-long servant leader and feels he is at his best when he is serving others.
Chetna Chandrakala, CPA
Chetna Chandrakala is chief financial officer for Villa of Hope, an organization that partners with individuals, families, and communities to Rebuild relationships, Recover potential, and Renew hope for the future. Most recently she served for 13 years as the senior vice president of finance and compliance for GRIPA/Cognisight. GRIPA is a physician-led partnership between Rochester Regional Health and physicians, helping to provide high-quality and high-value care. Chetna has over 25 years of experience in the fields of finance, accounting, human resources, and compliance across different countries and industries including manufacturing, trading, power plants, insurance, and healthcare.
Chetna’s educational accomplishments and certifications include Certified Public Accountant (CPA), and graduate executive management coursework from University of Chicago Booth School of Business. She completed her undergraduate studies at Shri Ram College of Commerce, India, and received her Bachelor of Law degree from University of Delhi, India. She also holds certifications from, and has been a member of, three esteemed institutes in India for Chartered Accountants, Cost Accountants, and Company Secretaries.
Chetna is very passionate about community service. She likes to help organizations by leveraging the intellectual capital of the Indian-American community and fostering cultural connections between the world’s largest democracies. She is currently the president of Hindu Temple of Rochester; treasurer/board member of the Mental Health Association of Rochester; finance committee member of United Way; board member and past chair of Development of Indian American Leaders (DIAL), and past chair of Professional Forum of India Community Center of Rochester. For several years, Chetna served the Pittsford PTSA in different capacities including as chair, treasurer, and in website management.
Chetna was a recipient of the Pittsford PTSA Lifetime Membership award in 2015, and an Honoree of Rochester Business Journal Women of Excellence Awards in 2019.
Adam Eaton
Adam Eaton became an Artist in 2019. He is the founder of the arts organization Rochester Artist Collaborative with the mission to support local Artists in Rochester NY. The organization focuses on low-income and underrepresented Artists, expanding diversity and inclusion in the fine arts, media, and design fields. These Artists are provided the resources they need to have successful creative careers while making art that inspires the community.
Under Adam’s leadership, Rochester Artist Collaborative has experienced enormous growth in both diversity and in the City’s perception of local Black Artists.
Over the past 15 years, Adam has been making a difference in the lives of Rochesterians through education with positions at the Rochester City School District and Monroe Community College all while volunteering to enrich the lives of Rochester’s citizens.
Fabeha Fazal
Fabeha Fazal is an Associate Professor in the Department of Pediatrics, Division of Neonatology, at the University of Rochester. Originally from India, she moved to Chicago in 1992. She relocated to Rochester in 2003 with her husband and three kids and has since been an active community member. She was a member of the Islamic Center of Rochester (ICR) Board from 2008 – 2018 and has served as the Vice President of ICR for two terms. At present, she serves on the Board of Trustees at Barakah Muslim Charity, a non-profit organization whose purpose is to provide social services to the broader community of upstate New York, serving people irrespective of race, religion, ethnicity, gender, or creed. Their services include food, clothing, and financial assistance to underprivileged families. Fabeha is also a member of the Muslim Civic Engagement Committee, whose goal is to provide civic education and bridge the gap in the Greater Rochester Area both in political and non-political ways. Community service has been a lifelong passion for Fabeha, through which she has built an amazing circle of friends from diverse backgrounds.
Fran Flaherty
Fran Flaherty is a Deaf artist, curator, and educator practicing in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Rochester, New York. As a first-generation immigrant from the Philippines, her work is centered in issues surrounding migrant family relations and assimilation, maternal feminism, and disability aesthetics that synthesize traditional media and physical computing. Flaherty is the founder of Anthropology of Motherhood, an ongoing curation of artwork and design that engages in the complex visual, material, emotional, corporeal and lived experiences of motherhood, care-giving, parenting, nurturing, and maternal labor. She is the Director of Dyer Arts Center for the Advancement of Deaf Culture at Rochester Institute of Technology’s National Technical Institute for the Deaf. She also serves on the Advisory Board of the Office of Public Art in Pittsburgh, and is a proud member of the #notwhite collective.
Isobel Goldberg Goldman
Isobel Goldberg Goldman is a career graphic designer and longtime community organizer. She has held positions nationally as an art director with Significs Design Studio in Rochester, Aardvark Advertising Agency in Atlanta, and Polo Ralph Lauren in New York City. In recent years, Isobel has served as the Community Relations Director for the Jewish Community Federation and most recently as the Director of Grants and Programs with the Farash Foundation. Isobel is the Founder and CEO of The Crayon Project, an art and literacy program that has distributed thousands of Art supplies to Rochester City School children.
Isobel currently serves on the Boards of E3 Rochester and the Joseph Avenue Arts and Culture Alliance.
Deborah Hanmer
Deb Hanmer has dedicated her professional career to education and nonprofit leadership. Deb serves as the Initiative Director for the Greater Rochester Parent Leadership Training Institute, a civics and leadership training program for parents in Monroe County. PLTI helps parents become leading advocates for children, families, and their communities by embracing a cross-race, cross-class, and parent-informed, pro-social educational model. Deb is also the Founder and CEO of Breakthrough Leadership Consulting, a public sector consulting group that helps organizations stay connected to their mission while building the capacity of their teams, creating strong systems based on concrete goals, and building a culture of continuous improvement. Deb’s primary focus is on improving educational outcomes in urban communities.
Deb holds a Bachelors of Arts in History from Dartmouth College, a Masters of Public Administration from the Maxwell School at Syracuse University, and a Masters in Educational Leadership from Cambridge College. Deb is a proud member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc and is active in a number of other civic organizations. Deb is an active member of her church community, enjoys gardening, reading, and outdoor time. Deb lives in Rochester with her husband and two sons.
Abhas Kumar
Abhas Kumar is a Senior Vice President at NIIT USA Inc., one of the world’s top five providers of Managed Training Services, and is also a director on the board of Eagle Productivity Solutions, based in Rochester. Abhas has an engineering degree from IIT Roorkee and an MBA from XLRI Jamshedpur, India. Abhas served on the board of the India Community Center of Rochester from 2010–12 and was Chair in 2011. At the ICC, Abhas founded the ICC Professional Forum and helped institutionalize KRHTPA, where kids raise funds for local kid-oriented charities. Abhas has also served on the board of SAATHI of Rochester and currently serves as a member of the Board at Bivona Child Advocacy Center. When not working or volunteering, Abhas’ other interests are photography, learning to dance, and theatre.
Debora McDell-Hernandez
Debora McDell-Hernandez joined Planned Parenthood of Central and Western New York in March 2018 and serves as Senior Director of Public and Community Affairs. She provides leadership in advocacy and public affairs. McDell-Hernandez also plays a key role in shaping public policies by enabling legislators, advocates and the public to understand and make informed decisions on issues that impact family planning and reproductive health choices. This includes legislative activities and relationship management; community partnerships, and public relations/media management.
Prior to Planned Parenthood, McDell-Hernandez worked at the Memorial Art Gallery (MAG) for 17 years and held several posts including Membership Manager, Coordinator of Community Programs & Outreach, Curator of Engagement, and, her final post, Engagement Manager. Before joining MAG, McDell-Hernandez worked at Chase Manhattan Bank in Rochester, New York as Community Relations Coordinator in Corporate Communications for six years and a Sales Officer in Retail Sales for three years.
Shalym Náter Vázquez
Shalym Náter Vázquez is currently employed at Ibero-American Action League, the leading dual-language agency in Upstate New York. Currently, he serves as the Director of Youth & Community Engagement with 15 years of experience in positive youth development. His focus is to advocate for and enhance the quality of life for youth and their families in Monroe County by providing services in the areas of education, mentoring, health, leadership development, cultural enrichment, and workforce development.
Náter Vázquez is active in the community emphasizing advocacy on behalf of the Latinx and LGBTQI+ community. He is involved with the Education Trust–New York, RCSD Bilingual Council, RMAPI Policy and Decimalizing Poverty groups, the Latinos Leader Roundtable, and the Monroe County/Rochester Youth Committee. Over the last five years, he has been a guest lecturer in Nazareth College’s Community Youth Development Program.
Heather Newton
Heather Newton was offered the privilege to serve as National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) Rochester’s Executive Director in January 2019 and she is proud to lead this dynamic and critically important organization. She and her husband found NAMI several years ago when they were struggling to make sense of their son’s mental health condition. The support and education they received were invaluable to their family’s recovery.
At NAMI, mental illness is often referred to as an equal opportunity disease. One in five Americans, regardless of their age, race, religion, education or income, are living with a mental health condition. Often, the most challenging part of mental illness is how isolating it can be for individuals and their families. There is a stigma around brain illness that does not exist for illnesses that affect other organs in the body. Symptoms of mental illness, including substance use disorders and suicidal thoughts/actions, can exacerbate stigma and limit access to treatment.
Despite these difficult realities, NAMI Rochester is an organization full of hope and optimism. Each time a person has the courage to speak up and share their story, the shame and silence around mental illness is diminished.
Doug Rice
Originally raised in Rochester, NY, Douglas Rice moved to New York City in 1984 to pursue a career as a sound designer, returning to Rochester in 1992. Raised in a family that placed a high value on community service, he has always had a passion for the arts, particularly Public Art. Doug founded ARTWalk in 1998 as a natural outgrowth of the creative environment where he lived, the Neighborhood Of The Arts (NOTA).
Doug’s unique talent for coalition-building and leveraging the entire Neighborhood’s passion for bettering the community led to great improvements in NOTA. Mayor Bob Duffy declared September 14th, 2008 “Doug Rice Day.”
In 2009 Doug founded a unique community theater, the Multi-use Community Cultural Center, or “MuCCC,” in Rochester, for which he received the Theater Association of New York State’s Outstanding Community Service Award in 2009.
Daisy Rivera Algarin
Daisy Rivera Algarin is the Director of The Neighborhood Service Centers (NSC) for the City of Rochester. In her role, Daisy oversees the operation of the four NSC offices in the Community. The primary focus is to provide focused customer service and improve the quality of life for all Rochester Citizens. In addition, she was part of the La Marketa Planning Team for the North Clinton Avenue revitalization project. She has served the City of Rochester since June 2000.
Daisy has also served in different capacities with Latinas Unidas. She was part of the founding team and has been the chair and now serves as Immediate Past president of the organization.
She was born in Bronx, NY and educated in Rochester. Daisy came to Rochester in 1971. She is married and has three children and two grandchildren.
Charisma Travis
Charisma Travis is a huge advocate of helping others to succeed, and becoming knowledgeable about any and everything. An Urban League of Rochester staff member since 2013, she is currently the Program Director for the Afterschool Academy program where she works with Monroe County students in grades 6th through 12th and their families, predominately those who reside and attend schools in the City of Rochester. With the Urban League of Rochester, Mrs. Travis helps close the education gap and provides various opportunities to help prepare students for college, work, and life. To accomplish this mission and the mission of the Urban League Movement, Mrs. Travis works closely with the National Urban League and its other affiliates Youth & Education staff, specifically the Project Ready signature program. This includes serving as an Adult Ambassador for the first National Urban League Project Ready Youth Council, working with students from affiliates around the country to use their voices. In addition, locally Mrs. Travis participates in a few advisory groups/partnerships where she works with community members and partners to provide and advocate for healthy meals and well-rounded after school and summer programming for our students.
A Brooklyn native, Mrs. Travis holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Criminal Justice and a Master of Science degree in Creative Studies, both from SUNY College at Buffalo. Mrs. Travis lives in Rochester with her husband and son.