Featured Speakers

OPENING PLENARY

To Be Water: Cultivating Belonging, Adaptability, and Collective Flow in Youth Development

Keynote Speaker: Sangita Kumar, with the Belonging Resident Company

Sangita Kumar and members of the Belonging Resident Company—Bolo, Chetna, Success, and Carla—will guide participants through an experiential journey that brings the conference theme into the room. We will begin by grounding in intention and reconnecting to the values that anchor us. From there, participants will engage in a playful collective problem-solving challenge, activating the creativity, flexibility, and resilience we already use every day in our work with young people. Through Playback Theatre – an improvisational form in which personal stories are immediately transformed into movement, sound, and theater – the Belonging Resident Company will bring these experiences to life.

Together, we will not only talk about resilience and adaptability; we will practice them, witness them, and feel them. By seeing our individual stories reflected back as part of a larger collective story, participants will surface the knowledge already flowing through this field: how we respond creatively to change, how belonging strengthens our capacity to adapt, and how we can move through challenge without losing sight of who and what we are here for.

The keynote invites us to leave with a different understanding of resilience: not becoming harder in response to difficult conditions, but becoming more responsive, connected, imaginative, and able to move—like water.

Closing Plenary Panel

Facilitated by Katherine Plog Martinez
Panelists: Mohamed Olow, Sheryl Blessing, and Monique Marines

Learning outside the typical school day is critical to the social, emotional, and academic development of children and young people. Research shows that access to quality expanded learning programs is key to improving youth outcomes in school and in life—especially for youth of color and youth living in poverty.

At the heart of these programs are the professionals who provide spaces where young people can feel seen, supported, and empowered to thrive. The youth development workforce is critical to program quality and the well-being of the young people they serve.

During this conversation, our facilitator, Katherine Plog Martinez, will be joined by youth development providers Sheryl Blessing, Mohamed Olow, and Monique Marines to highlight stories of what it looks like to dedicate a career to this field. They will share their perspectives on growth and support that make a difference, the challenges providers face, and why they remain passionate and optimistic in this work.  

Meet Our Facilitator

Katherine Plog Martinez is a strategic facilitator and youth development systems leader with over 20 years of experience in the field. She is the founder and principal of Katherine Plog Martinez Consulting, where she supports a portfolio of local, state, and national intermediaries, funders, and youth-serving organizations to strengthen their strategic capacity through facilitation, organizational development, and research. She holds an Ed.D. from the University of Pittsburgh, where her dissertation research examined the foundational knowledge that underlies youth development practice, work that speaks directly to how out-of-school time providers build and sustain the expertise their fields depend on.

Prior to building her consulting business, Katherine spent eight and a half years at Denver Public Schools, serving in roles including Director of Extended Learning and Community Schools and Executive Director of Whole Child Supports. She is a co-founder of the Denver Afterschool Alliance.

Meet Our Panelists

Mohamed Olow is the executive director of Diaspora Family Healing Network (DFHN), a South King County nonprofit that helps immigrant and refugee families access culturally responsive mental health support. DFHN brings that mission to life through youth mentorship, sports, gun violence prevention, and education about addiction and overdose.

Mohamed returned to the community that shaped him to help create the support he wishes had been available when he was growing up. From there, he has expanded DFHN’s work to families across South King County. He also brings a background in IT and cybersecurity, with a bachelor’s degree from Central Washington University. Mohamd believes the strongest solutions begin with listening to the community.

Sheryl Blessing, a former parks and recreation supervisor and a youth development professional with over 22+ years of experience, is a community leader who managed public facilities and recreational programs. Sheryl specializes in youth engagement and staff management and coaching to ensure young people have a safe, welcoming and fun space and environment. Developing teams and systems are current passions for Sheryl, and her approach of collaborative partnerships extend to schools, churches, and other community organizations.

She is a Best Out of School Time (B.O.O.S.T.) Ambassador, a youth and young adult minister practitioner, a Flourish Lab Adult Social Emotional Learning Certified Facilitator, and a David P. Weikart Center and The Forum for Youth Investment Certified Facilitator of Youth Work Methods as well as an Endorsed Youth Program Quality and Social Emotional Learning YPQ External Assessor.

Monique is especially passionate about creating opportunities for students who may not otherwise have access to them, including STEM experiences, college exploration, educational field trips, and leadership development. She believes youth development is strongest when schools, families, and communities work together. As a member of her local wellness coalition, she collaborates with community partn