Janna Browning MA, received her Master's degree in Counseling Psychology with a concentration in Drama Therapy from the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS). She received a BFA in Acting from Emerson College in Boston, MA. Janna has traveled widely and lived and worked in several regions of the United States as well as a number of countries. This exposure to other perspectives and values has given her deep empathy and a complex understanding of the cross-cultural experience. Growing up in Jonesborough, Tennessee, the "Storytelling Capitol of the World," she witnessed the healing power of the arts from an early age. Her great capacity for empathy, training in drama therapy, and artful therapeutic skills help her work powerfully with many different populations. Through her innovative approaches to transformation, Janna helps clients embrace a better self-concept and strive towards a more fulfilled life. She uses drama therapy in a playful yet powerful way to promote emotional growth and psychological integration. For the past year Janna has had a private practice at the Living Arts Counseling Center where she did drama therapy with individuals, couples, and groups. She also worked with Armand Volkas MFT, RDT in his Healing the Wounds of History project which produces public events and seminars for people identified with polarized groups, and promotes intercultural communication, mutual understanding, and conflict resolution through the expressive arts. Janna is a facilitator of the drama therapy group Too Much Drama 4 Yo Mama...An' Yo Daddy, which works with African-American teens in Bayview/ Hunter's Point, San Francisco.
Rena Marie Jones MA Candidate, MFT Trainee, is completing her Master's in Counseling Psychology with a concentration in Drama Therapy from the California Institute of Integral Studies (CIIS). She received a BA in Latin American History at the University of San Francisco. She is an actor, dancer, educator and community activist who is pursuing her own artistic dreams as well as working to help young people achieve theirs. She continues to perform live theater, act on film, and was most recently spotted on a television commercial in Washington DC, Fresno, and Memphis, TN. She has been working for the past ten years in the Bayview Hunters Point community on various projects; STD testing and prevention, helping to create and secure funds for the Providence Summer Day Camp, teaching dance and drama to children and teens, and volunteering in the Providence homeless shelter. She has a passion for working with children and youth, bringing her love of the performing arts to them. She strongly believes in the power of the arts to transform young people's lives by giving them an outlet for creative expression and a platform from which they can build their self-esteem. Her greatest desire is to help them see their potential for success, and to learn positive and effective ways to deal with many of the difficulties they will face in life.
Maria Breaux Labeled "promising talent" by Variety Magazine, Maria Breaux received her BA from Stanford University and an MFA in playwriting from San Francisco State University, where she wrote numerous plays before venturing into filmmaking. Her first film, I'd Rather Be...Gone, premiered at the San Francisco International Lesbian and Gay Film Festival to a sold-out audience. Her award-winning, infamous short Raised by Drag Queens has screened internationally, receiving audience and critical acclaim. ("John Waters wonders why he didn't think of it first." - Out Front Colorado) Maria has had solo performances, staged readings, and plays at many Bay Area venues, and has had the pleasure of working with a diverse range of writers and artists, from award-winning playwrights such as Adrienne Kennedy and Anne Galjour, to musicians such as Simon Raymonde, former bassist of Cocteau Twins. She was co-founder of the sketch comedy group "Baby Snatching Dingoes" and is a two-time winner of the Highsmith Playwriting Award. She owns and operates MBreauxsia Films, and has written and/or directed comedies and dramas with subject matter ranging from 1980s mods to blowup dolls.
Amal Kouttab MA, RDT is a registered drama therapist, teacher, social activist, and filmmaker. She has used drama, art and writing to facilitate therapeutic groups in mental health institutions, nursing homes, hospitals and drug rehabilitation centers in New York City and the San Francisco Bay Area. She obtained a bachelor's degree in the performing arts and women's studies from the University of Virginia in 1997, and a master's degree in psychology and drama therapy from New York University in 2001. For the past four years, she has facilitated therapeutic workshops with Palestinians and Israelis and other groups in conflict in the Middle East and the Bay Area. She has taught graduate psychology classes entitled Drama Therapy for Social Change at the California Institute of Integral Studies, where she developed part of the curriculum focused on internalized oppression. She co-founded the Araceli Theater Project based at San Francisco General Hospital, which rehearses and performs original educational theater pieces for people with cancer. In addition to her work in the non-profit sector, she also owns and operates a multimedia production company committed to preserving the work of Bay Area performing artists (for more information visit www.amaldesigns.com).
