Dr. Destiny Thomas will deliver a virtual lecture, "In Search of Our Mother's Urbanism: A Womanist Call for Spatial Reparations".

Dr. Destiny Thomas is a change agent. She is the founder and CEO of Thrivance Group, a multi-regional, socially responsible, for-profit firm that works to make public spaces and public services more safe, more healthy and more accessible, especially for Black, Indigneous, and transgender people, and those with disabilities. 

An anthropologist planner hailing from Oakland, CA, Dr. Thomas has a combined 15 years of experience in nonprofit management and project management within government agencies, including the California Department of Transportation (Caltrans) and the City of Los Angeles. In addition, Dr. Thomas has led advancements in statewide racial equity initiatives for over a decade. Her focus has been urban planning, policy writing, and organizational development in communities most impacted by racial inequities.

Dr. Thomas’s areas of interest include: harm reductive planning, implementing the Dignity-Infused Community Engagement methodology, anti-displacement studies, healing environmental and infrastructural trauma, and bolstering agency and voice in marginalized communities within municipal planning processes. To this end, she launched Thrivance in 2020. As a culturally-rooted, trauma-informed enterprise, the team works to build capacity for these very values within municipal agencies, direct service providers, and advocacy organizations. Dr. Thomas earned a Bachelor of Arts in Political Science from Fisk University in 2006; a Master of Public Administration with an emphasis in Public Health and Non-Profit Management from Tennessee State University in 2008; and a PhD in Social and Cultural Anthropology from the California Institute of Integral Studies in 2016. She is a creative who seeks to embody servant leadership, and is a proud member of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Incorporated.