Samaritas and Faith Lutheran Church in Okemos are collaborating to sponsor two educational Community Forums. Both forums will take place at Faith Lutheran Church in Okemos and both events are scheduled for the same week. The first forum is scheduled for Tuesday evening, October 15, at 7:00 PM, and it is a Community Forum to Discuss IMMIGRATION. Featured panelists for this event include: Andrew Lorenzen-Strait, the Director of Children and Family Services at Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services; Melanie Jones, Staff Attorney with Michigan Immigrant Rights Center; Amy Maldonado, Lansing area Immigration Attorney; and Farah Khalil, local Refugee Advocate.
BIOGRAPHIES OF PARTICIPANTS
Melanie Jones
Melanie is a Staff Attorney in Michigan Immigrant Rights Center’s Washtenaw County Office. Melanie provides legal representation for clients in Metro Detroit and Washtenaw County. Melanie received her J.D. from the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) and spent a summer in London, England studying international law with the Georgetown University Law Center. At UDC, Melanie worked as a student attorney in the UDC Immigration and Human Rights Legal Clinic and represented detained women and children in Dilley, Texas with the AILA-CARA Family Detention Pro Bono Project. Before joining MIRC, Melanie worked as a judicial law clerk at the Superior Court of the District of Columbia and the 4th Judicial Circuit Court in Jackson, Michigan.
Amy Moldonado, J.D.
Amy Maldonado is a 1998 graduate of the University of Pennsylvania Law School, where she volunteered extensively at Catholic Social Services preparing asylum applications, and the University of Houston (B.A. in Philosophy with minor in Mexican American Studies). She is a member of the American Immigration Lawyers Association, the American Bar Association, and the Hispanic National Bar Association. She is admitted to the United States Courts of Appeals for the Third, Sixth and Seventh Circuits, the United States District Court for the Northern District of Illinois. She is a member of the State Bar of Illinois, and is authorized to represent clients on federal immigration matters in all 50 states and Puerto Rico.
Then, on Thursday evening, October 17, at 7:00 PM, Faith Lutheran Church and Samaritas will host a Community Forum to Learn About Transgender, LGBTQ+ Issues. This forum will feature the following panelists in discussion: Andrew Lorenzen-Strait, the Director of Children and Family Services at Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services; Melanie Jones, Staff Attorney with Michigan Immigrant Rights Center; Jay Kaplan, Staff Attorney for the ACLU of Michigan’s LGBT Project; the Rev. Phiwa Langeni, Pastor of Salus Center, UCC; and Heidi Schaetzl, local school teacher. Courtney Isanhart, MSW, will moderate this event. This Community Forum also coincides with the opening of a Samaritas house for transgender refugee youth.
Andrew Lorenzen-Strait will be a panelist in both community forums. Before taking the job at Lutheran Immigration and Refugee Services in Baltimore, he was a career government employee working as an ICE Agent. His background is extensive, and he brings a wealth of information to the topics of discussion for both forums. He will be coming from Baltimore to participate in these events and this community is very fortunate to benefit from his presence.
BIOGRAPHIES OF PARTICIPANTS
Jay Kaplan
Jay Kaplan has been the staff attorney for the ACLU of Michigan’s LGBT Project since its founding in 2001. Jay has worked on cases including challenging undercover sting operations targeting gay men, fighting Michigan’s constitutional amendment prohibiting same-sex couples from marrying, defending the validity of second parent adoptions granted in Michigan, and recently advocating for a transgender high school student to be able to run for prom court. Jay was honored with the 2006 Unsung Hero Award from the Michigan State Bar and the 2010 Virginia Uribe Civil Rights Award from the National Education Association (NEA).
The Rev. Phiwa Langeni
Phiwa [pronounced PEE-wah] Langeni (they/them or he/him) is a transmasculine person who’s passionate about helping people understand that different doesn’t have to be dangerous. Phiwa is the solo parent of an adult daughter, the Interim Pastor of a United Church of Christ (UCC) church in Ypsilanti, the Pastor of Salus Center UCC, and the Founder/Director of Salus Center, Lansing’s only LGBTQ Resource and Community Center (which will be turning two next month!). Salus is the Latin word meaning wholeness and well-being. Being a nerd of words, Phiwa delights in the fact that salus is a word not commonly used, which lends itself to the beauty of co-creating the evolving meanings of salus within the LGBTQ communities of the Greater Lansing Area. In their free time, Phiwa enjoys writing, reading, and creating all manner of things, including clothing and fashion accessories for their small business.
Melanie Jones
Melanie is a Staff Attorney in Michigan Immigrant Rights Center’s Washtenaw County Office. Melanie provides legal representation for clients in Metro Detroit and Washtenaw County. Melanie received her J.D. from the University of the District of Columbia (UDC) and spent a summer in London, England studying international law with the Georgetown University Law Center. At UDC, Melanie worked as a student attorney in the UDC Immigration and Human Rights Legal Clinic and represented detained women and children in Dilley, Texas with the AILA-CARA Family Detention Pro Bono Project. Before joining MIRC, Melanie worked as a judicial law clerk at the Superior Court of the District of Columbia and the 4th Judicial Circuit Court in Jackson, Michigan.
Courtney Isanhart, MSW
Lead Policy Analyst, Office of Child Welfare Policy and Programs
Michigan Department of Health and Human Services
Courtney has spent the last 13 years in the child welfare profession. Courtney initially began working in child welfare as an independent living skills trainer, teaching teenagers in foster care about life skills that would assist them in preparing for adulthood. She expanded her involvement with older youth as an independent living caseworker, engaging with older youth placed in Michigan’s child welfare system to increase their life skills and self-sufficiency in preparation for emancipating from foster care. Courtney later served children and families as a foster care specialist, supporting families in increasing their protective capacities and reducing safety concerns so that children could be safely reunited with their parents. As an adoption specialist, Courtney assisted children who were not able to be safely returned to a parent to find permanent, loving families through adoption by relatives, foster parents, and others seeking to grow their families.
After seven years working directly with children and families, Courtney became a child welfare trainer with the MDHHS Office of Workforce Development and Training, where she provided trainings on a wide variety of topics to children’s protective services, foster care, and adoption caseworkers, supervisors, and administration across the state. Courtney’s trainings on trauma-informed child welfare practice highlighted the need for child welfare professionals to consider the sometimes-complex trauma histories of families involved with the child welfare system and engage with all families with respect for their experiences and identities.
Currently, Courtney is the lead foster care policy analyst with the Michigan Department of Health and Human Services’ (MDHHS) Office of Child Welfare Policy and Programs. Courtney was actively involved in the creation of the recently-issued MDHHS Practice Guide for Working with Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender, Questioning, Intersex, and Two Spirit Youth in Michigan’s Child Welfare System. The practice guide aims to educate and support child welfare staff to better meet the unique needs of children, youth, and families who identify with diverse sexual orientations, gender identities, and gender expressions, as well as improve outcomes for children and youth involved with the child welfare system who identify as LGBTQI2S. Courtney was recently selected to lead for the MDHHS Children’s Services Agency (CSA) LGBTQ+ Services Workgroup, where she hopes to continue to increase the knowledge, tools, and resources available to Michigan’s child welfare professionals when advocating for and providing affirming services to LGBTQ+ youth and families.
Courtney earned her Bachelor of Arts in Sociology and Master of Social Work with a concentration in clinical practice from Michigan State University.
Faith Lutheran Church is located at 4515 Dobie Rd. in Okemos. For more information, contact Pastor Ellen Schoepf at Faith Lutheran Church.