Ajowa Nzinga Ifateyo

Ajowa Nzinga Ifateyo got her start in the worker cooperative movement in 2003 when she was elected to fill a vacancy on the Eastern Coordinating Council, the board of the Eastern Conference on Workplace Democracy, eastern regional worker cooperative organization, where she served for nine years.  A year after joining the ECC, Ajowa went on to become a founding board member of the U.S. Federation of Worker Cooperatives in 2004 where she participated for eight years. She has also served as Chair of the Democracy at Work Institute and trained with the Democracy at Work Network.  She has also served on the boards of NASCO and NASCO Development Services, and the Ujamaa Collective in Pittsburgh.  She had cofounded the Ella Jo Baker Intentionally Community Cooperative in Washington DC in 2002 and lived in that community for eight years, serving as its Secretary and Treasurer for most of her stay. Ajowa joined GEO in 2005 as a co-editor. She has a master's degree in Business Administration and in Community Economic Development, both from Southern New Hampshire University.  She also earned a degree in Mass Media Arts from the University of the District of Columbia.  She traveled to Mondragon in 2011 and continues to do cooperative organizing in the Washington, D.C. area where she is based. She has a particular interest in internalized superiority and inferiority, and the role of love and spirituality in changing the world.