Abdul Ali

Abdul Ali works with Maine Youth Justice as the Portland organizer, and with the University of Southern Maine as a policy assistant inside the Muskie School.

He is also one of the Directors of Opportunities Scholars, where he works to create opportunities for incarcerated youth in order to achieve higher education.

He is in partnership with several organizations including The Young People's Caucus, connecting youth with policy and decision-makers in order to offer perspective on how to change laws that negatively impact their lives; as well as with Maine Inside Out, a theater company that uses the art of theater to tell stories about what it's like to live both inside and outside the juvenile justice system.

Last but not least, Ali sits on the Race & Equity Council for the City of Portland.

All of Abdul Ali's projects are collaborative in nature and vary from organization to organization, depending on how best to implement the work of systemic change while giving youth power to create and build leadership roles in our community.

Some of the initiatives he plans to work on this Winter at SPEEDWELL include:

• Youth and community engagement

• Youth training on abolition

• Youth training on organizing and activism

• Holding space for therapeutic conversations and storytelling

• Zoom conferences; as well as advocacy when working with decision makers (Legislature; Elected Officials)

• Theater and poetry work, both done individually and with youth

• Photography and video recording of the projects