People: Staff

Renée Heider, Executive Director

Hired as Destiny’s first Development Director in 2001, Renée took over leadership of the organization in August of 2007. She was previously the Executive Director of Oakland Ballet and draws on over fifteen years of experience in local and international arts organizations. After a successful career as an international event planner, she first became an arts administrator in 1992, when she joined the staff of the Bay Area Dance Series as Business Manager. Since then she has been the Director of Special Projects at La Peña Cultural Center in Berkeley and Production/Grants Manager at the Reichhold Center for the Arts at the University of the Virgin Islands, St. Thomas, prior to her hire at the Oakland Ballet in 1999. She holds an AA in Language Arts from Laney College, a BA in Bilingual Arts Administration from Mills College and an MA in Humanities from CSU, Dominguez Hills.

Sarah Crowell, Program/Artistic Director

Sarah Crowell has been at Destiny Arts Center for eighteen years, first as the Performing Arts Director, the Artistic Director of the Destiny Arts Youth Performance Company, and was named the Executive Director for Destiny in June, 2002.In August of 2007 she returned to programming as the Program/Artistic Director. She has danced with modern, jazz and dance/theater companies in Boston and the Bay Area since 1984, including Impulse Jazz Dance Company and the Dance Brigade, and has performed both nationally and internationally. Ms. Crowell also co-directs the dance/theater company called i am! Productions, that performs a two-woman show called “Portrait of a Girl from Nowhere... an urban fairy tale”. “Portrait...” explores issues of bi-racial identity, and has toured nationally and to Beijing, China for the 1995 NGO Forum on Women.

Sam Mende-Wong, Project DESTINY Director

Sam started training with Destiny Arts Center at the age of 10 and continued through the end of high school to receive his black-belt. Not only a black belt with Destiny values, Sam is also one of the original Destiny Arts Youth Performance Company members. Sam taught the Teddy Bear class from 1998-2000 and has helped teach workshops on violence prevention and self-defense to youth around the Bay Area. He attended Bard College in upstate New York graduating in 2005 with a degree in Film/Video and Electronic Art. He has returned to the Destiny community to serve as our Project DESTINY Coordinator.

Ellen D. Hamilton, Finance/Human Resource Manager

Ellen began serving as Destiny’s Operations Manager and Volunteer Coordinator in October 2003 and was promoted to Finance/Human Resource Manager in July 2008. Ellen has many years of administrative experience and a background in the arts. Not only the “office diva”, but an aspiring soul singer from East Oakland, Ellen has worked with Bay Area hip-hop group The Attik and toured with bay area dance band Afro-Mystik. While pushing her own dreams into reality, Ellen wishes to help and encourage youth to do the same. Ellen also holds a red/black belt in Tae Kwon Do (Chang-Hon style) and a purple belt in Tae Kwon Do (Taeguek style).

Amikaeyla Proudfoot Gastón-Callender, External Communications Director

A recent transplant to the Bay Area from Washington, DC, she is honored to be the External Communications Director and Music & Movement teacher. For the past 17 years she has done extensive work in the health care arena, and her education & professional focus has been concentrated in the field of Neuroscience and Biopsychology. Her studies with internationally –acclaimed musicians, traditional healers and spiritualists, coupled with her interest in the bio-psychological effects of music has taken her throughout the world appearing on numerous radio and television programs, and recently to India to perform for His Holiness the Dalai Lama at the International Festival of Sacred Chanting and Singing to commemorate the Golden Buddha. She is the founder of the International Healing Arts & Sciences Institute and Children’s Cultural Connection.

Damaliah (Damie) Nazapas, On-site Program Coordinator

Damie is a Bay Area dance teacher who not only educates students in hip-hop technique, but also in the history & music of the genre. Damie has been dancing & performing for over 20 years and teaching since the age of 13. She also has a strong athletic background in basketball and track & field. Her dance experience includes old/new school hip-hop, jazz, house, Caribbean, Polynesian & West African technique. Damie has taught in various studios & recreation centers in the Bay Area.and is the founder & director of the Berkeley-based performance company “BodiRock”. She has performed at various events in the Bay Area including Oakland’s Art & Soul Festival, SF’s Hip-Hop DanceFest and many independent dance productions in Oakland.

Miguel Binion, Office Manager

Miguel has volunteered in various capacities at Destiny Arts since 2003. He was hired on as the office Manager in June 2008. Miguel has worked with kids in every community he’s lived in since he was 13 years old, in youth enpowering organizations such as the YMCA, Camp Any Town USA, Oakland Feather River Camp, Melrose Leadership Academy, Peoples Grocery and he currently volunteers some of his time exercising one of his true passions, coaching Pop Warner Football. Miguel has a lot of loves like writing and recording songs with local recording artists and has hopes of re-igniting his Naked Souls Artist Alliance co-founded by Long time friend Simon Hanukai.