Women, Life & Freedom – Feminine Voices from the Fertile Crescent

Dr. Rola Hallam is an award-winning doctor, trauma-informed life coach, speaker, social entrepreneur, and humanitarian. She has been honored with several awards, is the first Syrian TED Fellow and founder of CanDo – a humanitarian organization supporting frontline health and aid workers to save children’s lives in their war-devastated communities. She has helped to build 7 hospitals in Syria, including the first ever crowdfunded hospital. Her latest TEDX talk “From Clever to Wise – How healing our traumas heals the world” shares what Rola’s mission is about.

Spozhmay Oriya is currently a PhD student in Simon Fraser University in Canada. She has a BA in psychology and MA in education. She was an assistant professor at faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences, Kabul University from 2007-2021 and has been teaching psychology courses. She has been with the Counseling Department at Kabul University for seven years. She conducted some research on mental health and traumatic experiences, and her research interest is in collective trauma field.

Kosha Joubert serves as CEO of the Pocket Project. She holds an MSc in Organisational Development, is an international facilitator, author, coach and consultant, and has worked extensively in the fields of sustainable development, curriculum development and intercultural collaboration. Kosha grew up in South Africa under Apartheid and has been dedicated to the healing of divides and collective trauma ever since. Kosha has received the Dadi Janki Award for engaging spirituality in life and work and the One World Award for her work with the Global Ecovillage Network. She serves as host and mentor on Thomas’ online courses, co-moderated two Celebrate Life Festivals and was a co-host of the 2019 and 2020 Online Summit on Collective Trauma.​