‍ Leading with Vision, Living with Love ‍

Maria Walker is a wildlife biologist turned social scientist who has applied her academic training to championing community solutions in the nonprofit sector for over thirty years.

As a child sexual abuse survivor, she co-created programs to help adult survivors heal and care for children she may never meet. Maria co-founded the Fairbanks Rescue Mission Recycling Center to transform relationships from combative to connection. She co-founded and served as Executive Director of Converse Hope Center, a nonprofit empowering survivors of domestic violence, sexual assault, and child abuse in Wyoming. She is the Board Chair of Haven House, a nonprofit supporting victims of violence on the Southern Kenai Peninsula of Alaska.

Maria is currently writing Surrender on the Mountain, a memoir about her seven-year search for language to communicate meaning and hold her lived experience in transforming trauma. Surrender is the most recent manifestation of her mission to — love others, as she loves herself.