Our Team

Charlotte Duerr James

PLT Founder | Educator | Medicine Woman

Charlotte Duerr James is an Educator and Medicine Woman of Afro-Caribbean and Germanic lineage. She works to create a world in which everyone is able to live in fearless pursuit of their radical transformation. She uses her skills as an educator, therapeutic coach, and ceremonial facilitator to build and engage a community focused on pursuing collective liberation.

Charlotte has been exploring her own mind and spirit with the support of Sacred Earth Medicines for over 15 years. She has completed a traditional apprenticeship with Kambo, and has supported hundreds of community members in ceremony. She graduated summa cum laude from Johns Hopkins University with a BA in Latin American Studies and Anthropology. While studying at JHU, Charlotte interned for the Baltimore CIty Health Department Needle Exchange Program and served as the first Overdose Prevention Coordinator, organizing city-wide Narcan trainings for 3rd party bystanders. Charlotte has lived throughout South America and is a multi-lingual Spanish and Portuguese speaker. She is a lifelong student of the Earth, and is actively continuing her facilitator training through a 3-year certificate program in Transpersonal Psychology, Psychedelic Medicine, and Indigenous Wisdom with the Awe Foundation where she also serves as a program mentor. She has sat in ceremony with elders and medicine keepers of varying traditions and is committed to her ongoing unlearning and relearning process. Charlotte feels that engaging in one’s personal decolonization work is imperative for being an authentic facilitator practicing in integrity, and in service to collective liberation.

Sara Reed

Co-Lead Trainer

Sara Reed is a mental health futurist and has spent her early career reimagining effective mental health care in the medical system. Sara's clinical interests focus on ethical care in psychedelic sessions, examining ways culture informs how we diagnose and treat mental illnesses. Before joining the Centre for Psychedelic Research, Sara participated as a study therapist with the MDMA therapy for PTSD clinical trials sponsored by the Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS). While working with MAPS, she advocated for health equity in psychedelic therapy and co-led the first ever MAPS MDMA-assisted psychotherapy training for clinicians of color. After this study ended, she received training in psilocybin therapy at Yale University for the "Psilocybin-Induced Neuroplasticity in the Treatment of Major Depressive Disorder" trial and co-wrote a paper using Acceptance and Commitment Therapy as a therapeutic modality in this treatment.

In addition to her appointment at Imperial, Sara co-facilitates psilocybin truffle retreats in the Netherlands. She works in private practice with patients with mood and anxiety disorders using ketamine as an adjunct to psychotherapy. Sara lectures on topics fusing culturally sensitive practices with psychedelic-assisted therapy and advises organizations on anti-oppressive and inclusive practices.

Guest Facilitators:

Hanifa Washington

Co-Founder of Fireside Project and One Village Healing

Tony ‘Butterfly’ Pham

Meditation Teacher

Ismael Ali, J.D

Director of Policy and Advocacy at MAPS | Founding Board Member of the Psychedelic Board Association

Ariel Vegosen

Founder of Gender Illumination and Queerdome

Robert “Roman” Haferd

Board Member of Psychedelic Medicine Coalition | Founding Board Member of the Psychedelic Bar Association |Restorative Justice Coordinator

Ariel Clark

Clark Howell LLP, Partner | Founding Board Member of the Psychedelic Bar Association

Aaron Orsini

Founder of Autism on Acid