The Aspire Group

Alan W. Goff is a group facilitator specializing in dialogue, training and development, and action planning for equity and justice. Through powerful listening circles, engaging workshops, and heartfully facilitated group processes, Alan channels the power of deep listening to foster understanding, build connection, promote healing, and strengthen alliances. He works with educators, students, community leaders, and a wide-range of groups and organizations that desire to build connected, inclusive, and just communities. 

 

Alan is trained and practiced in a range of group facilitation and dialogue approaches, including ToP Facilitation Methods through the Institute for Cultural Affairs, and the practice of Council through the Center for Council. He holds an M.Ed. in Social Justice Education from the University of Massachusetts Amherst, where he specialized in the theory, design, and facilitation of Intergroup Dialogue. He is a PhD student in Urban Schooling at the University of California, Los Angeles, where his work explores healing-centered approaches to professional development in education. 

 

Alan was born and raised in Los Angeles, of Belizean Kriol and African American heritage. He is the proud son of Alice Goff, a long-time civil servant, labor leader, and rights activist whose work first sparked and continues to inspire his drive for justice. Alan finds joy in learning about and celebrating world culture - including music, dance, language, and cuisine. He engages this passion through his professional hobbies of folkloric dance, (planning for) world travel, and building community with friends, ideally over plates of homemade food."