Team

Emira Chavira Chaparro brings more than two decades of experience organizing alongside immigrant families, women, faith communities, and grassroots leaders across Kansas and beyond. Her work is rooted in lived experience, deep listening, and a profound belief in the wisdom of people who are too often unheard.

 

As a co-founder of The Seed House – La Casa de la Semilla, Emira has created healing-centered spaces where women and families impacted by violence, migration, and systemic injustice can reconnect to their power and possibility. Through initiatives like Empowerment Circles and the Citizenship Academy, she has supported hundreds of people in their journeys toward healing, leadership, and civic engagement.

 

Emira has led successful community campaigns, trained emerging leaders, and facilitated retreats and learning spaces locally, nationally, and internationally. Whether working in schools, congregations, or community organizations, she brings a rare combination of strategic skill, cultural wisdom, and compassionate presence.

 

Her work is guided by a simple truth: when people are trusted, supported, and connected, they rise. Emira’s life and leadership reflect that truth every day.

Louis Goseland is a nationally respected organizer, trainer, and movement strategist with more than 20 years of experience building durable community power. 

His work spans faith-based organizing, labor, grassroots electoral engagement, racial justice, and coalition building.

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Louis has helped launch and lead major organizing efforts in Kansas and Illinois and has recruited, trained, and mentored hundreds of grassroots leaders and professional organizers, grounding them in both technical skill and relational leadership.

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Currently he serves as Lead Organizer with Justice Together, an affiliate of the Direct Action Research Training Center where he has been instrumental in forming a broad-based organization rooted in relationship, research, and the power of organized  people. Since 2012, his international training work has supported civil society leaders throughout Central and Eastern Europe.

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Known for his clarity, depth, and steady presence, Louis brings both rigor and heart to organizing. He believes lasting change emerges when people are rooted to their dignity, connected through their dreams and struggles, and supported in the growth of their collective power.

Laura Dungan has spent more than three decades helping communities imagine and build what does not yet exist. An organizer, author, coach, and movement elder, Laura’s work bridges grassroots power-building, inner transformation, and long-term systems change.

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She began organizing in Wichita neighborhoods in the late 1980s, growing small volunteer efforts into statewide organizations with national impact. Over the years, she has led campaigns on housing, immigration, economic justice, and voting rights, while mentoring generations of organizers and leaders.

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Laura co-founded The Seed House – La Casa de la Semilla as a space for healing, leadership development, and deep listening in community. Through her company, Center of Creative Change, she continues to support organizers and changemakers in cultivating sustainability, courage, and spiritual grounding.

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She is the author of The Archer, a novel that traces the inner and outer journey of a community organizer, reflecting her lifelong commitment to telling a deeper story of social change.

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Laura’s leadership is shaped by a conviction that transformation happens when people align their inner lives with their public work. Her role at The Seed House is to tend the long view—holding vision, nurturing relationships, and helping movements grow with soul.