Reva Navah
Retreats Program Director
Reva Navah (she/her) is an earth steward, mother, teacher, dancer, and community builder. Her background spans many communities, classrooms, and landscapes.
Reva has taught middle school language arts and social studies, organized food justice partnerships at Second Harvest Food Bank in Santa Cruz County, convened water policy gatherings with the Association of Monterey Bay Area Governments, and led international service-learning trips with American Jewish World Service partnering with communities in Uganda, Mexico, and Guatemala. She supported environmental research and donor cultivation at the Arava Institute for Environmental Studies, working across borders in Jordan, Palestine, and Israel, and served as Executive Director and choreographer for Walking Elephant Theatre Company, a documentary children’s theater.
After graduating from Cal Poly Humboldt with a degree in International Studies with a focus on Globalization and the Environment, Reva earned a MA in International Sustainable Development from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies and a Multiple Subject Teaching Credential from Hebrew Union College.
On Staff Since: 2021 Email Phone: x103
In Their Own Words
Why My Work Matters:
Movement-building organizations carry some of the most urgent work of our time, yet many of the people doing this work are separated from the land by urban environments and the relentless pressures of modern life, including working remotely, disconnected from the earth, their teams, and, often, from themselves.
My work matters because retreats done well transform people, organizations, and the strategies and campaigns working towards a Just Transition. At OAEC, we create that space through hands-on time in the gardens, walks of the land, shared meals grown from the land, storytelling, and opportunities to connect to this gorgeous place. I am deeply honored to host change makers here, and so grateful for the opportunity to support retreat groups in becoming more connected, to each other and to the land, carrying that rootedness back into their work in the world. It is truly inspiring and a gift to support and host movement-building organizations at OAEC.
My work at OAEC:
As the Retreats Program Director for movement-building groups advancing social and environmental justice, I bring together authentic presence, deep listening, and intentional retreat design to help groups flourish during their time at OAEC. My work integrates movement building, environmental justice, experiential education, radical hospitality, and land-based practice.
Central to my approach is the practice of Radical Hospitality that reorients space and hosting around care, dignity, and belonging. Land is not a backdrop in this work but an active participant and retreat design attends to place, story, seasonality, and beauty, inviting participants into deeper listening with the earth to inform their collective work.
My Passions:
I love many forms of movement and dance, especially Afro-Brazilian dance and Reggaeton, along with roller skating, hiking, and playing in the waves. Outside of work, you’ll also find me gardening, cooking and pickling seasonally, and singing showtunes at the top of my lungs. As a Body Tales practitioner, I’m deeply committed to the wisdom of the body, all while passionately raising two beautiful, spirited boys.
