New Faces: TaRessa Stovall Joins RARE’s Board of Directors

TaRessa Stovall

TaRessa Stovall was born in Seattle, Washington when much of the country was racially segregated and her parents’ marriage was illegal in 16 states, and grew up in Seattle’s pre-gentrified Central Area. She attended Seward Elementary School, Temple De Hirsch (Sinai) Hebrew School, Meany Middle School, then was bussed to Jane Addams Middle School and Roosevelt High School. An alumnus of Black Arts / West and Oscar Productions Film School, she attended the University of Washington and graduated from The Evergreen State College with a B.A. in Multimedia Communications.

An author from the age of seven, TaRessa has written several poems, books, and plays on various topics, including racial identity and the impact of colorism on People of Color. Her books include SWIRL GIRL: Coming of Race in the USA – a memoir of growing up Mixed; A Love Supreme: Real-Life Stories of Black Love, portraits of 20 couples, with a foreword by Ruby Dee, and featured on Oprah’s “In the Spirit”; The Hot Spot, a novel; and The Buffalo Soldiers, a children’s book.

TaRessa is humbled and grateful to have been mentored by Seattle leaders including Elmer Dixon and the Seattle Chapter of the Black Panther Party, Larry Gossett, Dr. Rosetta Hunter, Ron Chew, Dean Wong, Terry Morgan, Dr. W. Joye Hardiman, Dr. Maxine Mimms, Nate Long,  and Coleen McElroy.

TaRessa now makes her home in Atlanta, GA, although her ties to Seattle are strong. In addition to her writing, TaRessa currently produces blogs at Mixed Auntie Confidential, found on Spotify. Her background includes diversity awareness, marketing, communications, multi-platform content creation and customer relations and service. TaRessa is an invigorating, engaged member of the Open Discussions team at RARE, as well as serving on the Board of Directors.