Sankofa Village Welcomes You
WELCOME
Welcome to Sankofa Village — a healing community rooted in culture, compassion, and collective empowerment.
We are a 501(c)(3) nonprofit dedicated to creating accessible, culturally grounded mental health and wellness spaces for Black, Queer, Trafficked, and marginalized communities.
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Through our digital programs, community support groups, and our long-term vision for a land-based therapeutic wellness village, we are building a model of healing that reconnects people to themselves, to each other, and to the wisdom of our ancestors.
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This is where healing, culture, and community come home.
Discover Healing and Transformation
Welcome to Sankofa Village
Discover healing and transformation through Sankofa Village, a place created to honor the fullness of who you are and who you are becoming. Here, healing is not something you earn. It is something you return to. The Village is rooted in African diasporic wisdom and guided by a belief that every person deserves access to care that reflects their identity, culture, and lived experience.
Sankofa Village offers a model of wellness that helps people reconnect with the parts of themselves the world taught them to hide. ​Our programs are designed to meet the needs of individuals and communities who have historically been overlooked in traditional systems of care. Whether through our Healing Circles, our digital conversations that bring mental health into everyday language, or the late-night insight and humor of Ask, Dr. Moana, we create spaces where people feel seen, affirmed, and supported.
Sankofa Village brings together clinical excellence, expressive creativity, movement, land-based healing, and community connection in a way that feels both timeless and urgently needed.​ Discover what becomes possible when you enter a space built for liberation, authenticity, and the journey back to yourself. Discover Sankofa Village.
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Our Founder
Dr. Joel Marc Filmore, EdD, LCPC, LPC, LCMHC LMHC
I am a storyteller who has lived every chapter I write.
My life has been a collision of extremes — the darkness of survival and the light of transformation. I’ve been a professor, a licensed therapist, and a Doctor of Counseling with over 20 years in the field. I’ve trained future healers, researched what breaks us, and sat across from thousands of people fighting their way back from the edge.
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I’ve also been the one on the edge:
I’ve been homeless. I’ve walked the streets in high heels to survive. I’ve been addicted to crack and heroin, trafficked for sex, locked in the cycle of survival and scarcity until prison became my pause button. It was there, in a concrete cell, that I decided my story wasn’t going to end as a cautionary tale. I applied to college from prison and never stopped moving forward until I became the person I was always meant to be.
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Now, I live in two worlds. The healing world of Sankofa Village and the outside world that tried to break me, confuse me, and dim my light. There is no reality where life is perfect, where pain does not exist, and where people don't invariably fail you. The Sankofa Village way is healing, growth, and maturity that allows you to live above the chaos of the outside world.
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I hope that Sankofa Village can be for you, what it is to me, a sanctuary of hope and healing, a respite in a storm, and a lighthouse to show you the way.
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All Love and All Healing,
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dr. joel
Contact Us
Reach out if you have questions, are interested in volunteer opportunities, would like to donate, or simply to say 'Hi'!
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