Zenique Gardner Perry

Zenique Gardner Perry is a writer, educator, and community organizer dedicated to helping organizations and individuals cultivate diverse and equitable spaces that prevent the further marginalization of Black and Brown people, our Indigenous and immigrant communities, and those who have been impacted by incarceration. With a creative and relational approach to anti-racism and anti-oppression work, Zenique integrates media and literature, encouraging introspection through journal-writing prompts and thoughtful dialogue. She is also a strong advocate for affinity groups and caucuses—providing white people with a space to acknowledge and address their own racism without shame while offering Black folks and people of color a setting to process harm and practice healing, free from the white gaze.

 

An East St. Louis native, Zenique began her advocacy for diversity and inclusion in Philadelphia, PA, where she worked as an organizer for The Urban League of Philadelphia. Since returning to St. Louis in 2015, she has been actively involved in interpersonal and community-based violence prevention efforts across the nonprofit and public sectors. She worked with schools throughout the region as the Prevention Education Manager at Safe Connections and later led the Youth Safe Spaces Initiative as Project Director for the St. Louis Area Violence Prevention Commission. Currently, Zenique collaborates with Safe Streets Safe Neighborhoods and the St. Louis City Office of Violence Prevention to support victims of gun violence.

 

Zenique holds an MFA from Washington University in St. Louis and a BA in English from Eastern University in Pennsylvania. She and her husband, Jermar Perry, live in South St. Louis with their family of humans and animals.