Chairman and Teaching Interface (Auckland)

John worked as a public servant and policy consultant for two decades before training as a yoga teacher.

He takes classes in two prisons, as well as regular teaching in corporates and a local yoga studio.

When not teaching yoga, John coordinates volunteers to provide literacy tuition and other programmes to prisoners, is chair of the board of a tertiary education provider and attempts to parent his teenage son.

Founder

Adhyatma is one of the co-founders of YEPT and has taught in various prisons since 2007. She has spent many years seeing through the everyday administration of the trust, correspondence, trustee and management teams meetings, supervision for teachers and volunteers, newsletter editing, fundraising, grant applications and maintaining relationships with supporters.

She works passionately for the vision to establish free yoga and meditation classes in all prisons in NZ and to support released prisoners once they are back out in our community, and to make the work sustainable for the teachers.

Trustee

Adele joins us from a 12 year career in public relations spanning corporate, public sector and not-for-profit. Moreso, she’s a dedicated yogi, teacher, and teacher of teachers. She discovered yoga in her mid-twenties when she was suddenly diagnosed with advanced stage bowel cancer.

Suddenly her world as she knew it was no more, and it was when she was bed-ridden trying to navigate her way through chemotherapy that she first explored yoga in the form of meditation and breath-work. Yoga has been a daily part of her life since. It had such a powerful impact on her that it compelled her to teach, and she completed her first teacher training eight years ago.

Adele’s big dream is to run teacher training programs in prisons.

Trustee

Jasmin has a rich and diverse background in yoga with her primary focus in Classical Hatha & Tantra. She lived, trained and taught for several years of full immersion in Ashrams, Centres and Monasteries in India, Nepal, Canada and New Zealand.

Being a free-spirited yogi for so many years, Jasmin surprised many, but mostly herself, when she moved back to her hometown for love, got married and had two beautiful children.

Jasmin loves to share yoga with people from all walks of life. She weaves a synthesis of Yoga into her classes, combining asana, pranayama, mindfulness + meditation, philosophy, chanting, mudra and mantra to summon magic into the moment.

As well as being a board member with YEPT, Jasmin teaches at Milton Prison and Studio Tula, and offers workplace yoga, workshops, courses and one – to – ones privately. She also works as a consultant in the areas of strategy, sustainability and ethics.

Trustee
Ko te uri ahau o Ngāi Tūhoe, o Rongowhakaata, o Ngāti Porou.

Amy is a descendant of the Tūhoe, Rongowhakaata and Ngāti Pōrou tribes.

Throughout her years of awakening, Amy kept looking for the intersections between Classical Hatha & Tantra and her own culture of te ao Māori.

A pathway of dedicated practice has led Amy from training teachers at Kawai Purapura Yoga School to working inside Hawkes Bay Regional Prison as a Pou Arahi, where she provides cultural and spiritual support.

Holding space for healing within the prison is a stunning everyday experience and Amy hopes to offer meaningful service to the Yoga Education in Prisons Trust with the insight she brings from this mahi.

He aroha whakatō, he aroha puta mai.

If love is sewn, then love you shall receive.

Finance Officer

Heather had worked and volunteered in the Not-for-Profit sector, including youth work, disabilities, and the arts here at home and overseas, alongside a small business background. I live on a rural lifestyle block with my family, 2 dogs, 13 sheep, and 7 chickens in semi-retirement from the busyness of the world.

She gardens, plant trees and volunteers for a heritage and two environmental organizations, and weaves (raranga) in a local artist and crafters collective.

Working with YEPT as Finance Officer allows Heather to contribute to the well-being of people through this wonderful modality of yoga, meditation, and awareness.

General Manager Yoga Education in Prisons Trust

Wanting to go deeper with her yoga practice, Gemma undertook Yoga Teacher Training with zero interest in teaching yoga. Until, she thought about which part of the community might be underserved with yoga and meditation education. This thinking brought her to teach yoga in a women’s prison in Auckland, and to the Yoga Education in Prisons Trust.

That was in 2014 and today, she works as a General Manager with the YEPT utilising her Marketing Communications Skills, to bring more inner awareness, and the gift of yoga to people in prison.