The Team
We are a woman-owned consulting collective. Our mission is to help leaders maximize their impact in their organizations and the world. We do this working side by side with leaders and teams seeking to center equity in organizational and systemic change. Our team brings over five decades of experience leading systems change and equity building work across public and private sectors.
CEO
Mónica Palacio is the CEO and founder of DEIscovery Partners, a consulting practice that centers equity in organizational change work. She is a social justice worker and advocate, as well as an attorney and executive with 30 years experience in solving complex challenges regarding equity and inclusion. She believes long-term systems change requires a blueprint grounded in addressing historic inequities, building solidarity through liberatory mindsets, and actions that concretely improve the lives of individuals in chronically underserved Black and Brown communities. Mónica began her career as an advocate for youth affected by exposure to the criminal justice system and violence in their communities. After graduating from Georgetown University Law Center where she worked on juvenile justice issues, Mónica led violence prevention work across the U.S. as Training Director for the National Crime Prevention Council (2001-2004). As a trainer and instructor with the National Coalition Building Institute (NCBI) she led coalition building programs to support black and brown community leaders and for ten years she led groundbreaking work on race and identity with Latino leaders. Her anti-racism projects took her from Austin,Texas to Allentown, PA, and from Washington, DC to Santurce, Puerto Rico and Belo Horizonte, Brazil. As a civil rights lawyer, Mónica led the DC Office of Human rights, one of the largest and most successful agencies of its kind. Her team successfully resolved and investigated hundreds of cases of discrimination based on twenty traits covered by District of Columbia anti-discrimination statutes. Her pioneering work includes ensuring over thirty local government agencies met compliance goals and improved services to District of Columbia residents with limited English proficiency, expanding services for transgender women of color, and greater protections and resources for returning citizens ready to build new lives in their communities. Mónica was born in Bogota, Colombia and arrived in New York City in 1973 with her parents, newly arrived immigrants seeking to build a new future. She received her undergraduate degree from Fordham University before moving to Washington, DC to attend law school. She is dedicated to lifelong learning, loves salsa dancing and sitting around fire pits singing songs with her friends. She is a proud mother and lives in Washington, DC with her two sons, her husband and their pets Uma the dog and Bob the turtle.
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Senior Partner
Dahlia Aguilar is a Senior Partner with DEIscovery Partners. Using transformational vehicles for change with liberatory design DEIscovery Partners supports organizations with deep and important change in the workplace, equipping them to lead anti racism work. Dahlia’s work in building equitable environments began as a response to dismantling inequities in her classroom as a school teacher, then grew to change efforts in schools and systems. Now in her role as an executive coach, designer and trainer, she helps organizations build their capacity to see how their ecosystem is yielding the outcomes they desire, to understand how their stakeholders and constituents are affected by their practices, and to help deepen their ability to institute lasting, transformational change. Dahlia has worked in regional and national organizations in the education, non-profit, philanthropic and private sectors to support efforts focused on diversity, equity, inclusion and belonging and has supported using frameworks of equity by design and effective change management to support their efforts. Throughout her career, she has focused on building work environments that center equity and function as learning organizations. Dahlia brings over 25 years leading, coaching, and training to the DEI space. Over her career, Dahlia has provided job-embedded training in building professional learning communities with a focus on conflict resolution, building mutual trust and deepening racial literacy. She has provided training on change management, libratory design and the role of trauma and healing in teaching and learning. Prior to beginning her work as a Senior Partner with DEIscovery Partners, Dahlia worked as a founding executive of Mundo Verde Bilingual Public Charter School where she served as the Chief Schools Officer and principal of the school from 2010-2021. Before joining Mundo Verde, Dahlia taught in District of Columbia Public schools and Texas Public Schools. As well she joined Unidos US as the Director of Teaching and Learning where she provided technical assistance and professional development to community based organizations in developing educational models. Dahlia Aguilar earned her Bachelor degree in English from Georgetown University, her Masters Degree in Curriculum and Instruction from Texas A&M University-CC, and her Masters in Educational Leadership from Trinity University-DC through New Leaders for New Schools, an urban principal training fellowship. Grounded in racially, culturally and linguistically diverse communities she has worked with adult learners in the charter, public school and non-profit sectors. Her community engagement has included advocacy for immigrant rights, language rights and the promulgation of language education. She was born in El Paso Texas, reared in Corpus Christi and now lives in Washington, DC with her son, two dogs and her garden’s harvest. She provides group training, and individual coaching for equity and social justice in English and Spanish.
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Senior Advisor
Dr. Manjarrez is a seasoned evaluator and program manager with over 25 years of federal government and social sector experience. Trained as an urban planner, he specializes in community-informed action research, evaluation of place-based initiatives and the development of monitoring systems for federal and state grant programs. Prior to joining DEIscovery Partners, he held positions in the housing policy group at the Urban Institute and served as the founding director of two policy research centers in federal agencies. In addition to his consulting practice, Dr. Manjarrez teaches graduate-level urban planning courses in Community Informatics, Cities and Special Populations, and Housing Inequality. Carlos has a BA from the University of Michigan and a PhD from University of Maryland.
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Project Manager
Megan is a project manager at DEIscovery Partners. She is a bilingual Returned Peace Corps Volunteer with 5+ years of project management and program coordination experience. Her portfolio of work is diverse and multifaceted: spanning 3 continents and incorporating skills and experience in education, international volunteerism, public and non-profit spheres. She has developed expertise in cross-cultural and intergenerational communication competence, writing and research, education, and data management. Megan began her career post Peace Corps service, where she mentored Mayan youth in the western highlands of Guatemala. She later became a program manager for a nonprofit that provided mentors to migrant youth. After her graduate studies, she worked in program coordination for Amnesty International’s grassroots and youth programs. She holds a master's degree in Intercultural Communication with a specialization in Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion training, and a focus on conflict resolution. Megan is a compassionate activist, advocate, visionary, writer, lifelong learner, and teacher who believes in the power of people of color, women and girls, and humanity in the margins to transform our world. She is new to DC and was born in Albuquerque, NM. She is a Chicana, a desert woman, a daughter, a sister, an auntie. In her free time, find her volunteering at the foodbank, on her yoga mat, or in front of her sewing machine, creating funky garments.
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