Meet the Team

In 2014, a mother-daughter duo became the founding team of The Global Sunrise Project, joining together in an ambitious mission.

  • Kasha Sequoia Slavner is an award-winning Gen-Z documentary filmmaker, and founder of The Global Sunrise Project. At 16, she left school for a year, to travel the world, in production on her first feature film, The Sunrise Storyteller.

    The film premiered at the United Nations Commission on the Status of Women in 2017, and has screened at 61 film festivals, garnering 31 awards, some of which include: “Best Documentary” at Carmarthen Bay BAFTA Awards Qualifying Festival, “Rising Star Filmmaker” at Colorado International Activism Film Festival, the “Golden Jury Prize, Youth Visions” at the Social Justice Film Festival, Seattle.

    Kasha has also been a photographer, entrepreneur, educator and social justice advocate for over a decade, as well as a writer, public speaker and contributor to several publications, including National Geographic Learning.

    Kasha was selected as the first recipient of the Kim Phuc Youth Peace Prize. In 2019, she was the recipient of the Diana Award and is one of the Wonder Grantees for Sustainability by the Shawn Mendes Foundation.

    She has also been awarded the Pathfinders for Peaceful, Just and Inclusive Societies Trailblazer, Cloud-9 Festival Young Changemakers Award, and Peace Catalysts International Rick Love Young Innovators for Peace Award, Pathways to Peace Exceptional Young Woman Women of Peace Award, as well as a 2x Basel Pacey Award Finalist + more.

    Kasha is an accredited expert with the Women’s Media Centre. Her work has been featured in CTV news, CBC news, Vogue Photo, Elle Magazine, Thred, and National Geographic learning among many other publications.

    Kasha is a frequent UN Youth delegate as well as an Alumni and Ambassador of several youth leadership networks, including Global Changemakers, We Are Family Foundation, Youthtopia, Yunus & Youth, Youth for TPNW, Artists for Stop Ecocide, Earth Prize Foundation, and the United Nations Office of Disarmament Affairs Leaders4Tomorrow.

    Her second feature documentary “1.5 Degrees of Peace”, currently in production, is fiscally sponsored by The Redford Center in the USA . The trailer for the film won 1st prize at the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Foundation (Switzerland) 2022 film festival and 2nd prize with the Art Partners #CreateCop28 which was featured in Atmos Earth’s Next Generation of Climate Storytellers to Watch

  • Marla Slavner’s passion and commitment to caring & making the world a better place has seen her participation at the community, government & board levels advocating for youth, education, peace, environment, arts & literacy, access to justice, elimination of violence against women & girls, human rights issues. She is an entrepreneur with unbridled catalyst energy and creative vision and was the founding director of the International Children’s Art Foundation, which was recognized as an official NGO under the World Decade for Cultural Development by UNESCO.

    In addition, Marla has facilitated restorative peace-building circles to help divert youth from the criminal justice system, is a trained facilitator in trauma and transformational healing with the Capacitar World Network, as well as an accredited family court support worker for victims of abuse.

    Marla worked as an independent media, publishing & sponsorship consultant for over 25 years before she stepped into the role of Producer with The Global Sunrise Project, a media impact hub founded by her daughter Kasha.

Meet Our Partners

We’ve had some incredible collaborators and supporters on our journey.