Gennessa Fisher
Gennessa Fisher is one of Kern County’s strongest advocates for utilizing youths’ perspectives to create change within the foster care and homeless systems. Drawing from her lived experience of homelessness and foster care, Gennessa acts as the Bakersfield-Kern Regional Homeless Collaborative’s Youth Action Board Chair and serves on the Collaborative’s Governing Board. She is deeply committed to working in partnership with schools and community partners to develop strategic solutions to end youth homelessness. Gennessa currently works as a Peer Support Specialist at the Kern County Superintendent of Schools Office. She is very passionate about working with young people on a daily basis at the Dream Center, a foster youth outreach center, and seeks out any opportunity to help them recognize their awesomeness.

Brian Johnson
As a former foster youth, a foster youth advocate, and a foster parent, Brian Johnson has a unique perspective about the impact of foster care on the lives of children and youth. Brian joined the Kern County Superintendent of Schools Office in 2022 as a Peer Support Specialist at the Dream Center. Each day, he ensures that foster youth and homeless youth have a voice and the services they need overcome barriers to education, employment, and housing. Brian believes that by getting to know a foster youth’s story can grow our understanding of their foster care journey. Outside of the office, Brian, for the past five years, has been a devoted foster parent walking children through traumatic times and helping them to better succeed in life.