About Wilfred Stephen Anfield

Growing up in my grandmother's classroom in South Carolina.

My journey into community care work began in a place close to my heart: my grandmother's first-grade classroom in South Carolina. There, seated criss-cross applesauce on a rug, I first experienced the joy of watching her students find their words.

I'd spend time with her students each spring break, sitting alongside them as they sounded out words from their favorite books, counted (and ate) jellybeans for math lessons, and shared stories from their lives. That classroom was my first glimpse into the beauty of presence, encouragement, and patience that comes from being part of someone's journey rather than directing it.

Pecan trees taught me patience. Porches taught me how to listen. I'm rooted in Black Southern care, nourished by collard greens, front-porch wisdom, and the unshakeable belief that "y'all" means all.

Pecan trees taught me patience. Porches taught me how to listen.

Two decades in digital marketing before public health and social work.

I didn't take a straight path.

I spent nearly two decades in digital marketing, communications management, and social media, working as an Online Community Manager, Social Media Strategist, Media Analyst, and Consultant. My work spanned tech companies, nonprofits, government agencies, and everything in between.

I learned how to meet people where they are both online and off. I learned that digital tools can connect communities or leave them behind.

Along the way, I learned to ask questions like:

• Who else should be in the room?

• How do we make sure everyone's voice is heard?

Going back to school and stepping into caregiving as an only child.

I went back to school.

Why?

Because I wanted to deepen my ability to serve communities.

While in school, I became the court-appointed guardian, conservator, and caregiver for my mother. Suddenly, I was navigating care systems, legal frameworks, and financial decisions... all while working on completing two graduate degrees.

It was hard. It was clarifying. And it changed the way I see and think about everything.

• Why systems built to serve people so often miss the people they were built for

• What changes when a community designs the solution instead of receiving it

• How lived experience and community wisdom make health work actually work

• Where identity, culture, health, justice, and technology meet

I hold an MPH and an MSW. School taught me how systems are supposed to work.

Caring for my mother as her court-appointed guardian, conservator, and caregiver taught me what those systems do when they meet a real person on a real Tuesday afternoon.

Frameworks from one.

Stakes from the other.

I needed both.

Because of this experience my Mom and I share, disability justice and elder justice anchor how I see everything else, which means I bring trauma-informed ethics into every space meant for care.

I approach opportunities with what I call "mason jar values": clear, grounded, and built to preserve what matters most, even in hard seasons. Like a family recipe passed down through generations, the way I approach family caregiving, accessibility, and participatory design carries the soul of Black Southern care traditions: front-porch conversations that reveal collective wisdom, practical solutions as reliable as well-preserved summer vegetables, and enough room at the table for everyone.

I believe care is infrastructure and should never be an afterthought. The rest follows from there: say it in plain language because clarity is respect, listen to and trust community wisdom as expertise because lived experience is data, and always try to keep a little joy in your pocket because sharing joy is where connection happens. And because joy is highkey fun.

Everything I do still starts the same way it did on that classroom rug: sitting with people, sounding things out, and believing in what's possible when we design with community.