Elaine Miller-Karas was born in San Francisco. Her mother was born in El Salvador and
her father was born in Montana and they met after World War II. She is a social worker and her international work has taken her to the Philippines, Haiti, Kenya, Guatemala, Canada, Mexico, Thailand, China and many places within the United States in the aftermath of natural and man-made disasters. She has created projects to help underserved individuals and communities learn innovative biological based interventions that help build trauma-informed and resiliency-informed communities. Her hope is that by increasing resiliency we can reduce behaviors that come from unresolved trauma, such as family and societal violence.