Empowering Women through BJJ
WOMENS JIU-JITSU ALLIANCE
Empowering women to be the best version of themselves through BJJ since 2018
The Women's Jiu-Jitsu Alliance (WJJA) is a movement focused on bringing awareness and empowerment to the female community through jiu-jitsu. The alliance is made up of primarily female-owned companies that share similar missions with a common goal to bring more women into the art and sport of jiu-jitsu to provide a healthy environment and be fully involved with the growth of the community. Scroll down to meet our founding alliance members.
Our Story
Mission
The mission of the Women’s Jiu-Jitsu Alliance (WJJA) is to unite and empower women by providing support, fairness, and equal opportunities within the Brazilian Jiujitsu community therefore enabling females of any age to be the best versions of themselves.
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Vision
The vision of the Womens Jiu-Jitsu Alliance (WJJA) is to create a safe, encouraging, healthy environment within the Jiu-Jitsu community to promote, recruit, thrive, and provide a stage for continuous growth regardless of demographics, school affiliation, or innate identity, by providing seminars, tournaments, expositions, programs, conventions, retreats, and other avenues that will successfully raise awareness to our mission and platform for women to build self-worth and empowerment throughout their communities.
Founding alliance members and WJJA board members:
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Elevate Jiu Jitsu Mag
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Warrior Forged Project
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Masters Women (TAP)
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”My goal in forming the WJJA was to unite the efforts of complementary organizations who share the desire to expose all women to jiu jitsu and provide equal opportunities for women to excel within the sport. When we combine efforts, our impact multiplies, for the benefit of women of all ages.”
Nicole Farmer Houle
Founder
WJJA STORE
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Meet The Team
STACEY COUNCILMAN
CO-FOUNDER, PRESIDENT
Stacey's mission and passion in life since 2015 has been about self defense education. She founded the Warrior Forged Project (WFP) in 2015 to inspire and empower women, teens, families and children, to courageously fight through life’s battles, teaching them mental and physical life skills and how to obtain a healthy lifestyle through the use of self defense and martial arts. She actively studies various combat sports, is proficient with weapons, a motivational speaker and is a brown belt in jiu-jitsu, 4x Master World Champion, and ranked #1 in Master 3 in 2021 and 2022. She is also a black belt in Kung Fu and an advanced civilian/law enforcement/military Krav Maga instructor. She uses her combined combat skillsets to provide free self defense seminars across the country. Her program at WFP goes well beyond teaching physical tactical techniques and includes critical education on preparedness, awareness and avoidance.
In 2021, Stacey join forces with Lindsey Hedlund, and they created what is now Hero Self Defense, LLC / Mean Girl Project.
LINDSEY HEDLUND
Vice President
Lindsey started training at age 34 and immediately fell in love with jiu jitsu as a sport and for self-defense. She paved the way at her school as the only competitive adult female and the first female to earn her purple belt. In 2021, she launched a women’s only self-defense program known as Mean Girl Jiu Jitsu, which encouraged ladies to cast aside all stereotypes and risk of being labelled in order to protect their own safety and well-being. In 2022, Lindsey added Krav Maga and MMA training to her schedule and became a certified instructor with Warrior Forged Project, along with still training and competing in BJJ. Jiu jitsu has helped Lindsey to acknowledge her worth and become more resilient in all aspects of her life. She believes that every woman would benefit from training and truly treasures the jiu jitsu community!
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Original Founders
Nicole Farmer Houle
Founder
Nicole has been a passionate and vocal contributor to driving support for women in jiu-jitsu for over 10 years. She has been developing this concept of unifying efforts through alliances to support women of all ages in jiu-jitsu, and beyond the sport. Her goal is to educate and empower women to be the best versions of themselves for their own safety, equality, and livelihood. Nicole is cofounder of Elevate Jiu Jitsu Mag, an online magazine dedicated to supporting women on and off the mats. She is the owner of Elevate Event Services which runs personal and corporate event and trade show services and is founder of Embody meal services for healthy living. She has a purple belt in jiu-jitsu.
DIANE MAIER
Founder
Diane has spent a lifetime training and competing in a range of sports most notably gymnastics and jiu-jitsu. Her passion for health and wellness extends into what is best for the body and mind and how combat sports fitness translates into business. Managing fight or flight responses and how to draw on them to make decisions. As a marketer and business coach, she also donates her time to support various nonprofit and small business passion projects such as Secretary for the Women’s Jiu-Jitsu Alliance and Consultant for Elevate Jiu Jitsu Mag. She has a purple belt in jiu-jitsu.
KAREN PETERS
Founder
Karen is well known for her fight for equality in jiu-jitsu for women through her formation of her Masters Womens group TAP which stands for Together All Powerful. Karen, with the support of Carlos Melo, rallied the female jiu-jitsu community to support the need for equal divisions in the IBJJF. After a widespread petition gained the attention of the IBJJF in 2018, they approved masters divisions for women be equivalent to that of men and a new era was born. Karen continues to drive change and support for masters women by guiding this emerging and quickly growing group of individuals in the sport of jiu-jitsu. Karen studied at the California School of Professional Psychology, Berkeley/Alameda and has a brown belt in jiu-jitsu.