ABOUT

THE DADS

A national community of fathers choosing love over fear—together.

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WHO WE ARE 

The Dads Foundation is a national nonprofit dedicated to uplifting and supporting fathers of transgender, nonbinary, and gender-expansive youth.

What began as a small circle of dads searching for connection has grown into a movement—one that centers love, courage, vulnerability, and the stories of fathers showing up for their children in a rapidly shifting cultural landscape. 

Founded in 2024, The Dads Foundation offers year-round programs, multi-city events, storytelling platforms, and an annual retreat that brings fathers together to learn, grow, and build lifelong bonds. We are filmmakers, organizers, advocates, and community builders working to change what people believe is possible for families like ours.

Person holding a transgender pride flag against a blue sky with some clouds.

OUR BELIEF

Every child deserves a world where they are safe, affirmed, and free to thrive. And every father deserves a community that has their back as they learn how to protect that freedom—at home, at school, and in public life

MEET THE DADS

  • A professional Black man in a white shirt, striped tie, and gray vest standing with arms crossed in front of a bookshelf.

    Stephen Chukumba 

    Founder & Executive Director 

    Stephen is the founder and Executive Director of The Dads Foundation and a father of four, including his transgender son, Hobbes. Featured in The Dads, Stephen has become a nationally recognized advocate, storyteller, and organizer working at the intersection of fatherhood, gender justice, and community care. His leadership centers the voices of fathers while building sustainable spaces for connection, healing, and action. 

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    Alex Polotsky 

    Board Member 

    Alex is the father of Sky and joined The Dads in 2023. A lifelong advocate for the transgender community, Alex draws on his lived experience as a queer adult to inform and strengthen his work with the organization. He brings a strategic, steady hand to The Dads, leveraging his project management expertise to help organize, support, and grow the administrative team, ensuring the work behind the scenes is as strong and intentional as the community it serves.

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    Wayne Maines 

    Board Member, Emeritus 

    Wayne is the father of a transgender daughter and superhero, Nicole Maines, and a founding member of The Dads. A lifelong advocate for his child and others, Wayne brings wisdom, compassion, and steady leadership to the Board. His journey has helped shape the Foundation’s emphasis on peer support and authentic storytelling. 

  • A man with dark hair and a big smile, wearing a black shirt, sitting indoors with warm lighting and wooden walls in the background.

    Frank Gonzales 

    Board Member

    Frank is the father of a transgender daughter, Libby, and one of the original fathers whose story helped spark The Dads. His leadership reflects the courage it takes to grow, listen, and show up fully for one’s child—and for other fathers still finding their way.

  • A man with short dark hair, beard, and mustache, smiling, wearing a colorful plaid shirt, standing against a plain white wall.

    Chris Dakes

    Board Member 

    Chris has spent his career leading change initiatives that advance inclusive learning environments and humanize the way technical disciplines are taught in higher education. A lifelong learner, Chris credits his three adult children—all of whom are LGBTQ—with teaching him some of his most meaningful lessons about empathy, courage, and community. His goal is to engage and inspire people to build communities that strengthen our health, quality of life, and collective harmony—places where everyone can truly thrive.

OUR BOARD

Our leadership is deeply personal.

It has been shaped in late-night conversations, around shared meals, on long walks, and on quiet mornings by the water.

It has been forged in moments when we chose love over fear, presence over silence, and courage over comfort. That lived experience continues to guide our work. 

The Board of Directors of The Dads Foundation is made up of the original fathers featured in the Emmy®-Award-winning Netflix documentary The Dads. But long before there was a film, or a foundation, there was a shared understanding between us: that the story being told about transgender children—and about the families who love them—was incomplete, distorted, and too often rooted in fear. 

We found one another at a moment when each of us was reckoning with what it meant to be the father of a transgender or gender-expansive child in a world determined to misunderstand them. What began as vulnerability became connection.

What began as private fear became collective resolve. We recognized that fathers needed spaces of our own—spaces grounded in honesty, strength, accountability, and love—where we could ask hard questions, unlearn what we’d been taught, and grow into the fathers our children needed us to be. 

Each of us has lived the arc of this journey: the uncertainty, the fear of getting it wrong, the weight of stigma and shame imposed by others, and the profound transformation that comes from choosing affirmation over avoidance. We know what it feels like to love a child fiercely while navigating systems and narratives that tell us we shouldn’t. And we also know the power that is unleashed when fathers decide not to shrink back, but to step forward. 

We serve on this Board because we believe our stories matter—not as spectacle, but as invitation. By sharing them openly, we hope to empower other fathers to loosen the shackles of fear, embarrassment, doubt, and isolation, and to step fully into active support and advocacy for their children. We want fathers to see what is possible when love is practiced out loud.  

We remain accountable to the community we serve because we are that community. Our commitment is simple and unwavering: to help other fathers embrace, affirm, and protect their children—and in doing so, to help rewrite the narrative around transgender kids and the families who stand beside them.