Empowered Movement Lead Instructor Rachel Collins has worked in the violence prevention field since 2009, beginning as a feminist activist, working as an educator on sexual/reproductive health and healthy relationships curriculum in middle and high schools, and eventually becoming a sexual assault and domestic violence crisis line responder and community advocate. Since discovering the potential of empowerment-based self-defense to reduce sexual violence, she has devoted her career to making ESD and martial arts accessible to women and girls.

She has been an empowerment self-defense instructor since 2014, and currently studies Krav Maga, Boxing and Kickboxing, Wrestling, Jiu-Jitsu, and mixed martial arts as an amateur MMA competitor.