Boldly Go team

Lindsay Broyhill has over a decade of experience leading and executing strategies for organizations serving children, women, and families in the U.S. Prior to joining Boldly Go, Lindsay was the director of a strategic family foundation investing in child and family health in North Carolina, where she led strategic planning, program management, and communications strategies with the president and founder.

Lindsay enjoys finding high-impact opportunities at the intersection of philanthropy, policy, practice, and communications. She previously managed communications and supported fundraising and grantmaking at Ascend, a policy program at the Aspen Institute focused on building intergenerational cycles of prosperity for families in the U.S. Prior to the Aspen Institute, she held roles at management and communications consulting firms, where she supervised and supported projects for early childhood education, K-12 public education, and public health and financial federal agencies. Lindsay started her career raising funds and awareness for the largest child care provider for families with low incomes in New England.

Lindsay holds a bachelor’s degree in Sociology from Cornell University. She was born and raised in North Carolina, and enjoys spending time outdoors and thrifting for antique artwork.

Ryder Buttry has over 5 years of experience in the nonprofit and philanthropic sectors, holding various roles overseeing communications, fundraising, and grantmaking strategy. Ryder was formerly the Director of Strategic Programs and Initiatives at the Women’s Foundation of Arkansas where she led the design and launch of multiple programs including the Tjuana Byrd Summer Internship Program and the Women’s Economic Mobility Hub, both of which aimed to address economic disparities for women of color in the state.

Ryder has also worked as an analyst at the Government Accountability Office and an independent consultant providing advisory, research and grant writing services to universities, foundations, and nonprofits. Ryder received her Master of Public Policy from Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy and her Bachelor of Arts in Journalism from Texas Christian University. She currently resides in Dallas, TX and enjoys reading, needlepointing, and trying new restaurants with friends in her freetime.

Teresa Crawford has been deeply rooted in the nonprofit sector for more than 30 years. Her early career was spent in the Health and Human Services and Higher Education fields. Teresa started her career in philanthropy in 1996 while serving as the Grants Manager at the Frey Foundation, where she led the grants management system selection and implementation project that involved reimagining grantmaking processes, adopting a paperless system and creating more effective and efficient workflows. Her expertise spans database management, process improvement, data migration, and operations.

Teresa has a passion for streamlining processes and has extensive experience configuring and working in foundation grantmaking systems Blackbaud Grantmaking and Foundant GLM. She advised clients on the grants management system function and delivered end-to-end system implementation project management, training, and post launch support.

Teresa received her B.S. in Biology from Grand Valley State University and her M.M. in Nonprofit Management from Aquinas College. She is a former Board Member of PEAK Grantmaking and a founding member on the National Advisory Committee for Project Streamline. In her free time, she loves to cook for family and friends, and hang out with her dachshunds Noodle and Copper.

Noemi was born and raised in the Central Coast of California, where she spent her formative years working as a field worker alongside her family. Her upbringing set her passion to effect positive change in the areas of education, health, workforce development, and immigration.

Recently, Noemi received her Master’s in Public Affairs from the Lyndon B. Johnson School of Public Affairs at the University of Texas, and holds a Bachelor’s of Art in International Studies from Willamette University. With a diverse professional background, she has made meaningful contributions to organizations such as the City of Austin, Dallas College, the Ray Marshall Center at the University of Austin, Kids in Need of Defense (KIND), and the YMCA International Services. Noemi is excited to incorporate her process improvements, data analysis, project management, and stakeholder engagement skills in her role as an Impact Analyst at Boldy Go Philanthropy.

Outside her professional pursuits, Noemi enjoys playing tennis with friends, longboarding, and sipping on the best coffee Austin, Texas has to offer. Noemi also enjoys traveling to California to be with her family.

Abigail is an Impact Analyst with more than 4 years of professional experience in the nonprofit sector. She began her career helping refugees and migrants resettle in the U.S. through gainful employment. Afterwards, she transitioned into data collection and management for the largest U.S. research study on student financial aid for the Department of Education.

More recently, she has designed data collection tools, managed data processing and analysis, and drafted policy recommendations during strategic turning points for social impact nonprofits, development NGOs, federal agencies, and community foundations. She believes evidence and research should inform mission-driven work.

She holds a graduate degree in Global Policy from the LBJ School of Public Affairs, the University of Texas at Austin and BAs in Economics and French.

In her free time, she enjoys the outdoors with her husband, reads magical realism, and tutors ESL learners.

Mustafa is a Masters of Information Management and Systems candidate (class of 2024) at UC Berkeley. With a background in economics and over 6 years of experience in program implementation, strategy and data analysis. He is deeply interested in problem-solving, product management, and creating social impact. This passion has led him to diverse roles implementing technological solutions for organizations including government agencies, INGOs like UNDP, and Dalberg. His professional experience spans in areas including health, education, governance, rule of law, and climate change. He is skilled in stakeholder engagement, product design and execution, market research, and data analysis and visualization. Mustafa hopes to leverage technology and data to create measurable social impact. His goal is to develop innovative products that empower organizations to overcome pressing societal challenges through user-centered design and agile development.

Walid Hedidar comes to Boldly Go from the international development space. He has more than five years of work experience in seven different countries supporting international organizations, non-profits, startups, and governments with driving social impact. Walid has worked previously with the Brookings Institution in Washington D.C., the Ministry of Education in France, and the African Leadership University in Mauritius. He also consulted on several education and health projects with the United Nations Development Programme, Last Mile Health, and UNESCO’s International Institute of Educational Planning in Dakar.

Walid’s day-to-day work has previously involved: supporting countries with integrating 21-st century skills in their national education systems, designing COVID-19 response learning tools for community health workers, and conceptualizing TV-education programs for youth with low access to the internet.

Walid started his journey of social impact in his home country Tunisia. At the age of 17, he started two education reform initiatives focused on teacher training and youth development. These initiatives are now part of a startup, LEAPS Education, that Walid has been co-leading with a mission to revolutionize education in Africa and the Middle East.

Walid holds a master’s degree in International Educational Development from the University of Pennsylvania and an executive certificate in Strategic Philanthropy from Cambridge Judge Business School. He also holds a bachelor’s degree in Anthropology and International Affairs from the University of Denver.

Walid speaks Arabic, French, and English. In his free time, he enjoys trying new recipes and playing the Oud.

Beth has 30 years of experience building leading nonprofits and philanthropic endeavors through strategic planning, impact measurement, program development, funding collaboratives, and partnerships. She is dedicated to improving our human condition, particularly in the areas of youth development and education, civic engagement, microfinance, women’s issues, international development, displacement and climate crisis.

Prior to serving as Executive Director with the Taproot Foundation, Beth served for 13 years with the international microfinance organization Opportunity International in roles ranging from Chief of Staff to the CEO focused on strategic planning and knowledge exchange, with 27 country programs and 5 funder countries, to Global Services to the Women’s Fund Director. During her tenure, Opportunity International grew to be a leading organization – from making just over 100,000 microloans in 1998 to more than 1.5 million in 2010 to people living in poverty, with additional services in education finance, micro- savings and insurance.

As a Ford Foundation fellow, Beth lived in India researching the social impact of U.S.-based companies with significant operations in India. Earlier, she worked in private investment at Salomon Brothers in New York. She has also worked with youth programs through The Fresh Air Fund and City Year. Beth has delivered pro bono planning and research projects with the American Red Cross, the Center For Financial Inclusion, and Rotary Foundation International.

Beth has an MBA from Northwestern University’s Kellogg School of Management with a focus  on public/nonprofit management, marketing, and finance. She lives in Oak Park, IL with her husband and two teenage daughters, and she enjoys lively conversations, travel everywhere, cultural exchange, hiking, and reading fiction.

Hatim is a doctoral candidate at the University of Oxford (on Rhodes Scholarship). He is a lawyer by training and has previously completed graduate degrees in Global Affairs at Tsinghua University as a Schwarzman Scholar (2020), the Bachelor of Civil Law (BCL) at University of Oxford and dual degrees in commerce and law from National Law University, India. He currently teaches regulatory innovation at Judge Business School and is working on developing an experimental regulatory intelligence platform at Regulatory Genome Development Limited. His current research examines natively digital assets at the intersection of technology, finance and law.

Aliyah Jervier is an Impact Advisor and Operations Manager with Boldly Go Philanthropy. She has over six years of experience in community development, philanthropic operations, and program management.

Prior to Boldly Go, Aliyah worked as a Strategic Partnerships Program Manager at IFundWomen, where she worked on international executions regarding partnerships with clients across industry categories. There, she focused on strategic planning and programming to streamline funding to women entrepreneurs globally. Aliyah focused the early part of her career on operational excellence at Arabella Advisors, providing operational and programmatic support to non-profit partners and major funders.

Aliyah believes in empowerment, collaboration, and sustainability. As an alumna of the Obama Foundation Community Leadership Corps, she learned skills critical to community investment and project implementation. Her desire to create sustainable impact has extended to communities across the African Diaspora. She has participated in supporting women and girls’ education in rural communities in Senegal and Kenya alongside the Women’s Global Education Project. Additionally, she has worked with Global United Diaspora implementing and planning U.S. and international service projects.

Aliyah is particularly proud of her initiatives to provide holistic health education and natural products to her Chicago community.

Aliyah received her Bachelor of Arts in Political Science and African Diaspora Studies at Loyola University Chicago. In her free time, she enjoys martial arts, gardening, and cooking.

Sumati Joshi leads research and supports strategic advisory for clients—including small family foundations, funder collaboratives, private foundations, corporate impact teams, and community-based organizations. Her work has focused on health, gender, and racial equity and she is passionate about bringing entrepreneurial ideas to action. Sumati brings to the team five years of work experience as a founder of an adolescent girls’ reproductive health-focused social venture and an associate at a human capital advisory firm in India. She has experience of working with organizations across geographies, such as regional Menstrual Health Coalitions in Asia and Africa, UN agencies, Pivotal Ventures, New Jersey Birth Equity Funders’ Alliance, and other funders in the United States.

Sumati holds a MA as a Schwarzman Scholar from Tsinghua University and earned her BA in computer science. She is a Resolution Fellow and a recipient of The Diana Award for social action. She continues to publish research and volunteer time with young changemakers setting up their first non-profit.

Sumati speaks English, Hindi, and elementary Mandarin.

Justin Kong has 8+ years of experience in social impact and strategy consulting.

Most recently, he worked as a management consultant for Dalberg Advisors, an international development consultancy, based in Nairobi, Kenya. He engaged public, private, and nonprofit clients in a range of sectors including health, finance, and infrastructure. Examples include advising the US Trade and Development Agency and a Kenyan internet startup on rural connectivity infrastructure expansion across East Africa, and advising Gates Ventures on the drivers of return on investment of subnational community health programs in Kenya, Uganda, and Liberia.

Previous to this, Justin worked at Population Services International based in Yangon, Myanmar, where he managed a Gates-funded regional malaria elimination program with a network of 21,000+ private sector health providers and community health workers across Myanmar, Cambodia, Laos, and Vietnam. Justin also worked for a healthcare consulting firm in San Francisco, advising US healthcare systems like the University of California, San Francisco; Sutter Health; and Christus Health.

Justin holds a Master’s in Global Affairs at Tsinghua University, Schwarzman College, and a Bachelor’s in Public Health at the University of California, Berkeley. Outside of work, Justin enjoys traveling and eating, having visited 70+ countries and all 50 US states.

highlights

• Former Executive Director, Peter Kiewit Foundation: $450m place-based private funder.
• Former McKinsey consultant, built and led FSG’s San Francisco office and education practice.
• Six years of on-the-ground education experience as a teacher in the South Bronx and a nonprofit director in Harlem.

bio

Jeff Kutash started his career as a Teach For America corps member, teaching math at a public bilingual middle school in New York City. His students were all recent immigrants, and while he was teaching them math, they were teaching him the importance of hard work to overcome adversity and achieve big dreams. He left the classroom to revive the Harlem Educational Activities Fund, a dormant nonprofit serving youth in Harlem and Washington Heights. Jeff grew a small mentoring program into a college success pipeline that helped hundreds of youth finish high school, go to college, and get a degree. One of his proudest moments was when an early participant in his program finished college and became a teacher in the neighborhood she grew up in.

Between creating college prep programs and visiting students in their homes to help with college applications, Jeff married his college sweetheart, Jessica. Together, they went off to Harvard Business School — Jessica to advance her career in marketing, and Jeff to pick up a business skill set he thought was needed in the social sector. After getting his MBA, Jeff joined McKinsey & Company where he worked with financial services, tech, manufacturing, and retail clients. Helping Fortune 500 companies with their most critical business issues honed Jeff’s problem solving, communication, and client service skills, which he took with him to join The Bridgespan Group, a nonprofit consulting firm that helps funders and nonprofits create social impact.

In 2005, Jeff was recruited by The Seed Foundation to help open public college preparatory boarding schools in California. Jeff secured major pledges from donors, gained school district approvals, built broad community support, and ran legislation to fund the schools. And while the California budget crisis at the time put the project on hold, the groundwork was laid for The SEED School of Los Angeles, which will open its doors in 2022.

Jeff then joined Foundation Strategy Group (FSG), a nonprofit consulting firm focused on effective philanthropy and social impact. It was the perfect opportunity to combine his background in consulting with his entrepreneurial mindset. For the next seven years, Jeff led FSG’s San Francisco office, growing the team from two to over 30 professionals. He launched and built FSG’s national education practice, overseeing scores of consulting engagements with leading corporations, foundations, nonprofits, school districts, and government agencies. A few projects he is particularly proud of include helping reestablish New Orleans’ education system after hurricane Katrina and leading a statewide effort to reform New York’s juvenile justice system.

In 2013, Jeff and his family moved to Omaha, Nebraska where he became the CEO of the Peter Kiewit Foundation, a place-based private funder. Jeff crafted the foundation’s first strategic plan focused on education-to-career pathways, economic opportunity, and thriving and inclusive communities; transformed the foundation’s approach to grantmaking and evaluation; and retooled all operational functions. Jeff was responsible for $25-30M in annual grantmaking and led the foundation’s programmatic initiatives, community engagement, and operations. In that role, Jeff helped catalyze a $300M riverfront redevelopment, launch a regional transportation plan, and develop a statewide initiative on college success. After seven years at the foundation, Jeff left to found Boldly Go Philanthropy.

Jeff holds an MBA from Harvard Business School and a BA in Political Science from the University of Pennsylvania. He has served on the boards of the Greater Omaha Chamber, College Possible, National Center for Montessori in the Public Sector, and Great California Public Schools.

Jeff speaks around the country and writes on topics of effective philanthropy, corporate social responsibility, urban core and rural community development, effecting social change, and education.  He is author of multiple papers and case studies including “Structuring Post-Secondary Scholarships to Increase Student Success,” “The School Turnaround Field Guide,” and “Practices From the Portfolio: Case Studies on Effective Education Practices.”

Jeff and Jessica are the proud parents of three awesome kids – Gabriel, Theara, and Holden. As a family, they love to travel, mountain bike, snowboard, and hike. In those rare moments when he is not working or coaching his kids’ sports teams, Jeff can be found curled up on a couch with a great book.

Sarah lives by the motto “leave a place better than you found it.” Most recently, she was a Business Development Lead at the environmental engagement SaaS company, Temboo. She developed the go-to-market strategy for a new product and designed environmental data collection systems for community-based, government and private organizations. At Walmart eCommerce, Sarah created a new model for identity-based employee resource groups that was replicated across several US offices. Previously, Sarah was the Business Development Lead at Saathi, an Indian biodegradable sanitary pad brand. She led the brand’s product launch and managed a NGO partnership to donate 25K pads to rural women and girls. Prior to Saathi, Sarah was a Fulbright English Teaching Assistant to Bahrain where she taught research skills and English language courses. She graduated with her MMSc in Global Affairs at Tsinghua University in summer 2021, and has a BS in Mechanical Engineering from MIT.

Aastha Mehta has 15 years of experience in the philanthropy, nonprofit and government sector, including deep experience in program and grants management, policy development, gender, and nonprofit operations, budgeting and financials. Prior to her work with Boldly Go, Aastha  served as the Director of Donor Services at NEO Philanthropy, a philanthropic intermediary where she led the department in vetting new projects, prospecting new donors, acquiring new opportunities for growth for NEO, and developing department strategy in serving as a liaison for donors and donor collaboratives at NEO. Prior to NEO, Aastha served in both programmatic and business development functions on USAID projects at EngenderHealth, an international NGO focusing on reproductive health and family planning for women and girls in more than two dozen countries. She holds a Master of Public Administration from Columbia University, and an undergraduate degree from Georgetown University. She speaks English, Hindi and French fluently, along with proficient Spanish and conversational Arabic.

Colleen Muse has over 10 years of experience in the social sector, providing fundraising, strategy, and management consulting services to foundations, corporations, and nonprofits. With an extensive background in advocacy and public policy, community-based nonprofit administration, and human-centered design, Colleen is a trusted thought leader to a variety of clients in the philanthropic sector.

Most recently, Colleen worked as an Associate Director at Arabella Advisors, leading consulting engagements across strategy, grantmaking, evaluation, and governance projects for Arabella’s individual, foundation, and corporate clients. Prior to joining Arabella, Colleen worked in human-centered design consulting for nonprofit and federal government clients. She was a fellow at Triangle Community Foundation, conducting research on community foundation advocacy efforts and their influence on public policy across the nation. 

Colleen also has expertise in community-based nonprofit fundraising and administration. In 3.5 years, she earned more than $7 million dollars in government and foundation grants for a regional youth services nonprofit in DC. She is also proud to have started her career as an AmeriCorps VISTA, working to support affordable housing initiatives for Black residents in San Francisco. 

Colleen has a Masters in Public Policy from Duke University’s Sanford School of Public Policy and a BA in Global Studies from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Colleen lives with her spouse in Washington, DC, where you can find her out birding or trying new restaurants in search of the best southern biscuit.

Jarred Myers is an independent consultant specializing in Philanthropy and Impact Investing. Jarred was formerly the head of the Innovation Portfolio for the Dell Family Foundation in their Africa office. Jarred designed, built, deployed and managed both the education and workforce programs. Prior to joining the foundation, Jarred worked as a consultant and project manager for more than 10 years at various organizations in South Africa, both in the nonprofit sector at Afrika Tikkun and in the corporate sector in various capacities.

Jarred was a founding partner at the Arc Impact Foundation where he helped launch their technology focused impact venture capital fund and he continues to serve on their investment committee. Jarred consults globally to foundations, family offices, and nonprofits on strategy, innovation, and impact management – he holds an MBA from Duke University in North Carolina. Jarred has several hobbies which he plans to resume after his five daughters have left for college.

HIGHLIGHTS

• Former Executive Director, Walton Family Foundation: over $600 million in grantmaking per year.
• Built and led Foundation Strategy Group (FSG) for 14 years: advisor to philanthropists around the world.
• Ten years of global development experience in Africa: on-the-ground training for impact.

BIO

Kyle Peterson joined the Peace Corps right out of college and fell in love twice – first with his wife, a fellow volunteer, and the second time with the adventure of making a difference. While in Sierra Leone with the Peace Corps, Kyle helped farmers plant over 100,000 oil palm trees, witnessed a rich culture and heritage, experienced unjust inequities, and was inspired by everyday heroes.

The experience sparked an interest in Africa, international development, and solving big problems through business-like approaches. After getting business and public policy master degrees at the University of Texas, Kyle joined Population Services International (PSI), a non-governmental organization pushing the boundaries on social marketing, a new approach to social change at the time. Kyle went to Rwanda, six months after the end of the country’s genocide, as country director to restart PSI’s program shut-down during the war. He established a family planning and HIV/AIDS prevention program. Two years later, he started PSI’s social marketing program in Zimbabwe, the epicenter for HIV in Southern Africa in the mid-1990s. Kyle launched a number of novel health programs through the private sector — including a network of HIV counseling and testing sites and insecticide treated mosquito bed nets — that averted thousands of cases of HIV/AIDS and malaria.

Interested in private sector approaches, he signed on with Monitor Consulting to learn the strategy-making ropes, moving from Zimbabwe to Boston. He was soon in Wichita managing a competitiveness study for the firm’s founder, Harvard Business Professor, Michael Porter. He went back to Rwanda and started a multi-year project advising President Kagame and the Cabinet on the country’s economic strategy.

In 2001, Michael Porter and Mark Kramer had just started a new type of consulting organization — Foundation Strategy Group (FSG) — to help philanthropists be more effective. Kyle helped to launch and lead FSG over the next 14 years. While at FSG, Kyle built the global development and health practice areas and led over 150 consulting engagements for foundations, companies, and nonprofits. He also served on FSG’s board of directors and helped with big idea pieces, such as “Catalytic Philanthropy,” “Collective Impact,” and “Shared Value.”

The Walton family was searching for a new leader of their family philanthropy and Kyle signed on as the head of the 30 year-old Walton Family Foundation, based in Bentonville, Arkansas, in 2016. In the role, he oversaw the transformation of one of the nation’s largest family foundations to support $600 million in annual grant making, across education, environment, and economic development program areas. He also supported the philanthropic projects of all Walton family members, which included establishing new charitable vehicles. He helped to create a think tank serving the Heartland and was the founding board chair for two groundbreaking charter school facility revolving loan funds. He strengthened the profile of the organization with a new mission and vision and values; led a diversity, equity, and inclusion assessment and organizational change effort; and built new collaborative relationships with other funders.

Kyle has a BA in international studies from the American University, an MBA from the McCombs School of Business (University of Texas), and an MPA from the LBJ School of Public Affairs (University of Texas). He has served on several boards during the last decade, including Foundation Strategy Group, Crystal Bridges Museum of American Art, and the Global Health Council. He is a lifetime member of the Council on Foreign Relations.

Kyle is a frequent speaker on family and institutional philanthropy, corporate social engagement, and international development. He is author of several field reports including “Ahead of the Curve: Insights for the International NGO of the Future” and “Competing by Saving Lives: How Pharmaceutical and Medical Device Companies Create Shared Value in Global Health” and articles such as “Lobbying for Good” featured in the Stanford Social Innovation Review. He contributed the chapter  “Social Enterprise and Innovation in Emerging Markets” with Leslie Crutchfield in the 2016 book, Innovation in Emerging Markets. 

When not working, Kyle loves to travel, hike, and mountain bike with his wife, Maury, and teenage son, Finn.

Hannah Reyes is dedicated to the causes of poverty alleviation, mental health, and international development. Having been born in the Philippines and raised in Houston, she also has a particular interest in immigrant populations. Hannah is passionate about finding intersections between public, private, and philanthropic sectors to achieve improvement of outcomes for vulnerable populations and communities.

For the past five years, Hannah has volunteered and worked in the nonprofit sector in various capacities. She was a hospice volunteer for Hospice Austin, was a case manager at Foundation Communities, worked as a peer mentor for young adults with disabilities at E4 Texas, and was a student clinician for parents with children with developmental delays at ASPEN Intervention Program. She is a phone buddy for someone experiencing housing insecurity through Miracle Messages. During the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic, she served as an AmeriCorps VISTA with an intermediary nonprofit in the Greater Houston area serving 14+ nonprofits with their training needs.

In a consulting role, she has helped Dream Come True Foundation develop its alumni network and establish a mentorship pipeline for its beneficiaries. Hannah has also worked with Austin Pathways to improve its health assessment and wellness plan for its residents.

During this time, Hannah has also worked in Maximus, where she has co-initiated a monthly speaker series called “Health Talks” to increase awareness of health equity issues touching the beneficiaries of Maximus projects. Each talk has garnered 175-450 participants so far from across the United States. At the Texas Enrollment Broker Project, she has also worked on initiatives to improve processes and provide analysis regarding functions such as Pregnant Women Outreach, WebChat, the Texas 88^th Legislative session, and Call Center.

Hannah is obtaining a Master of Public Affairs from the LBJ School and a Master of Science in Social Work from the Steve Hicks School at the University of Texas at Austin. She is also working on the Data Science Certificate and Nonprofit Studies Portfolio.

In her free time, Hannah loves spending time in parks, attending concerts, and traveling.

Lauren is an Impact Analyst at Boldly Go Philanthropy where she supports client projects and firm development activities. She comes to Boldly Go with 4+ of professional experience in the philanthropy sector.

Lauren previously served as a Senior Philanthropy Associate at Lever for Change, an affiliate of the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation that designs and manages grant competitions on behalf of donors. In her role, she supported the identification, cultivation, solicitation, and stewardship of donors whom Lever for Change helped grant over $1 billion to high-impact nonprofits and social ventures.

Previously, Lauren held internship positions across the social sector including at the Global Food and Agriculture Program at the Chicago Council on Global Affairs, the University of Chicago’s Center for Global Health, and Health Access Connect, a public health NGO in Kampala, Uganda.

Lauren is a graduate of New York University with a B.A. in Global Public Health and History. In 2023, Lauren was selected as an Aspen Ideas Health Fellow.

Lauren was born and raised in Chicago. In her free time, she enjoys traveling, trying new recipes and restaurants, and spending time outdoors.

Melissa D. Starace joins Boldly Go to execute the philanthropic activities of the Dexter F. & Dorothy H. Baker Foundation following 25+ years serving community college and private higher education institutions.  As Foundation Director, Melissa will represent the family foundation in the Lehigh Valley community, oversee local grant making, help plan and execute philanthropic strategy, and utilize multiple philanthropic tools to drive impact with a particular focus on youth, arts, human services, and entrepreneurship. A convener and connector of people and programs, Melissa brings experience and a passion for fundraising, community engagement, board development and governance, advocacy, teaching and research.

Constance Thurmond was born and raised in Miami, FL and is the proud product of Miami-Dade Public Schools. She formally began her work in the nonprofit sector after learning Florida ranked third highest in the United States for human trafficking cases. This led to her involvement in  anti-human trafficking organizations through fundraising, policy, advocacy, legal research and community-based education, resulting in numerous awards from Miami-Dade College (the second largest college in the United States) for galvanizing student engagement and impact around the issue.

Constance’s early involvement in direct-service nonprofits led her to focus on the dynamic challenges nonprofit leaders face when balancing fundraising, leadership, and service. Determined to find new and innovative solutions for the investment of philanthropic funds within the sector, she began to work with social-impact driven technology ventures such as FreeWill. While there, she partnered with nonprofits to provide user-friendly, simple, and free software to donors that encouraged them to leave a bequest to a nonprofit of their choice. By the time she left, her team had collectively generated $3B worth of commitments to nonprofits.

She now uses her data analytics, writing, research, business development, fundraising, and operations skills to advance the goals of mission-driven organizations including the Advanced Regenerative Manufacturing Institute, Jrue and Lauren Holiday Social Impact Fund, Social Enterprise Greenhouse, Platform for Social Impact, and Mindful Business Inc. In September of 2022, she started Kora Insights, an interdisciplinary consulting firm partnering with mission-driven institutions to measurably improve quality of life.

Constance holds an Associate of Arts in Philosophy and Business from Miami-Dade Honors College, and a B.A. in Ethics, Politics & Economics from Yale University. She speaks English, Spanish and intermediate Mandarin. You can find Constance in Brooklyn, NY, where she dances professionally and volunteers as a Guardian Ad Litem for children in the dependency system in between hunting for the best local eats.

Rachel Gordon Vivas

Rachel has over 10 years of experience providing both strategy and management consulting services to non-profits, foundations and public sector entities. In a variety of cross-sector roles, she has developed a toolkit of best practices and data-driven techniques to closely collaborate with partner organizations and drive social impact.

Rachel began her career advising academic institutions on how to increase operational efficiencies, reduce costs and mitigate risk through data analysis, business process redesign and stakeholder interviews. She then transitioned to providing project management support to local governments, including planning, executing and implementing long-term initiatives, as well as advising on performance improvement strategies to enhance their daily operations. More recently, Rachel works with social change organizations to develop high-impact strategies and operational approaches centered on racial equity.

Outside of consulting, Rachel has managed research and evaluation projects to support data-driven decision-making regarding resource allocation and real estate investment in support of community development activities. She has led focus groups with community members and conducted demographic analyses to assess education, health and housing needs and develop models to measure long-term outcomes in their areas. She also served as a Mayoral Fellow focusing on government efficiency, policy analysis and enhancements to city-wide initiatives related to economic development, education, public safety and sustainability for the City of Chicago.

Rachel earned her BA from the University of Michigan in Organizational Studies and Political Science as well as her MPP from the Harris School of Public Policy at the University of Chicago. She also currently serves as an Associate Board Member for City Year Detroit and a mentor to its corps members.