Monday, June 28 | 12:00 PM EDT

Sara Heitler Bamberger '95 (Israel) is a seasoned founder and Executive Director of nonprofit organizations. She holds a BA in Religious Studies from Yale and an MA from Georgetown University's School of Foreign Service in Middle Eastern Studies.

From 2016-2021 she has served as a Board member and as the North American Director of SquashBond Israel: Sport and Beyond, an organization that brings together Palestinian and Israeli youth for squash and educational programming. From 2008-2016 she was the founder and Executive Director of Kevah, an adult Jewish education organization based in the Bay Area. Prior to her work at Kevah, Sara was the founder and Executive Director of the Religion, Politics, and Globalization Program at UC Berkeley.

Sara is an avid ultimate frisbee player and was the founder of Ramona, the Yale women's ultimate frisbee team (a detail only shared with this audience). She is also a devoted squash player and former member of the Yale University varsity team. She is currently writing a book on shifting national identities during the global pandemic. She lives in Jerusalem with her husband and five children. Her eldest son, Max, will be a freshman at Yale in fall 2021.

John Wakiumu SOM '97 (Kenya) is the Chief Executive Officer and Global Head of Agriculture for Reewire International ApS (“Reewire”), a financial technology company with a unique “OPEN MARKET” mobile financial services platform geared towards meeting the needs of presently unbanked populations in the emerging markets of Africa, the Americas and Asia.

Before Reewire, John was the Interim Head of Public Private Partnerships and Innovative Finance at the Alliance for a Green Revolution in Africa (AGRA), an international NGO with headquarters in Nairobi, Kenya. AGRA was established in 2006 with initial funding from the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and the Rockefeller Foundation. AGRA has worked with its partners across Africa to deliver a set of proven solutions to smallholder farmers and thousands of indigenous African agriculture enterprises. The alliance has built the systems and tools for Africa’s agriculture; high quality seeds, better soil health, access to markets and credit, and coupled by stronger farmer organizations and agriculture policies. AGRA is catalyzing an inclusive agricultural transformation in Africa by increasing incomes and improving food security for 30 million farming households in 11 focus countries by the end of 2021. John spent about ten years after leaving SOM in investment banking in Africa prior to joining the non-profit sector.

Megha Okhai '13 (London) is an Investment Executive at CDC Group, the UK’s Development Finance Institution, focusing on direct equity investments in Food & Agriculture across Africa and South Asia. Dual Bachelor of Arts in Economics and Global Affairs (International Development) from Yale University.

Tuesday, June 29 | 7:00 PM EDT

Samantha Heffner '02 spent over six years as a structured finance attorney in Manhattan at Dewey Ballantine LLP and Katten Muchin Rosenman LLP. While in private practice, she performed pro bono projects for the New York City Bar’s Veterans Assistance Project and conducted a fellowship with the nonprofit Lawyers Alliance for New York. In 2011, Sam left private practice to join the New York office of the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA). During her seven years at IAVA, Sam assisted the Development team, launched a major gifts campaign, led hiring efforts, and eventually became the Chief Talent Officer.

Constance L. Royster '72 is the principal of Laurel Associates LLC. She is a recognized fundraising, education, non-profit, and organizational leader. Her legal background provides her with significant expertise that has been invaluable to the institutional and individual leaders who have sought her out in times of transition, strategic decision-making, or crisis management. Those combined experiences are the foundation of her consulting practice and client engagements.

Ms. Royster has eighteen years of experience in leading fundraising roles at two iconic cultural and academic institutions. She served as the first-ever director of major giving for WSHU National Public Radio station in Connecticut, and subsequently at Yale University, her alma mater, as associate director of development at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies, and then for a decade as director of development at the Yale Divinity School. She developed strategies for capital, annual, special, and planned giving campaigns, and hired and managed implementation teams. Ms. Royster is known for her unique abilities to nurture and cultivate relationships across the cultural, economic, and international spectrum.

Lucy Zhang is a Private Equity Associate at The Carlyle Group. Prior to joining Carlyle, Lucy was an investment banking associate at Bank of America. She received a BA in Economics from Harvard College. Lucy is a Junior Board Member for ExpandED Schools, which is a group of dynamic and talented young professionals from a diverse range of industries in New York City who are committed to helping close the 6,000-hour learning gap, serve as ambassadors for ExpandED Schools, and generate support for our work among their friends and colleagues.

Thursday, July 15 | 1:00 PM EDT

Marilyn Machlowitz PhD '78 joined the YANA Board in 2021. From founding the firm in 1997 until retiring in 2021, she has worked in executive search, serving noted nonprofits and foundations. It was the privilege of a lifetime, for instance, to help recruit Darren Walker, now president of Ford Foundation, to his first job in philanthropy nearly 20 years ago. It also has been a continuing joy to see the wellspring of interest people have in moving to the nonprofit sector or joining a nonprofit’s board, something to which YANA contributes mightily.

Ken Inadomi '76 is the founding chair of YANA and former co-chair of Project Redwood, a social philanthropy fund managed by alumni from the Stanford Business School. He currently serves as the executive director of NYPACE, New York Professional Advisors for Community Entrepreneurs, a nonprofit that provides pro bono business consulting to entrepreneurs of color in New York and Chicago. After nearly three decades in the private sector, Ken entered nonprofit in 2008 and never looked back.  

Matthew Gerken '11 is a partner with American Philanthropic, focusing on overall development strategy, audits and assessments, and fundraising services. He has a particular interest in mid-level giving strategies, planned giving, and leveraging and interpreting data to maximize the efficiency and intelligence of his clients’ operations. He manages American Philanthropic’s data management and analysis efforts as well as the Chicago-based general consulting group.

Matt began his career with Teach for America, teaching world history to sophomores in south Texas—still the hardest job he ever had. He also worked as a program director at the Intercollegiate Studies Institute. Matt was a Humanities major at Yale (MC’11), and resides in the Chicago area with his wife, three sons, and one daughter. He enjoys dodging angry Chicago drivers while biking to work, reading history and poetry, and amateur astronomy.

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