KEYNOTE SPEAKERS

KIMBERLY MARTEAU EMERSON is a lawyer, civic leader, and human rights advocate. Kimberly worked in the Clinton Administration as a senior political appointee and spokesperson for the U.S. Information Agency (now housed in the State Department). She currently serves on the Board of Directors of Human Rights Watch, the Advisory Board of the USC Center on Public Diplomacy, and is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations and the Pacific Council on International Policy. She is Chair of the Board of Governors of Bard College Berlin, a founding member of the Transatlantic Advisory Board of United Way in Germany, and serves on the Advisory Boards of the Thomas Mann House and the ALL RISE Foundation.She divides her time between LA and Germany. Previously, Kimberly practiced law with Tuttle & Taylor, and worked in the film business as a business and creative executive with Savoy Pictures and Sony Entertainment. She holds degrees from UCLA (B.A.), UC Hastings College of the Law (J.D.) and l’Université de Droit d’Aix-Marseille (D.E.S.U.).

Photo credit: OSCE/Ghada Hazim

VALIANT (VAL) RICHEY is the OSCE Special Representative and Co-ordinator for Combating Trafficking in Human Beings. He represents the OSCE at the political level on anti-trafficking issues, and assists the 57 OSCE participating States in the development and implementation of anti-trafficking strategies and initiatives. His Office also has a co-ordinating function among OSCE structures and institutions involved in combating trafficking in human beings.

Before joining the OSCE, Val worked for thirteen years as a prosecutor in Seattle handling sexual assault, child exploitation and human trafficking cases. He led a coalition of law enforcement, NGOs, academics, service providers, philanthropists, and policy makers focused on the eradication of commercial sexual exploitation and trafficking in Washington State, and he was appointed by the Attorney General to represent prosecutors on the Washington State Trafficking in Persons Coordinating Committee. He has a Bachelor of Arts and Master of Arts in Political Science from Boston University and a Juris Doctor from the University of Washington.

“Collectively we are not doing nearly enough to combat human trafficking, let alone to end it. Today, on World Day we pay tribute to all victims of trafficking, and the best way to do it is to commit to its eradication – not next year, not next month, but today. We must confront it bravely and with integrity, recognizing how our own actions can contribute to exploitation and that we all have a role to play to create an equitable and safe future. Join us and find out how.”

JESSICA BUCHLEITNER is an American Journalist, Communicator, and Gender Equality diplomat. Her journalism features and books tell the stories of unsung global heroes while attacking hard-hitting issues of gender-based violence, policy, technology, and power structures. She is the author of the award-winning 50 Women anthology series – a dual collection of personal stories chronicling world events told by 50 women from 30 countries.

For ten years, Jessica has served in United Nations interfacing roles, first as an NGO delegate for Women's Intercultural Network and now as an NGO representative for OneMama.org. In addition, she collaborated with diplomats, politicians, and civil society stakeholders as part of the "Cities for CEDAW" campaign that encouraged U.S. city mayors to adopt CEDAW, the international women's bill of rights. Inspired by her communications strategy consulting with global companies for brand dissolutions, divestments, mergers, digital transformation, and regulatory matters, Jessica created the CEDAW for Companies framework. The framework enables private-sector firms to implement CEDAW's provisions to benchmark diversity & inclusion efforts. Jessica is based in Munich, Germany.

DAY 1 - SPEAKERS - NOVEMBER 4, 2021

in order of appearance

A self-described “iconoclast,” DR. TRICIA CALLENDER, Ph.D has almost 15 years of experience promoting equity, policy and behavioral change in a variety of contexts, most recently for the United Nations at the Antiracism and DEI Lead for NGO CSW to the UN and the Global Coordinator for UN Women Generation Equality Form (GEF). Tricia also built, directed and executed the “Addressing Inequalities Networked Alliance” (AINA), the largest and most successful online consultation in United Nations history featuring 6,000 member participants in 100+ countries in Asia, Africa, Latin America, the Middle East, the Former Soviet Union and the United States that culminated in equity targets and goals interwoven in each of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. After completing her doctorate with a focus on migration in South Africa, she remained in South Africa for 5 years working with the UN on equity issues including migration, refugee protection, gender equality, and racial equality. Additionally, Tricia has consulted with a wide range of non- profits, small and medium sized businesses and NGOs on Antiracism and DEI initiatives. She earned her Ph.D in Sociology from Columbia University in 2013. She has also studied at the University of Cambridge in the UK and Yale University. She will be starting the EADA/Ecole des Ponts Business School Paris Tech joint MBA program in September focusing on organizational development, strategy and social impact in medium sized companies.

ERICA HIGBIE serves as the NGO Committee on the Status of Women (NGO CSW) Advocacy Research Group Co-Chair, the Women Human Rights Teaching, Learning and Advocacy Resource Coordinator, and Chair of the Nominating Committee. She is also a member of the US Women’s Caucus at the UN, where she participates on the US Permanent Mission Committee.

Erica has been a Representative to the United Nations in New York for the Federation of American Women’s Clubs Overseas (FAWCO) for 10 years, during which she has serviced as NGO CSW Treasurer, a Director on the UN NGO Department of Public Information Board, and acted as Institutional Relations and Advocacy Co-Chair and Master of Public Health Practicum Internship Supervisor for the Working Group on Girls. She has also served as a Coordinator and Tutor for an open-access education initiative, building public health capacity in developing countries, People’s Uni, since 2007.

With work experience in the United States and Australia, her professional background is in healthcare administration and business development. She has an undergraduate degree in International Relations, a Master of International Health and an MBA.

SPEAKERS ON REFUGEES

ANILA NOOR, Founder of NewWomen Connectors is a policy influencer for inclusion, diversity and social justice, Feminist Ecosystem Builder, activist, TEDx  speaker and researcher based in the Netherlands. Recently she became a member of the European Commission Expert Group and evaluator for AMIF calls. As an Advisor and expert consultant, she works with different institutions on designing engagement projects related to inclusion and diversity. She is a former fellow of Open Society Foundation, a former member of European Migrant Advisory Board, EMAB  Urban Agenda and worked as a policy advisor on integration for the City of Amsterdam.

She has held many Board positions as ENS, ASYLOS and co-founder of European Coalition(GRN), Global Independent Refugee Women Leaders (GIRWL), part of the Advisory Board of UNHCR Task Force for PoCs, member of Kaldor Centre of Emerging Scholars Network Australia  and core team member of steering committee of Global Refugee Led Network.

She founded NewWomen Connectors, a movement striving for mainstreaming the unheard voices of migrant and refugee women living across Europe. NewWomen Connectors is a perspective-shift to the refugee agenda and advocates inclusion rather than integration as a policy choice.

NEDAL AL SALMAN, President of Bahrain Center for Human Rights (BCHR), is a human rights defender.  She previously headed BCHR’s Women & Children’s Rights Advocacy.  BCHR documents and reports on human rights violations in Bahrain. Despite a government order in November 2004 for the Center to close down, the BCHR is still operating and recently published Bahrain, Women, the Powerful Actors in Building Peace.

Nedal is also the 2019-2021 convenor for the IFEX Council (formerly International Freedom of Expression Exchange) which is a diverse, worldwide network of over 100 non-governmental organisations that advocates for the free expression and access to information rights of all.  Additionally, she is the Vice President of the International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), with a membership of 192 organizations from 117 countries.  Nedal has been targeted for her work as a woman human rights defender. She was placed under a travel ban in August 2016. Three years later, in 2019, the travel ban was lifted. She is based in Bahrain.

AMANDA LANE, Executive Director, Collateral Repair Project (CRP), is an accomplished international development professional. Amanda has served as a consultant on program evaluation and design with international governmental and nongovernmental organizations. Prior to her work at CRP, she led British Council Jordan’s governance and youth programs. Before coming to Jordan, Amanda consulted for nonprofit boards of directors in Seattle, made documentary and promotional films for nonprofit organizations, served on the board of directors of the Arab Center of Washington, and served in the Peace Corps (Cameroon, 1993-1995).

HEATHER BARR is the interim co-director of the Women's Rights Division at Human Rights Watch. She has done research in countries including Afghanistan, Bangladesh, Burma, Nepal, and Papua New Guinea, on issues including child marriage, girls’ education, violence against women, refugee and prisoners’ rights, and trafficking.

She joined Human Rights Watch in 2011 as the Afghanistan researcher, after working for the United Nations in Afghanistan and Burundi. After law school she litigated for discharge planning for prisoners with psychosocial disabilities in New York City, and founded an alternative-to-incarceration program. Before law school, she worked with homeless women. She is a graduate of London School of Economics, Columbia Law School, and John Jay College of Criminal Justice.

SORAYA SARHADDI NELSON is a veteran American journalist who was the program director at KCRW Berlin and spent most of her 13 years at NPR as an international correspondent running the U.S. public radio network’s bureau in Kabul, Cairo and Berlin. She opened the first Kabul bureau for the network in 2006. She was based there for four years and has returned regularly on assignment for NPR and later, for research for her book on female Afghan mountain climbers trained by the American NGO, Ascend. She’s the host of Common Ground Podcast.

She’s won numerous awards for her radio work, including a Peabody, Overseas Press Club Award and a Gracie. She also received the ICFJ 2017 Excellence in International Reporting Award for her coverage of Central and Eastern Europe, North Africa, the Middle East and Afghanistan. Prior to her radio career, Nelson spent 20 years as a newspaper reporter and was part of the Newsday team that won the 1997 Pulitzer Prize for its coverage of the crash of TWA Flight 800. She’s a member of AWC Berlin.

EVENING SPEAKER

PAULA LUCAS is an award winning social entrepreneur, author, speaker, life coach and the leading subject matter expert on American victims of GBV abroad. Paula was a victim of domestic violence and marital rape, and her sons’ victims of child abuse, when she lived abroad as an American expat. Her memoir, “Harvesting Stones, An American Woman’s International Journey of Survival” is a riveting account of her experience.

After escaping her abuser and fleeing back to the USA in 1999, she founded Pathways To Safety International, a global program to provide critical, and often life-saving, services to American victims abroad of domestic violence, sexual assault, sex trafficking and forced marriage. Pathways’ crisis center based in Portland, Oregon, 24/7/365 operations and international toll free hotline, was primarily funded by the US Department of Justice, Office For Victims of Crime. Funding for sexual assault was suddenly, and unexpectedly, discontinued in 2017 and the funding for the domestic violence program was discontinued in 2019.

During its 20+ years of operation Pathways assisted over 10,000 American victims in 165+ countries with long term case management, advocacy, counseling, legal resources, danger to safety relocation, emergency cash assistance, housing and more. Today Pathways’ continues to operate a crisis email and has in-depth international sexual assault profiles for 100 countries and 50 cities. Paula and her Board President, Keri Potts, are seeking funding to reinstate Pathways’ critical services in 2022.

MELISSA MORBECK, is Director of Partnerships at the NO MORE Foundation. Melissa is also the Founder and Global Executive Director of the Corporate Alliance, the leading consultancy addressing domestic violence and employment. Melissa is a leading authority on the subject of domestic abuse, gender-based violence and gender and climate change.

Melissa has extensive experience in the private sector and synergies with public health and government-based policy. Melissa spent 18 years in Human Resources. Melissa is the founder of the Corporate Alliance to End Partner Violence, along with several social enterprises and charities dedicated to working with businesses on issues of trauma, health & wellbeing, domestic abuse, violence and harassment. Melissa lectured at the Harvard School of Public Health for 9 years and is published with the Council of Europe. Melissa was a member of the President’s Commission on VAWG. Melissa also was a Director of the National Commission for Disability. Melissa has worked with the multilateral organisations, governments local and global businesses creating and delivering prevention programs, policies and collaborative partnerships to address gender based violence.

DAY 2 - SPEAKERS - NOVEMBER 5, 2021

in order of appearance

PANELISTS - STAND UP FOR HUMAN TRAFFICKING SYMPOSIUM - 5 YEARS LATER

Since 2004, SUZANNE HOFF is International Coordinator of La Strada International, the European NGO Platform against trafficking in human beings. This network comprises currently 26 (member) NGOs – and 4 associate members - in 23 European countries. The overall aim of La Strada International is to prevent trafficking in human beings and exploitation in Europe and to protect the rights of trafficked and exploited persons and ensure their access to justice.

Before La Strada International, she worked for different NGOs, like Caritas Netherlands, the Dutch Centre for International Cooperation and the Dutch Refugee Council as well as for the Amsterdam Mayor’s office and the International department of the Amsterdam Municipality. Most of her work focused on human rights and the situation in Central and Eastern Europe. Suzanne has an academic background; a master in Eastern European Studies and in (television) journalism.

“We note that not all relevant international legal instruments are ratified by States or they are not adequately implemented. We see serious gaps in the prevention and prosecution of human trafficking, as well as the identification, protection and support to trafficked persons”.

REBEKAH LISGARTEN, Director of Operations, STOP THE TRAFFIK (STT)

Rebekah has worked in anti-trafficking for the last 10 years. She currently oversees the global operations of STT's prevention programs. Prior to this Rebekah was the operational manager to the largest provision of support to survivors in the UK, supporting thousands of individuals who had been trafficked globally and in the UK. She has worked in a multitude of global rescue and prevention programs in the anti-trafficking field.

“The technology available to us now in combatting human trafficking has advanced significantly in the last few years. It is imperative that those fighting human trafficking harness this technology to make us the most effective we can be. No matter if we are working in rescue or prevention, tech and  big data, driven by those with lived experience, can improve the questions we ask and the action we take.”

DR. SHEETAL SHAH is the Academic Director at Webster Leiden Campus-Webster University USA. As an educator and change maker, she is a psychologist with a global orientation.

She specializes in the field of counseling for chronic illnesses and trauma; her research interests are focused in the field of modern-day slavery and human trafficking. In 2012 she founded the Bijlmer project, now a registered foundation called The Bridge2hope. Based in the Netherlands,  The Bridge2Hope is a research and intervention project (www.thebridge2hope.org) that addresses the psychosocial and vocational needs of sexually trafficked women and men in the European Union.

WE ALL, in our own way need to bring awareness to the issue of modern day slavery. It is important to understand our slavery footprint which is very often linked to our consumption habits, and move from mindless consumption to conscious consumption. When was the last time we asked, “Do I know where this product actually comes from and who made it?”

ESTA STEYN-JANSEN, married to a wonderful husband, lives in Amersfoort with two cats. Born in South-Africa, raised in the Netherlands. Has a bachelor degree in social work and a master degree in the contextual approach a family therapy approach. Started fighting injustice and human trafficking 9 years and continues to do for STOP THE TRAFFIK Netherlands now called Be Slavery Free. She campaigns for a just and fair world for all. A world where no one is bought or sold, and we as consumers don't have to wonder if the products we buy are tainted by human trafficking.

Foto: Willem Jan de Bruin/EO

INSTA: Foto: @willemjandebruin @evangelischeomroep

DR. COURTNEY SKIERA-VAUGHN holds a Ph.D in psychology with an emphasis on how culture affects behavior with a research focus around stress and trauma.  She has worked in the counter-trafficking sector for over a decade and as the executive director of Free The Girls for the last 6 years, speaking on platforms around the world on issues of justice, reintegration, and cultural understanding. http://freethegirls.org

PANELISTS - CHILDREN AND SEX TRAFFICKING: PREVENTION, MYTHS  AND REALITY

NATE ARNESON, United Against Human Trafficking, (UAHT), Manager of Houston Rescue and Restore Coalition (HRRC). Aspiring to see a sustainable and unified effort to fight human trafficking, Nate manages the Rescue and Restore Coalition and The Pathway Referral Network, led by UAHT. Nate brings his experience in building and strengthening municipal and state-wide inter-agency health programs in Guatemala to analyze, evaluate, and grow our needs as a network to fight human trafficking at a macro level. His passion is building strategic and heightened partnerships to ensure that our communities are ready to address those needs and better assist survivors from identification to restoration.

MARY T CALLAHAN, Executive Director of Girls on the Run of Greater Houston. In 2001 Mary T brought the then 4-years old national organization, Girls on the Run, to Houston because she saw a need. Having been raised with 5 older brothers and surrounded by athletics, Mary T saw the power she got from running as she grew up. She found that when you feel strong in your body, you feel strong in your thoughts, and actions, in your life. Also, the mother of three girls, she saw how her beautiful, smart, athletic girls would go into the “girl box”, the place where they don’t feel smart enough, beautiful enough or athletic enough, around sixth grade, and thought this program would give girls throughout the Houston area the skill set to avoid entering the girl box. For 10 years, Mary T attempted to grow the organization part-time with full support of her family, friends and a fledgling board while working at _Town and Country Pediatrics, raising children, and nursing her ill mother. After finally making the decision to devote herself to GOTR full-time, the organization has experienced exponential growth, growing from 100 girls in 2001 to 2000 girls pre covid-19, impacting over 18,000 Houston-area elementary and middle school girls since 2001. Mary T has recently graduated from the Rice University Leadership in Non-Profit Executives program, is now a grandmother of three and still working on her quest to run a marathon or half marathon on every Continent.

DR. BOB SANBORN, President and CEO, Children at Risk, is a noted leader, advocate, and activist for education and childreN. He earned his undergraduate degree at Florida State University and his doctorate at Columbia University in New York City. Before entering the non-profit sector, he had a distinguished career in higher education at institutions such as Rice University and Hampshire College. Under his leadership, Children at Risk has expanded its influence considerably. Notable achievements include opening up centers in Dallas and Fort Worth; launching the Public Policy & Law Center, the Children at Risk Institute, the Center for Parenting and Family Well-Being and the Center to End Trafficking and Exploitation of Children. Sanborn is the Executive Editor of two peer--reviewed, open-access academic journals, the Journal of Applied Research on Children and the Journal of Family Strengths. He is also the host of the popular radio program and podcast Growing Up in America on the Pacifica Radio Network.

EVENING SPEAKER

LISA COHEN is a senior supervising producer at CNN International, where she manages various feature programs and specials, including The CNN Freedom Project, a multi-platform initiative that aims to expose the horrors of modern-day slavery and advocate for change. Started in 2011, The CNN Freedom Project has generated more than a thousand stories about human trafficking from all over the world. Cohen helped launch and develop the editorial mandate and mission that set the tone for this network-wide initiative. She has personally produced countless stories for The CNN Freedom Project, including the award-winning documentaries “Operation Hope,” “Every Day in Cambodia,” and “Canada’s Stolen Daughters.”

Prior to her assignment on The CNN Freedom Project, Cohen served as supervising producer for CNN International’s live news programming during the Asia prime hours. In that role she oversaw the launches of several news programs, including News Stream and World Business Today.

Cohen joined CNN in 1994 as a writer and producer. Prior to that, she worked for several years as a

television news reporter and anchor in local news markets across the United States. A native of Canada, Cohen is based in Atlanta where she is married and has two children.

DAY 3 - SPEAKERS - NOVEMBER 6, 2021

in order of appearance

HIBO WARDERE is a campaigning legend: a fierce force of nature, urging the world to stop mutilating millions of young girls in the name of culture, religion, or social compliance, as well as an educator on FGM and related issues. Hibo underwent FGM at the age of just six years old in Somalia. A traumatising event which followed her being pampered and spoiled in the lead up to the event – and which led to devastating pain, anger, and feeling betrayed by those she loved the most. She moved to London as a teenager. She is one of the world’s most prominent campaigners against FGM, Hibo works with Safe Hands to raise awareness about FGM and is the author of Cut: One Woman’s Fight Against FGM in Britain Today: a memoir which also doubles as a campaign manifesto, shedding light on a medieval practice that has gone undocumented for too long and needs to be wiped out. She lives with her husband and five children in East London.

PANELISTS - THE EMERGING ROLE OF STRANGULATION IN GENDER BASED VIOLENCE AND HOW VICTIM-CENTERED INVESTIGATIONS CHANGE THE GAME

KELSEY MACKAY, Founder and CEO, RESPOND Against Violence and McKay Training & Consulting, LLC, is a highly recognized national expert on the topic of criminal asphyxiation and interpersonal violence. She spent twelve years as a child abuse, sex crimes, domestic violence, and homicide prosecutor in Austin, Texas, and exclusively prosecuted strangulation related crimes for half of that time. She now trains and consults nationally to implement sustainable protocols and help strengthen how communities identify, investigate, and prosecute strangulation in cases ranging from intimate partner violence, human trafficking, sexual assault, child abuse, and homicide. She is the President & Founder of RESPOND Against Violence and also serves on multiple faculties, advisory boards, and committees.

TRACY MATHESON, Founder and President, Project Beloved, was raised in Fort Worth and is a graduate of Trinity Valley School. She is also a graduate of The University of Oklahoma where she earned a degree in Elementary Education. After college, she married her high school sweetheart, David Matheson, also from Fort Worth. Tracy has worked as a teacher, a realtor, and mission and outreach coordinator over the years. However, her role as Mom was always her dream job and one she has cherished. She and David are parents to Nick, age 30, who is now married and lives in Fort Worth with his wife, Elizabeth, and works at JTaylor & Associates, Ben, age 22, who is doing mission work with YWAM, and Max, age 20, a member of the class of 2023 at Texas A&M. They also have a daughter, Molly Jane, who should be 27. It is Molly’s life which inspired her to found Project Beloved and gave Tracy her most important role…a momma with a mission. 

DR. KHARA BREEDEN, Founder and CEO, Texas Forensic Nurse Examiners, has been involved in forensic nursing since 2012. While collaborating with community partners, Dr. Breeden was challenged to aid in closing the gap in medical forensic services for victims of violence and developed a collaborative approach through the creation of Texas Forensic Nurse Examiners: The Forensic Center of Excellence, where she serves as Chief Executive Officer. The Forensic Center is a community-based victim service center that is continually seeking creative ways to improve outcomes for victims of violence. She currently serves as the President-Elect of the International Association of Forensic Nurses, and as the Secretary of Texas Association Against Sexual Assault (TAASA).

PANELISTS - THE REALITIES OF CHILD MARRIAGE IN THE US

FRAIDY REISS, Founder/Executive Director, Unchained At Last, was 19 when her family arranged for her to marry a man who turned out to be violent. But with no education or job, in an insular religious community where only men have the right to grant a divorce, she felt trapped. Still trapped at age 27, Fraidy defied her husband and community to become the first person in her family to go to college. She graduated from Rutgers University at age 32 as valedictorian (called “commencement speaker” at Rutgers). Her family declared her dead, but Fraidy persevered. With her journalism degree, she was hired as a reporter for the Asbury Park Press in New Jersey, eventually getting promoted to the paper’s elite investigative-reporting team. She went on to a career as an investigator at Kroll, the world’s largest investigations firm. At the same time, Fraidy managed to get divorced, win full custody of her two daughters and get a final restraining order against her ex-husband. But Fraidy knows that most women and girls who want to flee or resist an arranged/forced marriage are limited by finances, religious law and social customs. For them, Fraidy founded and now leads Unchained At Last.

Fraidy is recognized internationally as an expert on forced and child marriage in the U.S. Her writing on the subject has been published in the New York Times, Washington Post and countless other publications in the U.S. and beyond, and she has been interviewed and featured by those outlets as well as Financial Times, BBC, PBS, NPR, CBS and others. Legislation she helped to write to end or reduce child marriage has been introduced and, in some cases, already passed in multiple states. 

SHERRY JOHNSON, Child Bride, Activist, Author, Speaker.

After surviving rape, abuse, and her own child marriage at the age of 11, Sherry Johnson is committed to ensuring the practice becomes illegal in every U.S. state. Currently, it is still legal in nearly all of them.

At age 11, Sherry Johnson was forced to marry her rapist, who was also the deacon of her Florida church. After raising nine children of her own by age 27, Sherry dedicated her life to ensuring that no child will ever be forced into marriage before they reach adulthood.

In 2018, Florida implemented one of the country's strictest laws, requiring a person to be at least 17 years old in order to get married. This significant legislative victory in Florida is largely attributable to Sherry, who has been advocating for policy change at the state capitol since 2012. Although the bill was not an outright ban on child marriage in Florida, Johnson was pleased with the legislative victory, and remains firm in her activism against child marriage. Sherry is committed to sharing her story and repeating this success nationwide, as well as spreading her efforts globally, until it is illegal for children to marry everywhere around the globe.

BOBBEE CARDILLO, Co-Convener of Zonta U.S. Women’s Caucus, has been a member of the Zonta International Advocacy Committee since 2016. She co- convenes the Zonta USA Caucus, an advocacy coalition of 13 Zonta districts representing 7000+ US members. In addition she serves as the Zonta’s District 3 Area 4 Director and has been a proud member of the Zonta Club of Fairfax County VA for twenty four years. Her interest in child marriage stems from Zonta International’s project in collaboration with Unicef/UNFPA in sub Saharan Africa begun in 2014. She has since overseen the implementation of the Zonta USA Caucus Billboard Campaign against child marriage in the US and led Zonta clubs to join state coalitions to end child marriage in PA, MN, NY and elsewhere. Bobbee is also a former foreign service spouse, having raised her family in Ethiopia, Greece and Liberia.

ADVOCACY SESSION

BETH ELLEN HOLIMON, Global Equity Advocate, Social Impact Strategist, has worked in the public and private arenas for over twenty years, developing expertise in executive management, fundraising, board development, and strategic planning.  She has a BA from the University of Colorado at Boulder and an MA from the University of South Florida. Beth Ellen has served as executive director for numerous organizations and worked as a financial advisor with Smith Barney helping individuals and nonprofit foundations to further their philanthropic goals through strategic wealth planning.

Beth Ellen has served as a rape crisis counselor, training coordinator for a domestic violence shelter, development director, and a teacher in South Korea.  She was a Rotary Ambassadorial Scholar to Mexico working with Rotary clubs through three states on issues of domestic violence and served as the president of the Sarasota AM Rotary Club.

Beth Ellen has completed the two-year BoardSource Building Better Boards consultant training program and has been an executive coach since 2007. She has served on several boards and currently sits on the Board of Directors for Kids Included Together, a national nonprofit helping organizations engage youth with and without disabilities.