Staff

Lara Allen – Director

Dr Lara Allen has worked extensively in international development and has the ideal mix of skills to lead the Humanitarian Centre during its 2014-15 year focused on Empowered Voices and into the future. Lara has a PhD from the University of Cambridge and was Associate Professor and Research Fellow at the University of Witwatersrand in South Africa. In 2007, she co-founded the Tshulu Trust, which links rural communities in the Venda region of South Africa with universities. The Trust aims to improve livelihoods by sharing knowledge and building the capacity of developing communities. Lara ran the organisation for eight years. Since 2012, Lara has been head of monitoring and evaluation, research, capacity building and communications at Misean Cara, an Irish NGO, which supports development projects worldwide. She took up her post on the 6th of October 2014.

Contact: lara.allen@humanitariancentre.org

 

Moira V. Faul – Senior Advisor

Dr Moira Faul works one day a week, providing advice to the Humanitarian Centre on impact assessment and networking strategies. Moira also works at the University of Cambridge Centre for Science and Policy leading on the ESRC-funded Policy Challenges initiative, which aims to provide new perspectives on some high-priority public policy issues identified by policy makers. Originally from Zimbabwe, Moira recently completed a PhD at the University of Cambridge, comparing formal and informal global policy networks in international development. As Head of Education and Youth Policy (UK) at Oxfam GB, she led an extensive programme of policy research and advocacy. Prior to this, she held senior managerial positions in the private sector in Spain and China.

Contact: moira.faul@humanitariancentre.org

 

Janice S. Pedersen – Resource Manager

Janice supports skills and capacity-building for Humanitarian Centre members, by providing guidance, advice, resources and networking opportunities. She also communicates members’ activities within the network and to the wider community, and oversees the provision of occasional training opportunities. Janice comes to the Humanitarian Centre after working as a policy researcher, with a focus on evaluation and performance management as well as health policy. She holds a bachelor’s degree in archaeology and anthropology from the University of Cambridge and a master’s degree in social anthropology from the University of Copenhagen, Denmark. She has carried out independent fieldwork in rural eastern Uganda, exploring elderly people’s support networks in cases of ill health. Prior to moving to the UK, she worked for a Danish consultancy that applies anthropological and design-based theory and methods to user-driven innovation projects for a range of clients across sectors. Janice is a Danish national, and spent her formative years in Botswana and Tanzania.

Contact: janices.pedersen@humanitariancentre.org

 

Anne Radl – Programmes Manager

Anne leads the Humanitarian Centre’s  work on ‘cross-sector collaboration’: helping people from academia, NGOs, policy–and increasingly business–to connect with one another, to explore better ways of working together for more just and sustainable development.  She runs the Humanitarian Centre’s ‘themed years’, providing a platform to catalyse new ways of thinking and creative collaborations to tackle complex global challenges, like Global Health (2011-2012) and Global Food Futures (2013-2014).  Anne was a Peace Corps Volunteer in Guyana, where she helped build networks for sharing ideas and resources for better community health and well-being. She also spent two years working at a San Francisco-based NGO, Shanti, growing and strengthening the volunteer community, to provide support for people living with HIV, AIDS and breast cancer. Anne studied anthropology at the University of Cambridge, for her master’s degree, and at the University of California, Berkeley, as an undergraduate.

Anne will be on maternity leave from the 8th of August 2014 and we look forward to welcoming her back in August 2015. While she is away, please get in touch with the Humanitarian Centre office instead at info@humanitariancentre.org.

Emily Brocklebank – Events & Project Coordinator

Emily is the Events and Project Coordinator for the ‘Empowered Voices Year’ at the Humanitarian Centre. She recently graduated from the University of Southampton holding a degree in Applied Social Sciences: Anthropology. Her dissertation focussed on the importance of bottom-up approaches to sustainable development through exploring the impact of cultural values, practices and norms on maternal mortality. Emily’s passion for human rights was ignited at a young age and is reflected in her work with Amnesty International and Feminist Societies.

Contact: emily.brocklebank@humanitariancentre.org

 

Federica Garofalo – Administration Office & Sustainable Development Intern

Federica is a life lover, passionate for people, sustainability and out of the box thinking. She works as administration officer at the HC during mornings and as a creative researcher intern in afternoons. Having a background in architecture studies, she is now developing a brand new collaborative project between the Humanitarian Centre and the e-Luminate foundation, exploring the world of light, light-art, cutting-edge research on LED and efficient lighting technologies connected to the huge impact that the discovery of efficient/ low cost LED light can have in international development. She is also facing the challenge of being able to communicate effectively and creatively to people the outcome of this research in an installation that will be exposed during the e-Luminate festival 2015 in Cambridge, where she will also give a talk about the whole process.

Contact : federica.garofalo@humanitariancentre.org

Millie Cherfils – Communications Co-ordinator and Intern Programme Lead

Based between Cambridge and Paris, Millie has worked as a print, radio and television journalist for more than 15 years since graduating from Columbia University with a Master of Science in Journalism in 1998. She is fluent in English, French, Spanish and Creole and has worked in both the US and France since graduating as well as travelling globally for work. She also spent 8 years with the world association of newspapers promoting media literacy and reading amongst young people.

Contact: millie.cherfils@humanitariancentre.org

 

Sylva Eretova – Events and Projects Support Officer

Sylva is currently studying a bachelor’s degree in International Relations and European Studies at the Metropolitan University in Prague. She spent a final year of her studies in Finland studying degree programme in Politics at the University of Tampere. She has started to focus on Humanitarian Governance as well as Security Policy and European Integration there. During her studies she worked as an Administrative Assistant and Conference Assistant in several Czech firms. Furthermore, she gained work experience in the USA, Spain and United Kingdom. Sylva is set to graduate in 2015 and would like to continue her studies in Denmark.

Contact : sylva.eretova@humanitariancentre.org

 

Tom Hughes – Special Projects Officer

Tom studied International Law at Yokohama National University in Japan and has returned to the UK to pursue a career in the charity sector focusing on his interest in human rights.

Tom has been involved in a number of roles at the Humanitarian Centre including fundraising, events planning and members’ communications such as the events emails. Tom is now working on new partnership projects to expand the Humanitarian Centre and its member’s reach to include voices from the global south.

Contact: tom.hughes@humanitariancentre.org

Stuart comes from Berkshire where he obtained AS and A levels in Maths, Further Maths, Physics, Geography and History. He is currently studying a BA in Archaeology and Anthropology and will graduate next summer. He has worked for African Prisons Project where he led a team with a focus on education. He has also lived with squatters, participated in archaeological excavations and worked in a bone lab.

Contact: stuart.king@humanitariancentre.org

 

Axel Minet – IT and Software Support

Axel came to Cambridge in 1997 to study Audio & Music Technology at Anglia Ruskin University. He has been involved in setting up Cambridge 105 and its predecessor 209radio (the local community radio station). He now works as a freelance web developer and is involved in organising a local Community-Supported Agriculture scheme called Cambridge CropShare.

Contact: axel.minet@humanitariancentre.org

Mandi Naini- Membership Officer

Mandi volunteers with the Humanitarian Centre and helps update and maintain its membership records. She has a PhD in Politics from the University of Hull and worked as a post docteral reasearch associate at the Department of Asian and Middle East Studies at Cambridge University. In 2002 she managed a joint project with the UNDP entitled ‘Strengthening Legislatures’ in Iran. Her passion for volunteering started in her undergraduate years where she helped communities in Botswana and Lesotho. She has a strong interest in Governance, Human Development and Gender Empowerment.

Contact: mandi.naini@humanitariancentre.org

Alice Oates – Communications Intern

Alice who originally hails from Devon graduated this summer from Cambridge University with a degree in Geography having obtained AS and A-levels in Geography, Biology, Ethics and Philosophy and Chemistry. She hopes to work in international development, either in a humanitarian or a security capacity and will be applying for a Masters in Geopolitics and Security at Royal Holloway starting in October 2015.

Contact : alice.oates@humanitariancentre.org

 

Marieta Teleman – Finance and Accounting

Marieta came to Cambridge in 2012 to develop  insights into  finance and accounting. Her dream is to work in the accounting unit a one of the world’s leading firms. She is responsible for recording the Centre’s financial activities and establishing a clearer model for book-keeping.

 

 

 

 

See our LinkedIn page for more connections, including former staff.

 

Our thanks to photographer Mustafa Beg for donating his time to take our portraits. Follow him on Twitter @24by36.
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