Board
2011-2012 Bridge Board
Melissa Levick, President
melissa.levick@gmail.com
Melissa Levick is a MPA candidate at Wagner specializing in Management and Social Entrepreneurship. Inspired by a month-long trip to Bagamoyo, Tanzania, where she taught English to 40 kindergartners, she found her calling to change the world through social entrepreneurship and women’s empowerment. Prior to Wagner, Melissa worked at Google, Inc., where served as an Associate at Google Ventures, Google’s venture capital arm, as well as Assistant to the President of the Americas Operations. She also served as Head of Marketing for True Religion Brand Jeans, where she oversaw marketing, licensing and public relations for the global denim brand. Melissa received her B.A. with honors in Communication and Education from the University of Southern California.
Valerie Varco, Director of External Affairs
vvarco@gmail.com
Valerie Varco is the Director of External Affairs for Bridge and she is a 2012 M.P.A. Candidate with an International focus. Prior to joining Wagner in January 2010, Valerie was a non-profit consultant specializing in communications strategy and defining organizational processes. Passionate about poverty-alleviation through access to health and financial services, Valerie became interested in social entrepreneurship and the synergies between the non-profit and for-profit world while working as the Executive Assistant to Dr. Jim Yong Kim at the Harvard School of Public Health. After leaving Harvard, Valerie volunteered with Barack Obama’s Presidential Campaign in Cleveland, Ohio where a fellow volunteer persuaded her to move to Mumbai and write donor reports on the HIV/AIDs and adolescent girls’ program for Swayam Shikshan Prayog, a local Indian NGO devoted to educating and empowering women in rural areas. While in India, Valerie became interested in Bottom-of-the-Pyramid markets and products that can enhance the lives of the poor. She spent the past summer in Burkina Faso as a marketing intern for Ashoka Fellow Joceylne Yennega Kompaore where she developed the introduction strategy for The Talking Book, a learning device for low-literacy communities, in the village of Donsin. Valerie received her Bachelor’s in History from Colorado State University.
Katie Hale, Director of Operations
halekathryn@gmail.com
Katie is Director of Operations for Bridge and a MPA candidate at Wagner specializing in International Policy and Management. Previous to making the career shift to international development, she worked as a financial journalist covering the power and energy markets on a global level for three years based in New York and Buenos Aires. Katie also lived in Ecuador, where she worked as an editor and writer for a start-up travel guidebook company. Now, she is especially interested public-private partnerships and in exploring women’s empowerment through social entrepreneurship and economic development in Africa and Latin America. Katie interned at Women’s World Banking this year and is currently at the UNDP Private Sector Division, working on an initiative which challenges companies to develop innovative business models that achieve commercial success and development outcomes. A West Coast native, Katie graduated with a B.A.with Honors in Journalism from the University of Oregon.
Nerissa Clarke, Director of Events
nerissaclarke45@gmail.com
Nerissa is enthusiastic about social enterprise and corporate citizenship as a means for creating avenues for economic development and sustainable social impact. She graduated from Binghamton University in 2008 with a self-designed major in International Development and minors in Business and Economics. After graduation, Nerissa worked for The Samuel Bronfman Foundation for two years, where she evaluated grants and provided management consultation to the foundation’s core grantees.Nerissa spent last summer volunteering in Peru with a social enterprise called ProWorld. Nerissa is currently pursuing her MPA degree at NYU Wagner with a focus on Policy Analysis. Her primary interests center around how to build cross-sector capacityand how to measure impact within the emerging social innovation field.
Maëlle Fonteneau, Treasurer
mfonteneau@gmail.com
Maëlle Fonteneau, Bridge’s Treasurer, is a student at NYU Wagner pursuing her MPA with a Finance specialization. While at Wagner, she has been interning at the Mayor’s Office with the New Business Acceleration Team, a mayoral initiative to help entrepreneurs open their doors more quickly. Prior to moving to the east coast for graduate school, she worked in California on education and economic development with a focus on serving immigrant communities. Additionally, she spent several years at a capacity building consulting firm that supports nonprofits and grantmakers. Maelle is interested in the intersection of the public, private, and nonprofit sectors and how to build the capacity of projects dedicated to poverty alleviation and asset building.
