Nik Haas-Dehejia graduated from Vassar College in 1994 with a BA in International Relations.  He worked in Washington, D.C. at the World Resources Institute and at The World Bank where he engaged in policy research and project development on international agricultural development issues.  Nik then moved to San Francisco to work at Business for Social Responsibility (BSR), where he led a number of consulting assignments for Fortune 500 companies interested in implementing corporate social responsibility strategies.  He also generated awareness of BSR and drove traffic to the organization's website through a weekly email publication and a series of business papers designed to promote benefits to BSR members on issues including environmental partnerships, workforce diversity, work-life balance, and business ethics.  

Alison Lingane graduated from Harvard with a BA in Biology, after which she managed a job training program for "at risk" youth in entrepreneurship and small business management at Berkeley Youth Alternatives. Through developing and growing several small businesses, she created a highly effective hybrid of on-the-job training and classroom learning. At the Haas School of Business, her emphasis is in Management of Technology, and she has worked closely with many Bay Area organizations, including OpNet, Silicon Valley Community Ventures, Global Education Partnership and New Schools. Alison also worked as a management consultant at Towers Perrin on high tech and telecommunications projects.  

Denise Yamamoto graduated from UC Berkeley in 1992 with degrees in Economics and East Asian Languages, emphasis in Japanese. She worked in San Francisco for Barclays Global Investors for 6 years, most recently as the international equity portfolio manager in the firm's Alpha Strategies Group. Last spring, Denise spent three weeks in Bangladesh working with Grameen Fund, Bangladesh's first venture capital fund. In the summer of 1999, Denise worked for the National Park Service and the National Parks and Conservation Association writing a business plan for Shenandoah National Park in Virginia.  

Lia Fernald graduated from Swarthmore College in 1994 with a B.A. in Biological Anthropology and Public Policy, after which she went to Jamaica for a year as a Fulbright Scholar. In Jamaica, and later in Nepal, Lia studied the effects of malnutrition on mental development and stress response in school children. She received her Ph.D. in 1999 in Clinical Medicine from the University of London, where she was fully funded by the National Institutes of Health. Lia has also worked as an economic analyst for UNICEF in Nairobi, Kenya and as a nutritional counselor at the WIC program in East Palo Alto. Last spring, Lia spent three weeks in Zimbabwe as part of a team evaluating the potential of a micro-credit bank for women in the rural part of the country. In the summer of 1999, Lia worked at the Healtheon Corporation in Santa Clara in strategic planning, business development and marketing.  

Sara Olsen is a Dartmouth '93 and received her M.A.S.W. from the University of Chicago in '98. She taught public high school in the Mississippi Delta and was a strategic advisor to the MidSouth Economic Development Initiative. She was sales and business manager of a startup social enterprise launched by Shorebank Corporation, called Studio Air (www.studioair.com), a design company that cultivates the entrepreneurial skills of African-American teens. She co-founded the Community and Economic Development Club at the University of Chicago, and will use her Haas MBA to increase the hi-tech business sophistication of social service efforts through scalable social entrepreneurship.

 

Misha Cornes (not pictured) holds an MA in International Relations from Yale University and a BA (Honors) from the University of California, Davis. He was an Associate with the global management consulting firm Booz-Allen & Hamilton, where he provided strategic, regulatory, and financial advisory services on the privatization of state-owned enterprises for the World Bank Group. He was also a consultant to the United Nations Development Program. Misha serves as Vice-President for Communications on the Haas student government, and is assisting with marketing and public relations for the Competition.  

Lynelle Preston (not pictured) With an MS in Natural Resource Management, Lynelle has been working in the environmental nonprofit sector for over seven years. Most recently Lynelle worked with The Mountain Institute, an international nonprofit which implements conservation projects in the major mountain regions of the world. Working in the Himalayas, Lynelle co-founded a micro-enterprise loan fund in Tibet, designed a national endowment fund for biodiversity in Nepal, and wrote a strategic plan for The Mountain Institute. Previously Lynelle worked for the National Outdoor Leadership School, World Wildlife Fund, and the Jackson Hole Conservation Alliance. She plans to continue environmental work from within the private sector, ideally working on environmental strategy for high-tech companies.