Our Team
Conference Leadership Co-Chairs
Majd Steitieh, MPP 2022
Majd Steitieh is a second year MPP at the Harvard Kennedy School and a Rawabi Fellow. She comes from a multidisciplinary background that includes management consulting, financial services, public policy, humanitarian aid, and fashion design. Prior to HKS, she spent two years as a management consultant at PwC in their Abu Dhabi and Jeddah offices. During this two-year period, Majd worked with governmental entities on issues centered around public safety. Majd also spent three years auditing banks and other financial institutions at PwC in Qatar as part of their Assurance Practice. Majd has always had a passion for public service and started a socially-motivated women's fashion brand specializing in a unique blend of traditional and modern wear for Middle Eastern dresses including Abayas to raise money for Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) treatment for Syrian and Palestinian refugees. Majd completed her undergraduate degree at McGill University where she majored in accounting. At HKS, Majd has been involved in a number of extracurricular activities including Co-chairing the Women in Power Conference, Leading the Arab Caucus and Vice-chairing the Student Public Service Collaborative.
Itika Gupta, MPA 2023
Valeria is a student of the Master in Public Administration and International Development program at Harvard Kennedy School. Prior to coming to Harvard, Valeria was a senior analyst at the prestigious economics think tank “México, ¿cómo vamos?” (MCV), where she was in charge of keeping track of economic indicators at a national and state level, making policy recommendations accordingly, and communicating them to policymakers and the media. Before her career at MCV, she worked as a research assistant to the head of Mexico’s National Institute of Public Health. Her research was mainly focused on the relationship between public health interventions and public finance. Valeria’s main interests are economic growth, public finance and, most recently, energy markets. Valeria is an Economist from Instituto Tecnológico Autónomo de México (ITAM), where she obtained her College Diploma with the thesis: “Dutch Disease in Mexico: the case of Campeche and Tabasco”.
Jamie Mittelman, MPA 2022
Jamie is a second year Master in Public Administration candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School. With the support of Harvard University's Innovation Lab and Women and Public Policy Program, Jamie launched a podcast, Flame Bearers: The Women Athletes Carrying Tokyo's Torch spotlighting women Olympians and Paralympians. Jamie received her MBA from Dartmouth's Tuck School of Business, where she consulted with the World Economic Forum and led the student delegation to win the World Government Summit's Global Universities Challenge. Her professional experience is in corporate social responsibility and nonprofit management.
Leonie Bolte, MPA 2022
Maddie Ulanow is a first year Master in Public Policy candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School. Prior to HKS, she worked as a risk analyst at Deloitte and in humanitarian aid in the Middle East, where also worked as a Fulbright fellow with the United Nations Relief and Works Agency. Maddie is deeply passionate about promoting equity and equality for women and girls in the U.S. and abroad, and to that end serves on the board of the Nina Brekelmans Memorial Foundation and as an Avodah Justice Fellow. In her spare time, Maddie loves baseball, phone banking, and her side hustle as a Washington, D.C. monuments tour guide. She holds a B.A. in Political Science from Carleton College.
Tasneem Ahmed, MPP 2023
Abosede is a Mid-Career MPA Mason Fellow candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School. Named Woman of the Year 2020 for her work in Women’s Political Participation by herNetwork and one of Nigeria’s 100 Most Inspirational Women by Leading Ladies Africa in 2019, Abosede is an experienced tri-sector leader with experience working in the non-profit, private, and public sectors. She has 17 years’ experience as a development professional working to improve the health, education, and economic outcomes in Nigeria and across Africa. She has a degree in Political Science/Public Administration and MSc in Communication for Innovation and Development from the University of Reading. Now she is on a mission as Co-founder ElectHER, an end-to-end women’s political advancement organisation bridging inequality gaps in Nigerian politics by addressing the under-representation of Nigerian women in elective office.
Conference Committee Chairs
MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS TEAM
Leonie Bolte, MPA 2022
Leonie is a first-year Master in Public administration candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School. She holds a B.A. in Political Science (FU Berlin) and an M.Sc. in Management (HEC Paris). Prior to attending HKS she worked as a management consultant (3 years at BCG), honing a passion for sustainable mobility and transportation. She is curious about digitalization and its effects on mobility, but also on broader society. She is a strong believer in diversity to foster sustainability. At HKS she specializes in the intersection of tech, digitalization, and policy.
MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS TEAM
Emmy-Lou Nicolaï, MPA 2022
Emmy-Lou is a first year Master in Public Administration at the Harvard Kennedy School. She focuses her studies and campus engagement on gender and social inequalities, especially in the education field. It compliments her academic background, which includes a Master’s Degree in History and a Master’s Degree in Public Affairs, as well as an Executive MBA. Prior to HKS, her musical score was played at the confluence of the public and private sector, with an experience as a high school educator and 4 years as a manager in a French strategy consulting boutique.
DIVERSITY & INCLUSION TEAM
Harman Bhullar, MPP 2022
Harman is a first year Master in Public Policy student at the Harvard Kennedy School. She previously worked as a Field Research Associate at J-PAL South Asia, focusing on Agricultural Economics. She also has experience in NGO strategy and operations, having worked in management at Teach for India. She is interested in financial inclusion for women from the global south and volunteers at a Government Girls' High School in her native village in India to help young girls transition into vocational careers and higher education post high school.
MALE ALLYSHIP TEAM
Sabarathinam Selvaraj, MPP 2022
Prior to joining HKS, Saba worked for 6+ years at the South Asia practice of commercial diplomacy firm Albright Stonebridge Group, where he led the research team and specialized in technology, renewable and development sectors, enabling tri-sector partnerships. Saba is also a founding volunteer of the Vedica Scholars Program for women, an 18-month leadership program to equip future women leaders.
TECHNICAL EVENT PLANNING
Leah Nakaima, MPP 2021
Prior to joining HKS, Leah consulted with the United nations Population Fund (UNFPA) where she co-led private-public partnerships with the Ugandan Ministry of Health and the Mastercard Foundation, to procure funds for small and medium-size entreprises (SMEs). For her thesis, Leah is working with Eli Lilly and Company to research and analyse the drug supply chain in low-income countries and to recommend policy options that would increase access to affordable pharmaceuticals, particularly insulin. Additionally, she has worked with Eli Lilly and Company to develop a program which the Gates CEO Round Table would implement to holistically address the health inequities in the U.S. caused by COVID-19 and systemic racism. Leah is passionate about healthcare reforms, value-based drug distribution chains, and increasing access to affordable and quality lifesaving medications to the people who need them.
COMMUNITY OUTREACH TEAM
Svenja Kirsch, MPP 2022
Svenja is a first year Master in Public Policy candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School. She previously worked in corporate sustainability management in the automotive industry and possesses further experience in academic reviewing, political campaigning and think tank research. She is passionate about female empowerment, particularly in economic and political contexts, and writes a female leadership column at Global Risk Insights.
COMMUNITY OUTREACH TEAM
Shradha Gupta, MBA/MPA 2022
Shradha is an MBA/MPA dual degree student at the Wharton School and the Harvard Kennedy School, respectively. She previously worked in investment banking in Toronto, at a not-for-profit in Uganda and in venture capital/impact investing in India. She is passionate about gender equality and is working on launching her own start-up focused on helping women navigate gender bias in the workplace.
PODCAST FLAMEBEARERS
Michelle Poulin, MPP 2022
Michelle Poulin is a first year Master in Public Policy candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School. She also helps produce the Flame Bearers podcast. Prior to enrolling at HKS, she worked as an international college recruiter and then at a health policy thinktank. She is passionate about racial justice, climate justice, and LGBTQ+ rights. In her spare time, Michelle loves to play guitar and spend time outdoors. She holds a B.A. in Asian studies and anthropology from Hobart and William Smith Colleges.
HKS Partner Organization Leadership
WOMEN IN DEFENSE, DIPLOMACY, AND DEVELOPMENT, Co-Chair
Izzy Ernst, MPA/MBA 2021
Izzy Ernst is a joint Master of Business Administration and Master of Public Administration student at the Stanford Graduate School of Business and the Harvard Kennedy School. Izzy started her career as a management consultant at McKinsey & Company. During the European refugee crisis in 2015/16 she moved back to her hometown Berlin to support the state government in its efforts to accommodate and integrate 60,000 newcomer refugees. She later joined the International Rescue Committee (IRC) as Senior Advisor to the Senior Vice President for Europe.
WOMEN IN DEFENSE, DIPLOMACY, AND DEVELOPMENT, Co-Chair
Aoibheann Thinnes, MPP 2021
Aoibheann is a second year Master in Public Policy student at Harvard Kennedy School. Prior to HKS, Aoibheann worked as a federal management consultant in Washington D.C., leading multi-functional teams and delivering strategic and analytical support to federal agencies primarily in the Department of Homeland Security and Department of Justice. She studies the intersection of national security and foreign policy and is currently researching the nature of organized cybercrime groups.
WOMEN’S POLICY JOURNAL, Co-Editor in Chief
Rose Khattar, MPP 2021
A second-year student in the Master’s in Public Policy Program at the Harvard Kennedy School, she is dedicated to ending sexist oppression. While at HKS, she is consulting for the OECD on pay transparency laws and partnering with the World Bank on closing gender gaps in the Mashreq region. Last year, Rose was chair of the HKS’ Women in Power Caucus and a Research Assistant with the Women and Public Policy Program. Prior to joining HKS, Rose worked as an economist in the civil service, and as a policy advisor to an Australian Senator. Recently, her analysis of the effects of gender imbalances on gender norms was published in the Review of Economic Studies.
WOMEN’S POLICY JOURNAL, Co-Editor in Chief
Amanda Said, MPP 2021
Amanda is is a second-year student in the Master’s in Public Policy program at the Harvard Kennedy School, where she focuses on education policy. In particular, she is committed to dismantling structural inequality in education systems. Prior to joining HKS, Amanda worked on providing access to educational and professional opportunities to students of color in Detroit, MI.
WOMEN’S CAUCUS, Co-Chair
Megan Linquiti, MPP 2021
Megan is a second-year student in the Masters in Public Policy program at HKS, where she focuses on social & urban policy. She is a co-chair of the Women’s Caucus and an associate editor with the Women’s Policy Journal, as well as a consultant with the Rockefeller Foundation on projects related to impact evaluation. Prior to HKS, she worked in the philanthropic sector with a portfolio focused on economic mobility and fiscal policy.
WOMEN’S CAUCUS, Co-Chair
Maddi Reeves, MPP MBA
Maddi is a joint MPP and MBA at Harvard and Northwestern. Prior to graduate school, she worked as a consultant at Bain before joining the Gates Foundation, where she helped design the foundations’s inaugural Gender Equality strategy. Maddi is passionate about climate, energy, and environnemental issues, especially cleantech innovation and public-private collaboration to support the energy transition. In her personal time, Maddi loves to cook, parent her dog, read fiction, and explore the outdoors.
Academic Advisors
Kessely Hong, Lecturer in Public Policy
Kessely is a Lecturer in Public Policy and the Faculty Chair of the MPA Programs and the Mid-Career MPA Summer Program at the Harvard Kennedy School. She teaches both Degree Program as well as Executive Education students in the areas of negotiation and decision-making. Prior to HKS, she worked for McKinsey and Company and taught English in Ecuador. Her interests include exploring strategies low-power or low-status parties can use to influence others through negotiation.
Janina Matuszeski, Lecturer in Public Policy
Janina is a Lecturer in Public Policy at the Harvard Kennedy School, teaching courses in economics and international development. Prior to HKS she worked for Oxfam America as Senior Research Coordinator, Community Finance Department, in Mali, Senegal, Cambodia, El Salvador and Guatemala. Prior to this, she served as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Mali. Her interests include program evaluation, development economics, political economy and research involving digital map data (GIS).
Barbara Kellerman, James McGregor Burns Lecturer in Public Leadership
Barbara is the James MacGregor Burns Lecturer in Public Leadership at the Harvard Kennedy School. She is the Founding Executive Director of the School’s Center for Public Leadership. Kellerman was cofounder of the International Leadership Association (ILA), and is author and editor of many books focusing on women and leadership.