Unbound Philanthropy, a family foundation that funds work to protect the human rights of immigrants and refugees and to support their integration into receiving communities, has promoted two staff members to directorships while doubling its staff size in recent months.
Ted Wang was promoted to Program Director for Unbound Philanthropy’s United States Program and Will Somerville was named Program Director for the foundation’s United Kingdom Program.
Ted Wang joined the Unbound Philanthropy staff in 2011 as Senior Program Officer for the United States Program. He had been a public policy consultant and, prior to that, worked for 14 years in the civil rights community, holding leadership positions at Chinese for Affirmative Action and the Lawyers' Committee for Civil Rights of the San Francisco Bay Area. Wang received his Bachelor's degree from Reed College and his law degree from Yale Law School. He has received awards from public and private groups, including the California Asian Pacific Islander Legislative Caucus' Legislative Hero Award and the Asian American Bar Association of the Bay Area's Outstanding Leadership to the Legal Community Award. Wang is originally from Taipei, Taiwan and works out of Berkeley, California.
Will Somerville has focused on immigration policy and practice at the international and national levels throughout his career, and also is a senior policy analyst for the Migration Policy Institute. His experience includes work as a policy advisor on migration issues in the Prime Minister's Strategy Unit and as the policy lead on asylum and immigration at the Commission for Racial Equality. He is the author of the book Immigration under New Labour (Policy Press, 2007) and has written more than 60 articles, chapters and papers. Somerville holds a first class History degree from the University of Leeds and a Master's with Distinction in Social Policy and Planning from the London School of Economics. He is a member of English PEN, a charity that works to promote literature and human rights. Somerville is a British citizen, born in Germany; during his career he has lived and worked in London, Lisbon, Buenos Aires and Washington, DC. Somerville is currently based in Bath in the West of England.
Carmen Maria Pérez, Unbound Philanthropy’s Office Manager since 2010, was promoted to the position of Operations and Administration Officer. She had previously worked as an assistant to a senior executive at an international sports marketing agency and as a personal representative for classical musicians. Pérez attended St. John's University and Hunter College where she majored in Psychology. She makes her home in New York and volunteers with the Careers through Culinary Arts Program, helping underserved young people find opportunity and a career path in the food industry.
New to the Unbound Philanthropy staff are Grants Manager Celeste Dado; Program Officer Adey Fisseha; Strategic Opportunities Analyst Kate Brick; Executive Assistant to the Executive Director Bernadette Crasto; and Program Officer Jake Lee.
Celeste Dado has 14 years of international and United States grants-management experience. For the past six years she served as the Senior Grants Manager of the Arcus Foundation and previously as a Grants Administrator in the Peace and Social Justice Program of the Ford Foundation. She also has lengthy experience in finance and administration with museums, arts organizations and the New York Public Library. Dado earned an M.B.A. in Arts Administration from the State University of New York at Binghamton, and a Bachelor’s degree in Economics from Douglass Women’s College of Rutgers University. She was born in the Philippines and now lives in Cobble Hill, Brooklyn.
Adey Fisseha previously worked for ten years at the National Immigration Law Center (NILC), most recently serving as a policy attorney and campaign coordinator. She worked on a wide range of federal policy issues at NILC, including, notably, as lead lawyer on a national advocacy campaign to pass the Dream Act. Fisseha was a compelling media spokesperson on the effort and led of a coalition of more than one hundred national faith, education, labor and immigrant/civil rights groups on the campaign. Fisseha graduated from Harvard University with a Bachelor’s degree in Government and a certificate in African Studies, and earned her law degree at the Benjamin N. Cardozo School of Law, where she was a Cardozo Public Service Scholar.
Jake Lee previously worked for six years as an attorney at Allen & Overy LLP of London, one of the world’s largest law firms. As manager of pro bono and community affairs for the firm, his work focused on the issues of human rights and equal access to justice. Lee developed strategies and built strategic partnerships for the firm’s social justice work, where he will continue to play a role. He has grantmaking experience with the Allen & Overy charitable foundations and the Baring Foundation and speaks French and Spanish. Lee holds a first class degree in Economics from the University of Warwick and graduated from BPP Law School with distinctions in both the postgraduate diploma in law and the legal practice course.
Kate Brick previously served for two years as an associate policy analyst at the Migration Policy Institute. Before that, Brick worked for three years as a program associate for the Mexico Institute at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars. She is fluent in Spanish and is familiar with United States and European Union immigration and asylum law. Brick earned a Bachelor’s degree in Latin American studies, magna cum laude, from George Washington University’s Elliott School of International Affairs, and a Master’s degree in International Affairs with a focus on Social Policy and Immigration at Columbia University’s School of International and Public Affairs.
Bernadette Crasto worked for more than a decade with Dr. Olara Otunnu, the United Nations Under-Secretary-General and Special Representative for Children and Armed Conflict and President of the International Peace Institute. She has studied at Milagres College in Kallianpur, India, and at Marymount Manhattan College. Crasto immigrated to the United States from India, and now makes her home in Queens Village.