Lauri Alpern

Lauri Alpern is a partner in ROI Ventures and ROI Partners Fund. Lauri
brings extensive experience developing results-oriented strategic plans for a variety of non-profit organizations and institutions. Her unique expertise lies in defining organizations in order to expand their social missions through earned-income strategies and social purpose business ventures.

Most recently, Lauri served as Executive Director of The Enterprising
Kitchen (TEK), a non-profit social enterprise which operates a
manufacturing company that produces natural soaps and soap products as a way to provide job training and support services to women.

Lauri has more than fifteen years of experience creating and implementing community, economic development and higher education programs and partnerships. She helped found the Great Cities Institute at the University of Illinois at Chicago, where she has served as associate director. There, she worked on university-community
partnerships in the areas of community development, education, health
and public policy. She has also held positions with UIC’s Center for Urban Economic Development, and as assistant commissioner for the City of Chicago Department of Economic Development in the administrations of Mayors Harold Washington and Eugene Sawyer.

Lauri has a Master of Urban Planning and Policy degree from the University of Illinois at Chicago.

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Jane Beckett provides freelance assistance to nonprofits and specializes in training, organizational assessment and writing for membership-based organizations. Ms. Beckett has staff experience in community-based, labor and educational organizations and was program officer at the New Prospect Foundation for a number of years. Ms. Beckett has experience in foundation, special events, dues and fee-based fundraising. She has participated in two funder collaboratives whose goal was to introduce Chicago foundations to funding in areas that were new to them.

Her volunteer involvements - in organizations ranging from the Girl Scouts to the National Organization for Women to the Treekeepers Program of the Open Lands Project to the Coalition of Labor Union Women - have informed her practice and provided her with a wealth of experiences that underline her conviction that fundraising success is directly tied to organizational strength and to thoughtful diversification of funding sources.

Ms. Beckett has a Master of Science in Teaching and a Bachelor of Arts in American Civilization.

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Martin Berg

Martin Berg, Director of Marketing and Communications for Community Investment Corporation, specializes in marketing, fundraising management and operations management. CIC is a nonprofit multifamily rehab lender creating affordable housing for the six-county Chicago area. Mr. Berg is a member of the Publicity Club of Chicago, Public Relations Society of America, American Marketing Association, Independent Writers of Chicago and the Chicago Newspaper Guild/CWA Local #34071, AFL – CIO.

Mr. Berg has over 25 years of nonprofit public relations/marketing experience, beginning with his service from 1979 as director of community programs for the former St. Anne's Hospital on Chicago's west side and continuing with his tenure as executive director of the North-Pulaski Chamber of Commerce in the mid-1980s. From 1988 to 2000 he was director of communications, member services and retail development for the Chicago Association of Neighborhood Development Organizations (CANDO), where he worked with that nonprofit citywide coalition to revitalize Chicago neighborhood retail and industrial areas.

Mr. Berg was born and raised in St. Louis, Missouri. He received his Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Saint Louis University and pursued a Master of Social Work degree at the Jane Addams Graduate School of Social Work at the University of Illinois at Chicago.

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Robin Berkson

Robin Berkson, Vice President, Member Relations of the Donors Forum of Chicago, specializes in fundraising management. The Donors Forum has more than 170 grantmaking members and 900 nonprofit Forum Partners.

Ms. Berkson has extensive experience in grantmaking, social research and fund raising and has been a consultant to philanthropic and nonprofit organizations. She is the former director of United Way 's Priority Grants and Needs Assessment Program in Chicago where she facilitated volunteer oversight, produced needs assessment reports and managed grantmaking. At United Way, her specializations included education, employment, poverty issues and family life issues. Ms. Berkson also managed United Way's needs assessment and grantmaking that specifically addressed discrimination in education, employment, health and housing. Ms. Berkson has served as chair of the board of directors of Chicago Women in Philanthropy.

Ms. Berkson holds a Master of Arts in Philosophy and a Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy, both from UIC.

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Bob Brehm

Bob Brehm has provided direct technical assistance to over 20 community organizations, focusing on organizational development, strategic planning and management, program evaluation and community organizing and development strategies. He has also been teaching in several venues, including the Urban Developers Program at UIC, the Masters of Arts in Community Development at North Park College and various workshops in Chicago.

Mr. Brehm's interests lie in community empowerment – looking beyond the numbers and tangible results in community organizing and development to such things as individual growth, leadership development, changes in the power structure and the ongoing struggle for economic and social justice. He has always strived to manage in a way that is both inclusive and democratic, and that prioritizes recruiting people from the local community for staff and leadership positions. Over the years, Mr. Brehm has found that good organizational management is not at all inconsistent with those principles. A well-managed organization can put more energy into its empowerment work than can a group that is struggling to maintain its people, finances or focus.

Bob has 30 years of experience in community organizing
and development in Chicago and more recently in the Washington D.C. area.. Seventeen of those years were spent as director of the Bickerdike Redevelopment Corporation, a community development organization active in the West Town/Humboldt park area. During his tenure the organization grew from a staff of three to more than 50, developed several hundred units of affordable housing with resident councils active in management of the properties, created a subsidiary construction company and developed two commercial real estate projects.

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Margo recently founded De Ley and Associates, a consulting firm serving foundations, nonprofits and other public service institutions. Previously she spent a year as senior consultant at the Chicago-based Millennia Consulting. Margo served for more than eleven years as a program officer at The Chicago Community Trust, where she oversaw grants in two communities under the Trusts Children, Youth and Families Initiative, was senior program officer for the Community Development program and directed the Chicago Area Foundation for Legal Services. While at the Trust, she worked with organizations in the fields of youth development, legal services, affordable housing, economic development, regional planning, workforce development, adult literacy, community organizing, leadership development, civic participation, civil rights, criminal justice reform and strengthening the nonprofit sector. In addition, she reviewed and evaluated programs of the Trust and worked with colleagues, Latino trustees, and Latino business leaders in the creation of Nuestro Futuro, a Latino fund at the Trust.

Margo served on the awards committees for the Chicago Neighborhood Development Awards and the Chicago Community Organizing Awards. She also served on the grant making committees of the Fund for Immigrants and Refugees and the Funders Collaborative for Strong Latino Communities of Hispanics in Philanthropy. Margo is a member of the Urban Development Committee of the Metropolitan Planning Council.

Prior to joining the Trust, Margo held positions in the Office of Research Services at the University of Illinois at Chicago and the Office of International Studies at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign. She has published articles on French immigration policy and undocumented Mexican immigrant workers in Los Angeles, a study of community foundations in Mexico and a capacity-building manual for organizations of Spanish-speaking immigrants. She has more than fifteen years of experience in teaching and program development at the pre-school, elementary, university and adult education levels. Margo is fluent in Spanish and French.

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Joan Flanagan

Joan Flanagan is the Fundraiser for the Center for New Community www.newcomm.org, the only national organization based in the Heartland working on the ground with organizations, coalitions, and congregations to build community, justice, and equality. She also serves as fundraising counsel for the Association of Small Foundations.
Every year, Ms. Flanagan trains more than 500 professional fundraisers and community leaders in the United States. She will be leading a workshop on "Raising Money for Smaller Organizations and Congregations" for the Donors Forum of Chicago twice a year www.donorsforum.org. Joan has worked for two foundations that have made more than $300 million in grants. She also practices what she preaches as a volunteer for her church, Horizon Hospice and Interfaith Worker Justice.

Joan Flanagan is the author of two best selling "how-to" books. Her classic The Grass Roots Fundraising Book is the most popular fundraising book in the world. Successful Fundraising, 2nd Edition, focuses on how to raise big money from corporations, foundations and individuals by involving celebrities and marketing your “brand” to a corporate sponsor. The Chinese language and Korean language editions were launched in 2003. The Grantsmanship Center calls her books “the New and Old Testament of Fundraising.” Both books are available from any bookseller and on audiocassette from Recordings for the Blind and Dyslexic.

Ms. Flanagan graduated Magna Cum Laude from Denison University with a Bachelor of Arts in French. She studied at the Université de Paris with the Sweet Briar Junior Year in France program with courses at the Sorbonne, the Louvre and Paris Theatres. She is currently earning a Master Online Teaching Certificate through the University of Illinois.

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Atanacio (Nacho) Gonzalez

Atanacio (Nacho) Gonzalez specializes in nonprofit governance and strategic planning. He is a fellow at the Great Cities Institute and coordinator of the Great Cities Institute Community and Economic Development Research Cluster as well as Associate Director of the UIC Neighborhoods Initiative, which is based at the Great Cities Institute.

Mr. Gonzalez has a long record of work in community organizing, housing and economic development. He is very active in the Latino community of Chicago and nationally. As an organizer, Mr. Gonzalez utilizes popular education organizing, a methodology used in Latin American community organizing. He is treasurer of the Bickerdike Redevelopment Corporation, one of the most successful affordable housing organizations in Chicago and president of the Humboldt Construction Company, which is community staffed and builds low-income housing. He is also the coordinator of the Organizer Learning Network, a community-driven learning center for community organizers. He has been a consultant in organizational development and organizer training since 1982. He has authored or participated in numerous research projects on economic and community development with the UIC Center for Community and Economic Development, the UIC Voorhees Neighborhood Center and the UIC Neighborhoods Initiative. Mr. Gonzalez holds a Master in Urban Planning and Policy degree from UIC as well as a Bachelor of Arts degree in History from California State University at Los Angeles and a Certificate in Business Administration from UIC.

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Ike Heard

Ike Heard serves as a Visiting Assistant Professor of Geography and Urban Planning at the University of North Carolina at Charlotte. His primary subjects are environmental planning, transportation planning, community economic development and urban planning (practice and theory). He has operated as an economic development and planning consultant for community-based organizations and local governments since the late 1980s. Ike earned his B.A. at Dartmouth College, his Master of City Planning degree at Harvard University and his Master of Public Administration degree at UNC Charlotte. From 1999 until 2003 he was the Charlotte Office Director for the Enterprise Foundation, a national organization that works with partners to provide low-income people with affordable housing, safer streets and access to jobs and childcare. The Charlotte office provides technical assistance and $1 million in annual funding (core operating grants and project loans) to 6 Charlotte-area CDC's. From 1991 until 1999, Ike Heard was employed as the Executive Director of the Northwest Corridor Community Development Corporation. In that capacity, Ike Heard was responsible for: planning and executing a 55,000 SF shopping center; developing nearly 200 units of affordable housing stock (new, rehabilitated, rental and owner occupied); co-developing (with Volunteers of America) a 60-unit LIHTC project for fixed-income elderly; implementing leadership training seminars for volunteer neighborhood activists; and developing a 30,000 SF community-oriented services facility and office building (sold to the Carolinas Medical Center and operating as a free-standing medical clinic). In support of these projects, he raised more than $2 million in grant funds to support the core operations of the CDC and more than $24 million in loans, investments and grants to finance the various projects. Prior to 1991 Ike worked for local housing developers for 4 years and was on the staff of the Charlotte-Mecklenburg Planning Commission for 13 years. Top

Mary Heidkamp

Mary Heidkamp, President of Dynamic Insights International, specializes in strategic, operations, marketing management and nonprofit governance. Dynamic Insights International strives to inspire organizations and their leaders to become the best that they can be while discovering the best of who they are.

Dr. Mary Heidkamp has twenty-five years of experience in leading organizations, including ten years as the Director for the Campaign for Human Development in Chicago, Illinois. In her role as president of Dynamic Insights International, she has consulted with organizations as diverse as the Chicago Mayor's Office for Workforce Development, the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation, Mercy Hospital's Comprehensive Breast Center, the Sargent Shriver National Center for Poverty Law, Catholic Relief Services and Sarah's Inn of Oak Park. Drawing on the experiences of eight years spent living in South Africa, Japan and India, she brings a cross-cultural and international perspective to the work of organizational problem solving.

Dr. Heidkamp has received numerous awards including the Harry A. Fagan Roundtable Award (1996), the Cardinal Bernardin Common Ground Award (1996) and the Clarke College Distinguished Alumnae Award for Humanitarian Service (1995).

She teaches Strategic Management, Operations Management and Board of Director Development at the University of Illinois at Chicago and Organizational Change at McCormick Seminary.

Dr. Heidkamp is also the author of numerous popular articles on topics including goal setting, time management and women's unique challenge in the workplace. She is the co-author, with Jim Lund, of Moving Faith into Action (1990, Paulist Press) “a guide for organizing congregational groups for social action.”

She holds a Doctorate from McCormick Theological Seminary (1993) with a specialization in organizational change and executive leadership.

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Noah Jenkins is a freelance research, planning, and writing consultant to nonprofit groups and universities that are engaged in community development, technical assistance, workforce development, social justice, poverty alleviation, and higher education. She has written and edited documents at the local and national level for clients such as the Chicago Jobs Council, the New York Academy of Medicine, and the North Lawndale Employment Network. Since May 2002, Noah has helped clients, through her grant writing, to raise approximately $4 million for workforce development programs, technology upgrades, ex-offender re-entry programs, community-based research, advocacy activities, strategic planning, and other activities.

Previously, Noah worked in the Affordable Housing Division of LR Development Company (1999-2001) and from 1994 to 1999 she was project manager for a foundation-funded national evaluation of the federal Empowerment Zone program. Other professional experience includes work with the UIC Center for Economic Development, the United Way of Chicago, the Community Workshop on Economic Development, volunteer ESL tutoring at Erie Neighborhood House, and literacy tutoring at the Chicago Christian Industrial League.

She holds a Master of Urban Planning and Policy degree and a Bachelor of Arts in Spanish, both from the University of Illinois at Chicago, where she graduated Phi Beta Kappa. She recently served as president of the UIC College of Urban Planning and Public Affairs alumni association.

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Dottie Johnson

Dottie Johnson, CPA, Associate Executive Director of the Nonprofit Financial Center (NFC), specializes in financial management. NFC is a 24 year old, not-for-profit lender and financial management services provider in Chicago, Illinois.

Ms. Johnson has held multiple positions during her 20 year tenure with NFC. She began in 1985 when NFC was still the Donors Forum Emergency Loan Fund, a $20,000 a year joint project of regional grantmakers' association and the Community Renewal Society. The Fund quickly took advantage of Ms. Johnson's accounting background to assist borrowers and the Fund itself during its transition from project to independent organization. Today, Ms. Johnson is the chief financial officer of NFC and the director of its Financial Management Resources Program. She oversees NFC's multi-million dollar financial activity and its unique financial management assistance program for the benefit of hundreds of nonprofits each year. Ms. Johnson is also NFC's principal consultant and technical trainer for financial staff and accountants around the country. NFC is considered a local organization with a national presence.

Ms. Johnson has over 20 years of accounting and financial management experience in the nonprofit sector and is active in the Illinois Society of CPAs as a member of the Nonprofit Organizations Education Sub-Committee as well as the Association for Consultants of Nonprofits and the Alliance for Nonprofit Management. She is a published author in trade journals and other professional publications. Also active in her community, Ms. Johnson is the past President of the Parent Teachers Association Board in her local school district.

Ms. Johnson has successfully provided assistance to a diverse clientele through:

• Organizational Analysis and Development
• Policy Formation and Evaluation
• Training in Financial Management Services
• On-site Evaluation of Client Financial Reporting
• Training Client Staff in Accounting Programming and Procedures
• Continued Teaching at NFC Institutes

Ms. Johnson is a 1982 graduate of Murray State University with an undergraduate degree in Business Administration and many continuing education credits.

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G. Sequane Lawrence

G. Sequane Lawrence, Co-President of Prim Lawrence Group, is a community economic development practitioner and consultant and specializes in strategic management and nonprofit governance. Prim Lawrence Group is a CED consulting firm.

Mr. Lawrence was previously the Safer Foundation Sheridan project director. The Sheridan Project is a national re-entry model for formerly incarcerated men whose criminality stem from addiction and who are incarcerated at the Sheridan Correctional Facility in Sheridan, Illinois. Mr. Lawrence was responsible for job preparedness inside of Sheridan and job placement assistance for Sheridan program participants when they returned to the community. Mr. Lawrence was formerly the chief executive officer of Youth Service Project, a youth development organization that provides market driven workforce strategies, social services, leadership development, youth entrepreneurship, economic development and multi-media programs for Latino and African-American youth in the Humboldt Park community.

Mr. Lawrence's former employment also includes the City of Chicago Mayor 's Office of Workforce Development where he was the director of the Kulick Quantum Opportunities Program (QOP), a national mentoring/employment demonstration project funded by the U.S. Department of Labor for out-of-school youth between the ages of 16-24. He was employed at ShoreBank Neighborhood Institute (SNI) a subsidiary of ShoreBank, Inc. on Chicago's west side, where he was a principle architect of an innovative demand-side labor initiative designed to assist west side residents succeed in the labor market. Mr Lawrence was also the director of Choices for Fathers, a Paternal Involvement Program for non-custodial fathers, which is a program of the Chicago Institute for Economic Development. He is also the co-founder of Prim Lawrence Group a community economic development and real estate finance consulting firm founded in 1992.

Mr. Lawrence is a specialist in workforce solutions, youth-development and community economic development strategies. He is also an activist and an organizer. Mr. Lawrence holds a Master of Science degree in Community Economic Development from New Hampshire College in Manchester, New Hampshire .

Mr. Lawrence serves on the board of directors of Chicago Jobs Council, Near North Neighborhood Network (NNNN) and Concerned Black Men of Chicago. Mr. Lawrence also serves on the Wright College Advisory Committee and the Chicago International Film Festival Education and Community Outreach Committee.

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Valerie F. Leonard

Valerie F. Leonard is a community development consultant, with a mission to strengthen the capacity of organizations to make a positive impact on the communities they serve through technical assistance, specialized workshops, resource and organizational development and project management. Her clients include the Illinois ResourceNet, After School Matters, Quad Communities Development Corporation, Greater Chicago Food Depository and the Garfield Park Conservatory Alliance.

Ms. Leonard’s projects span a wide range of community and organizational development, including comprehensive organizational assessment, d eveloping organizational budgets, financial management systems, policies and procedures, strategic planning, proposal writing and resource development, preparing cash flow projections, performing regulatory compliance reviews, development of specialized workshops and providing technical assistance for organizations seeking federal funds.

Ms. Leonard has considerable experience in the public, private and not-for profit sectors.

Prior to starting her consulting practice, she

• Spearheaded the spin-off of a community-based grant making organization from a family foundation and became its founding executive director
• Managed site planning and development activities for certain Jewel and Osco stores in Chicago and the six Collar Counties
• Coordinated financing in excess of $100 million for construction, renovation and major capital equipment purchases for a healthcare system on Chicago's West Side
• Developed marketing strategies for New York City's $6 billion general obligation bond program

Ms. Leonard holds a Bachelor of Arts degree in economics from Spelman College in Atlanta, Georgia, and a Master of Management degree with concentrations in finance and marketing from the Kellogg Graduate School of Management in Evanston, Illinois.

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Jean Pogge

Jean Pogge, Executive Vice President, Funding and Operation Division, of ShoreBank, specializes in operations, strategic, marketing, financial management and nonprofit governance. She is responsible for the overall management of the National Funding Group, a centralized sales unit responsible for national deposit raising from institutional and individual Development Depositors across the country. Development Depositors establish bank accounts with the ShoreBank banks to support their innovative community development work.

During 1996-1998, Ms. Pogge established the commercial cash management unit for ShoreBank and developed a profitable ATM business operation. During 1995, Ms. Pogge managed the consolidation of bank operations and the regulatory application process for the Bank's acquisition of Drexel National Bank and Independence Bank. From June 1992 until July 1995, she managed sales and customer service for the Bank's Development Deposits unit.

Prior to joining ShoreBank, Ms. Pogge was president of Woodstock Institute, a nationally recognized nonprofit organization that works to promote community reinvestment through policy development, applied research and interactive program design. During Ms. Pogge's tenure, the Institute completed the first multi-city computerized analysis of mortgage lending and developed and implemented broadly defined Community Reinvestment agreements with the largest Chicago banks. The Institute also created a policy agenda for Community Development Financial Institutions that later led to passage of federal legislation authorizing capital investments in CDFIs.

Ms. Pogge received a Master of Urban Planning and Policy degree from the University of Illinois at Chicago, a Bachelor of Arts degree from Barat College and pursued studies at Oxford University, Oxford, England.

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Kate Pravera

Kate Pravera is senior consultant with Millennia Consulting, L.L.C., a Chicago-based consulting firm founded in 1996 to serve nonprofits, foundations, public agencies and others engaged in public service.

An accomplished nonprofit executive and educator with more than 25 years experience, Kate has worked extensively with community-based organizations, national advocacy groups, universities, citywide coalitions, federal agencies and more.

As an instructor and facilitator, Kate’s approach is highly participatory and results-oriented. She has shaped the successful design and facilitation of many professional development workshops, conferences, graduate-level courses, and online classes in a wide range of fields. She has served as founding executive director of the Chicago Community Loan Fund as well as senior fellow and director of professional education at the University of Illinois at Chicago’s Great Cities Institute. At UIC, Kate established the Online Certificate in Nonprofit Management, a professional development program for nonprofit practitioners. At Millennia, her practice centers on planning, design and evaluation services, including business planning, curriculum design for adult learning, program design and organizational development. Kate holds a Ph.D. in social ethics from Northwestern University.


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Deborah Strauss

Deborah Strauss stepped down in 2007 after twenty-two years as Executive Director at Lumity (formerly the IT Resource Center). Lumity’s mission encompassed technology consulting and training for nonprofits, internet tools such as NPO.net, as well as work to bridge the Digital Divide. She was responsible for all areas of management and was exclusively responsible for fundraising for more than twenty of those years. Previously she was Director of Development and Public Relations for the Chicago Child Care Society.

She is currently a consultant in the nonprofit arena working on projects involving capacity building, fundraising, and public relations.

She is a Certified Fund Raising Executive. She was a founding member of the board of the Alliance for Nonprofit Management and served on the board of the Association of Fundraising Professionals. She is also a member of the National Technology Enterprise Network.

She received the Capacity Builder of the Year Award from the Alliance for Nonprofit Management in 2007 and previously received the Benjamin Franklin Award from the Association of Fundraising Professionals.

Deborah has AB and AM degrees from the University of Chicago.

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Renee Welch recently joined the Ounce of Prevention Fund with more than 10 years of experience in designing curriculum, and managing
professional and continuing education programs. An interest in early
childhood programs, and knowledge of instructional design, adult
learning strategies, and training implementation lead her to the Ounce.
She is uniquely qualified in the following areas: professional
development and training, learning technologies, and project management. Dr. Welch served 10 years at the University of Illinois at Chicago, lastly as Assistant Director and Instructional Designer where she was responsible for faculty/instructor development and instructional support in design, development and delivery of technology-enhanced, blended, and online courses and programs, as well as professional and continuing education.

For the last 5 years, Dr. Welch has served as a peer reviewer for the
U.S. Departments of Education, Commerce, and Telecommunications grants administration offices. As a Development Consultant, she has with social services agencies, small businesses, and nonprofit agencies on proposal development and review, as well as grants management. She is an Adjunct Instructor at UIC and certified Master Online Instructor. Dr. Welch earned her masters in Education and doctorate in Educational Policy from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.

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