Derek Ellerman | Chairperson
Co-Founder, Polaris Project
Thomas Lockerby | Treasurer
Vice President for Development, Boston College
Sarah Devine | Secretary
Partner, Fulbright and Jaworski
Mei-Mei Ellerman, Ph.D.
Resident Scholar, Brandeis University
Carolyn Bartholomew, JD
Commissioner, U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission
Elizabeth Eun
Partner, RAFFA Inc.
Karen Olcott
Partnerships for Global Impact
2012 independent voting members
Derek Ellerman | Chairperson
Co-Founder, Polaris Project
Derek Ellerman is a co-founder, former Co-Executive Director, and current Chairperson of the Board of Directors of Polaris Project. Mr. Ellerman supervised the development and implementation of Polaris Project programs in the United States and Japan. An expert on U.S.-based sex trafficking networks, Mr. Ellerman has trained and worked closely with federal and local law enforcement, testified before the U.S. Congress, and worked directly with survivors of trafficking. He has been featured in various media including National Public Radio, the Washington Post, and several network news shows. Formerly an Adjunct Professor at Trinity University, Mr. Ellerman taught at the graduate-level on international criminal network operations and counter-trafficking strategies. Before co-founding Polaris Project, Mr. Ellerman founded and for four years served as Executive Director of the Center for Police and Community (CPAC), a Providence-based non-profit working on issues of police misconduct in Rhode Island. In 2004, Mr. Ellerman was selected as an Ashoka Fellow and then as an Ambassador with Ashoka Innovators for the Public, where he provides consultation services as a Senior Venture Advisor. Mr. Ellerman has a Sc.B. in Cognitive Neuroscience from Brown University.
Thomas Lockerby | Board Treasurer
Vice President for Development, Boston College
Thom Lockerby was appointed Vice President for Development at Boston College in June, 2008; he has served in leadership roles in the BC Advancement Office since 2004. Mr. Lockerby directs the Boston College campaign, Light the World, which was launched in October, 2008, with a goal of $1.5 billion. He has spent his entire career working in or consulting with charities, primarily focusing on major and planned gift fund raising. His expertise is advising donors and families about strategies to effectively maximize their philanthropy in concert with overall financial, estate planning, and wealth transfer goals. Prior to joining BC, Mr. Lockerby served as Director of Gift Planning at Dartmouth College. Previously, he was Relationship Manager at Kaspick & Company, an investment firm specializing in charitable trusts and endowments; Vice President at PG Calc Incorporated, a development software company; and Director of Development Relations at Harvard Business School. Mr. Lockerby speaks widely on the topic of effective philanthropy from both the donor and institutional perspectives and his articles have appeared in Planned Giving Today and the Journal of Gift Planning. He serves on the board of the Partnership for Philanthropic Planning, is a past President of the Planned Giving Group of New England, and is a graduate of Harvard College.
Sarah Devine | Secretary
Partner, Fulbright and Jaworski
Sarah Devine is a partner in Fulbright & Jaworski L.L.P.'s Washington, D.C. office. Sarah is a member of both the firm's Corporate, Business and Banking and Structured/Project Finance Departments. She has extensive experience representing clients in connection with a variety of cross-border corporate and commercial law matters and international financings. Sarah was seconded to the legal department of the International Finance Corporation (IFC) from July 2006 through January 2008 where she provided legal counsel on the financing of IFC projects in a number of regions and across a range sectors, including transport, hydropower, education, manufacturing and microfinance. Sarah received her Bachelor of Science in Foreign Service (BSFS) degree from Georgetown University, summa cum laude, in 1996 and her JD, with honors, from Stanford Law School, in 2002. She also has a MA in Modern History from Oxford University, where she studied on full scholarship following graduation from Georgetown. During 1997, Sarah completed a U.S. Fulbright Grant in Buenos Aires, Argentina, where she studied international relations at the Facultad Latinoamericana de Ciencias Sociales. Sarah has counseled a number of nonprofit corporations on legal matters, and began working with Polaris Project on a pro bono basis in 2004. In 2006, Sarah joined Polaris’ Board of Directors, on which she served until September 2010.
Mei-Mei Ellerman, Ph.D.
Resident Scholar, Brandeis University
Mei-Mei Ellerman, PhD, is a founding board member of Polaris Project (2002). She strives to raise awareness of modern-day slavery by addressing audiences in schools, universities, churches, libraries, fundraisers, and conferences, both nationally and internationally. Ms. Ellerman has testified before the Massachusetts State House in support of a state anti-trafficking bill and organized two Vermont Freedom Walks along the ten-mile-long stretch of an old slave route. She has given interviews to the media in the United States, China, and Italy.
In 2006, Ms. Ellerman was the recipient of the MA Commission on the Status of Women award of “Unsung Heroine” for her contribution in raising awareness of human trafficking. She is currently a Resident Scholar at the Brandeis Women’s Studies Research Center (where she is writing two memoirs), and co-founder of the Brandeis Gender and International Development Initiatives. She also serves on the Board of Chinese Adoptee Links International and the International Advisory Board of the Alexander Graham Bell Association for the Deaf and Hard of Hearing.
Adopted in the United States, Ms. Ellerman was raised and educated primarily in Italy, France and Switzerland. She attended the Liceo Michelangiolo in Florence, the University of Geneva, and Boston University. She holds a PhD from Harvard in Romance Languages and Literatures. Until turning to full-time writing and social activism, Ms. Ellerman taught Italian literature and cinema in Boston area institutions for 30 years.
Carolyn Bartholomew, JD
Commissioner, U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission
Carolyn Bartholomew is a consultant to non-profit organizations on policy analysis, legislative and media strategy, advocacy, and issue development and management. She serves as the Commissioner of the U.S.-China Economic and Security Commission, a Congressional-advisory body. Ms. Bartholomew has been appointed to the Commission for four consecutive terms by Speaker Nancy Pelosi. Ms. Bartholomew worked at senior levels in the U.S. Congress, serving for almost sixteen years as Counsel, Legislative Director, and Chief of Staff to U.S. House of Representatives Speaker Nancy Pelosi. She also served as a Professional Staff Member on the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. Previously, she was a legislative assistant to then-U.S. Representative Bill Richardson. Ms. Bartholomew was a member of the first Presidential Delegation to Africa to Investigate the Impact of HIV/AIDS on Children; and a member of the Council on Foreign Relations Congressional Staff Roundtable on Asian Political and Security issues. In addition to U.S.-China relations, her areas of expertise include terrorism, trade, proliferation of weapons of mass destruction, human rights, U.S. foreign assistance programs, and international environmental issues. Ms. Bartholomew is a director of the Kaiser Aluminum Corporation. She received her B.A. from the University of Minnesota, M.A. in anthropology from Duke University, and J.D. from Georgetown University Law Center. She is a member of the State Bar of California.
Elizabeth Eun
Partner, RAFFA Inc.
Elizabeth Eun is an Accounting Outsourcing Partner at Raffa, P.C., an accounting & consulting firm specializing in nonprofits located in Washington DC. Ms. Eun joined Raffa in 1991 after 3 years with a local public accounting firm. She has more than 23 years of audit, accounting, and tax experience in not-for-profit organizations.
In addition to managing Raffa’s outsourcing practice, Ms. Eun provides a wide variety of consulting and business advisory services to Raffa’s clients. She also provides certain tax services to nonprofit clients. Ms. Eun has taught various seminars on topics related to nonprofit accounting and reporting. She has also written articles on accounting and human resources outsourcing topics which were published in the American Society of Association Executives journals and the Raffa website.
Ms. Eun graduated from George Mason University. She has a Certified Public Accountant (CPA) certificate from the State of Virginia and is an active member of the American Institute of Certified Public Accountants and American Society of Association Executives. She currently is a board member of the Association Mutual Health Insurance Company, where she serves as the Treasurer of the Board and the Chairperson of the Finance and Audit Committee. She was the Treasurer of the Board of Directors of the Asian American LEAD, where she also served as the Chairperson of the Finance Committee.
Karen Olcott
Partnerships for Global Impact
Karen Olcott works on business and technology partnerships that have scalable social impact, from the corporate, nonprofit, and the private and public sectors. She spent 14 years as an Executive at Microsoft, and was most recently Director of Strategic Partnerships & Business Development where she negotiated and led technology, ecommerce and content partnerships for Bing and MSN across 45 markets worldwide. She joined Microsoft in 1997 to develop programming strategy for international, and scale out the online business into emerging markets.
Prior to 1997, Karen was Executive Director of Pinnacle Efx, a Seattle-based creative agency for advertising, broadcast/cable and web clients. From 1985 – 1994, she was the Creative Director for Showtime Networks in New York, and drove the Network Design Strategy of graphics, music and identity elements to package numerous cable networks. As President of the Broadcast Designers Association, a non-profit organization of 2,500 associates, she led the merger with 3,500-member Promax in 1997. She has won two Emmy Awards, and over 40 awards for design and identity projects. Karen worked for ABC Sports from 1980 – 1985, traveling the world for Wide World of Sports, Monday Night Football, PGA Golf Tour, and worked at all the Olympic Games from 1980 – 1988. She holds a B.A. from Brown University in International Relations and German, and graduate degrees from the Freie University in Berlin and Harvard School of Architecture.
Karen has been working on Human Trafficking issues for 7 years. She is a member of the Business Coalition Against Trafficking (BCAT), which is exploring ways that the business sector can take a leadership role in ending sexual and labor exploitation in their supply chain and employee policies. Karen is on her second term on the Board of Directors for Love146.org, a 10-year old nonprofit focused aftercare programs in Asia, and prevention initiatives in Europe and the US. Karen is active in Net Impact, provides strategic mentoring to several non-profits, and played a pivotal role in creating the 2011-2012 Presidential Initiative on Human Trafficking for the National Association of Attorneys General (NAAG), entitled “Pillars of Hope: Attorneys General Unite Against Human Trafficking.”
Karen has a passion for emerging trends in technology, impact funding and social responsibility leadership, and a heart for those who are victims of injustice.
Katherine Chon | Board Emeritus
Co-Founder, Polaris Project
Katherine Chon is the President and co-founder of Polaris Project, a Washington, D.C.-based nonprofit organization combating human trafficking and modern-day slavery. Sparked by a local newspaper article describing the enslavement of women in a brothel a few miles from where she lived, Katherine piloted innovative victim outreach strategies focused on direct interventions which identified more than 400 potential victims in her community. Katherine led the creation of one of the first transitional housing and service programs assisting victims of all forms of human trafficking and partnered with the D.C. police and U.S. Attorney’s Office to establish one of the first community-wide Human Trafficking Task Forces in the United States. Katherine has testified before U.S. Congress and helped to pass landmark federal legislation bringing parity of services to citizen victims of human trafficking. She has spoken before dozens of government, corporate, and community audiences and interviewed with numerous U.S. and international news sources including the Washington Post, ABC News, Marie Claire, Newsweek, and Women’s Health magazine. Katherine has been recognized for her leadership and social entrepreneurship with the Do Something BRICK award presented by President Bill Clinton, the People’s Voice award presented by Diane Von Furstenberg at the United Nations, and the Legacy award from Working Mother Media. Under her executive management, Polaris Project grew into a $3.1 million organization in eight years. It has been recognized as “one of the best charities in the Greater Washington region” by the Catalogue for Philanthropy and received the highest four-star rating from Charity Navigator for its efficient spending and effective work. Katherine currently serves as an advisory board member of Maria Shriver’s A Woman’s Nation and sits on the Emma Willard Head of School’s Advisory Council. She is also an active member of the Asia Society’s Asia 21 Initiative. Katherine received her M.P.A from the Harvard Kennedy School, supported by the Roy & Lila Ash Fellowship on Democratic Governance and Innovation. She received her Sc.B. in Psychology with honors from Brown University and completed the Executive Program for Nonprofit Leaders at the Stanford Graduate School of Business with a Center for Social Innovation Fellowship.
