REF Headquarters, Hungary
Judit Szira
Executive Director
Email: jszira@romaeducationfund.org
Judit Szira, a Hungarian national, holds a teacher degree in Mathematics and Chemistry, and holds a degree in Public Education. Between 1998 - 2006 she was a member of the School Board of the city of Budapest City Council. Between 1994 and 1997 she was Programme Director of the Public Education Development Programme at the Soros Foundation, Budapest. Previously she was chief advisor to the Roma Commissioner in the Ministry of Education of Hungary. She is a member of the board to the National Tempus Foundation. She has been working from the beginning of her carrier on Roma inclusion issues in the field of public education. She published in professional journals and news papers on equity issues, active citizenship and social cohesion.
Anasztazia Nagy- on maternity leave, please contact Eva Foldesi on efoldesi@romaeducationfund.org
Program Officer
Email: anagy@romaeducationfund.org
Anasztazia is a Roma from Hungary working as programme officer at the REF. Currently she is coordinating and managing the Hungarian project portfolio. She graduated at the Budapest Corvinus University – Faculty of Public administration in 2002 and holds a MA degree in public policy, Central European University, Budapest. She is very committed to improve the educational situation of Roma since she believes that this is the field which can significantly change the future of the Roma pupils. She was also active member of the Roma community during her studies.
Andrea Dörömböző
Financial Officer
Email: adorombozo@romaeducationfund.org
Andrea Dörömböző is a Hungarian Roma, holds a MA degree in English studies, obtained ELTE University, Faculty of elementary and nursery school teachers. Prior to joining the REF team in Budapest, Andrea has spent 8 years as assistant casino manager, leading and controling the Casino activities, being responsible for all financial activities, working with various international organizations and financial teams. Now, as a REF employee, Andrea works as a financial officer.
Barbara Tonté
Administrative Assistant
Email: btonte@romaeducationfund.org
Barbara Tonté is a Hungarian Roma, working for the Roma Education Fund as administrative assistant since September 2010. Barbara works for Kai Consulting as well in implementing a community development program in five disadvantaged settlements of Hungary. Previously , she worked for the Hungarian Ministry of Social Affairs and Labor, and the European Parliament, and Romaversitas Foundation. She graduated at the University of Szeged (BA 2005) as a human resources manager and Central European University as an expert on European Studies (MA 2008).
Beata Bislim Olahova
Grant Program Manager
Email: bolahova@romaeducationfund.org
Beata Bislim Olahova works at the Roma Education Fund in Budapest, as a Project Grant Programme Manager since 2006. Beata holds BS/BA honors degree in Business Management and a Master Degree in Business Administration of Central European University Business School, Budapest. Since 2007, Beata is a Member of the Management Board of the European Union Agency for Fundamental Rights (FRA) nominated by Slovak Republic. Before joining REF, Beata been through lot of human rights actions, among others, she worked with the European Roma Rights Center as a legal monitor for Slovakia where she was involved in human rights monitoring and worked to investigate potential cases of discrimination and human rights abuse. As a student of the post graduate Roma Diplomacy program of the Diplo foundation, she participated and contributed to the international events on Roma Diplomacy, as a Challenge for European Institutions.
Beata Prokaj
Finance and Administrative coordinator
Email: bprokaj@romaeducationfund.org
Beata Prokaj, a Hungarian national, holds an MA degree in Economics. She started in the private sector then worked for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees as a Staff Development Clerk. She joined REF in June 2010 as a Finance and Administrative coordinator working on the EU Roma Pilot, “A Good Start” project. She has strong social responsibility.
Dan Pavel Doghi
Higher Education Program Manager
Email: ddoghi@romaeducationfund.org
Dan Pavel Doghi (Romania) worked for seven years as Officer on Roma and Sinti Issues at the OSCE ODIHR Contact Point for Roma and Sinti Issues. Mr. Doghi helped, since 1996, the development of few Roma organisations. Between 2000-2004 he was Programme Coordinator at the Open Society Foundation's spin-off Resource Center for Roma Communities, in Cluj. He also worked as an advocacy fellow on Roma educational matters at the Public Interest Law Initiative of the Columbia University, in Hungary. He studied social work at Babes Bolyai in Cluj Napoca, Romania, and completed a postgraduate course in International Diplomacy at Malta University.
Dennis Omondi Yonga
Overall IT Specialist
Email: dyonga@romaeducationfund.org
Kenyan national, formerly of KEMRI/CDC – Kenya. Worked as data analyst/IT specialist for 4 and a half years. Role is to provide a leading support in the GMS and online scholarship development, in-house support for the development and continuous maintenance of the organization’s IT systems, represent the organization towards 3rd party suppliers, translate the requests of the professional REF staff into IT language and formulate IT related service needs, help formulate achievable goals within the scope of IT, ensures that REF HQ (Budapest, Hungary) IT infrastructure runs smoothly, make sure solutions are cost-effective and fully utilize the available up-to-date technology improvements, negotiate new contracts if need arise, arrange purchases or renegotiate existing contracts with suppliers such as the Internet Service Provider or hardware suppliers.Holds diploma in IT from Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, Nairobi.
Eben Friedman
Advisor on Policy Development
Email: efriedman@romaeducationfund.org
Eben Friedman holds a Ph.D. in political science from the University of California, San Diego. His dissertation, “Explaining the Political Integration of Minorities: Roms as a Hard Case,” drew on two years of field research in Slovakia and Macedonia. Based in Skopje since 2005, Eben joined REF in 2007 after several years with the European Centre for Minority Issues.
Erzsebet Bader
Communications Assistant
Email: ebader@romaeducationfund.org
Erzsebet Bader is a Hungarian Roma, holds a BA degree in English studies.
She worked as international coordinator at the Roma Press Center in Budapest, prior to that participated in one project of the European Roma Rights Centre as a researcher, focusing on Roma education in Hungary and took part in a Media and Marketing training program of the Centre for Independent Journalism, Budapest, held for local TV stations in Hungary as assistant. In 2007 Erzsebet was a press coordinator of the Chachipe photo contest, organized by the Open Society Archives and Open Society Institute, Hungary.
Éva Földesi
Program Officer
Email: efoldesi@romaeducationfund.org
Eva Foldesi, a Hungarian national, holds a BA degree in Economics and an MA degree in Sociology and Anthropology received at CEU. Before joining Roma Education Fund, she has been working as a project assistant to a Roma labour market and she was an educator in the Holocaust Museum, Budapest. Besides, she participated in various researches surveying Roma people`s situation in Hungary. After graduating from the CEU, in the October of 2009, she joined to REF first as an administrative assistant then took the position of country facilitator for Hungary from September, 2010. This position included duties of supporting grant management programmes and coordinating the European early childhood education project of REF, overall facilitating the implementation of these programmes among partner organization, local stakeholders and donors. From September 2011 she has taken program officer position in REF, being responsible for the Hungarian grant programme- and project portfolio management.
Jeno Zsiga
Finance and Administration Manager
Email: jzsiga@romaeducationfund.org
Jeno Zsiga, a Hungarian National, comes from the private sector. He manages from 2001 to 2006 an international Advertising Agency as deputy director. He holds a BA from the Budapest Business College and holds an MA from the University of Pecs in Economics. As a young Roma activist he was a student leader at Romaversitas, Hungary and he was one of the founders of one of the first Hungarian young Roma Association, the Bronz Klub.
Marius Taba
Monitoring and Evaluation Officer
Email: mtaba@romaeducationfund.org
Marius Taba is Monitoring and Evaluation Officer of Roma Education Fund. Marius Taba is a Roma from Romania working with REF from the very beginning . He graduated with an MA in Public Administration, Faulty of Sociology and Social Work, University of Bucharest. In 2011 he obtain a PhD in Sociology from the University of Bucharest. He is very active in civil society activities in Romania since 1999. He has worked for more than 5 years for Romani CRISS- Roma Center for Social Intervention and Studies where he was implementing projects dealing with education and public awareness campaigns. Marius Taba is founder and Board member of the Romanian Students Organization from Hungary.
Merziha Idrizi
REF Scholarships Program
Alumni and Program Officer
E-mail: scholarship@romaeducationfund.org
Merziha Idrizi is a Roma from Macedonia. She has BS`c degree in Economics, Financial Management from the University of “Ss. Cyril and Methodius”- Faculty of Economics-Skopje, Macedonia and has joined REF/SP in September 2007. Merziha has previously worked as a Program Coordinator on the project “Alliance for Inclusion of Roma in Education” within the Foundation Open Society Institute Macedonia, as a part of the Roma Education Program. Merziha has experience in the work, on a voluntary base, with Roma and non Roma NGO`s from Macedonia, related to the Roma language and Roma culture. She was a member of the Center for Economic Analysis (CEA) – Macedonia until 2007. Merziha is currently working as an Alumni and Programming Officer in the Scholarship Programs team of REF.
Mihai Surdu
Research and Policy Development Manager
Email: msurdu@romaeducationfund.org
Starting in 1995, Mihai Surdu worked with the Research Institute of Quality of Life in Bucharest, Romania. In 2007 he joined the REF as Capacity Building and Policy Development Manager. Mihai Surdu has a doctorate of Sociology from the University of Bucharest. He has written extensively on issues related to Roma Education, and has published extensively on segregation as well.
Milen Milanov
Program Officer
Email:mmilanov@romaeducationfund.org
Milen Milanov works at the Roma Education Fund in Budapest since September 2011. He holds BA in International Business Relations of the International Business School Botevgrad, Bulgaria. Before joining REF Milen served as a National Coordinator of the Decade of Roma Inclusion 2005 - 2015 in the government of Bulgaria. As a Decade coordinator, Milen succeeded to update the existing Framework Program for Equal Integration of Roma into the Bulgarian Society, which was a base for the recently presented Roma National Strategy 2012 - 2020 in front of the European Commission. In his work, supported by Roma and non-Roma NGOs from Bulgaria Milen initiated the state institutions to start developing mechanisms for implementation of the state policy for Roma integration and methodology for monitoring and evaluation. Between 2008 - 2009 he served as a Deputy Mayor in "Slatina" Municipal districts of Sofia City Municipality responsible for the implementation of the Decade Municipal Strategy for Roma 2007 - 2013 at local level. From 2001, after he completed his one-year intensive English language course at the American University in Bulgaria till the moment he was appointed to the position of Decade National Coordinator, Milen worked as an NGO activist. He managed EU and other donors' funded projects related to Roma integration in Bulgaria. Meanwhile, he participated in different trainings at national and international level related with diversity and cohesion-youth participation at the Council of Europe, political management and participation at the Bulgarian School of Politics at the New Bulgarian University, participation of Roma
Shemsi Shainov
Senior Program Officer
Email: sainov@romaeducationfund.org
Shemsi Shainov is a Roma from Macedonia and holds a BA in Economics. He was appointed as Senior Program Officer from his previous assignment as Country Facilitator for Macedonia. Before joining REF, he worked as a freelance consultant, mainly on small and medium-scale enterprise development, training programs, land tenure issues, and environmental protection projects. As of 2001, he was National Program Officer of the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation within the Swiss Embassy in Macedonia. For more than three-and-a-half years he had various assignments, working in the Czech Republic, and occasionally in Poland, for The Prince of Wales Business Leaders Forum, a UK charity, in the development of Romany Youth Entrepreneurship Program. In 1995, the Government of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany appointed him as a local partner consultant for the project on Economic Reintegration of Rejected Asylum Seekers, and one year later he was appointed as a Director of Department Entrepreneurship Development. He has worked for three years as a journalist for the Macedonian Television Corporation.
Stela Garaz
Program Officer
REF Scholarships Programme
Email: sgaraz@romaeducationfund.org
Stela Garaz is a Moldovan national. She holds a BA degree in Political Science from Moldova State University and an MA degree in Comparative Politics from Central European University. Currently she is a PhD candidate in Political Science at Central European University, working on a research project about the link between the concentration of political power and ethnic minorities’ mobilization in post-Soviet Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine. Before joining REF, Stela worked for CEU Asia Research Initiatives in Budapest and for the European Centre for Minority Issues in Flensburg.
Szilvia Pallaghy
Program Manager of the
EU funded `A Good Start` project
Email: szpallaghy@romaeducationfund.org
Szilvia Pallaghy is a Hungarian National, holds an MBA, graduated from the Case Western Reserve University, Cleveland, Ohio and the CEU Business School, Budapest. She holds an MA in Literature and in Psychology pursued in Hungary. After working in the private sector as Human Resources Specialist for General Electric, she began to work in the Ministry of Education, Hungary, in various positions. Between 2003 and 2006, she was the Head of Secretariat at the Office of the Ministerial Commissioner for the Integration of Roma and Disadvantaged Children. From 2006 onward , she worked as the Head of Unit for Education and Equal Opportunity in the Directorate General for Equal Opportunity. She joined to the Roma Education Fund as a manager of the the EU funded 'A Good Start' project on ECEC in 2010.
Viktoria Koszegi
REF/Scholarships Program
Program Officer
E-mail: scholarship@romaeducationfund.org
Viktoria Koszegi holds a BA from the Teacher Training Faculty of Eötvös Loránd University and a postgraduate degree from the Personnel Administration Faculty of Budapest University of Economic Sciences and Public Administration. She comes from the governmental sector where she worked in administration of municipality level and had coordination tasks for the Community Development and Cultural Committee. She joined the REF/Scholarships Program in September 2008 as administrative assistant and country coordinator for RMUSP in Hungary and is currently working as program officer in the Scholarships Program team.
