The Leadership Institute at Harvard College

Jennifer Choi is currently pursuing a dual degree at the Harvard Business School and the Harvard Kennedy School of Government as a Rubenstein Fellow. Jennifer graduated from the University of Pennsylvania in 2005, where she was elected to four consecutive terms on the Undergraduate Assembly (UA), and served as Executive Treasurer managing a $1.4 million student activities budget.After Penn, she went to work in New York as an Analyst and Assistant Vice President in the Higher Education and Not-for-Profit Public Finance Group at Barclays Capital and Lehman Brothers. At Barclays and Lehman, she helped advise the leading institutions of higher education and world-renown cultural institutions in the US. Before Lehman, Jennifer worked as a management consultant at Marakon Associates.

While in New York, Jennifer was an active member in the Korean American community in New York. She served as Co-Fund Distribution Manager for the Korean American Community Foundation (KACF) a non-profit organization raising over $800,000 in funds  to help other social service organizations in the greater New York area, and also was  selected to serve as Secretary on the KACF Board of Directors. Most recently, Jennifer  was elected to serve on the Harvard Graduate Council, the student government for all 11  Harvard graduate schools.

In her spare time Jennifer enjoys photography, tennis, scuba diving, traveling, fishing in Alaska where she was born and raised, and building awareness for Prader-WIlli  Syndrome.

George Davies is currently a first year student at Harvard Business School where he is  studying for an MBA. He is a British national and grew up in London. George was an  undergraduate at St. Hugh’s College, Oxford University, where he graduated with a B.A. in history

On leaving college George worked for the current UK Finance Minister, George Osborne  M.P., before moving on to the London office of McKinsey & Co. At McKinsey George worked on a variety of projects all over the world, with a particular focus on corporate  strategy, M&A, and private equity. George left McKinsey after two years to spend a year working as an adviser to the President of Liberia, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, on behalf of Tony  Blair’s Africa Governance initiative.

As an undergraduate at Oxford George was Editor of the student newspaper, The Cherwell, and was active in a number of university-wide societies. His interests include politics and current affairs, investing, history, sports, and travel. He is also a board  member of a British/Sierra Leonian education charity, Planting Promise.

Grace Hou is currently a first year student at Harvard Business School. Originally from a small town in colonial Virginia, Grace attended Harvard College (Dunster House), graduating magna cum laude in 2006 with a concentration in economics. In college, she served at Treasurer of the Phillips Brooks House Association, the student-led non-profit organization with a $1.5 million budget and over 85 programs serving 10,000 low-income people throughout Greater Boston. She also directed the Cambridge Youth Enrichment Program, a summer camp for 150 urban children in Cambridge. In addition, Grace led the Housing Opportunities Program, a microfinance institution providing loans to prevent homelessness in Boston.

After college, Grace attended Oxford University on a Vonn Clemm Fellowship at Corpus Christi College, graduating with a Masters in Policy with Highest Honors. She then spent three years with McKinsey & Company focusing on advising companies through the financial crisis. She also served as a Public Sector Fellow at McKinsey serving government institutions in the United States and abroad in the Middle East, Asia and Haiti. Her prior work experience includes summer internships in investment banking, the Council of Economic Advisers, and international development work in China.

Grace enjoys traveling, classical piano, punting, novels, cooking, policy and politics.

After growing up in the coastal areas of Accra, Ghana, Hermi miraculously moved to Indianapolis in 2004 for college at Purdue University. Before starting college, Hermi spent a year coordinating free medical clinics in various rural areas in Ghana in collaboration with a mission’s hospital in Ghana and missionaries around the world.

She graduated summa cum laude from Purdue in 2007 with a B.Sc. in Biology with chemistry minor. At Purdue, Hermi was a Dean of Science Scholar, Charles O. McCaughey Leadership Scholar, student commencement speaker, National Alpha Lambda Delta graduate student fellow and a member of the Golden Key Honors Society
Among other things at Purdue, Hermi participated in several community service projects with various organizations on campus and served as the President of the Biology Club (with about 300 members at the time). She also spent 6/7 semesters in college TAing freshman biology courses and working with Biology Professors to develop teaching aids/resources for difficult concepts. Her love for community service and international health care issues sent her to Australia the summer after college to explore the Australian health care system and Aboriginal health.

Hermi is currently a dual degree MD/MPP student at Harvard Medical School and Harvard Kennedy School of Government where she is a Knowles Fellow. At HMS, she has served as the President of both the Psychiatry Interest Group and Christian Medical and Dental Association and as the treasurer for Student National Medical Association (SNMA). While in medical school, Hermi has worked with the Ministry of Health in Ghana on health professionals’ retention/brain drain problem and with Harvard professors on the Massachusetts Healthcare reform.

In her spare time these days, Hermi loves spending time with Harvard undergrads as a resident tutor in Currier House, photography, travelling around the world or the US (recently visited the Koreas and Alaska), cooking all kinds of cuisines, spending time with friends, watching movies, listening to music and going to the Boston Symphony.

Matt McKnight is currently a joint degree student at the Harvard Business School and the  Harvard Kennedy School of Government where he is also a Zuckerman Fellow.

From 2005-2009, Matt served as an officer in the United States Marine Corps. During this period, Matt spent time working in the Office of the Coordinator for Counterterrorism at  the State Department and was deployed to western Iraq for 13-months with the 5th Marine Regiment. While in Iraq, Matt’s time was focused on facilitating transition of authority to the Iraqi government while also attempting to prevent a reemergence of  insurgent elements that had largely been eliminated during the tribal awakening and the corresponding troop surge.

Matt is originally from Maine, he attended Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire, and he graduated from Dartmouth College with a degree in History in 2005.

Jerry Murphy is currently in his first year at Harvard Business School, where he is actively involved with the Real Estate Club and serves as the Education Representative for his section.

Prior to HBS, Jerry was an Associate at the Carlyle Group in Washington, D.C., in their  U.S. Real Estate funds. In that role, he managed investments in retail, office, and senior  living properties as well as distressed mortgage security acquisitions. He originally  became involved in commercial real estate investment while working for Fannie Mae’s multifamily lending group.

A Boston-area native, Jerry attended the Roxbury Latin School and then Harvard College, graduating in 2005. While in college, he served as a design and layout officer for The Crimson and provided color-commentary for sports broadcasts at the student radio station. Additionally, he co-founded a tutoring program that helped students at a Cambridge charter school prepare for state standardized tests.

William Niebling is a first-year student at Harvard Law School.  He graduated from Yale University with a degree in East Asian Studies, where he was involved in numerous music groups, playing the French horn and trombone, as well as singing.  He also was a leader of Freshman Outdoor Orientation Trips, or FOOT, and an employee of the China Law Center.

After college, William worked for four years in the United States Senate.  Serving under Senators Biden and Kaufman, his responsibilities ranged from opening mail to driving the Senator around town, from budget vote-o-ramas to monitoring United Nations climate change negotiations.  His policy portfolio encompassed budget, fiscal, economic, energy, and environmental issues, as well as a wide range of other areas.  Particular focuses included international environmental policy, Senate floor procedure, and domestic energy policy.

Building on a lifelong love of travel and the outdoors, William has spent summers working in China and performing in music festivals in Europe, backpacking in the  Canadian Rockies or canoeing in Utah.

Tiffany Niver graduated cum laude from Harvard College in 2008 with an A.B. in Psychology and Economics. In college, Tiffany served as the Harvard Undergraduate Women in Business President, among other positions. Tiffany was also a Founding Member of Smart Woman Securities (SWS), an intercollegiate investment fund. She also sat on three student advisory boards, worked as a Women’s Center Intern, served as Forte Foundation’s Boston Marketing Intern, and was an active member of Kappa Alpha  Theta. Finally, Tiffany served as President of the Leadership Institute at Harvard College.

Tiffany currently works at the Parthenon Group, a strategy and management consulting  firm, where she also worked as a summer intern in 2007. Her prior work experience  includes a summer internship at Young & Successful Interactive, a sophomore rotational  program at Lehman Brothers New York, and an internship at the Gallup Organization.

Tiffany will attend Harvard Business School in the fall of 2010.

Christina is a dual degree student in the MPA/IS program at Harvard Kennedy School, where she is a Reynolds Fellow, and in the MBA program at MIT Sloan, where she is a Legatum Fellow. She is passionate about building innovative market-based solutions that improve the lives of the poor in developing countries, and has special interest in mobile technology in sub-Saharan Africa.

Before school Christina tested out a number of different ecosystems. She spent a year helping d.light design, a social enterprise start-up in India, get solar lights to rural households in northern India and create innovative consumer financing partnerships to make them affordable. Before d.light, Christina worked as a management consultant for Bain & Company in the Boston office. Prior to that she worked in East Africa for Village Enterprise Fund, where she evaluated the NGO’s microentrepreneurs and conducted business trainings in rural areas.

Christina grew up in Napa, California and received her B.A. in history from Stanford University. When the weather in Cambridge is warm enough, Christina pretends she’s home in California and enjoys running along and windsurfing on the Charles (no to be done simultaneously). Otherwise, you can always find her excited to brainstorm new business ideas and approaches to social issues over a latte.

Nabihah Sachedina is an MPP/MBA joint degree candidate at the Harvard Business School and the Harvard Kennedy School, where she is also a Dubin Fellow and Fulbright Scholar.

Nabihah studied Medicine at King’s College London. She graduated with double distinction in 2005 and has practiced as a hospital doctor within the UK National Health Service for four years. She has undertaken clinical research into diabetes mellitus and has practiced Pediatrics in London, gaining Membership of the Royal College of Pediatrics and Child Health. Nabihah was appointed as a Clinical Advisor to the Chief Medical Officer for England and to the Patient Safety Programme of the World Health Organization in 2009. She aspires to improve health service delivery, working at the interface between health policy, management and medicine. Her other interests include music and traveling.

Emily Slota is currently a dual degree candidate pursuing an MBA at the Harvard Business School and an MPA-ID at the Harvard Kennedy School, where she is a Zuckerman Fellow.

Emily grew up in California, and graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Stanford University with a dual degree in Human Biology and Economics. After college, Emily worked with McKinsey and Company in San Francisco and South Africa, focused on environmental issues and emerging markets.

Emily is passionate about sustainable poverty alleviation, and has worked in Tanzania with the Touch Foundation and the ministry of health to alleviate the health care worker shortage in Tanzania.

Shortly after the world economic downturn, she moved back to the US to play a part in the US economic recovery; she worked for the US Department of Energy, structuring the spending of $36 billion in Recovery Act funding to make a down payment on the country’s energy and environmental future. She enjoys traveling, backpacking, kayaking and dancing.

Aly Spencer is currently in her second year as a joint MPP/MBA student at Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Business School.  Originally from Charlotte, North Carolina, she graduated magna cum laude from Princeton University in 2006, majoring in Politics with a concentration in International Relations. While at Princeton, she studied abroad in Beijing and spent four years as a member of the Swimming and Diving team.

After graduating, Aly went to work for McKinsey and Company in New York City and Washington D.C. There, she worked with clients in many sectors but eventually focused on serving the U.S. Federal Government. She served on the Presidential Transition Team for the Obama Administration as it prepared to take office in the winter of 2008-2009, leading the team that designed the new office of the Chief Performance Officer. She also spent the summer of 2010 working on the East Asia desk at the U.S. Department of the Treasury.

In her spare time, Aly is a political junkie. She has been involved with campaigns as an advisor and volunteer and currently spends time working with the Center for a Better South, a non-partisan, progressive think tank in Charleston, SC. In addition, she has  volunteered for and served as an advisor to several  non-profits in New York, D.C., and  Boston that support children and families through mentorship, health, and education  services.

When not working or studying, Aly likes cooking (and eating!) and adventurous travel including diving, climbing, backpacking and mountaineering.

Michael is pursuing his joint Master’s in Public Policy and Master’s in Business Administration at Harvard Kennedy School and Harvard Business School, class of 2013.

A native of Phoenix and the oldest of five children, Michael graduated in 2009 from Arizona State University, obtaining a B.S. in Economics, Honors. At ASU, he was a dedicated student leader, serving as President of the Hispanic Business Students Association and Chairman of HBSA’s 35th Anniversary Banquet Committee.

After graduation, he worked in Real Estate Investment Banking at Bank of America Merrill Lynch in New York. Since 2007, Michael has been involved with the Be A Leader Foundation, as a scholar and mentor. Currently, Michael is a Dubin Fellow through the Center for Public Leadership at HKS and is involved in several organizations at Harvard, including the Hispanic/Latino Caucus (HKS), the Harvard Journal for Hispanic Policy, and the Latino Students Organization (HBS).

Regan Turner is from Floresville, Texas and graduated magna cum laude from Texas A&M University in 2003 with a B.S. in mechanical engineering.  While at Texas A&M, he served as Deputy Commander of the Texas A&M Corps of Cadets, the largest cadet corps in America outside of the service academies, and was named Outstanding Committee Chairman of the Year in 2003 by the Student Government Association for his leadership of the Aggie Muster Committee.

Regan was commissioned into the Marine Corps in May 2003.  From 2004-2007, he served as an infantry platoon commander with 2nd Battalion, 3rd Marine Regiment and led platoons in Afghanistan (June 2005-Jan 2006) and Iraq (Sept 2006-Apr 2007).  Upon returning from Iraq, Regan served as an instructor and staff platoon commander at The Basic School in Quantico, Virginia and subsequently as a class advisor and instructor at the Infantry Officer Course.  He is a recipient of the Combat Action Ribbon (w/gold star in lieu of second award), Navy and Marine Corps Commendation Medal, and Navy and Marine Corps Achievement Medal (w/combat distinguishing device).

Regan is currently enrolled as a joint degree candidate at the Harvard Business School and Harvard Kennedy School, where he is a Dubin Leadership Fellow at the Center for Public Leadership and Pat Tillman Foundation Military Scholar.