Nonprofit Finance Fund Welcomes Three Board Members
New York, NY — March 24, 2022 — Nonprofit Finance Fund (NFF) is pleased to welcome Berit Ashla, Ivy Draughan, and Rev. Allyn Maxfield-Steele to its board of directors. The new board members will contribute a wealth of experience in philanthropy, finance, and social movement-building.
“Berit, Ivy, and Allyn bring complementary expertise and perspectives that will bolster NFF as we redouble our efforts to contribute to a more equitable society where money and knowledge come together to support vibrant communities,” said Henry A. J. Ramos, NFF’s board chair and senior fellow at the New School Institute on Race, Power, and Political Economy.
Over several years, NFF has increased its focus on supporting BIPOC-led and serving organizations, through a range of efforts such as COVID-response loan funds, advisory engagements with networks of community-based nonprofits, and internal work to build a responsive, diverse team. The new board members guiding and bolstering NFF on its path are:
Berit Ashla is Director of Philanthropy for Fremont Group, a San Francisco-based family office, designing the family’s integrated philanthropy practice. Prior to joining Fremont, Berit led Rockefeller Philanthropy Advisors’ West Coast advisory office managing client engagements with individual, family foundation, and corporate donors. She holds a wealth of experience in grantmaking, foundation governance, education, social justice, arts, and sustainability.
Past positions include roles at the Tides Foundation, the Threshold Foundation, Foundation Source, the David Brower Center arts and sustainability center, Marin Community Foundation, KQED Public Television, and the UN Environment Program in Paris, France. Berit also currently serves on the boards of the Institute for the Future, and the Center for Social Sector Leadership (CSSL) at Haas School of Business.
Ivy Draughan, CPA, is a finance professional with nearly 20 years of experience in public accounting, private equity, real estate investment and development, healthcare, and nonprofits. In her current role as Finance Director of Los Angeles’ Loyola Law School, Ivy manages strategic planning, budgeting, financial analysis, and reporting. She also proactively seeks out professional and personal opportunities to partner with organizations like NFF that are committed to promoting equity and achieving large-scale social change.
Ivy previously held positions at SRO Housing Corporation, a nonprofit that provides low-income and supportive housing for veterans, formerly unhoused people, and people with special needs in Los Angeles’ Skid Row; and Brilliant Corners, a nonprofit that partnered with the City of Los Angeles to facilitate supportive and interim housing, rental subsidy, job training and intensive case management programs, and COVID-19 response efforts.
Rev. Allyn Maxfield-Steele has been Co-Executive Director of the Highlander Research and Education Center since 2017. Raised in Texas, Germany, and North Carolina, he was born into a family of educators, farmers, secretaries, salesmen, veterans, hotel night-shift managers, social workers, and small-town Protestant church folk of the southern Piedmont and southern Atlantic coast. Between 2002 and 2004, he had the opportunity to live with and learn alongside organizers and leaders from the people’s movements of Northeast Thailand. That experience transformed Allyn’s understanding of the power and purpose of education.
Since then, his movement work has focused on connecting people and grassroots communities to one another through high school and college education, faith and spiritual leadership, and organizing on a range of frontlines throughout the US South and Appalachia. He is committed to figuring out how people and organizations transform together and, in particular, how rural people can work together to teach everyone else how to build powerful movements.
More information about our Board and staff is available at https://nff.org/people. If you would like to explore joining our team or partnering in our work, please be in touch at [email protected].
About Nonprofit Finance Fund
Nonprofit Finance Fund® (NFF®) is a nonprofit lender, consultant, and advocate. For more than 40 years, we’ve worked to strengthen nonprofit organizations and improve the way money flows to social good. We believe that alongside others we must build a more equitable and just social sector, and are committed to helping community-centered organizations led by and serving people of color access the money and resources they need to realize their communities’ aspirations. To learn more, visit https://nff.org/.