Welcome new member of Board of Trustees of the Aspen Institute Kyiv
We are pleased to announce the expansion of the Board of Trustees of the Aspen Institute Kyiv and welcome Olena Boytsun as our new board member. Olena’s tenure as Trustee will be for the period of 2 years. Olena leads investment activities in Central and Eastern Europe at Luminate, a global philanthropic organisation focused on empowering people and institutions to work together to build just and fair societies. It was established in 2018 by Pierre Omidyar, the founder of eBay, and before 2018 Luminate has worked in Ukraine as Omidyar Network. To date, it has supported 236 organizations in 18 countries with $314 million in funding. In Ukraine the portfolio includes Prozorro and Dozorro procurement reforms, Ukrainian emerging leaders program of the CDDRL at Stanford University, Ai for Kyiv project at the Kyiv Smart City initiative, 1991 Civic tech center, and others.
Olena participated in the Aspen Institute Kyiv seminar “Responsible Leadership – 10” in 2014 and since then has been an active member of the Aspen Community, also serving as a member of the Coordination council of the Alumni association “Aspen-Ukraine” (2015-2016).
Olena brings over 15 years of investment and management experience to her role, having worked and studied in Europe, Asia and US, including as a national coordinator at the Goethe Institute and the UN Development Programme, and investor relations director at an agro-industrial holding. Olena is a Women International master in chess and has founded the national charity “Chess for children” that helps children to uncover their potential through the game of chess. For many years Olena was also involved in chess management processes, representing Ukraine at congresses of the International Chess Federation (FIDE) and serving at FIDE Development and Events Commissions. Olena was awarded the State Order of the Princess Olga of 3rd rank for her achievements promoting Ukraine internationally.
Olena is a member of the steering committee for Civitates, a philanthropic initiative for solidarity and democracy in Europe, and serves as a jury member at Seedstars’ startup competitions in post-communist countries.
Olena graduated summa cum laude with a Master in International Economics from Dnipropetrovsk National University in Ukraine. She was an OSI/Chevening Scholar at Oxford University, a recipient of ERP DAAD scholarship for economics at Passau University in Germany and is an alumna of Global Shapers community, an initiative of the World Economic Forum.
We sincerely congratulate Olena Boytsun on her new role in our community and welcome as a new member of Board of Trustees of Aspen Institute Kyiv.
