Staff Interview: The Community Opportunities Fund TeamJune 30, 2008 |
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 A powerful trio working with a dynamic interdepartmental team, Aleece Kelly, William Rowel and Reuben De Leon have together led the efforts in planning the launch of the Community Opportunities Fund. Bringing passion and depth of experience to this funding effort, they embarked on the process more than a year ago with a collective intention to contribute to the health, early learning, and safety of L.A. County's children through non-conventional means. By supporting the ability of community organizations to build capacity and advocate for the improvement of children's well-being, the COF team balances this indirect funding approach with direct service funding to create long term change. Each a visionary, these three core team members use their academic and professional experience to carefully craft and evaluate programs that will embody the mission of COF. Aleece holds a master's degree in public policy from USC and a BA in sociology from UCLA. She has worked in the nonprofit field for ten years in both programmatic and advocacy roles, including a director position at the nonprofit Recording for the Blind and Dyslexic. Aleece has worked in health and education research, contributing to reports produced by LAUSD's Program Evaluation and Research Branch, and has presented at the Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management and the American Public Health Association conferences. An L.A. native, Reuben earned a master's degree in urban planning from UCLA and a master's degree in public policy and management from Carnegie Mellon University. He completed his BA in social welfare at UC Berkeley and is a Woodrow Wilson National Foundation Fellowship Recipient. Prior to coming to First 5 LA, Reuben worked for Community Partners, a management service and consulting organization to non-profit and philanthropic organizations, the Center for Human Rights and Constitutional Law's Immigrant Homeless Youth Project, and the Getty Research Institute. With a BA from Howard University in public engineering, William comes from a long line of community-centric advocates. Influenced by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Langston Hughes and his father, he began his work in health education through an internship program with the Department of Health and Human Services in Washington DC. William has worked with the Children's Defense Fund, NAACP, the Washington D.C. Mayor's office, American Diabetes Association, Los Angeles County Department of Health Services, Tobacco Control Division, REACH 2010 and UCLA. Click below to hear interviews from each of these team members about their perspective on the Community Opportunities Fund.
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